"The banality of Evil that is systematic misogyny"

I've been taking a Barre ballet class for the past two months during the Coronovirus epidemic. The class is conducted via Zoom and it is the one thing that keeps me sane during the week! It consists of my quirky ballet teacher - a 30-something millennial who was trained at the CalArts in Los Angeles and works at the House of Yes in NYC, a Brooklyn-based arts collective that hosts an array of artistic shows and endeavors during the week, including Circus Arts!

Every week, on Mondays and Wednesdays, I eagerly turn on my computer screen and am faced with an array of faces via Zoom--usually ranging from five to 12 women. I don't think the class is just limited to women, although we have yet had one male participant! There are participants from NYC, Chicago (including yours truly), Cleveland, OH, to Canada! It's comforting to know that I will not be judged during or at the end of class as I go through the series of moves (plie, tendu, releve, fondu, saute, demi-plies, developpe, attitude) as we all become one-bound through the portals of our computer screens for an hour, trying to learn the moves and usually sweating bullets at the end of our virtual classes.

What does this have to do with the title of this essay? Well, sometimes, I'm not completely motivated to dance or to even be in class, to be honest. I have to work up the gumption to dance or exercise or ply myself away from my bed on a cold, blistering winter day like today, where light snow blankets the streets of Chicago. But just before class today, I read a book review of Kim Jiyoung, born 1982 - a pro-feminist book written by Cho Nam Joo, a Korean author whose book helped spur the new feminist movement in Korea. As I read the review, it finally clicked that this simmering layer of discomfort I have been feeling acutely the last year or so had culminated to a boiling level of anger that I could feel in my palpitating heart.

The book (which is one of the books on my Must-Read list) is about a Millennial Korean woman who is pressured to give up her job in Seoul after her first kid is born to raise and be the care-taker. Of course, this is the expected gender norm all over the world, but especially in South Korea, which is very much a patriarchal society. As a result of this sacrifice, the protagonist experiences a sense of disillusionment and malaise and seeks help, which introduces the readers to the character and life of Jiyoung, whom I'm sure every woman can identify with. This book also invokes the real-life news of one South Korean woman, who had a heart attack in 2018 as a result of balancing overworking and taking care of her children (the woman collapsed and passed away in the stairwell of her work during one of her overtime hours; she felt pressured to work nights and weekends so she could spend more time with her children during the week). This incident prompted the South Korean government to consider a legislation to achieve a more sustainable work/life balance for women in South Korean society.

In response to the above-mentioned book, one book reviewer (Euny Hong in the New York TImes Book Review) said that Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, " highlights the banality of Evil that is systematic misogyny". So often, the experiences of ordinary women are overlooked because that is part of the gender norm and it is expected that women balance their work and family lives because that is what women are supposed to do. But this constitutes silent labor and women should be compensated accordingly by this standard of reasoning. Yet, women are expected to shoulder these burdens based on our gender. Who is there to capture the voices of these ordinary women?

Even in my own experience, I had a really bad encounter this past weekend when someone I had met through some mutual acquaintances here in Chicago crossed the line and acted in a way that made me really uncomfortable through his inappropriate behavior on a simple lunch excursion. I told him that his behavior made me uncomfortable, especially in light of the #MeToo Movement and he, being from a Latin American country, said "that is how men act in Latin America" in response and perhaps "I'm overreacting because I'm from South Korea." The fact that he and other men think they can act obnoxiously, then try to put the blame on me or on the women as being too "conservative" or "prudish" just highlights the fact that some men are clueless when it comes to how to even behave around or even treat women just based on our gender. This is the type of systematic misogyny, prejudice and discrimination that women are faced with every day.

I'm not here to bash all men or malign them by any means. It is important to have male allies especially when broaching and discussing the subject of women's rights issues and when combatting gender-based violence. But when I feel and sense , based on the countless number of testimonies I've heard from other women, or even from my own experiences, that women are treated a certain way or don't have the freedom to act, behave, work, govern, rule, make decisions, manage or even dress and the way we do or don't do these things elicit certain responses from the society around us, then I have to ask the question -- really? And I am left seething or wanting to be part of the collective rage that is elicited by books such as Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 and a countless number of other narratives by women.

So admittedly, all these thoughts were running through my head as I turned on my Zoom screen this morning and tried to concentrate on the series of plies and tendus and demi-plies and releves that my ballet teacher was reiterating today. Ballet and feminism--go figure (think about the irony of this 2oo-year old form of art which expects the dancers' bodies to bend and twirl and contort in certain ways and the women's rights movement!). In a virtual class of sweaty women, using our kitchen chairs or kitchen counters or barres or furniture fixtures as our structures holding us steady and proud, I can also remain and stand proudly while ruminating about all the inconsistencies and contradictions and misogyny that is inherent in Life because I am a woman.

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