Flawed Feminism

"So you are a feminist then?" A question, or rather a statement which has been said to me many times over, and then some.

The answer "No, I am not a feminist. I don't believe in feminism" often causes confusion in men and anger in women, especially as they have created an image of me in their mind of a woman who is living the ultimate life of feminine freedom.

And whilst I may have created a lifestyle of travelling solo around the world, having built a business of writing books, coaching and consulting for clients, whilst parenting my two sons long distance with the support of my ex-husband who takes care of them both (and my fur babies), this has nothing to do with feminism.

I am simply a woman who believes I have the right to live, speak and act freely with love, compassion and conviction, not just for myself, but also for others and as an example of humanity for my children to follow.

Why should my gender or sex have anything do with the conversation? And why would my gender or sex mean I am anything less than a man? Because the 'perceived' teachings of the Abrahamic faiths and monarchies of centuries gone by have said so?

I am not really that different to any man, a lot less hairy I'll admit, with a voice a few notes higher, but other than the fact that my 'balls' are on the inside of me and called ovaries, we all have the same birth rights to live by, speak and choose freely.

If I am not happy with my working conditions, I have the choice to change employment or create my own company. And yes, it is all well and good for me to say this as a 'white privileged' woman born in the late seventies in the UK who comes from a working class family.

The thing is though, it is what I do with those privileges that makes the difference to others who are not as fortunate as me.

Do I look down upon them, or do I hold out my hand and say 'What do you need and what do you want the world to know?"

Having had the success I have had over the years and speaking on a variety of subjects to do with women in the workplace, cultural diversity and community cohesion, entrepreneurship and human rights, I have harnessed the gift of being a woman in business to make social change, rather than just make money.

When we look back through history at the great, largely unknown names of female leadership, such as two of my favourites Alexandra David-Neel and Nawal el Saadawi, we see women who pushed the boundaries and forged ahead regardless of the outcome and social rulings of the time.

These women didn't think about how many likes or followers they had, or which filter to use, they just did what they wanted to do and knew they had to do, regardless of the circumstances that followed.

Being a woman didn't stop them like it does the majority of Western women today who make excuses as to why they can't do something.

Having a vagina or using your child as an excuse to not succeed in the things you want to succeed in is not acceptable, esecially when there are women around the world with a lot less resources, support and education who succeed regardless of the social constraints of their culture, society and religion.

The rights for women which have been fought for by the suffragettes are well known, as are the inspiring examples of women like CJ Walker , and which have been clearly laid out in holy texts such as the Qur'raan, have been ours since humanity began.

We simply gave away our rights and our power due to fear, manipultion and believing we were less than. We then allowed it to spread around the world creating deep seated wounds which have lasted for generations, and will last for generations more if we don't change our own stories.

Being a feminist isn't about flying flags, or starting angry protests in the streets, emascualting men or gyrating in zero to no clothing in music videos. It is about taking action, about collaborating on projects together, often silently within our community for women the world over.

It is about understanding that we have immense personal power, and how we choose to use it. A great case in point is the fact we have the ability to grow a human being inside of us and then force it out of our vaginas - the epicentre of pleasure for the majority of humankind.

Some may be offended by the 'v-word' - just as they are offended by the sight of a mother breast feeding her baby. The sight of nipples in a wet t-shirt competition is fine, but to feed a growing infant? It's time to call the morality police out in full force.

This last year with the release of the first four books in my critically acclaimed body of work called The Sacral Series - a collection of nine true life stories written as fiction to protect identities, my team and I have been met with resistance from the media channels.

Apparently talking about rape, female genital mutilation, prostitution and sex trafficking are not items which the news channels wish to discuss; even though the books show how each of the women who experienced these crimes against them healed themselves using alternative healing modalities, and then went on to use the modality for great success.

When we do not discuss these human rights violations, when we do not create solutions and share education and our experiences, the ability to create positive social change in the world is minimal.

When we turn a blind eye to the censorship by the media channels, mainstream or social, then we become part of the problem, and the 20 million women and girls (that we know of) who are walking around at the moment having had their clitorus butchered, are joined by more and more women who bare the scars of this traumatic cultural procedure.

The 30% of women in the world who have reported rape within their marriage are the brave ones, and when we consider how many more have not reported it, the figure becomes even more alarming.

1 in 3 women are raped in the US alone, so for all of you reading this in the US, just take a look around, count the women in your lives, and then do the maths. Whilst you are doing the maths understand that 1 in 6 men are rapists. That's how close to home the problem of rape is.

Horrifying statistics, and not the thing most people want to talk about, or even acknowledge is happening. Not talking about it doesn't make it go away, quite the opposite in fact.

These subjects are 'off putting at lunch time', 'too painful and uncomfortable to think about' especially when we can simply distract ourselves with the latest memes laughing at the political leaders around the world; forgetting that the pain and discomfort these women feel is far greater than many of us will ever know.

What I find most interesting about the general public is the indifference they have when compared to murderers. Put a sex offender in a prison (outside of Central and South Africa) and watch how the murders and other inmates take action against them.

A murderer may have taken away the final breath of their victim, but the rapist took the life of their victim away in more devastating ways.

In many cultures around the world, rape within marriage isn't even a thing, because the woman is the man's property and he can do with her as he wishes.

In other cultures, including the UK, women still believe their role is to raise the children, sticking to a model of parenting which is centuries old, and then blame others for them not having the success or life they always dreamed of.

Many mothers today criticise and emasculate their husbands for doing things 'wrong' when in fact the men are just parenting differently because they are men and have different values and attributes to bring to the parenting mix.

A pandemic of 'Mummy Martyrdom' is more widespread than the Certificate of Vaccination Identification programme which is in full force at the moment, because apparently outdoing other mothers with how stressed we are with parenting is a sign of being a great mother.

Women don't like to discuss money, and the majority of women in business make less than a UK school leavers minimum wage due to their lack of confidence in asking for the sale, not investing in or believing in themselves.

Very few will feel comfortable talking about self pleasure or join in with sexual innuendo, believing it to be improper and inappropriate, living in the partiarchal conditioning of shaming women into knowing their place and not embarassing others.

Our rights weren't taken away from us, we gave them away when we turned our backs on each other and allowed ourselves to be separated from the sisterhood.

We haven't taken the time to understand the right to freedom is more than drinking as much as the lads, competing against other women in the beauty stakes; or worse still sleeping with married men 'because we can sleep with who we like' leading to the ultimate in betrayal in the sisterhood of women.

The Dalai Lama's prophecy states that the world will be saved by the Western woman, but before that can happen and women's rights are understood and owned by women the world over, the Western woman has to stop make excuses, stop martyring herself, and start owning her ovaries, going after everything she has ever wanted.

And for those of us who use our children as an excuse, we must understand that our children are the very reason we should go after the fortunes, the success, the education and the positive implementation of human rights in every area of every life around the world.

Only when we understand human rights as a way of life for all, do we have the collective power to help the women in underdeveloped countries who have a hell of a lot more to worry about than who won last week's episode of Love Island and which selfie shot to post on social media.

#1millionreaders #humanrightsmonth #socialjusticematters #ownyourovaries #humanrightsforall #day2