Kicking Out Internalised Misogyny from our Childhoods

Written by: Selin Kurt and Elvan Eren

 The majority of us girls probably had a phase where we despised the colour pink. We thought it was too ‘girly’ or ‘childish’. This is one of the many examples of how internalised misogyny is, in a subliminal way, being planted & embedded in our lives ever since we were in cradles.

We were raised to hate the colour as an effort to stir away from ‘girly’ things. This was where it began. 

Some of my friends are still under this spell even at the ripe age of 17 where they desperately try to look masculine and mature to avoid being too girly or feminine like the “other girls”. I can’t blame them, since I also went through that phase until the very moment I, thankfully, learned how to love myself while embracing being a woman and my femininity. Society tells us to act like a girl, but just in the right amount. We were told to love other girls but not as much as you love and befriend men because your one true goal in life is to please and obey men. But if you have a lot of male friends, that is completely unacceptable because then you are given the label “belongs to the streets” by society. 

The aim is to slowly and unconsciously teach us women to hate our own gender just to get men to like us. You have to be different from the other girls because “all girls are the same and basic”. As tempting as it sounds, as a feminist, to call out or even put down women who follow those rules, we shouldn’t blame them but educate them instead. Because in the end, their behaviour is the result of the pure effort to try and survive in a world where patriarchy is in control of everything. Dominating. But this mindset does nothing to the patriarchy but feeds it. Us girls, they’s and gays should support each other no matter what, because we are already put down by cis men enough. The only way we can get through this is by sticking together, without having prejudice for each other, and forgiving each other for our past experiences with the same struggle. 

A sadly common scenario is when, in a cheating situation it is often the other woman who gets blamed, as she is the one who got in between the relationship. Yet it is the man who decided to cheat, a fact often forgotten. Most of the time the other woman doesn’t even acknowledge that the man is in a relationship simply because the man “forgot” to mention it, if she did though, the argument would become entirely different. A lot of my friends got cheated on and in the moment of weakness, they all went on about how bad of a person the other woman that got in between them is, which I also experienced. In my experience, after a moment of self-reflection, I decided to inform the girl (the other woman) about the situation we were put in. The girl was not aware of the situation. After all, we were both played with, and I falsely blamed the girl instead because it was easier for me than to blame the guy I liked, well at the time. We became really close friends later on because we both set our prejudices aside. That’s how I learned, no matter how complicated the situation is or gets, one should always be forgiving and take a moment to analyse the situation from different aspects to help them drop the assumptions and have a clear view. This friendship healed my inner child who “hated” women because that was what I was told and raised to do. Now, I sincerely enjoy being like other girls, I think girls are amazing. I love expressing my femininity with my clothes and makeup. I now learned to love girls who try to be “different”, and that they still deserve that love, even if they hate on women while doing so, because it was something they learned throughout their childhood, just like each of us. I now aspire to educate whomever I can to find the process I ended up finding. With smashing patriarchy on our minds, we should spread the word that we can all if we want to, love our own gender and help others find their own identity without being affected by societal norms. We should learn how to not be deceived and help others who are deceived.

This essay is not meant to put down or harm men in any way but to bring up women and the relationships among women which I believe is the key to healing our internalised misogyny. With that being said, as a feminist, to clear up the common confusion I would like to share the Britannica Dictionary definition of feminism.

Feminism: Feminism is the belief in social, economic, and political equality of the sexes. Feminism is represented by various institutions committed to activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests.

I am, thank god, a girl’s girl.

By Selin Kurt and Elvan Eren