“Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists”

By Rachel Leingang
Contributing Writer

Perhaps the most important moment in a feminist’s life is the moment of realization, the very instant when a feminist discovers that she/he is angry, passionate, ready and willing to commit to life as a feminist. Commonly referred to as the “click” moment, most feminists can recognize a click or a series of clicks that led them to feminism and showed them the proverbial light.

Edited by Courtney E. Martin and J. Courtney Sullivan, the essay compilation “Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists” explores this topic by asking feminist writers, both young and old, well-known and unknown, to share their clicks.

From Fargo native Jennifer Baumgardner, prominent author of multiple books on modern feminism, to Nellie Beckett, 18-year-old writer and aspiring professional feminist, “Click” explores the many faces of modern feminism and the diverse definitions and moments that make each feminist unique, yet bind us all together.

Jessica Valenti, founder and editor of the popular blog feministing.com, further explains the Click moment in her essay “I Was an Obnoxious Teenage Feminist.”

“Part of getting older is owning the facets of your identity that frighten you the most; click moments are the wonderful instances where you can feel yourself growing up, and I can think of nothing better to grow up into than a feminist.”

The Click moment can be a moment of outrage, like that of Linda Fuselier, local biosciences professor and director of the women’s studies program at MSUM. Her click moment came after having a child at age 20 and attempting to get her son baptized in the Catholic church. She hadn’t had a traditional Catholic ceremony, opting instead for a cool outdoor ceremony with a justice of the peace. She agreed to re-marry in the church, but the priest required that she attend confession.

“I hate confession,” said Fuselier. “I never know what to say, so I did the usual, ‘I was mean to my best friend,’ ‘I swear a lot…’ That’s not what he was looking for, evidently. He insisted that I confess that getting pregnant was a mistake and that I was quite guilty of a litany of horrendous crimes that only a woman could commit.”
That’s when anger set in and the click moment occurred.

“I actually refused to confess my biological misfortunes,” she said. “That’s when I realized I was a feminist…I never set foot in a Catholic Church again and my understanding of feminism and oppression took a huge leap forward.”

Femolution contributor and dedicated feminist Sarah Dawson’s Click moment came when inappropriate conduct by an employer made her reach a boiling point of indignation.

“My Click moment was the year I was sexually harassed by my boss,” Dawson said. “I had been an amazing and well-respected employee for six years. Every single day he saw me, he commented on how my hair looked or how good I smelled or how nice my outfit was. I was a nurse’s aide; I wore scrubs.”

After her boss told her to parade in front of some men working on the building outside, Dawson told him to stop because she felt uncomfortable. He responded with “Well, it’s okay to feel uncomfortable once in awhile, isn’t it?”

Dawson’s boss was never reprimanded and she decided to quit. With the end of her job came a realization of feminism.

Libby Sundby, Girl Scouts Dakota Horizons membership specialist and Femolution contributor, experienced an outraged Click as well. While hanging up publicity posters for a women’s networking club, a young male walked past her and yelled, “Feminism sucks!”

“I was angry,” Sundby said. “I actually felt rage and my body became hot. I thought to myself, ‘Equality sucks? Fair wages suck? Equal opportunity employment sucks?’…It drove me to continue the good fight.”

Apart from outrage, a lot of times, as Jennifer Baumgardner describes in her essay “One is Silver and the Other’s Gold,” the click moment comes in the form of a friend, an ally or a confidant who shares some commonalities and is a person to talk to about feminist views, goals and ideas. Originating in a social friendship, Baumgardner’s relationship with her ally, Amy, eventually led to important conversations about creating feminist culture, which led Baumgardner to assess just exactly what her definition of herself as a feminism entailed.

“Rather than my continuous repetition (and romanticizing) of feminist truths that came before me, I began to look in the mirror and see myself: as important to feminism as the women who had come before me,” she wrote.

Many Click moments also come from the hands of mothers, grandmothers or influential women in early life. Winter Miller, a journalist and playwright, cites her mother as an early and important feminist influence in her essay “I Was Not Aborted and Further Miscellanea.”

Miller describes her mother as “feminist to the core. She believes in equal rights for everyone. She dislikes patriarchy, and she’s ignored it every step of the way, and the woman has never wavered.”

No matter the reason for the Click moment, it’s a milestone in feminist self-discovery. Despite the diverse ways we came to feminism, it’s important to note that feminism is not always the easy way or the path of least resistance, but there is unity and power in sisterhood.

Amy Richards, author and cofounder of Third Wave Foundation, comments on this in her essay “Righteous Little Beaver.”

“I wanted the movement to be easier, more popular, and less precarious, but now I see that the struggle is what makes it feminist –- not willingly tolerating what society has said is the rule,” Richards wrote.

“Click” is published by Seal Press and is available at book retailers and online.

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