Intro to Feminism was a required course for philosophy majors, so I had to take it.   Every Tuesday and Thursday (almost), I dragged myself out of bed and across campus to dutifully listen from the back row as a horde of rosy-cheeked freshmen girls from wealthy metropolitan backgrounds babbled about being oppressed and stifled and compelled by the media to hate themselves.

Don’t get me wrong.  There are many places where gender bias is a very real, very significant problem, and throughout most periods in history it was an even bigger one.  But here and now?  Less so.  Most contemporary American women, particularly those with the time, education and resources to write and publish academic papers, should just get over themselves -- or get therapy. 

Besides the one guy in the class, a gruff, muscle-armed jock named Max, who mostly stayed quiet, and Ryan, a fellow female philosophy major rumored on account of her butch-sounding name and boy-short hairstyle to be my lesbian lover, I was on my own about this though.  So most days, I held my tongue.   

You’re fucking kidding, right?

The girl with the green notebook started it.  I can still see her hand in the air.  I can hear her voice, calm, crisp, matter of fact.  

“There are no significant biological differences between women and men,” she said. 

...

No, of course not.  I mean, except for that whole chromosome thing.

...

I waited for someone else to disagree, someone more capable of not laughing in her face, the professor or Max or the redhead from the week before who admitted to thinking the ‘all men are rapists’ theory was bullshit.  But no one did. 

My immediate, unspoken response would not work.  I had to dial it back. 

 “That’s pretty blatantly false.”   I said.

The whole room turned to stare at me, eyes wide, breath held -- a naysayer in their midst. 

Short, wordless bursts of disgust, disbelief and righteous anger flooded the air in waves.  They were all talking at once, saying nothing discernible.  They were shocked, freaked out, and they weren’t going to stop. 

An hour later, after the chaos had dispersed, I stood by the door in an empty hallway, steered there and cornered by our rookie instructor.   Ryan, who was curious, waited too, next to me.

“I’m going to recommend you drop this class,” the professor said.  “Those comments today about biology -- you made the discussion unsafe.”