Imagine you are on your way to work, when the light turns red. You push your brake to a halt, and glance over at the driver next to you. You realize the person driving the car is a beautiful woman. She senses your gaze, and looks at you. Your eyes meet, and she smiles. Nervously, you then both look away, and the light changes to green. What did this woman look like in your mind’s eye?
Notice, the only physical attribute I provided was that this woman was beautiful.
I recently read an Electric Literature article titled “Describe Yourself Like a Male Author Would’ Is the Most Savage Twitter Thread in Ages:
The challenge is a fierce indictment of what happens when you try to write a character you don’t respect or understand.” Did it grab your attention too?
This post takes one male author’s shallow description of a character, and Whit Reynolds turns it into a twitter game of women ‘describing themselves the way a male author would’! She states that “what started as a joke” received a lot of support.
The tweets seemed to be innocent, and some even hilarious, but then some women begin to describe themselves as invisible due to their age, weight, or color of their skin.
Some of the posts had me questioning what the world has come to, but then I try not to get too wrapped up in the messiness of society. Even though I try to keep my inner peace and stay true to myself, it is hard to ignore the ignorance of shallow men.
