We Should All Be Feminists Major Figures

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is the author of the essay, which draws from her own experiences as a Nigerian woman and successful author. Descriptions of her childhood and adult experiences with the injustice of gender discrimination provide a jumping-off point for reflections on the nature of gender, societal gender expectations, and the ways these often-harmful gender norms are ingrained in people from a very early age. Her clear, often witty observations of how gender norms are taught and upheld—and how those not on the receiving end of discrimination often fail to notice it—define a problem that has a solution: notice the problem, and adjust social behavior to stop perpetuating it. Adichie presents a hopeful vision of how society could be if everyone decided to be feminists—those who see how strict gender roles diminish the humanity of all people and who work to make changes that allow all people to live more authentically.

Okoloma

Okoloma was Adichie’s close childhood friend—a person whom she respected and could rely on for good advice, like a big brother. Okoloma was also the first person to call her a feminist, when she was about 14 and did not even know what the word meant. However, he used this label in a clearly negative tone, as if being a feminist were like being a terrorist.

Adichie uses this anecdote to frame her essay, noting that Okoloma died in a 2005 airplane crash. After this incident, she was called a feminist many more times and became even more aware that the word carried negative connotations and associations. Yet when she looked up the word after hearing it from Okoloma, the dictionary defined it as “a person who believes in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes.” This definition does not seem, on its face, to define a threatening or dangerous person. Yet there was something about being a feminist that even Okoloma—her good friend—saw as dangerous. As the first of many such comments, Okoloma’s remark highlights both the negative stereotypes associated with the word feminist and the pervasiveness of these stereotypes.

Louis

Louis is a friend of Adichie and a “brilliant, progressive man.” Despite his intelligence and open-mindedness, he is at first dismissive of Adichie’s claims that things are more difficult for women than for men. He believes sexist attitudes and gender discrimination are a thing of the past. This, Adichie suggests, is primarily because as a man, he just does not see this discrimination—until it is right under his nose. He finally realizes she is not inventing stories of discrimination when she tips a man who helps them park and the man turns to Louis and thanks him. In that moment, Louis sees that gender discrimination is, in fact, still alive and well—and Adichie realizes that what is so obvious to her is just not obvious to Louis. The idea that restrictive gender norms can be upheld because people simply don’t notice them establishes one major purpose of the essay: to define the problem clearly so that all people can see it and then perhaps be moved to do something about it.