New film by Sarah Gavron is deeply moving but gender inequality remains rife in a multitude of modern societies
I leave the film Suffragette drenched in tears with a whole host of other women (and men), old, young, clad in purple and green, in reverent homage to our ansister suffragettes. The whole cinema trickles out of the screening in a sombre, heavy and largely teary-eyed silence. So why tears not words?
I sob my way through the film as Carey Mulligan’s Maud is labelled an unfit mother and ripped from the arms of her son, as she and her colleagues endure sexual harassment and violence in the workplace, as they are ridiculed, belittled and physically harmed by men for their beliefs, as the central characters cling to each other in crisis, enveloped in the gorgeous bonds of sister solidarity through all struggle and self-doubt. I weep not because I feel I am watching an historical account of sexism but because I see my own society reflected back at me.
While all women in the UK over the age of 21 have had the vote since 1928, for which we are indebted to the ferocious bravery of the suffragette movement, the oppressions displayed in Suffragette are still very much ours to tackle and challenge in the 21st-century. The urgency to address these issues was displayed beautifully by the brave, bold, brilliant direct action activist group, Sisters Uncut, who stormed the red carpet of the Suffragette premiere in a flurry of green and purple smoke bombs, proclaiming “Dead Women Can’t Vote”.
For how can we continue ignore the fact that one in four women in England and Wales will be the victim of domestic violence in their lifetimes? That 50 per cent of deaf women suffer domestic abuse? That all of these problems are exacerbated by the intersection of sexism with racism, transphobia, ableism and classism in an increasingly prejudiced and unjust society? How can we refuse to take to the streets and cry at the top of our lungs, “we don’t want to be lawbreakers, we want to be lawmakers” when only 29 per cent of MPs that represent the UK today are women?
We simply cannot continue to live like this. If Suffragette is effective in anything, it is in inciting and inspiring women to find the rage and strength to contribute, and in making strides to defy the inequality imposed upon women and girls in each and every one of the world’s countries and societies. It should push the women of Britain into rebellion, to defy this government’s savage cuts that have disproportionately affected our support structures – both our lives and our lifelines.
I cannot sit and wait 70 years for the gender pay gap to close of its own accord. I cannot sit and wait for a time in which two women a week are no longer killed by a current or former partner. I cannot sit and wait for the staggering gender inequality in our society to simply autocorrect itself. None of us can – and I will dedicate every fibre of my being, every scrap of my existence to the eradication of the insidious, hideous culture of sexism that we still allow to dominate the world that we live in and the lives that we lead.
There are no innocent bystanders in the fight for an equal society and Suffragette confronts those who proclaim “I can’t” with the reality that “you can’t not” be part of the solution. The film forces you to decide which side you are on. We need to re-energise our fight, because “we’ve been ridiculed, battered and ignored” for too long. “All my life I’ve been respectful, done what men told me, but I can’t have that anymore”: the sooner we all realise this, the better. We have to be defiant, not compliant. For Emily, for Emmeline, for all of us.
In response to watching Suffragette I put together this poem:
“We break windows, we burn things, because war is the only language men listen to”
They tell us it is history, it isn’t.
That women fought for their rights and they were given.
But they have to learn to listen
That same defiant cry, we’re still singing,
With pride in resistance, voices defiantly ringing.
Because we still live imprisoned in patriarchal systems,
Though we’re conditioned into thinking they’ve simply stopped existing.
I still feel as indignant, as societally sickened as my sister suffragettes.
“The time is now” to give as good as we get
To demand the respect, we’re historically bereft of,
To recover the freedoms we’ve lost, with courage against all the odds.
We can be tough, rough and stuffed with the stuff that defies giving up.
The only way is up, we need to sup from the cup of justice.
So to women and girls I say just this:
“The only way is forward”, you cannot keep us cornered,
Though it will be dark and deep, awful and awkward, we will fight for our rights like we ought to.
Until we are brought to a state where equal pay means equal work
Through our struggle, strife, tears, deeds and words,
We can make our voices heard
Claim the half of the world we deserve.
“Ask with Courage”, take with pride, know your worth.
Claim the space that is yours on this earth.
With thanks to Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge.
Image from: https://flipboard.com/topic/helenabonhamcarter