Short Response 9/21

In Oppression, Marilyn Frye discusses the double standard prevalent in our society. Similar to our class discussions, women are often faced with the choice of sexual freedom or restriction. We are either labeled promiscuous or prude. Especially in todays fast paced sex obsessed society, it is very difficult for women to feel sexually liberated. This is extremely prevalent on Colgate campus. When at a party, if a girl goes home with a guy and doesn't put out the guy feels as if he wasted his night. However, if she does put out she is usually labeled easy and can be passed on to his friends. It is extremely interesting to examine what type of girls men find it suitable to date. For the most part it is totally unacceptable to date a girl who has had sex with one of your "boys". I feel that being sexually oppressed is a serious problem. Even if girls have a lot of sex they can still be sexually oppressed due to the judgments and labels we must endure. Frye also discusses the difficulty women have showing their oppressed status. If we walk around looking sad than society thinks we have an attitude, but if we hide signs of oppression and walk around smiling than we must not be oppressed. As a society we must take a step back and look at the larger picture instead of small individual cases- which she references with the bird cage metaphor. 

Allan Johnson discusses patriarchy and its long standing existence. This is due to the fact that as a society we collectively embrace and accept this concept. Men for the most part embrace patriarchy because it empowers them and gives them many privileges- some of which they might not realize. Unfortunately, these privileges are mostly exclusive to the male species and thus gives them benefits over women. I think it will be an extremely long time before patriarchy is fully dissolved, despite the fact that numerous cultures actively practice matriarchy. Some qualities are simply biological- men are naturally stronger than women- this biological discrepancy cannot change. I feel like some biological differences help to perpetuate patriarchy and will be extremely hard to change.