Emailing Governor-General Michaëlle Jean

Your Excellency,

I recently read an article in the Globe and Mail about your Women’s Conference, discussing the need for a third wave of feminists to take on today’s issues, namely the wage gap and the under-representation of women in politics. I have to say I am incredibly disappointed at how young feminists were talked about by some of your invitees, namely that we don’t seem to care. 

I notice the picture taken of your event shows many older women and very few, if any, younger women. How do you expect to understand our activism if you don’t invite us? We are out there, we are just online, on Twitter, facebook and blogging. I invite you to read my blog or follow our hashtag on twitter (#youngfems and #fem2). We may not engage in activism the same way 2nd wave feminists did, but that doesn’t make it less meaningful, important or effective. We cannot expect to reach youth unless we are online and you cannot expect to find us if you don’t look online.

I would like to assure you that we do exist, we do care and we are fighting. It becomes very difficult to fight inequality when we are effectively being stabbed in the back by older feminists, forcing us to defend ourselves against such claims that we don’t care, rather than focusing our collective energies on what is really important: equality.

Sincerely,
Alysha Bayes
A very vocal, very politically active and very caring young feminist.