Raising a Feminist

Every morning, before he goes to work, the mister and I put the Bean in her stroller and take our dog for a walk. Our usual route takes us past the local high school, and we always seem to be walking by during the morning break. At least I assume that's what's happening, there is always a large number of teenagers crowding the sidewalk and smoking.

This morning as we were walking by, we passed a group of girls walking the other direction. One of them was wearing a shirt sporting the playboy bunny logo. My mister turned to me, after they went by, and asked me if I would let the Bean out of the house at fourteen wearing a similar t-shirt. I told him I hoped we would have raised her so that she doesn't think the objectification of women is cool. Hopefully her wanting to wear that t-shirt, or another one of a similar theme, will never be an issue. Hopefully she'll be sporting a "this is what a feminist looks like" t-shirt instead.

As soon as I found out I was going to be having a baby , I started to think about how I would go about raising a feminist, no matter what the gender. When I found out my baby was a girl, I started to worry. I was incredibly happy to be having a girl, but this world is so hard on them. There is so many obstacles to raising a healthy, happy girl to be a happy, healthy adult. How do you go about it, when everywhere she'll go and everything she sees, will be telling her that there is something wrong with her?

So far I've come up with a few ideas.

Fist of all, love her. Love her. Love her. No matter what she does, how she dresses and what she says, I want my daughter to know that she is loved, and have the security and freedom that comes with that knowledge. I want her to know that her self worth and her value do not come from her appearance, or how desired she may or may not be. That she is more than a sum of her parts, and that happiness is based on her own definitions and not her dress size.

I want to teach her to think critically and to question the messages she's getting from the media, her teachers and even her parents. She should have the space to form her own opinions about the world and her place in it. And hopefully we can provide an atmosphere where she feels confident to express her thoughts and opinions, even if they differ from our own.

I plan on encouraging her in whatever she wants to pursue, no matter how fleeting the idea is. She wants to eat bugs, I'll find a recipe. She wants to study dinosaurs, will plan a trip to Drumheller. She wants to be a princess, I'll help her build a castle out of the sofa cushions and turn the dog into a dragon.

She will be a reader. Books were an important part of both mine and my husband's lives. To me books open the door to learning empathy, expand one's imagination, and are the cornerstone of the previously mentioned critical thinking. Also they're fun. And in my experience there is a lot of room for fun within feminism.