‘So, do you think Emma Watson’s speech is a “game changer”?’ my housemate asked me as we crossed paths this morning. Housemate was prompted by a report he’d just heard on the radio regarding Emma Watson’s much-circulated speech for the UN on gender inequality and the #HeForShe campaign.
‘No,’ I replied as I laced up my shoes, ‘I think it’s great, but it’s not a “game changer”. I’m not sure I even know what that is.’
You might be different. Perhaps you believe that the words of an eloquent, attractive celebrity can change centuries of ingrained inequality. And that’s okay – it’s a lovely idea. I am not so optimistic.
The minute the Emma Watson speech popped up on my Facebook news feed, I hit ‘share’. I’m a feminist, plus I enjoyed Emma Watson’s pixie cut back in 2010.
And sharing on Facebook is easy. Thanks to the news feed, you handily receive all your news updates from like-minded acquaintances and the sympathetic media outlets you follow. You never have to step out of your ideological comfort zone. You don’t even have to comment on what you share; my simple ‘yup’ status, which accompanied the Emma Watson article I shared, sufficed. Then those aforementioned ‘like-minded acquaintances’ will ‘like’ the post, and possibly share it themselves.
These sorts of advancements in the productivity of social media are, in many ways, brilliant. Now you can find a circle of people within your circle of people with whom to celebrate Beyonce’s 2014 VMAs performance, or to bemoan the continued existence of Robin Thicke.
But here’s my problem with calling a speech given by Emma Watson that’s gone viral a ‘game changer’ – who is it really changing the game for?
Celebrity attitudes towards hot-button cultural issues are significant. As much as it can be vexing to admit, these people are often role models or tastemakers for society. Because we thrust them into the spotlight, we indulge in their opinions – whether or not it’s constructive to do so. But their significance exists on a spectrum.
When Katy Perry and Lana Del Ray tell magazine interviewers that they don’t believe in feminism because they have no need for it, their rejection damages the movement just a little. Especially at the bottom end, where young women and men are making their minds up about whether or not gender equality is important to them. When Beyonce releases an album that is a love letter to feminism, or Taylor Swift reveals that her friendship with Lena Dunham made her aware of the importance of the movement, the issue inches back into the spotlight.
And consider how the White House press team uses American celebrity influence to hammer home PSAs about issues that divide their community, such as gun violence or sexual assault. Jon Hamm telling you that sexual violence is ‘on us’ is vastly more potent than being told by some faceless feminist blogger, because Jon Hamm is very famous and unfairly attractive.
These celebrities coming out for and against gender equality has a trickle-down effect. It may spread the debate into circles that would otherwise shut it out. It might prompt a think piece that gets shared on Facebook and Twitter. It could encourage housemate to ask over breakfast: ‘What do you think of Emma Watson’s UN speech?’ And hopefully all of this prods people to make up their own minds about the significance of gender equality (albeit lubricated somewhat by how much stock they put into the opinion of Taylor Swift or Emma Watson).
But maybe all it does is continue to box us into our own little ideological circles, fuelled by ‘likes’ and ‘retweets’ and the knowledge that our favourite pop singer thinks the same way we do, and is therefore just like us. Or perhaps it trivialises the issue, as we are forced to wonder: Who cares what Joseph Gordon-Levitt thinks about feminism anyway?
I prefer to think these ‘celebrity endorsements’ are positive, because at least they promote discussion. This is fantastic, but these are tiny elfin tiptoes in a movement that has been struggling forward – or shoved roughly backwards – for over a century.
And with the positive comes the negative: the backlash that Susan Faludi wrote about, which festers in MRA blogs and troll-filled comments sections, in the posts of Women Against Feminism, in your office lunchroom where Steve from marketing and Jane from accounting are talking about how feminism is over because equality has already happened.
And these messages – these opportunities to share, debate and think about an issue as significant as gender equality – are for the privileged few. Does word that Emma Watson told men to take up the cause of gender equality reach the parts of the community where that message is most needed? Do the women who aren’t on the privileged front line of feminism know that Watson is fighting for them too?
A woman of influence speaking out about gender equality is a wonderful thing, but Watson’s speech will not change the world.
What’s really important is what happens after, and what keeps happening after every public discussion about feminism and equality. It’s turning around in the lunchroom and telling Steve and Jane that you think they’re wrong, that feminism is still necessary. It’s what everybody else does that matters.
Fantasise or Perish 