With Emma Watson and her brilliant speech about gender equality in front of the UN launching the "He for She" campaign it got me, like anybody else, who has seen her, thinking more about gender equality and feminism. Generally, becoming more aware of it. I think I have never expierienced a disadvantage or was told I couldn't do anything because of my sex, at least not that I am aware of it ( but I forget quite a lot of things that happened so who knows...). Until a couple of month ago at the beginning of the previous term at University.
I am a med student, having done 9 of 12 university terms. As you approach the end of your studies it is normal that everybody, including your internship advisors, asks in which profession you are going to go ( i.e surgeon, g.p, anesthesiologist etc.). I personally am not sure yet but I am quite keen on becoming a surgeon (if so hopefully a proper Christina-Yang-badass one). However at the start of this term I had an internship at the university gynaecology clinic. That is most definitely not a speciality which i want to pursue a career in, but the internship had to be done. So when the FEMALE doctor asked me what speciality I wanted to do after my exam and I replied with "Surgery" the first thing she did was say "No". And she did it almost agressively. Well, maybe not "agressive" agressive in the sense that she was about to punch me in the face but she was really convinced..
She then went on: "Don't be stupid, that is not a good profession to have children and it is exhausting, leave it to the men. What are your alternatives?" Excuse you: Who the F**k ever said I wanted to have children??? I don't recall to have ever said I want to have children, let alone saying this to somebody I have known for just a day!
Frankly, I was shocked, bewildered and angry. I was brought up in the believe that I could become anything that I wanted to, as long as I worked hard enough for it and maybe was talended enough for that job. Never would I have imagined that an educated woman would tell me that being female should stop me from pursuing my dream career. I didn't know that you need a penis to become a surgeon... why didn't anybody else tell me before?!
Let's be honest she was/is stupid. Yeah I think that describes i quite well, I get what she was trying to say but putting it that way it just showed sheer idiocy. If I want to become a surgeon I'll become a surgeon because I CAN. Being female doesn't mean you have to have kids or that you can't do an exhausting job, neither does it mean that YOU have to stay at home if you've got kids. Your partner i as much responsible for the children as you are! (But if you want to stay at home that is completely fine, just don't feel pressured!) Being female (or generally not being male or 'male' enough) should not mean that you get automatically less paid, or that you can't get leading positions in you job. But unfortunately it often is that way.
I am lucky enough to live in a society in which girls and boys are considered as equally worthy, and things like this little encounter are a trifle compared to what girls have to face every day in other parts of the world. But it shows that even in the "developed" world equal doesn't really mean equal. Emma (and all other feminists of course) is right when she says it is time to change that!
Cheers
P.S. Sorry if it doesn't all makes sense it is currently 3 am as I am wreiting but I couldn't sleep until I got this off my chest..
P.P.S. feel free to comment :-)
