Former UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher. (source: The U.S. National Archives)
By Elise Mária Ábelová
Ms. Ábelová won first place in the B category intheLEAF Academy Essay Competition. She chose the topic "Slovakia and gender equality: where do we stand?" She studies at the Gymnázium P. Coubertina grammar school in Piešťany, western Slovakia.
As Slovak citizens, we are proud to say that we were one of the first countries to grant women a right to vote. Women have been able to voice their political opinions in elections since the First Czechoslovak Republic. During the 20th century, women joined the workforce, encouraged by the socialist regime. In the Velvet revolution, women spoke on stage, went out to the streets to protest and fight for the nation’s future. Women’s rights seem to be held in high regard historically. However, after the revolution, the Institute for Public matters released a statement, claiming that a large wage gap between the genders was present in the Slovak labour market. Women were also more frequently unemployed, as their situation and gender stereotypes often forced them to become women in the home.
In the last thirty years, many women’s issues were inquired into by various institutions, like the UN or the Ministry of Foreign affairs. Women have steadily gained more respect. We can see women in politics, business or academia, being respected as competent leaders. Still, for women, the road to respect and success is paved with thorns of societal expectations, hours of emotional labour, fighting against stereotypes and even enduring ridicule from the general population. Only 50 percent of Slovak citizens think that we live in an equal society, a great deal of those who responded positively being men. One would think that with the slow death of institutional discrimination against women, social discrimination would be long gone. But, as we can see, it is alive, well and shaping our future generations.
A man can, and is pressured to, have it all. Be intelligent, successful, and attractive. It has been proven that a man who is both handsome and smart has an advantage both at work and in personal life. Attractive men are better compensated, smart men are considered more ‘human’.
A British study found that for every 16 IQ points a man has, his chances of entering a marriage rise by 35 percent. For women, the same does not apply. On the contrary, women who are beautiful often experience more bullying and discrimination in the workplace than they would if they were plain-looking. Intelligent women face issues in their personal lives, mainly while finding a partner. For every 16 IQ points a woman has, her chances of elopement drop by 40 percent. Intelligent women are also considered less ‘human’ than attractive ones.
It is a wide-held belief that women are either beautiful or smart. Ever since we were small children, we have been conditioned to sort our female classmates into social groups. Classmates, but even teachers, assume that the pretty girls are more interested in gossip and socialisation, while the smart girls, in thick glasses, braids, and braces, are buried in their books nose-deep. This belief accompanies us all the way to adulthood, popularised by social media, children’s and teens’ films, our own families, friends and partners. Society tends to view pretty girls as shallow, adult women who are connected to their feminine side as seductresses, dishonest, dangerous femme fatales not to be trusted . ‘Intelligent-looking’ girls, glasses and braces wearing, with a plain look are looked down upon for not caring enough about their visage and not ‘being attractive enough to be so smug’, like the Oxford academic Gail Trimble.
Women should be able to have it all, to seize the day, but they are not. As we opened doors to the gentlemen’s club that used to be academia, politics and business, we forced women to leave their femininity at the threshold. A woman with a full face of make-up is seen as too girly and not taken seriously, expected to adhere to male standards of what it means to look serious. I had the opportunity to experience this unbelievable phenomena myself – there is a radical difference in how my opponents in debate tournaments treat me when my hair and make-up is done and when it is not. A woman who is proud to be a woman or to be girly is not much of a threat in people’s eyes intellectually, because all things feminine are taken at no intellectual value.
Women who are both intelligent and feminine have an unexpectedly hard time in a country where large groups of people refuse to believe a woman contains multitudes. On one hand, they are assumed to be shallow because of their interests, on the other, they are disliked by their (often male-dominated) environments for being know-it-alls. This makes social life harder for these women. Many do not want to venture beyond the feminine outside, because how dare a woman have more than one virtue?
The well-known lesson Elle Woods taught the world never came to Slovakia, a country so strongly gripped by Catholicism and gender roles. Female scientists, politicians, business figures are all expected to give up any ‘womanly’ interests in order to become serious and gain respect. The most disturbing part is that this opinion is not only held by men, but by women as well. In recent years, psychologists named a new phenomenon in the workplace – women bullying women. This is a real problem caused by internalised misogyny and a need to fit into one distinct category and devalue the other, felt by many women.
In conclusion, the facts stated support the idea that in order to achieve true gender equality, we must change our condescending attitude towards women and their interests. I do think many people make this judgement subconsciously, even women about other women. In order to change the narrative, let us ask ourselves, what pleasures of being a woman are we refusing ourselves in order to be taken seriously? Women bring so much to society by being themselves, the most important thing being a safe space for girls with all kinds of interests to grow up in. Womanhood is not inherently incompetent or shallow. Or, in the words of Margaret Thatcher: “There is a nonsense about intelligent women not being beautiful.”
The English Essay Competition is organised by LEAF Academy, an international boarding high school in Bratislava. The competition is open to all Slovak students from primary and secondary schools who are passionate about writing in the English language.
