Freckles! Emma Watson has great freckles, and this is a really lovely cover from Porter Magazine. I wish the rest of the shoot was as great as the cover, but it’s really not. Anyway, I don’t really think Emma is on the cover to promote a movie or TV project. I think she’s just supposed to be talking about feminism and her work as a UN ambassador for the HeForShe campaign. Emma became an ambassador for the program last year, and while I don’t have a problem with her activism on this front, I do side-eye the UN program a little bit. The whole thing seems like an effort to make “feminism” more palatable to men, to rebrand feminism so that we’re basically just arguing over the definition of feminism rather than truly trying to affect change for all women. Emma talks about feminism & more with Porter – some highlights:
Finally feeling comfortable in her own skin: “[I’ve] spent more than half of my life pretending to be someone else. While my contemporaries were dying their hair and figuring out who they were, I was figuring out who Hermione was and how best to portray her. Now at 25 for the first time in my life I feel like I have a sense of self that I’m comfortable with. I actually do have things that I want to say and I want to be my most authentic self.”
She’s not a different person in private? “I don’t want there to be a big separation between the public and the private person. It’s definitely the harder road to tread, but without a doubt, ultimately the most rewarding.”
Her style has changed as she’s gotten older: “When I was younger I remember being told ‘no pain no gain’, but recently my willingness to wear something that makes me freezing cold or that I can’t walk in has changed. I want to feel fabulous and comfortable and sexy and strong and beautiful. And if it’s making you uncomfortable, don’t do it. It’s so sad if you need to go home just because you need to sit down! Moving forward, I’m prioritizing just feeling awesome.”
Her now-famous United Nations speech: “I was encouraged not to use the word ‘feminism’ because people felt that it was alienating and separating and the whole idea of the speech was to include as many people as possible. But I thought long and hard and ultimately felt that it was just the right thing to do. If women are terrified to use the word, how on earth are men supposed to start using it?”
Fashion as a feminist issue: “I think using fashion as a means of expression is brilliant. One of the ways I became a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador was through my interest in fair-trade fashion. Because so many women design and make the clothes we wear, it’s primarily the working conditions of women that are affected by the decisions we make, so fashion is a feminist issue.”
I wonder who encouraged Emma to not use the word “feminism”? Is she talking about United Nations people? And wasn’t the whole point of the HeForShe program generally and Emma’s speech specifically to address the fact that more men should be feminists? Anyway… I don’t think women are terrified to use the word “feminist,” but I’m probably wrong. As I said last year, I thought Emma’s speech was full of the most obvious and uncontroversial observations on gender equality, but people acted like she reinvented the feminism-wheel. My point? She’s going to be talking about this stuff in interviews for a long time… so I hope she’s able to expand the conversation as she learns more.
Photos courtesy of Porter Magazine.
I didn’t think women were terrified to use the word feminist until I started reading this site. That sucks. I guess all the women I know in real life are just feminists.
I don’t think it’s only about fear. I’m feminist by definition but I don’t want to call myself one or have that title. I’m vegan as well but I’m not vocal about it, just think that actions and opinions say more.
sooo being vocal about something as progressive as feminism and your palate choice being vegan…. is NOT a good analogy….. food lifestyle to equally for all…hmmmmm
im sure white people said that about being an feeling awful about slavery…. but if you dont voice your opinion in the vein of a abolitionist…. then you are the quiet majority going with the status quo….
so the fact that feminism a unwanted buzz word should be upsetting to you and you should in turn be vocal about it…. (esp if you have the effort to reply online with what i presume was turning on your device/computer, reading this article, thinking of a response, and typing it on a public forum -blog)
FFS!! How can you give a speech on a topic if you can’t use the topic’s name? When will people understand that feminism has nothing to do with “alienating” people? I cannot believe some people still fear that word. I’m going to name my Frenchie “Feminista”. I swear to god. And when I walk her and shepoops, I will say to anyone who is at the dog park “oh look. Feminista just had another movement!!”.Eff people.
It truly saddens me to see the word ‘Feminism’ being demonised by the media. I am also astounded by the lack of understanding among women of what Feminism really is – many have lost the plot and think its just a label. What so difficult to understand that its equality for women.
Thats bc most of the world equates feminism with being a butch lesbian burning bras not wearing makeup and hating men.
And it’s men who push that image of feminism.
I have to say, I’m heartened about this issue with the younger generation. My older nephew (age 17) told me he’s a feminist; a group of friends (boys and girls) were discussing it in school. My younger nephew, (15), came in the room at this point, and after listening for a bit asked: “Why *wouldn’t* everyone be feminists? Who loses in this so they have to be against it?” This proud auntie just sat there beaming at her boys 🙂
This is awesome to hear!!
Thanks for my faith-restoring moment of the day. I am sure you are a great aunt to those boys!
As a college student, I have many many friends that I know are feminists. They believe in equality, equal pay, pro choice, paid maternity leave, etc. but they truly believe that feminism is a scary, radical word and means that you’re an unshaven man hating woman. I also know that as mainstream and simple as her speech was, it made more men and woman my age (18-22) feel more comfortable and cool identifying as a feminist and talking about gender equality.
Like Betti said, I don’t understand how many people can’t grasp the concept of feminism. Where did the mentality of “feminist = anti-men” even come from? Bad interpretation that no one bothered to correct?
Honestly, when celebrities were being asked questions on feminism and answered all these questionable things, I actually thought that I had misunderstood the term.. But the definition is easy enough to understand.
Strictly on grammatical precedent, it is an easy word to misinterpret though. Most “-isms” reflect an exclusive ideology. One does not think “capitalism” suggests equality between capitalists and socialists. When people strive for marriage equality they don’t call it “homosexualism”. So in an effort to be an entry-level Feminism 101 for the masses, I could see her being encouraged to use terms like “gender equality” to avoid misinterpretation by people who are naive on the accurate meaning of the word “feminism”. Calling this an effort to avoid alienating people might ironically be a poor choice of words. The other approach, of course, is to just define the word in the speech itself outright so there’s no misunderstanding.
I think the issue of women’s agency and position in society is improving in terms of where we were. That being said I wasn’t too impressed by this speech, or in fact many of the public relations company sponsored attempts at creating a feminism rallying cry that have occured recently.
It’s all so shallow and timid while rights are continuously stripped from women, lunatics shoot up Planned Parenthoods because of political games, and women are ultimately suffering and dying for their right to make mature decisions with their own body.
I really don’t care if ‘he’ is for ‘she’. I care that the LAW is for she, that JUSTICE is for she, that FREEDOM is for she. If some dribbling nanny-sucker can’t handle that then he can kick rocks with his bare toes.
I dont think women are afraid to use the word, but I think attitude in some overshadow the intention…and that’s more of a personality issue than a feminism one.
Women ARE terrified of using that word because many still do not understand the correct meaning behind it.
Respect to Emma for trying to do her part on changing that.
Political words get demonised like that when they go against the beleifs of whoever is in charge. Same happens with the word “socialism”, where it’s not simply seen as a different economic model but as chaos and destruction and poverty for everyone. You can see people incorporating socialist ideals in their work – but they’ll never use the word “socialism”.
Tbh… I don’t really care. If the fight is still in favor of equal rights between the genders, you can call it whatever you want. Never been one to give language that much thought.
The comparison to the word “socialism” is a good one. Politicians seem terrified of using that word, or being accused of using the word.
OMG though, she is so insufferable, I wish they had found someone with a little more merit than being popular. Or at least someone popular for their talent, and grace not some overly advertised, overly expensive film series that basically lacks everything that makes a film good. OR even someone who doesn’t wiggle her eyebrows and call it “acting”
Ugh Thank you! She gives these superficial interviews but even in her twitter responses about feminism you can see she is pretty ignorant beyond the obvious “politically correct” approach. She doesn’t understand intersectional feminism, she is not seen wearing the so called “ethical fair trade” clothing brands and in her interview in Bangladesh her comments were just so vapid! She just seems to fall into people’s good graces bc she is what, well behaved? Great PR team she must have.
I’m so tired of the treatment the good f-word is getting, but here we go. Two very different examples from my own experience, regarding how two very different men viewed the word feminism:
Several years ago, I explained feminism, as in: equal rights, to a male then-friend, whose reaction was: “But that’s humanism!”, and I went. “Yup, that’s the point, women are humans, too!”. He wouldn’t believe it, being unable to reframe the word feminism as meaning anything but “man-hating”. But who am I kidding, he liked to go on a feminist website and post misogynist bullshit, just to get a reaction. No, we’re not friends anymore. Also, just for the record, we’re not talking teens here, we are talking about late twenties back then.
When my boyfriend and I first started dating (both in our early thirties), one evening I cooked a nice meal for him and he went: “I have to admit, I thought you were a hardcore feminist!”. I looked at him and was like: “I AM a hardcore feminist!”
– “But, the meal…?”
I explained to him that believing in equal rights for all genders, which is the damn definition of feminism, does not mean I don’t get to spoil my man rotten, BY CHOICE. He converted there and then. In his case, we are talking about a loving, kind man who respects women, period. But again, in his mind, the word feminism itself had a different, twisted meaning. The real meaning had to be explained to him.
I’m so tired of this…
My boyfriend is a feminist. He seems so much more masculine to me than men that are afraid of women’s rights.
Exactly. Nothing makes me want to drop my panties faster than mutual respect.