Apart from the challenges of moving to a new country, living abroad offers a delightful chance to be immersed in a new culture, to appreciate the richness of sharing experiences, and, hopefully, to celebrate the beauty of diversity. This gets even more interesting when we can build a sense of belonging that’s applicable in both our home country and our new country of residence.
In my case, moving to Canada from Brazil was a choice, and one filled with expectations. One of the expectations was a higher quality of life, which certainly involved safety—as a woman, that’s undeniably and deeply meaningful.
So far, one of the rewarding parts of living in Victoria has been the ability to take the bus back from work after a late-night shift and walk almost one kilometre from the bus stop, all by myself, while enjoying looking at the stars. Besides the sore feet from hours standing as a restaurant hostess, I didn’t feel so relaxed the first time I had to make that way home. The reason is probably because I didn’t really remember doing that in Brazil; if I would walk home, I would certainly have a sort of automatic cautiousness to whatever or whoever was—or was not—surrounding me. Also, it’s very important to say that I don’t think I could do it everywhere in Canada either.
Even so, I quickly became comfortable with those walks. To be 100-percent honest, there was one evening when I did fear a raccoon that appeared by the sidewalk and seemed to be interested in the box of pizzas I was carrying home. I’m still impressed by how humorously Canadian that sounds. It reminds me of a news story I watched online about a month before moving here. It reported on a woman in Nanaimo who had called the cops after hearing a noise of someone pushing the fence and trying to break in; it turned out to be a beaver, which the CTV host called “a very Canadian criminal.”
What both this news and my story tell me is how quickly we can get used to favourable scenarios—how fast we can adapt to what feels comfortable. That surely has a very positive and celebratory side. Nonetheless, I know that Canada is not perfect, and I know that it’s only by acknowledging privileges that we can expand our horizons to recognize that there is so much to be questioned and fought for in our societies.
One of the things to fight against is the culture of fear and abuse that makes so many women feel unsafe in public spaces.
I feel like it’s everyone’s responsibility to always be vigilant about this. I take it as my responsibility to not let myself or others turn a blind eye to what women are still unfairly faced with—here, in Brazil, or elsewhere.
March 8 is International Women’s Day, a milestone in the history of women’s rights that started in 1909 and resonates with a long battle for gender equality that we are still fighting. The date is often marked by demonstrations and protests around the world. However, some people still don’t acknowledge the day’s importance. Even worse, there are those who dare to doubt the reasoning behind it and its current purpose, which, ironically and simply enough, is a fair explanation of why women still have so much to fight against. It’s relevant and it’s relatable.
When the Nexus editors proposed that I write this first-person opinion piece, I was taken by a mix of feelings. Yes, I was the one who had suggested the idea of covering International Women’s Day in my feature and I was very sure of its priority. What I was not expecting was that I would be personally speaking about it. Of course, I felt honoured to have this opportunity, but not only because it would be an opportunity to express my feelings, thoughts, and experiences around the date and about being a woman myself. I also thought that this could be a good chance to interview myself in the same way that lately I have been interviewing other people—including many wonderfully inspiring women—for Nexus.
However, my conflicting feelings in regard to this article came from the realization that I would not be in a position to just dive into my inner thoughts and write them down in a personal journal. I would be reflecting on a major topic and people who do not know me would read it. Self-doubt kicked in fast. When I confided this to a couple of girlfriends, I explained how I felt I had so many privileges and therefore I was not sure if I should have the space to address such a topic, to voice my own perspective, to tell my story.
There I was, a feminist, an avid reader, an advocate of storytelling, doubting the value of my own story. What I received as feedback from my friends was that I should go ahead and that they appreciated the fact that I was already acknowledging my privileges even before the first draft; as they pointed out, that itself was a good start. But was it really? Not that I was doubting my friends’ wonderful and honest advice, but that question still popped up in my head.
I must say I have built a high level of critical thinking, which I usually address to external topics and which in large part I can attribute to four years pursuing a Political Science degree. So even though I’ve heard how critical thinking at an exasperating level can lead to analysis paralysis, I do not intend to put it here as a synonym for self-doubt, because it is not. The reason why I even make this comparison, which at first may sound silly, is because I believe there is an important distinction to be pointed out specifically in the context of being a woman, of facing gender stereotypes, and of a long history of gender inequality.
I acknowledge that self-doubt may be a personality trait tied to the complex human psyche, but I cannot deny how much connection I see in it with social structures of power that have historically constrained women, leading us to not believe in our potential to speak up, to pursue certain careers, to make choices in regard to our bodies. By those social structures I mean educational institutions, workplaces, the media, political institutions, and so forth. It’s inspiring to see that safe spaces in all these areas are being opened up; daring to speak up as a woman rejects that historical—yet in large part still current—lack of representation of women in a wide range of roles in society.
This is when critical thinking becomes paramount in looking at sociopolitical systems, norms, and standards that guide societies and our behaviour. I don’t see how we can continue to move toward achieving women’s rights and gender equality if we don’t remain critical of the harm that can also be caused by retrograde ideas that those social structures have helped to foster.
Progressive changes in law, policies, and regulations are an indispensable step, but they are not always immediately followed by changes in attitude; it’s only when the changes are truly reflected in the way we think and conduct ourselves that we can prevent retrograde political agendas from rising and oppressing minorities. It’s of prime importance to recognize and talk about the disparities we overcame and those that we are still faced with. We have been silenced for too long and it’s necessary to always listen to what women have to say.
I’ve recently realized that for some time I’ve been reading only books written by women. I somehow felt really happy about that; it was, apparently, an unconscious decision, but one that got me thinking about representation and about the gender gaps in the arts. A quick online search led me to an article, for example, that presented the results of a report published in 2019 and showed how book review coverage of male published authors by the media in the UK largely outnumbered that of female authors.
So if you ask me, yes, I will move forward deliberately thinking about reading more women writers. This doesn’t mean I won’t read male writers. What it simply means is that I’m aware of the existing gender gap of published authors and the unfairness of it; reading books written by women is the least I can do to support diverse and representative literary work. For instance, I have a friend in Brazil who is currently working on launching a publishing company with two other women. Their goal is to publish Latin American female authors whose work has not yet been translated into Brazilian Portuguese. This goes far beyond the fact that Brazil stands alone with its language in the south part of the continent. It demonstrates how important it is to break a pattern of history—and stories—being dominantly told by male voices.
I have vivid memories from my childhood involving Disney movies. My favourite princesses had always been Esmeralda, Pocahontas, and Jasmine. They all have quite something in common, don’t they? Suffice it to say that I guess I could see myself in them; they reflected an audience of girls who did not look like the majority of Disney princesses. But also, I believe their courage and bravery were much more inspiring to me than the perfectly delicate ladies who, above all else, were very busy falling in love with their princes.
Don’t get me wrong—I watched those other movies too, and I don’t think it’s wrong to be delicate or to fall in love. What I truly appreciate is the fact that my favourite characters broke some patterns in how they looked as well as what they liked; they even had causes they fought for. There is just so much that can be represented in female characters, simply because there’s just so much in a woman’s life that does not exclusively revolve around finding a loving partner—and that’s something certainly extendable to certain romantic comedies.
A couple of years ago, when my husband and I were happily sharing wedding-planning duties, we found ourselves in a situation where a salesperson shared how surprised she was by how much opinion my husband was giving into the purchase of a decorative item for the dessert tables. That struck us both, and the words that immediately slipped out of my mouth were something along the lines of “He is getting married as much as I am!”
That moment is an example of how mistakenly limited expectations and perspectives are built when a majority of female characters are written as fragile, emotionally unstable beings who somehow need to be rescued by a magnificently brave male. This is a discouraging message, to say the least. For boys, it puts a burden on them to not deal with their own emotions. For girls, it takes confidence away and sabotages their potential.
Not long ago, I saw on social media a picture of a little girl wearing a T-shirt that said “Forget princess, I want to be a scientist.” That was one of the rare times I took the risk of looking at a comment section. Many were supportive and like-minded, but some were disappointed and even outraged. What I guess the latter had not come to understand was that the point in that message was not to put one (princess) versus another (scientist), but actually to illustrate access to different possibilities and freedom of choice; such achievement passes by examples, by messages that are culturally spread.
The good thing is that in the last few years there has been some innovation in the world of Disney, with the launch of characters such as Moana, Tiana, and Merida. Perhaps we’re, fortunately, witnessing the famous studio broaden the scope of female characters and what they represent in our societies across the globe. Hopefully we’ll increasingly share a message that girls can be courageous and see it being spread and understood as much as it already is for boys.
Something else I remember from when I was a little girl is how I completely disliked the colour pink. My parents were totally fine with my preferences on that, but my mom recalls how she had to make an effort to look for toys that were other colours. This shouldn’t even be up for discussion, right? I can’t help but ask myself what has changed since that time in the early ’90s as I walk into toy stores nowadays and still see that blue-versus-pink landscape paired with a split in the kind of toys. It isn’t a matter of selling the same toys in different colours; it is really about different toys strategically marketed to two different categories of childhood fun.
Unfortunately, in Brazil, we even had to witness a ministry officer announce about a year ago, at the occasion of her inauguration, “It’s a new era in Brazil: boys wear blue and girls wear pink.” The damage caused by that kind of foolish statement and by a big part of the toy industry can unfortunately go way beyond difficulties suiting colour preferences. It reaffirms the stereotype that girls should traditionally be perceived as caring beings with an intrinsic ability to master house chores and who as such should necessarily be entertained mostly by baby dolls and kitchen utensil sets. At the same time, boys are traditionally encouraged to focus on expanding adventurous spirits with superheroes and motorized car toys.
Sadly, this contributes to girls being deprived of exploring a wider range of abilities while playing; this unfairness can transcend childhood by further impacting career decision making. This is why programs that support girls delving into science and math, for example, are so important in order to build confidence to give these areas a try despite the fact that toys advertised as tailored to girls rarely offer a direct correlation with them.
I also advocate for arts education, as it can bring boys and girls together with the opportunity to develop numerous skills, such as creative and logical thinking.
Still, in terms of the disparity of values passed on to children, I guess we could even argue that many girls are presented with an almost unquestionable role of becoming prepared to be mothers one day. This gets really complex in many ways, but in great part because it doesn’t seem like boys are being pushed to become fathers in the same way. I think it’s clear how unfair it is for women when society largely delegates to them, from an early age, what should be a shared responsibility.
In Brazil, for instance, there is an alarmingly high rate of men who have abandoned their parental responsibilities. There are millions of children whose fathers have never even showed up to register them; there are millions of single mothers having to deal with the gender wage gap and raising kids on their own. These facts were brought to light internationally during the last edition of the FIFA World Cup, when it was reported and widely shared that six of the 11 Brazilian starting players had been raised in single-parent households led by women.
My home country is famous for its soccer culture, and I grew up deeply involved with it. I was only 10 years old, but I still remember my parents waking me up in the middle of the night to watch the FIFA World Cup that took place in South Korea and Japan in 2002 and was Brazil’s national male soccer team’s fifth championship. Even though the Brazilian women’s national soccer team only played its first match in the late ’80s, the team is internationally considered of high level; one of the most famous players, Marta Vieira da Silva, has the record of having won FIFA’s best player award six times. However, professional female soccer is still fighting for space in mainstream media coverage and TV programming, as well as with sponsors. Worse than that is the pay gap between female and male players; last year, the United Nations announced that Lionel Messi receives almost double the amount of what the 1,693 female players from the top seven international leagues make combined.
In a variety of careers, from sports to corporate roles, the wage gap continues to be a battle that women have to fight. Along with it, many ideas and behaviours based on a machismo culture are, unfortunately, still in place. So there’s an urgent need to keep having the discussions that clarify things like the fact that assertive women cannot keep being called bossy; that mansplaining must stop; that it is unacceptable to justify women’s rights solely because they are someone else’s wife, daughter, or mother; and, even more urgently, that the way a woman is dressed will never be an excuse to disregard consent nor to exempt the need to ask for consent.
We need to have the kind of discussion that helps us evolve as society by sharing a common understanding that women should have the same social, economic, and political opportunities as men do. It’s about women being able to make choices regardless of impositions based on the fact that we are women. Furthermore, we need to be attentive to point out various levels of inequality.
When I say that Canada is not perfect, especially when I say it in the context of women’s lives, I do so by acknowledging intersectionalities. A woman, per se, has many barriers to overcome, but there are many more when we take into consideration our ethnicity, race, gender, sexuality, nationality, and social class. It’s essential to recognize these intricacies, to learn from one another, and to open up safe spaces for all of us.
March 8 is a date that fills me with hope as I learn about the growing achievements that have taken place throughout the decades with the activism and protagonism of so many powerful women around the world. It genuinely feels celebratory. On the other hand, I feel an urge to reflect on what remains to be fought. It’s an urge to digest what I’m personally faced with, to acknowledge the privileges I have, to share my story, and to sit back and listen to what other women have to say.
I believe we must embrace this date to celebrate the fierce beings that are women but to also remain critical enough—and this should happen all year—to avoid using “being tough” as a justification for women enduring what they should never have had to endure.
March 8 is a date to recharge our energy into critically thinking about what cannot yet be celebrated and working on taking steps toward gender equality—steps toward change.