Hello my name is Melissa? I am a successful young woman?

Do I really end all of my sentences with a question mark? Apparently I do. This was pointed out to me once when I was part of a business training program in the beginning of my sophomore year of college. I was practicing an interview and was told (by a male manager) that I raised the tone of my voice at the end of each of my sentences. He told me that I should work on keeping my voice stable throughout my speech in order to sound more professional. I thought that maybe something was wrong with the way I spoke. Then, this past month I was in a weekend Women and Politics seminar and Laura Liswood laid it out for me. She gave me a lesson on the differences between male and female speech patterns and how the different ways we speak affect societal relations between men and women. I realized that the only thing that was wrong with the way I was conducting my mock interview during my sophomore year was that I was “talking like a woman.”

Let me lay it out for you. (or should I say “Can I lay it out for you?")

When a woman needs something done by 5 o’clock before the office closes, she walks up to her assistant and says: “Hey, I really need this done by 5 today. Do you think you can do this by 5? It is really important that it gets done today, are you sure you can have it done by 5?”
A man listening to this conversation only hears, “ I am a woman. I don’t know what I want and I don’t know how to get things done.”

When a man needs something done by 5 he walks up to his assistant and says “Have this done by 5.”
A man listening to this conversation only hears, “Have this done by 5.”

Women tend to use a more invitational speech pattern that is heard as less authoritative than a man’s very direct speech pattern. Women invite other people into conversations because women want the input of others. Women are just as capable as men are when it comes to having someone accomplish a task for them by 5 o’clock. The difference is that women ask to have it done while men demand to have it done.
One pattern of speech is not necessary intrinsically right or wrong, but society has come to value the direct, typical male pattern of speech over the invitational pattern of speech common among women. Placing a higher value on what is generally a male speech pattern holds women back, especially in professional settings like business and politics. Women are told that they must speak more like a man if they are going to be “right”, as I experienced after conducting my mock interview.
What makes this situation truly unfortunate for women is that once a woman does take on the direct speech pattern that is valued in society, the situation plays out like this:

A woman needs something done by 5 o’clock so she says to her assistant “Have this done by 5.”
Now men hear, “Wow a woman that knows what she wants. What a total bitch.”

This is because once a woman takes on characteristics typically associated with men, like a direct speech pattern, she must fight a battle with her “tooness”. By taking on an archetype male characteristic in order to be taken seriously, a woman becomes too masculine and must face criticism. Therefore, the society we live in leaves women with two choices:
1) be consistently held back because of who we are
or
2) challenge the female archetype and deal with being referred to in the office, or by Chris Matthews, as an icy bitch.

My hope for you is that you choose the latter. Who takes Chris Matthews seriously anyway?

This is my “Vatican Hides Pedophiles” sign and it reads “Remember the Ladies”.

“The odds are loaded toward a path of least resistance in several ways. We often choose a path because it’s the only one we see. When I get on an elevator, for example, I turn and face front along with everyone else. It rarely occurs to me to do it any other way, such as facing the rear. If I did, I’d soon feel how some paths bring on more social resistance than others.

I once tested this idea by walking to the rear of an elevator and standing with my back to the door. As the seconds ticked by, I could feel people looking at me, wondering what I was up to and wanting me to turn around. I wasn’t saying anything or doing anything to anyone. I was standing there minding my own business. But that wasn’t all I was doing, for I was also violating a social norm that makes facing the door a path of least resistance. The path is there all the time-it’s built in to riding the elevator as a social situation-but the path wasn’t clear until I stepped onto a different one and felt the greater resistance rise up against it.”

Allan Johnson, Privilege, Power, and Difference

John Wojnowski. Very few people know him by name. John Wojnowski stands on Massachusetts Avenue every day smiling and waving at people while holding a large sign that reads “Vatican Hides Pedophiles”. I had the pleasure of riding the bus with John a few weeks ago from Dupont Circle to his regular stop outside of the Vatican Embassy. I had been thinking a lot about challenging the path of least resistance and realized how much everyone on the bus must have felt like John was facing the back of the elevator. I decided to engage him and tell him that I really admired his courage. I was expecting him to break into story about why he holds his “Vatican Hides Pedophiles” sign every day, but instead he just said to me “I have to. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t.”

I almost burst into tears on the N4. It was one of those life defining moments where you are never the same afterwards.

I realized in that moment that John Wojnowski epitomizes challenging the path of least resistance. He subjects himself to that feeling-the one where your cheeks start to burn because what you just said made yourself and everyone in the room uncomfortable-so that he can go to sleep every night and wake up every day knowing that he is doing what is right. His work liberates him from the pain he suffered in the past.

John is working against an injustice that most people let slide by every day. This man’s actions make me think how any of us can really live with ourselves. Every day we just let injustice pass us by. We remain silent in the face of racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism, and hate. We take the path of least resistance because it is safe. Because it is comfortable. Every day John Wojnowski faces resistance. He makes himself and others feel uncomfortable in the name of justice. How many of us can say we make ourselves feel uncomfortable on a daily basis in the name of justice? How many of us speak up when we hear a racial slur or a sexist remark? Not many.

This is why I love John Wojnowski. He has more courage than anyone I know. It is not enough not to be a pedophile, just like it is not enough to not be racist or sexist or homophobic. By not speaking up we are perpetuating injustice. We let it go by unnoticed, unprotested.

My request to you is next time you encounter injustice, speak up, take action, make yourself feel uncomfortable, make someone else feel uncomfortable. An even bigger challenge- Make everyone who drives on Massachusetts Avenue feel uncomfortable. John Wojnowski does. So can you.