My Life of Feminist Privilege...At Law School?

It's late and I can't sleep. I'm not sure why, but maybe because I was up late reading Next Time She'll Be Dead for my feminist legal issues class. God, it makes me angry. And I'm still all keyed up about the Jane Doe Conference this weekend. Wow, was that ever great. The fact that a conference on sexual assault sold out is a really good sign among lots of not so encouraging news.

One of the great things about it was meeting other women in law school, new generation feminists who are committed and thoughtful and so smart. I sometimes wonder where we all are and wish we could find each other and work together more. Hopefully some of those connections were made during the conference and will endure.

I learned an astonishing thing, though. Compared to probably every other law school in Canada, my law school (uOttawa) is largely a place of safety for feminists. It's definitely not perfect. All of my colleagues here have at least one story where we have witnessed some form of anti-woman, heterosexist, homophobic, classist, racist, or colonialist displays that have gone unchallenged in the classroom (and outside the classroom). But I have, to a very large extent, been able to craft for myself a feminist legal education, taught by real feminists who declare their principles loudly. My classrooms have largely been a place where I felt safe to speak from a feminist perspective. Even where I knew I was not with a feminist prof, I was at least tolerated and not humiliated (had I taken evidence, it probably would have been the exception). Always, if I needed to, there was a feminist woman professor to whom I could turn.

Not so in other faculties, apparently. I probably should not have been quite so surprised. It's not as if I'm not totally aware of the treatment of women at the hands of the justice system (why would the education system that spawned the players be any different?). I just didn't realize how bad it was in other places. I thought that at least maybe people (profs and students alike) were affected enough by political correctness to pretend to be tolerant. Apparently being around feminists for the past three years has both distorted reality for me and made me less cynical and more hopeful about my place in the world. (Sort of.)

I've been experiencing a mounting anxiety about leaving a place that has been so openly supportive of my feminism. This is in direct contradiction to being utterly desperate to get out of law school, but that's definitely not because of the feminists. I'm feeling nervous about finding a community of feminists in a small, conservative (and Conservative) region. I wonder if I will be mocked and discounted if I am open about my feminism (in spite of the fact that I'm going to be a hell of a good lawyer). I'm spending a lot of time right now thinking about how I will locate a community of women, whether they will be feminists (openly or not), how I will contribute to my professional practice in accordance with my feminist values, and how I can contribute to my community in a positive, feminist way. I may have to do it quietly.

The past couple of years have made me realize how critical and relevant feminism is today. Before law school, I had no formal feminist education, and it's been both a privilege and a surprise to get it here. It's part of me now and I have to be a part of it.