Poem: Pocket-Sized Feminism

About

Blythe Baird is a spoken poet from America. Pocket-Sized Feminism is a poem she performed in 2016. Here is the full poem https://medium.com/poem-of-the-day/blythe-baird-pocket-sized-feminism-a000288125a7 and here is a video of her performance https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vT74LH0W8ig.

Reflection

Pocket-Sized Feminism is a poem about rape culture—a concept that rape and sexual assault are prevalent, normalized, and excused by society. The title says ‘pocket-sized’ because in the poem, the speaker mentions about feeling ashamed of keeping her feminism hidden "in her pocket" until it’s convenient to show it in the right places, like poetry slams or women’s studies classes.

Pocket-Sized Feminism is a personal poem—because Blythe Baird wrote about her personal experiences—but the theme of the poem is universal. Rape culture is pervasive and so ingrained in our society. Baird went over the typical experiences of a woman one by one in her stanzas: being too afraid to speak up, forgiving a predator out of fear that it would disrupt the group dynamic, being sexually harassed in public places, feeling guilty for not reporting her own sexual assault, being accused of hating men, and being told that sexism is dead but still gets reminded to bring pepper spray to protect herself. Baird talked about the bitter reality where we have to invent all kinds of stuff to prevent rape—nail polish that changes color in a drugged drink, apps to walk women home virtually, lipstick-shaped mace, special anti-rape underwear—because apparently it is not enough just to tell men to stop raping. Baird also talked about society’s double standard in treating boys and girls—people tell boys to go out and play, but tell girls to be careful and safe.

Something that I think is very significant in this poem is how Baird mentioned she felt shame and guilt for not reporting her own sexual assault, for forgiving a predator, and for not bringing up feminism unless it’s in poetry slams or women’s studies classes. Because even though the shame and guilt are valid, they’re not completely her fault. It is indeed easier to keep silent, because the alternative is not great. When a woman speaks up about rape culture, it’s not received very well. At best, people roll eyes at her or try to change the subject awkwardly because it’s an uncomfortable subject. At worst, the woman faces intimidation from every direction, gets blamed, gets accused of lying, gets mocked and insulted and shamed, or even gets death threats. The reactions are not pleasant at all. Instead, it’s discouraging, disheartening, and heartbreaking.

There is a hard-hitting line in the second stanza, “There are days I want people to like me more than I want to change the world.” That line is bold and honest, and I think every woman can relate to it at some point. It’s hard to speak up. It’s hard to remain brave in the face of thousands of barriers that prevent women from telling the truth. Of course we should still speak up, but it’s hard to blame women for not doing it when they always get punished by society, even though they’re the victims.

According to the USA’s National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) in their 2015 data brief, “approximately 1 in 5 (21.3% or an estimated 25.5 million) women in the U.S. reported completed or attempted rape at some point in their lifetime”. According to National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey in 2010, “90% of perpetrators of sexual violence against women are men. When men are victims of sexual assault (an estimated 1 in 71 men, and 1 in 6 boys), 93% reported their abuser was a man. It’s true that women also assault men, but even when victims of all genders are combined, men perpetrate 78% of reported assaults”.

These statistics are grim enough. Moreover, so many more sexual assault cases go unreported. According to NCVS, “despite the increase in self-reports of rape and sexual assault, there was a decrease in reporting to police from 2017 to 2018. Forty-percent (40%) of rapes and sexual assaults were reported to police in 2017, but only about 25% were reported to police in 2018”. These cases are underreported because of the gross victim blaming habit in our society. Women also fear that the perpetrator will try to get revenge and attack them again, or they fear of being shamed and not believed by their loved ones. Oftentimes, sexual assault and rape cases are not taken seriously by law enforcement, and there’s a serious lack of prosecution for the perpetrator (as quoted from worldpopulationreview.com, “only 9% of rapists in the US get prosecuted, and only 3% of rapists will spend a day in prison. 97% of rapists in the United States will walk free”). 

This doesn’t only happen in the USA, but also around the world. Rape and sexual assault are so prevalent in this world, protected and nurtured by the patriarchal culture in our society, and Blythe Baird paints that picture so well in every line of this poem of hers.