"[...] when my friend Meredith said that she’d had to describe me to someone else and that what she’d said was, “Sady’s the kind of person who has…nemeses.” Which I did. Lots of them by that point. Turns out I wasn’t getting a reputation as a strong woman. I was getting a reputation as an asshole. And so it was time to rid myself of drama."Maybe I should backtrack a little and mention that my "feminist education" runs almost counter to Sady's. I've always been somewhat stoic and unmoving, or resorting to gallows humor when things are getting a little out of my control. It's something I've learned to reign in because a) I'm actually not that funny, and b) my funny can be a little hurtful. That's not the easier thing to accept because, like Sady, I feel like I've amputated part of my personality. Either way, I never had the impression that being a strong woman meant getting up in someone's face and screaming until your point is heard.
I'm not going to deny that there's probably a little (okay a lot) of internalized misogyny on my part: it's just so unattractive. But something else that's been bothering me as I float in and out of feminist circles, is that that kind of explosive, very visceral, very visible, anger isn't always an option for everyone. For those without class or race privilege, we're already seen as unsophisticated and unreasonable. I've learned to appear cool and collected so I might have a chance I won't be dismissed.
A big part of why I'm bringing this up now is that I'm seeing a lot of "oh, you're not angry enough" within the feminist blogosphere. Even if you exclude the obvious missed signals that come from internet discussion, it's unfair to parse whether someone is "properly" angry.
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