Fearsome Feminism

Yesterday a friend of mine stopped by my place.  She’s an avid feminist, be that for better or worse in your opinion.  Last night we found ourselves in an interesting predicament.  One of my roommates, a tall Catholic hailing from Cameroon, asked her what she is studying.  She told him, and also mentioned that she’ll be graduating this summer and then heading off to grad school.  I sat back to watch the conversation, not really expecting what was to come next.
“But if you go to grad school in the fall, won’t that be a lot of school without a break?” he asked.
Casually, she replied, “Sure, but I love studying.  I wish I could keep studying forever.”
“Yes,” he said, “but you know you have other things to think about.”
At this point I nearly choked on my drink.  Knowing her opinion on such things, I placed my chin on my fist, grinned as cheesily as possible, and asked her, “Yes, don’t you have other things to be thinking about?”
She easily heard the thick layers of sarcasm in my voice, cast me a hellish glare, and instead of giving me my sought reaction, proceeded to respond to my roommate.  Looking again toward him, she asked one simple question, “What do you mean?”
Rarely have I seen someone as confused by a woman as my roommate was last night, and never before had I seen my friend even remotely as angry as she was on this occasion.  Suffice it to say that their conversation ended a short time later in an uneasy stalemate.
The reason I bring this up is simple: obviously we are all biased.  I am definitely biased, my roommate is biased, and my friend is equally biased.  You, reader, are too.  Bias is a word today that has inherited an extremely negative connotation.  When we watch the news, listen to politicians, or hear about outrageous court decisions, we also often hear angry tirades accusing one source or another of being biased.  Biased has come to be an insult which leaves an utterly bitter aftertaste in the shadow of today’s polarized political and religious climates.  I suppose this insulting nature almost makes a certain amount of sense, seeing as how being biased has unfortunately become synonymous with being uninformed in one way or another.  Of course I’d like to think that I’m fairly well informed, but I suppose there’s plenty of room for debate on that point.  If my education so far has left me with anything that I really value, one of those things would be the realization that there is no such thing as an unbiased view, and another would be that one of the most important things we can do is recognize and come to terms with our own biases.
While my friend and my roommate were having their discussion, I struggled with what to do.  I thought about intervening on the side of my friend – with whom I strongly agreed – but then held my tongue in order to let her defend herself, for I knew that she would have little trouble doing so.
This is my blog, and I reserve the right to state my biased opinion without having to write down the biased opinion of anyone else.  I respect feminism, and I truly believe that no one should feel restricted in their possibilities due to their sex or gender.  If yesterday’s conversation did anything for me, it reminded me how strongly biases can affect our lives.  I fear that I associate so often with like-minded people that I may be losing touch with that fact.  Bias is alive and well, so do what you will about it.  Fight it, embrace it, or try to ignore it.  Either way, we all have to move on at the end of the day and get up again tomorrow.