In America I felt...liberated. Okay, so that isn't necessarily true. I felt liberated up to the point in which I still lived with my mom (shot-out to my mom: I love you, Mom!), was incredibly broke, and without prospect. All the same, there was a certain optimism that guided my actions and kept me buoyant to despair. This certainty that things could feasibly go my way if I tried hard enough was indispensable in allowing my mind to remain free and in a very abstract fashion shielding me from the imprisonment of self-doubt and the bleakness of having my mom drive me to work everyday. This was the very narrow definition of how I personally defined liberation: economic independence, manifest destiny, partying, and other shit that service in Peace Corps has taught does not matter.
I knew upon joining the Peace Corps that I would relinquish some traits and habits that were dear to me in expressing my individuality. I knew that I couldn't really be me or at least that I couldn't be me as how I practiced being an autonomous being capable of agency and reflection. I knew that I would become someone different, ideally better, but definitely different and I was okay with this. I was okay with this sacrifice. I was okay with no longer being me. In my highly complex and elaborate analysis in what it means to be true to the self, I made the assessment that there were two aspects of personhood: the first being those things which are unshakable, existing as qua, intrinsic to nature, and standing forevermore; the second being shaped by experiences of an a posteriori nature, erratic as unqualified atoms, unstable and central to the dichotomy, capable of change. So when I say, I was okay with, "no longer being me" and you feel as I feel an ickiness at the impeding denial, I mean to say that I was okay with giving up attributes that I felt did not fundamentally define who I perceive myself to be. Those were the parts of myself that I would barter with, those were the parts that I "prepared...to make a commitment to serve abroad" and give-up if need be because all I ever wanted to be was a Peace Corps Volunteer.
The journey to self-discovery is tricky, replete with pitfalls, and involves a series of challenges that test the fortitude of the ego.
So, there in lies the complication, a ruthless odyssey towards self-discovery, a uselessly servile definition, and mode of thought that erroneously rested on the premise of the cultural norm afforded to me as member of the hegemony.
Still and unwittingly, I came to Morocco with high spirits. High spirits that plummeted none too quickly. High spirits that I now know are the hopes of fools. And high spirits that tease me with the fantasy of gender equality. I took a break from feminism. I was bored with it, but mostly I was bored. I felt post-feminism as though it was an emotion akin to apathy or passion or the joy I feel when flipping through fashion magazines planning outfits for The Future. My break has ended indefinitely. An infinity will expire before I relent on feminism again. The world is a hostile place for the majority of the people living in it. Women are in danger, but I am getting ahead of myself.
Fact: It is easier to be a woman in America than it is to be one in Morocco. This statement, however, targets a small percentage of women (at least on the outset) and is based upon an anecdotal comparison of life in the USA versus life abroad. Sexism is alive and well in America. Male privilege is still giving unearned leverage to a class of people who recognized that women are at the disadvantage, but who do not consider gender relations--the very denominating factor--to be a fault1. In spite of this lapse of integrity, there is a strong current of civil rights that historically and actively challenges the bigoted notion that only men are created equal and deserving of the pursuit of happiness. I find delight in this concerted effort towards equality. In the fact that being born is adequate enough to assert my claim on rights that proclaim universality and to be unalienable. Simply, knowing that the law was technically behind me if someone discriminated against me because of my gender was comforting (though in the court of law this anything but true) and allowed me to express my femininity in ways that went unchecked and unnoticed.
I had liberty because the world told me that it was mine to have. I cast no blame when I say I was led to believe that I could freely be a female in public. This exaltation on the virtue of being a woman in America is due in part to my naivety and ignorance (and tackiness). These being resultant of not thinking critically about the scope of misogyny, the girth of entrenched sexism, the intersection of race and sexual orientation (e.g. the battles of women who identify as LBGQTAI), the power of capitalism and exploitation, and the socially engineered structure of patriarchy. I was very blind. My lack of sight so joined with an analysis of self that was vacuously predicated on elements that did not genuinely seek to acknowledge the fullness of my humanity, but rather treat me as a second class citizen, an ornament if I'm lucky left me with unintelligent and truly repulsive concept of feminine value: something I considered to be an inherent and fixed birthmark of personhood. Stated without guile or fair, had I known that my idea of femininity was faulty, I wouldn't have fallen so far in Morocco.
Something that has always helped me catch a break is the ability to intellectualize any experience I deem negative. As it were, my (misguided) theories only accounted for a worldview of life in America. I did not think globally. Leaving America behind was the catalyst for the destruction of my perception of what it means to be feminine and by extension other social outliers and defining qualities.
Thanks be to God, that this totality in collapse happened incrementally. This was and is my mental current. My physical current is a narrative that frightens me.
Although horrendously delusion, the world used to seem big. Or at least I felt no apprehension at the thought of exploring all seven continents--five if you ask the average layman. These days however, I feel violation saddle alongside all the emotions that make me sentient. And I don't want to go outside.2
I can't recall the first time I felt the world encroach upon my personal space, or as I come to recognize the justification for this encroachment upon my female, personal space. Some early
The second instance and most glaring invasion of the female space is the male gaze. My understanding of the gaze is more than cursory, though far from crystallized. Further still, it stems from my background in Art History as opposed to women's studies or basically any field that serves to eradicate the effects of colonialism/imperialism/orientalism. Essentially, the ideology supporting the malicious application of the gaze precedes from the concept of Othering. [And now I have to define Othering!] "Othering" is the recognition that you are you and that someone else is not you; they are the Other. Within the realms of social inequality, Othering is a tool used for the dehumanization of another human being because and for the sole fact that they are different from you. The gaze--all gazes--is the means of viewing another person as an object (because in a very literal sense everything we see is an object) without any moral qualifier. Upon combining these two elements and working within the context of sexism and gender inequality we arrive at the male gaze4: the objectification, commodification, and compulsory sexualization of female bodies for the pleasure of the man5.
Everyday I am coerced into becoming the object of some asshole's affection. Everyday I am made to feel less than human, less than woman because of my existence. Everyday I am forced to not smile when walking for fear of increasing unwanted attention. Everyday I am reminded that sexism will find any way to rear its ugly and uncouth head. Everyday my stomachs sinks at the thought of going farther than the grocery store around the corner from my house. Everyday I wait for men to blink. Everyday my body tenses when someone is more assertive in their gaze. Everyday I think about how other women feel this sickness and stay in their homes all day. Everyday I am made more aware that the outside world is the domain of men. Everyday I confront the despicable truth that some men think that I'm responsible for their behavior. Everyday I wait for someone to stand up for me. Everyday I wait to stand up for myself. Everyday I question myself to whether or not 'I'm asking for it." Everyday I feel less and less capable. Everyday I realize that I am not strong. Everyday I want to go home. Everyday is one too many days.
The invasion of my female space is daily and specific. It is a continuous assault that shrinks my world to a thumb tack size that still is not small enough to avoid encroachment. Some days my personal bubble is all but gone. It has been popped and I am utterly exposed with only my damnable sweater pants on.
And now I will elucidate my belief that women are in danger and that the world is a hostile place. I have expounded on the conditions that I face being a woman in Morocco. To a greater extent, I have waxed long about the personal consequences of a diminishing female space. This is mainly because it is what I know and also because I am tired of not having a venue to express myself. Also, and more central it is on account of the shyness and newness that I feel when it comes to talking about sexism and gender inequality on a macro level. Nonetheless, I know with every fiber of my being that it is to the detriment of society to subjugate one class of people under another. Cruelty will see our demise as a species.
In the spectrum of aggression, cruelty ranks high. By contrast, the gaze and body-policing rank some place much lower. They are mild, slight of hand, a blink away from being over. But the gaze is far more varied and a negative experience probably all women have endured while acts of cruelty are less likely to be experienced by the vast majority (except no because 1 in 4 women are sexually assaulted within her lifetime). Still operating from a standpoint that all women experience the gaze we can readily attest that this is an issue of prevalence. That this is something that is widespread, a pandemic, a social pandemic. Pandemics are obviously not good. Does that make them dangerous? Yes. Is that why I think the gaze is dangerous? No.
The danger derives from extent. If a man (disclaimer: ugh, some guys aren't animals) feels like the utmost he can do is stare at a female-bodied person with a lustful and lewd countenance then that is what is he will do. If he feels like he can caress her leg in a crammed grand taxi, then he will do that. If he feels like the best he can do to attract her attention is to cat-call then that he will yell at her. To whatever extent he can impose his will upon her, is the degree to which he will6. The cap of what society permits as non-violent aggression is the limitation, the cap. Not the lowlier, the actual peak of sexual aggression. If the social mores condone spousal abuse to point where hitting your wife ten times is too many, then he will hit her nine times. It is dangerous to expose women to the height of violence that a man feels like he can get away with avoiding punishment. There is no safety insomuch as guaranteed safety that does not hinge upon a knight in shining armor. What about cultures were the pinnacle is rape? Rapists in America routinely get a verdict of not guilty. The environment becomes hostile when the people who have systemic power are the creators and benefactors of the rules of engagement.
How do I challenge this? What is the solution for overcoming such a physically and mentally exhausting experience of the world? How do I leave my house fully aware that the worst that a man can do, is what he is going to do? I am trying desperately to find ways to combat gender equality in my site and in my life. I am nervous about becoming bitter, nervous, angry, and scarred. Some days I feel like it is completely acceptable for me to stay inside and have my sitemate bring me groceries. Some days I feel complete rage.
And to be honest, this is not the worst of it. The worst of it is the lack of allyship I have experienced from male PCVs. Everybody knows that female PCVs in Morocco are more likely to ET because of sexual harassment/sexism/gender inequality. It is not enough that I can count on receiving sexual harassment from the average Moroccan male, but to be belittled and slut-shamed and embarrassment by my fellow PCVs is terrible in its ability to break my heart. It's in having the language ability to actually tell a guy to stop and knowing that how you feel about about him does not and probably will not ever influence how he chooses to interact with you. It's in being scared to go to the Thanksgiving dinner because you know and so does everybody else who knows anything that he will "try something to the extent in which he can get away with it." It's in showing up at my host family's house or questioning our mutual friends as to where I am. It's in knowing that I want to cease all exposure and still finding a way to make intimate contact with me with a New Year's kiss. It's in feeling like I'll have to get a restraining in America because my no does not mean no. It means try harder. It means that what I value is of no significance. And it is a reminder that even in a supposed "safe space" that I am not safe, that my sphere is ever shrinking and my ability to grow as a human being is being crushed.
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1. http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html
2. Sometimes I don't want to go outside because of laziness or the weather or because I don't feel like saying hi. It isn't always because of the fear of being objectified.
3. Being completely unfit, this article does not take into account asexuality. Further still, the analysis is presented from a heteronormative viewpoint.
4. Explaining Othering and the Male Gaze is tough work. If I like you, then feel free to call me for a more in-depth discussion.
5. Definition of male gaze: http://feministing.com/2013/05/31/a-hip-hop-fminist-questions-the-male-gaze/
6. I examined the concept of "extent" from the cultural analysis that Morocco is a "shame society." Meaning that any act that incurs punishment is seen as doubly wicked because of the embarrassment it will bring to the perperator and by extension his or her family. This fear of restitution (being called to account for one's acts) sets the boundary for then what is permissible.
7. The more I mull over the topic, the more I realize that the analysis is critically incomplete and in time, I intend to fine tune my thesis. I would also like to expand more on how having a crippled definition of selfhood has also restricted my feminine space. All in all, it is my hope to have a better understanding of gender dynamics as well as regain some of the sanity that I've lost because I literally have no idea who the fuck I am.
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