I was never fully aware of my femininity and how it presents to the world until I became an adult. I was always aware that I was female, and I was always very comfortable with my female gender, but I never really thought of how other people perceived my identity. To me, it was always just a part of me, and since I accepted it, I thought others would, too. I was gymnast, a dancer, and a rock climber as a child, and I never regarded them as masculine or feminine domains—to me, they were always just sports with no extra meaning attached to them. It was about learning the trade and perfecting it—not about fitting into or being an abnormality within that domain. Yet, I realized later in life, particularly towards the end of my rock climbing career, that many people do gender sports. People gender everything, and that shocked me.
Once I became an adult, I realized that many people consider rock climbing the man’s domain. To be a successful climber, you need strength, discipline, and grit—all of which are traditionally masculine traits. I realized that many people in the rock climbing community did not see me as possessing any of those qualities. They knew I was a good climber, but I was always judged on my finesse, flexibility, and strangely, the quietness of my footwork. I knew that that was problematic, but I could never articulate why it was problematic, and I never truly realized how extensive the issue really was. I have realized that the same difficulties that I faced in the rock climbing world are the same difficulties that I will face in the international relations world. There are some domains that are traditionally considered male domains, and I do not think I will ever be able to destroy those traditions.
Because I am a woman, I am a subaltern. I have learned that the subaltern is completely stuck. Discourse surrounding the subaltern is so pervasive that as soon as we see the subaltern, we immediately have a plethora of language that we will use to describe the subaltern. We ascribe traits to the subaltern that are preexisting, and because of the preexisting nature of these traits, the subaltern can never speak. Anything they say or do will always be viewed as an extension of the discourse we have about them. Because the matrix of domination is so pervasive and old, many people consider it to be natural. They are unwilling to confront it and allow for the hierarchy to be changed, so they just let it persist.
I think about these issues primarily in terms of gender because gender is the area in which we seem most caught up in sticking to a binary. You can either be male and masculine or female and feminine, but there can be no mixing. The perceived naturalness of this matrix of domination seems to be a root cause of much of the sexual harassment, assault and discrimination that takes place across many fields. I experienced a lot of this during my rock climbing career, and I was forced out of the field because of it. As an adult, I want to go into the traditionally masculine-associated field of international relations, and it has become pertinent for me to understand the gendered matrix of domination so that I can work to help women live in a system that will always undervalue them. Francis Fukuyama talks about masculinity or femininity being bred into the bone, and that is such a commonly held belief that we see it, speak it, and cannot speak against it. It is impossible to ever completely transform the matrix of domination; women will consistently be judged as feminine and submissive to men, but perhaps we can change norms and create a culture in which women can comfortably and consistently challenge the matrix.
What makes it so hard to challenge the matrix of domination is that people do not find the matrix particularly problematic. We can accept that certain things are blatantly wrong, but we often forgive many things because we consider them exceptional circumstances. Alsultany describes this in terms of race, calling it ambivalent racism. Ambivalent racism is the concept that we generally accept racism to be bad, except in certain circumstances in which not being racist would endanger security. This same idea can be applied to sexism, and I think that the matrix of domination is greatly aided by ambivalent sexism. We can all accept that sexism is bad, but then we find ourselves allowing it in certain circumstances—particularly when a woman is upsetting the gender hierarchy. We find comfort in the exceptionality of our sexism, but we fail to realize that this feigned exceptionality is just a reflection of our true feelings. My thoughts ossified once I saw a documentary about the Harvey Weinstein scandal. The survivors of the scandal were victimized because the situations they were in were viewed as exceptional when, in reality, their situations are just small drops in the bucket of a much larger matrix of domination.
The Harvey Weinstein documentary combined with my thoughts on ambivalent sexism gave me a very bleak outlook on the future of gender hierarchies. I started to feel very hopeless because I know the impossibilities for the subaltern to ever be released from the matrix of domination. As the lower ranking gender on the matrix of domination, women will always be much more likely to be subject to sexual harassment, assault, and discrimination. We will always have to cognizant that the matrix of domination has painted us as lesser-than men. I struggled with ways to try to transform the matrix of domination. Fanon immediately came to mind—the only way to ever become a human in the oppressor’s eyes is to show them your strength through violence. However, if women were to use violence against men, the women who did that would be viewed as the select few women in the world capable of wielding such force. They would be explained away through discourse as the Buffy the Vampire Slayers or Margaret Thatcher’s of the world. It would be better to transform the gendered matrix of domination through an approach like Biko’s. With black consciousness, Biko writes that counting on the white liberal to be an effective ally is a bad idea because they are only willing to help if it does not affect their relationships with other white people. In that sense, black consciousness must be a movement by and for black people. This idea is very applicable to transforming the gendered matrix of domination. If women are going to transform the matrix of domination, then we must gain power by relying on each other and building off each other’s strengths. Miss Representation offers this same idea. If women can build a strong coalition in which we empower each other to speak out and confidently show our presence, then perhaps we can transform the matrix of domination.
Of course, this is straight conjecture. The gendered matrix of domination is much older and complex than any of my thoughts, and it would be foolish of me to think that the matrix could ever be transformed for every subaltern. Because of the intersectionality of our population, everyone has a very specific spot in the hierarchy. Women of color and LGBTQ individuals are considered hierarchically lower than me, but even more greatly affected by the gendered matrix of domination are the poor. Socioeconomic standing plays a huge role in the ability of women to transform the matrix of domination for themselves. Because I am economically empowered, I can legally pursue those who harass, assault, or discriminate against me if I desired. Poor women are further silenced by their socioeconomic disadvantage. It is much harder for them to legally go up against the matrix of domination. Currently, most systems that we have that work for the betterment of women work to help white, economically empowered women. We cannot claim that we are actively working to transform the matrix of domination until we figure out a system that works to help all women, regardless of their color, sexuality, gender, and socioeconomic status. The matrix of domination affects all women across the board, and if we ignore certain groups of women and silence their experiences with the matrix of domination then we are working for the same matrix we claim to be working against.