53/365 Fight club confessions - part 2

Eliza in 2008

Physicality and women’s rights

Let’s go on a walk together and let’s allow each word, each step, each idea shared to take us closer to understanding our world.

The crispy air of December takes me back to when my little hometown was dressed in white. There was a pile of snow at every turn and next to what looked like a miniature mountain, sometimes, stood a gang of boys awaiting to perform the “baptism” on you.

The “baptism” consisted of you being chased down, thrown to the ground, taken to the pile of snow, have snow rubbed onto your hair and face until you felt your skin tearing, to finally be left there looking disheveled, with snow down in your clothes and wet, while you were being laughed at and mocked. The “baptism” was performed on girls only or that is what I remember.

I just had to cross the road to get to school and it was hard to avoid a conflict because there was always a pile there, with company. I remember that I was strong on my feet, but not invincible, no matter how many super heroes movies I watched.

I wonder if I ever thought at the time to ask for help from an adult to come with me or maybe I was thinking that it is a normal thing to go through.

Myself and other colleagues, would hide in the school until everyone would clear out and then we would sneak around the back, jump fences and run home.

The “baptising” gangs were still on the street in 2009, the year I decided to leave the country. I hope it is an extinct practice.

My point is, and you might have noticed, that the real rabbit hole is not the “baptism”, but the entitlement culture that breeds one of the highest rates of domestic violence in Europe. The entitlement that starts early on in life and it should not come as a surprise when later in life one believes talks about equality and women’s rights are a joke.

We don’t know what we don’t know, because it is so deeply embedded, it’s part of one’s identity! But we should know better than that, because our daughters deserve better.

You got this!