Younger (40-) feminists, have you ever heard anything like this from older (40+) feminists?

Question

Not long ago, I asked for opinions on the statement that (I'm paraphrasing) "a woman does not become a feminist unless she has experienced sexism." I said that I never had. One woman in her early 50's said:

"Either you are still young and cute in your 20's. and [men] cater to you ---(Get fifty, fat, and female and you will find real discrimination."

I'm under 20 and cute, but I've experienced "catering" from men only as much as I've experienced sexism. Is this a common belief among older feminists? Are there other signs of a generation gap?

Answer 1

I became a feminist before I hit 20. Although I never applied this label until I came here (lol)

Sexism?..lol

Well ask a 10 year old that is sexually harassed in the streets every time she goes to school...tell a teenager that has a light in her eyes to study just to find a teacher telling her: "what for? you will just get married?".

Yes, I think when you experience enough sexism you become a feminist, in the other hand many others become feminist because they see what is happening to others. Like for example, (fortunately) I never experienced war, but the suffering of those people made me apply for certain causes.

We are what we experience but also what we are aware of!

Answer 2

I can't give you a best answer because I don't live through the personal experience but one thing I can tell you is that the older you get the more likely you are to experience sexism professionally.  The best example I can give you is the lack of opportunity for semi-retired professional females in comparison to semi-retired males.  I have personally seen for myself that older professional ladies in the same field as older men are usually only offered menial jobs in clerical work whereas their male counter-parts often get jobs as managing consultants, managers etc.  This type of ageist discrimination is very real.  I'm not exaggerating.  

Answer 3

When older women look for social acceptance, with average, even if professional careers, and fine none except from their families, they believe it is sexism, instead of, that it is just the way of the world

Answer 4

exactly, when feminists are young they want an easy ride because men cater to them, when they hit their 50s they rely on laws to get their cake on a siver platter...

Answer 5

What you have encountered is a form of liberal elitism that rises within an oppressed minority, where status might or might not be earned by who suffered more. This is driven by the presumption that you cannot be in touch unless you've endured the same type and degree of discrimination.

Your elder friend's point is not illegitimate; the author Janet Hardy once, in exploration of the Maiden, Mother, Crone paradigm looked up "crone" to find the word related to "carrion". So this idea that a haggard woman being beyond use is nothing new. King James' fear of witches (at the time wise women and midwives) being implanted into the bible did not help the cause. Our patriarchal society favors beauty over grace, matching senior straight-man heroes with undulating twenty-somethings in skin-tight catsuits.

But this is not unique to aging women. We have entire industries devoted to making us younger, prettier, with a full head of hair, and none anywhere else. We botox our wrinkles, cream our blemishes, work off (or diet off) our extra inches and so on, not because we are truly ugly, but because we are fed images constantly of what the ideal looks like, and we don't compare. Modern marketing at work, by which our eight-year-old girls are driven to diet and stay slim.

Of course, as old men die off, leaving their fortunes to their surviving wives, and the balance of power shifts. This all may change.

Answer 6

I haven't heard this, but I can imagine it. Ageism is rife in our society. Especially if you're female.  

Answer 7

I think the same can be said for unattractive members of either s*x. Unfortunately we live in a superficial and vapid culture that prizes the appearance of things over the reality of things at all times. Better looking people of either s*x receive more concessions and leeways in their life. They are seen as inherently more trustworthy and more capable. It can be conversely viewed in the light of an unattractive man and the discrimination he receives on account of that ie. women that call him a stalker because he finds them attractive or a loser if he asks her out and there are such callow girls about as much as you may deny. It is not a matter of s*x discrimination but something much more normative; how much we all of either gender value beauty and attractiveness and how much this dictates our character. There are people who will treat attractive people with obeisance and respect and ugly people with disdain...really and it has nothing to do with feminism or gender relations but on evolutionary inveterate mechanisms in our brain

Answer 8

I don't know if it's a common belief among feminists over fifty, but the men on here seem to imply that unattractive women deserve less consideration.

Answer 9

That's more like ageism than sexism, but surely women suffer most from getting old because women are expected to be good-looking. Men get judged on what they can do, women on how they look. Seems unfair to me.

And yes, nice-looking young girls do get catered to. Men want to f*ck them and tell them everything they want to hear: you're really smart, you are a genius etc, it's that simple. When this changes the compliments disappear. That would p**s me off too.

Answer 10

Here's that question:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

I'm over 50 and, from my perspective, I don't see ANY "gender gap" between our generations.  When we are young, older women are an abstraction to us.  We have never been them, so, we see them as creatures not exactly connected to us.  I did that when I was young.  But, now that I'm older, I see younger women as VERY connected to me because youth is not an abstraction to me.  It was a part of my Life journey, a part of me.  I see no ages any more, just a continuous learning curve that we are all on, and, wherever we are at on that Life journey, that learning curve, is part of ALL of us.  I know it is fair to say that the older we become, the more aware we are of that and the less likely we are to abstract or divide us along ages.  Also, as we age, all of us enter new eras in which society DOES still respond to us differently.  Because women are becoming more self-determining, old and young, we are becoming less dependent on the social messages that attempt to reduce us or value us exclusively as nubile s*x objects. Ageism and the sexual objectification of women isn't an "older " woman's issue alone because ALL women have aging in their Life journeys to experience.

My generation experienced something that, sure, younger women today do experience, but not in the context of the times we had back then.  Sexism was everywhere. EVERYWHERE.  But, what we experienced more than younger women do was that first huge wave of free women en masse "coming out of the closet" feeling, that original awakening that we DON'T have to put up with it anymore.  Honestly, most of us just wandered around in an utter daze at just THAT, that startling concept that we DON'T HAVE TO PUT UP WITH IT ANYMORE.  Our focus was on GETTING OUT OF THE TRAP.  Today, women are out of the trap or they are climbing out of the trap depending on their efforts and choices, and their focus is on bull-dozing paths for women to travel along now that they are out of the trap.

It was an awareness thing back then in my youth, a dense wall of a social consciousness that had to come down like the walls of Jerico.  We humans just see what we expect to see. The lack of awareness back then was the issue.  Today, the issues are the issue.  Back then, it was all about bringing down those deaf and blind walls of Jerico.  The only "gender gap" I perceive from my own perspective is the memory older women have of the way it was before those walls came crashing down, a memory that gives us a measure of greater awareness than younger women have who did not experience those times.  The crashing of those walls was a singular event, one that isn't happening today in as dramatic and psyche-affecting way.  That huge shake-up in social awareness made us see the wizard of oz behind the curtain.  Take a look at this quick video.  It's the "Awareness Test" fifth down far left.  Women in my generation actually pass these kinds of awareness tests more so than younger people do and I think it's just because of that singularity that occurred in the social consciousness back in the 60's.

http://www.funnyyoutubevideo.com/funnies...

Answer 11

I think a few women feel that way but the truth is a lot don't. I can recall being talked down to or getting the feeling from some men that I wasn't intelligent or competent. It was mainly older men who did this. I'm sure some young women enjoy this behavior because they are getting more attention and it makes them feel special. It is a form of discrimination even if it isn't as blatant as being told you can't do certain jobs because of your gender.

Answer 12

I am right on the cusp of that age cut-off you cite. I have not personally experienced sexism, probably do to my rather strong personality, I'm the kind of woman men tend to take seriously.

However, the chances are high that any woman conscious of sexism over a certain age WILL have experienced sexism. They were adult women trying to function in a time when a woman couldn't buy a house on her own or get her own credit.