Gloria Who?

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She’s staring at me like I’ve just insinuated that she embodies the Antichrist. “A feminist? No, I’m not a feminist. Oh my God.” Despite the fact that my classmate just spent ten minutes ranting about how a woman has the right to choose and thinks anybody who disagrees is archaic, she is equally appalled at the thought of labeling herself as a feminist. Am I frustrated? Yes. But as a teenage feminist, I’m used to it.

Teenage feminists are a mighty minority. You may find us in the malls, mingling amongst girls who carry bags plastered with a naked torso and the word “Abercrombie.” We’re even at football games, willingly crushed between excited pubescent bodies. Maybe we’re the girls in hoodies rolling our eyes as the cheerleaders jump around, but we are there. The fact is: We’re not always the hairy-legged girls with makeup-less faces scowling through the daily grind of the high school experience, clutching a battered copy of The Second Sex. Sometimes we are. But we’re not always that easy to spot.

Why? That image is a stereotype most feminists, let alone teenagers, don’t fit. We can be the girl at the game, the girl shaking her ass at homecoming or even “the girl next door.” So, why can’t you recognize us? Most teenage feminists don’t even know that they are teenage feminists. How could you?

How are we supposed to identify as feminists when most of us don’t even know what a feminist looks like? Role models are important. They help us figure out who we are as we sit in a cafeteria full of people who are defined by a single word. Prep. Jock. My favorite: Slut. Role models help us figure out what we want to be rather than what everybody else has labeled us.

But who are our role models? Most teenage girls don’t know who Gloria Steinem is, or they believe that Hillary Clinton is a whiny bitch, because that’s how the media portrays her. It’s sad but true. If these women are even on our radar at all, they’ve probably already been made unpopular by the media. And nobody wants to be unpopular at sixteen. We fear the hatred of others like our parents fear taxes.