First confrontation with sexist remarks and behavior, gender stereotypes and barriers in school and work… On the occasion of International Women’s Rights Day, four young women, from different backgrounds and aged 25 to 31 , tell the World their intimate experience of inequalities as well as their awakening to the question of feminism.
Paloma, 25, sales representative: “As a child, I quickly understood that we always asked more of women”
Paloma Afonso Machado grew up in a family with mixed Italian and Portuguese roots, surrounded by “models of strong women”but ” constantly sent back to their traditional role by rather macho men”. Scanning her memories, this 25-year-old export sales representative in Feurs (Loire), remembers the adages that were constantly repeated to her at the time:
“’A girl has to behave well’, ‘it’s ugly, a woman who says swear words’, ‘girls, come and clear the table’… As a child, I quickly understood that, even if it is unconscious, we always ask more of women than of men. »
It was at the age of 20, after flying to England for her third year of Erasmus studies, that Paloma operated her first ” revolution ” on the subject, far from the family straitjacket. “ I started to explore my sexuality and that’s when I also lifted the veil on the sexual abuse I had suffered when I was younger. It all happened, it’s funny, thanks to my boyfriend at the time I met there, educated on the issue, and especially with whom I had my first balanced relationship. Then a friend introduced me to what feminism was and I started reading about it”, she testifies. With #metoo, which bursts in the middle of her reflection, the young woman finds the right words to talk about his own experience.
Today, Paloma claims proudly feminist, even if she does not find herself “in certain militant actions that are too radical”. In the light of recent cases, such as that of the former president of the French Football Federation, Noël Le Graët, ” where it was necessary to wait for his comments on Zidane for his behavior to be denounced, while his actions and sexist comments were known”the twenty-something is worried to see the fight progress “ too slowly”. But advance taken, for example, by Spain on menstrual leave or by Scandinavian countries on pay and parental equality gives him hope.
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