Simple Small Town Gal
“I’m just a simple, small town girl. So, I’m going to keep this simple.” This is was the start of my speech at Take Back The Night this year. Take Back The Night is designed to raise awareness about rape, violence, and abuse towards women. This event is held yearly and is hosted by the Brandon University Women’s Collective. The Women’s Collective is a group of dedicated young women who actively stand up for what is right. They say that they will take on any women’s issues. From what I can tell they stand against any and all injustice. I looked at their list and it scares me to think that there is really that much hate in the world.
The Women’s Collective works on campaigns that address issues of sexism, ageism, racism, ableism, homophobia, etc. So what are these things and why should anyone really care? To answer this I went on Wikipedia and then through my sociology notes.
Sexism is the belief that one gender is inferior to the other. Normally, sexism is thought of as a man discriminating against a woman but it is just as bad for a woman to discriminate against a man.
Ageism is the stereotyping and discrimination against a person because of their age. Racism is the belief that a race is better than others. It should also be pointed out that it is just as bad to assume that all persons of a race have the same traits. Such as the idea that all Asian people are good at math.
Ableism, this one bothers me the most. The idea that there are still people in this world that discriminate against people with disabilities. It makes me want to scream. A disability is just an undiscovered ability.
Last but not least, homophobia. Homophobia is defined and an irrational fear of or aversion to or discrimination against homosexual people. That is a long definition for a very complex issue. An issue, I think, I will have to write an article or two on.
Looking into what else the Women’s Collective does, I will bring up Take Back The Night once again as it was the start of me bcoming an activist. Or rather, I should say the issues is addresses were the reasons I became and activist. Rape, Violence, Abuse. Rape refers to sexual assault. Sexual assault is defined by law as any sexual act done to a person without their consent. Violence is an expression of physical or verbal force with the goal of causing pain. Abuse is the use or treatment of something or someone that is harmful and continual. Abuse comes in many forms such as: verbal, physical, sexual, emotional, and neglect.
Now that I’ve informed you what the Women’s Collective does, what are your thoughts? Some of you may be crying. To those I assure you that there is hope and you can help to make this world a better place for all. Some of you might be saying, ‘I’ve heard this before but why should I care? Everyone likes me.’ All I can say is that: if you have never suffered under some form of discrimination then I am glad for you, but if nothing is done about the hate then someone, someday just might discriminate against you. Who will stand up then?
