Crusader for Empire: Flora Shaw/Lady Lugard, by Helen Callaway and Dorothy O. Helly

2008-04-16T23:05:00.000-07:00

In reading this chapter, I was first stuck on what I immediately picked out as absurd contradictions in Flora Shaw's beliefs. Although Shaw advanced farther in her traditionally masculine career as a journalist and sought experiences, professional advancement, and influence beyond the norm for her gender, she maintained the imperialist constructs of women for social life. She supported neither the advancement of women's rights nor women's suffrage. While another female significant to the Western imperialist movement, Isabelle Eberhardt, held more consistent ideas about gender (For more information, click here), I think that Shaw was blinded by what I saw as an obsessive dedication to the imperial cause, which led to a belief system that appears illogical to an outside perspective.

When I recovered from my instinctive distaste for what I interpreted as Shaw's hypocrisy of thought, I was struck by the realization that her contrasting beliefs were not uncommon. We are all, as humans, prone to let ourselves become so blinded by a passion, emotion, desire, etc. that we are unable to see our own incongruity. Many belief systems, or schools of thought, contain contradictions that are rarely questioned or even noticed because they are so commonly held. Perhaps if Shaw's support of untraditional professional roles and traditional social roles for women was a common ideology of today, I would not have given it a second thought.

When I analyze myself, my own culture, and popular belief systems, I find blaring examples of this. A common example that comes to my mind instantly is of the "pro-life" ideology. People who label themselves as "pro-life" typically also support the use of capital punishment. It seems more intuitive to me that a person who says they are strictly "pro-life" would, in the political realm, oppose abortion, oppose capital punishment, oppose warfare, and support environmental protection laws. (Of course, these issues are highly controversial, and I welcome the opinions of readers.)

When you evaluate your own beliefs, and those around you, what contradictions can you find? How are these seeming hypocrisies justified in our culture today?

Chathams, Pitts, and Gladstones in Petticoats: The politics of gender and race in the Ilbert Bill Controversy, by Mrinalini Sinha

2008-04-14T11:53:00.001-07:00

The Ilbert Bill was an attempt to remove a racially discriminatory clause from the Indian Penal Code. White women in India publicly opposed the Ilbert Bill, but similarly minded white men did not welcome their support. I believe that the men were threatened by the discovery of a similarity in thought between males and females.

Although this personal example is rather unprofessional, I was reminded of my own interactions with my mother. When I was younger and hit the age where I started to get irritated by my parents, I began to dislike similarities I found between my parents and myself. If my mom liked one of my new CD's, I felt compelled to stop listening to it. Although typically a shared interest brings two people together, I did not like how the similarity made me feel like my mother and I were on the same level. She was my mother, not a peer, and I wanted to maintain that distance.

Similarly, the white men did not want to find similarities with the women, even if it meant gaining support for their cause. These similarities of thought and opinion reminded men that women were not so different from them after all. Even Flora Shaw, who was a living contradiction to her own beliefs, rejected the idea that women were intellectually equal to men. Both Shaw and the male opposition to the Ilbert Bill saw any threat to this belief to be a direct threat to the Western imperialist movement, which was based on the perceived superiority of the white, male population.

In what areas of your life have you rejected the support of others, and why do you think you did so? Which people/groups do you want to find similarities with, and which people do you not?

Western Women and Imperialism

Crusader for Empire: Flora Shaw/Lady Lugard, by Helen Callaway and Dorothy O. Helly

Chathams, Pitts, and Gladstones in Petticoats: The politics of gender and race in the Ilbert Bill Controversy, by Mrinalini Sinha