Rights vs Realities

Well 2020 has already been a year we will never forget, hasn’t it? Some people believe this is the year that the universe got fed up with waiting for us to understand some things and decided to shout them so loud at us that we can’t ignore them any more.

I for one have certainly understood some new and important things on the equality front in the last few weeks.

Firstly, from a few responses to some of my posts. In general, people don’t disagree when you post about gender equality and any response you get is usually quiet agreement and support. Occasionally, though, people see things very differently and I have noticed a common theme among those who do: they claim that there is no longer any inequality in the world between men and women. Now the first time I saw this, I was somewhat incredulous - based on my experience, reading and research I didn’t understand how anyone could claim equality between the sexes. But I resisted the temptation to dismiss these comments (and people) and got into discussion with them, and what I realized is that what they are claiming is that men and women have equal rights and therefore that we have equality. They are confusing rights with realities. They believe that if a law or regulation demands equality, then that is what we get.

How I wish this were the case, but the law says many things that are sadly ignored. The law says women and men should be paid equally for doing the same work. They are not. The law does not say a black person and white person should be treated differently by the police. I think we all understand by now that they are.

So I have been asking myself, is this part of the problem, that too many of us have blind faith in equal laws and rights and we don’t see that these rights don’t always turn into realities for others? The only good news this week is that I think more of us are starting to see: and how powerful it is when a fight for equality becomes everyone’s fight, not just the fight of those who are on the wrong end of it - when men also join the fight for gender equality and white people the fight against racism. Audre Lorde said ‘I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.’ I think she would be happy for us to now paraphrase it to ‘I am not free while any person is unfree’.

So keep shouting universe, I think the messages are finally starting to get through.