What is considered Sexist?

Gender Roles

Gender roles imply that there are certain ways to behave if you are a woman or a man. If your actions, manners or habits differ from what is generally seen as “masculine” or “feminine” you are suddenly not “a proper woman/man” anymore. By limiting people’s means to express their gender you reject the idea of there being different ways to represent gender. Gender roles present in society heavily depend on cultural and social backgrounds and environments.

Examples

“Calm down. Stop being dramatic/stop overreacting!” → Context is important here

This statement implies that it’s okay for men to be upset, but not for women. Often, women who simply state their opinion they are seen as arrogant, bossy or presumptuous. Men on the opposite are received as confident or assertive.

“Women can’t be interested in football, men can’t be interested in ballet.”

Gender does not dictate what interests someone will have. Assuming a certain gender can’t have a specific interest because of their gender doesn’t make sense. Masculinity is not exclusive to men and femininity is not exclusive to women, though they are oftentimes assumed to be. There are many people who believe men shouldn’t wear dresses or makeup or women shouldn’t do sports such as basketball (sports considered to be more “masculine”) or wear suits. However, the concepts of both masculinity and femininity are social constructsー people’s interests are dependent on their gender, it may be dependent on their surroundings and circumstances.

“Women are too emotional for this job.”

“I need a strong boy to move these desks.”

In the above quotes, someone is assigning certain characteristics to a gender. There are plenty of women who are not emotional at all or who are not emotional in the workplace. There are plenty of men who are very emotional. Let people be who they are rather than assume what they are like just because of their gender! Stereotypes are sexist. Furthermore, assuming men can’t be or aren’t emotional contributes to toxic masculinity, which leads men to repress their emotions or “feminine” traits/interests.

Mansplaining

A man explaining something to a woman in a patronizing/condescending way, especially when it is relating to the female reproductive system, or when trying to explain a topic to a woman when the woman is an expert in that topic.

Examples

Cis man: “Actually...tampons and pads should be taxed as luxury items because no woman really needs them on her period. If you don’t want to have your period, you can just go to your doctor and find a way.”

Cis man: “You can just do competitive sports and lose your period and you won’t have to worry about buying tampons.”

Man (speaking to biologist woman for example): “Actually mitosis doesn’t work that way. There is a deep mechanism behind it...”

Why are these sexist?

A man is providing advice or knowledge on something when it is really not their place to do so. People with female reproductive systems ultimately know more about their own bodies than cis men. Furthermore, speaking over women, especially in a subject they are experts in, is essentially looking down on them and considering them to be inferior.

Objectification

Any “joke” that involves s*xual assault / r*pe.

Cat calling

Sexist “jokes” → “go make me a sandwich”

The Importance of Inclusionary Feminism

Feminism isn’t only for white, straight, cis, middle-upper class women. Feminists should fight for the equal rights for all women. As a feminist, try to make your feminism as intersectional as possible. Intersectionality is a framework that allows people to understand how different social identities are related to one another in discrimination. For instance: Will a cis woman and trans woman have the same experiences with sexism? Will they face the same discrimination? Probably not. That is why speaking up about issues that affect trans women, or lesbians/bisexual women/pansexual women, or women of color is equally important as speaking up about issues facing women in general.

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