popping our own bubbles

What ultimately scares me about theorizing on the existence of that Bubble (with a capital letter B), within which we all inevitably fall as women, is that it brings us back to a capital letter P-atriarchy.

That bigger Bubble makes victims of all of us, and puts the blame of our divisiveness on an all-encompassing power that has made us wary and critical of each other. To have that bigger Bubble to fall back on, is to be dependent on Patriarchy and its view of us as a collective of women.

I would like to think that we are here talking like this precisely because we have burst that bigger Bubble.

Because we now have the capacity to speak to each other and be critical of what we do as women, regardless of what the men think. Because we can now have as premise the assertion that there is no sisterhood among us all Pinays, that we are not required to find affinity with each other just because of our biological make-up. When in the onset, feminism was about coming together with ALL women across race, class and religion, we meanwhile grew up in a Pinoy society that points to anything but unity. And it has become every Pinay for herself in the face of each other; not all of us against that one Patriarchy, or that one big Bubble.

I would like to think that as we delved into the difference between "us" academic chicks and "them" cosmo chicks, or "us" loyal and romantic wives/girlfriends/mothers and "them" career women, that we were aware of the fact that we were asserting stereotypes and choosing one over the other. That we were making those stereotypes, and seeing ourselves within and beyond them, is good enough for me. That we know of women who will continue to be oppressed because they don't have the material conditions to be anything else is powerful enough as it is.

I would rather see many bubbles created by different/differing Pinays, then believe in that one big bubble created by that man who purportedly oppresses us with his mere gaze.

We after all, can already look back. And win a staring contest -- with a man, or woman. And then prick their bubbles as we go along.