Hey, at Least Be Glad You Aren't as Wretched as THAT Person Over There

One thing I've heard most of my life is "Well, at least you aren't as bad off as that person" or "You haven't had it nearly as bad as my mother/sister/aunt/cousin, you should consider yourself lucky."

I don't. I never did. I thought that what I was going through sucked and that what they were going through sucked harder and that both of them were unnecessary. It didn't make me feel better to know that I was 'luckier' than some other poor wretch. No. It pissed me off--because now I'm pissed off for the crap I'm having to deal with and I'm also pissed off for those other people, so I'm twice as pissed. Thanks for that, now I feel worse! And I'm pissed off that this other person is being used as an example of How Bad Things Can Really Be. How embarrassing and demoralizing is that shit?

So I'm feeling the writer of this little rant 100%. Her experience is not my experience. I'll mark mine appropriately like she suggests. Hell, I'm not shy about this stuff.

So here's something every woman hears in her life, over and over and fucking over again, until it's drilled into our heads and falls from our mouth as automatically as our eyelids blink. "I'm grateful; it could be worse." My entire fucking life, I've had this statement flung at me, been subjected to mental and emotional and sometimes physical violence until I parrot it faithfully for people to hear. And I am done being grateful for things that a reasonable human being would take, not merely for granted, with all the patronising permission of that bloody word, but for deserved, for being a thinking, feeling being.

Are there women out there who have had it worse than me? Of fucking course. I am not going to argue that for a moment. There are millions - billions - of women out there who have experienced horrors that I can only extrapolate my reactions to, from what little financial, mental, physical and sexual harassment I have had happen to me.

This should not, and will no longer, make me grateful to the men around me, and the society I live in, that these things have not happened to me. These are not things that should happen to anyone, and asking me to be grateful for them is a slap in the face to all the women who are working and have worked to ensure that it does not. It is a slap in the face to the best humanity can be, for saying that the default of every rational being on this planet is to rape and pillage and murder and spiritually crush each other in a bloody frenzy, all their lives. It is a slap in the face to the very concepts of equality and freedom and justice, by making them inaccessible privileges instead of inalienable rights. Being grateful for the fact that I've been spared these things is implicitly accepting that I probably deserved them. Thanking society for its gracious mercy for not subjecting me to horrors most men never have to contemplate in their lives, for sparing my worthless self the abuse I so clearly deserve for being female. And I am done perpetuating the existence of this outrageous and disgusting concept, even by a second.


I am not grateful that I have never been raped. *
I am not grateful that I have never been abused by a partner.
I am not grateful that I have never been sexually abused. *
I am not grateful that I have never been assaulted by groups.
I am not grateful that I have never been forced to marry against my will.
I am not grateful that I have never been forced to carry a foetus to term, or abort a foetus I wanted to keep.
I am not grateful that I have never been forcibly impregnated or sterilised.
I am not grateful that I have never been subjected to corrective rape/assault for my sexuality.
I am not grateful that I have never been threatened with having children taken away from me if I did not comply with the community's religious requirements.
I am not grateful that I have never been made to defer to men simply for being men.
I am not grateful that I have never been stripped of my rights as a human being in favour of according those rights to a man.
I am not grateful that I have never been forced into any profession - or out of one.
I am not grateful that I have never been forbidden from seeking employment.
I am not grateful that I have never been denied education.
I am not grateful that I have never been denied food, shelter, water, clothing.
I am not grateful that I have never been barred from appropriate and timely medical care on legal or religious grounds.
I am not grateful that I have never been denied freedom of movement.
I am not grateful that I have never been religiously coerced to abandon any of my basic morals.
I am not grateful that I have never been denied access to the outside world.
I am not grateful that I have never been denied access to friends and family.
I am not grateful that I have never been denied appropriate and necessary sex education.

*These have happened to me so...add them to the list below instead.

None of these things that have not happened to me make any of the things that have happened to me one bit less wrong, less twisted, less damaging. They are far less severe, less dehumanising than the things I listed above, but - and this is an important but - the fact that that is supposed to make these things okay strikes me as remarkably like an abuser saying "What's the matter, baby? I could have broken your arm instead of twisting it, you know." So here, have the flip side. These things are not all right, will not ever be all right, and I refuse to ever think of them as appropriate again. Not all of these are still happening - most aren't, in fact - but the fact remains that they have happened.


It is not all right that I have been beaten, slapped, pinched, bitten and hit in the head with hardcover books.
It is not all right that I have been thrown in cold showers in winter for disobedience, or denied a change of clothing when wet.
It is not all right that I have been forced (at the age of eight) to witness my mother prepare for a suicide attempt because it would "teach me to talk back".
It is not all right that I have been denied sleep.
It is not all right that I have been denied access to the toilet for extended periods in order to "better my attention span".
It is not all right that I have been forced to go without appropriate and timely medical care, even when it was available.
It is not all right that I have been denied the use of painkillers even while suffering from migraines or intense pre-menstrual cramps.
It is not all right that I have been forced to hand over control over money I have earned to my family.
It is not all right that I have been forced to share sleeping space with others against my will, even when other accommodations were available.
It is not all right that I have been forced into prolonged physical contact with people I have openly asked not to have to see because of their sexual advances towards me, even when there were other options available.
It is not all right that I have been denied permission to close my door all the way, or go into the bathroom without informing others where I am.
It is not all right that I have had family walk into changing rooms with me to "see if my underwear fit" without my consent.
It is not all right that I have had my complete and private contact information revealed to a man who sexually harrassed and stalked me, on casual request.
It is not all right that I have been forced to ensure that my room and my person were at all times available to be checked for "appropriate behaviour", and forbidden from closing or locking my door.
It is not all right that I have had my possessions (books, clothes, jewelry, CDs, toys, musical instruments, bicycles, and on one memorable occasion, a pet I'd had for a few weeks already) given away to anyone who asked, against my will.
It is not all right that I have been consistently denied the opportunity to hold onto mementos or souvenirs or letters that are precious to me unless they are considered important by the family.
It is not all right that I have been forced to listen to lectures about how fat and ugly I was, while I ate.
It is not all right that I have been forced through my teenage to wear clothes I did not want and which were restrictive and weather-inappropriate in a way others' weren't.
It is not all right that I have been forced into the closet.
It is not all right that I was denied choice of religion, despite vocal and reasoned protest.
It is not all right that I have been forced to allow my diaries to be read, my private writings to be accessible to everyone.
It is not all right that I have been forced until very recently to allow all my correspondence to be read at will.

My list:

It is not okay that I have been beaten until black and blue from neck to ankles with a 2x4.
It is not okay that I know what real hunger feels like.
It is not okay that I have known neglect.
It is not okay that I have less hair on one side of my head than the other from having a hunk of it ripped out when I was 5 to remove a knot.
It is not okay that I could never have friends over in case one of The Fights happened...again.
It is not okay that I learned to ignore my own needs and feelings in order to keep the peace.
It's not okay that in order to survive, I learned to dismiss myself.
It is not okay that I have been used for maid service, among other services, for years and given zero respect, dignity or assistance.
It is not okay that I have been lied to, cheated on and stolen from for decades.
It is not okay that I have been made to feel like I should accept this as 'normal' and expected and my due for a decision made while still a teenager.
It is not okay that people with whom I should feel safe think it's okay to feel superior to me and show it in both word and deed.
It is not okay that I'm supposed to swallow that without complaint and remain pleasant in a way others are not.
It is not okay that my acceptance has always been predicated upon my good behavior when others' are not.
It is not okay that any random person feels it is perfectly appropriate to tell me how to arrange my face for his** pleasure, ie. "Smile!" (To which I say, "Dance and I might." or "Unzip and I probably will." Depends on my mood.)
It is not okay that I am held to a beauty standard that is impossible to meet, expensive to attempt and takes away time, energy and resources better spent on saving the world---or playing video games even.
It is not okay that I was expected to maintain a relationship by myself because that's the woman's job.
It is not okay that the failure of that relationship is automatically my fault and the assumption is that I must not have 'kept my man happy'.
It is not okay that being single means being a failure as a woman.
It is not okay that exploring my sexuality and/or "sowing some wild oats" is unacceptable for me but acceptable for others.
It is not okay that the way my children turn out is a reflection on me in a way it is not on their father.
It is not okay that the cleanliness of my home was a reflection on my worth as a person in a way it was not for the Man of the House.
It is not okay that there are so many more entries in this list that I could be here all day.

**and it is ALWAYS a man who does this. I have never had a woman do this to me.


So, well, that was a rant that's been building for years. Ahem. Anyway. Please, if you are a woman who cares about these issues - who will have been subjected to some of these, even - repost this in your journal. Add what you've experienced, take away what you haven't; and talk about this, because it needs talking about. --macavitykitsune

If the best we can do is merely be better than some hell hole on the planet, we are failing. If the only way we can feel okay about where we are is by feeling superior to some poor abused other person, then we aren't anywhere good ourselves. If the only way we can justify what is happening to us is by telling ourselves that something even worse could have happened, we are being fucked and there is no making that right.