Women's Rights: Best Represented by Vagina Billboards?

On a Montana Christmas morning in seventh grade, I got a pin that said, "This is what a RADICAL FEMINIST looks like." I wore it to school my first day back because I knew I would get attention for it. My best friend at the time was raised in an incredibly conservative household and he and I argued politics during our Civics class all the time. Sure enough, within the first three minutes of Civics, we had a very heated argument going. My teacher told me to take my new pin off. I refused, since it's my First Amendment right to wear it, and got sent to the office. They sent me back to class (with the pin on), told me not to cause trouble, and told him to regain control of his own classroom.

Recently, the University of Cincinnati Feminists and the University of Cincinnati LGBTQ groups have combined their efforts to create a project: "Re-envisioning the Female Body." This project consists of 12 temporary billboards with giant photographs of vaginas that will be placed outside a building on the University of Cincinnati's campus for four hours apiece on Thursday and Friday. According to this article by Kendall Herold of WCPO, the reason the students give for this project on their Facebook page is "to combat social inequalities and abuses through the use of our vaginas as a form of collective resistance to oppression and to claim our positions as individuals with unique experiences, perceptions, and needs" and "to call attention to the vagina as a site of conflict in medical, legislative, domestic, and representational arenas." Author's Note: I would highly recommend against going to the Facebook page that is linked at the end of the aforementioned article. Their main photo seems to be one that will be featured on a billboard.

The president of the University of Cincinnati issued this statement yesterday, saying that the billboards will be allowed on campus because UC is "a public institution obligated to protect the First Amendment, even--perhaps especially--when that protection results in disagreement." While this is understandable, I don't know how legal it is; not because of the nature of the First Amendment, but because of laws against public nudity. I don't expect the president of UC to be well-versed in these laws, but I do expect the Cincinnati police department as well as university attorneys to look into it.

I'm still incredibly invested in women's rights, but a decade after the seventh grade pin incident, I no longer see myself as a "radical feminist." This is radical and, in my not entirely humble opinion, completely misses the point of being women's rights activists! If women want to draw attention to our rights and try to move forward in changing our society so that we have equality, we cannot be so stupid. If we are trying to have men and other women take us seriously, showing giant vaginas with "personal stories under each one" for eight hours on a public university campus is hardly the way to accomplish this! It is important--so important--to have our voices heard, but it is equally important that we conduct ourselves so that we can retain the respect that women who have come before us have fought for and won!

As women who desperately want equality in our "medical, legislative, domestic, and representational arenas," would it not serve us better to put our energies and talents toward earning our degrees in medicine, in political science, or in anything else in which we want equality, than throwing around photos of our privates in a manner that suggests we care more about making a scene than affecting change? This will not change anything. Anything. 

There are, however, some things that we, not as women, but as citizens, can do that will affect change:

• Research the positions of your governments (local, state, and federal) on issues regarding your body, your salary, and any other matters about which you are concerned.
• If you don't like any of the positions that your elected leaders have taken on one of the previously mentioned topics, let them know. You can't just rant about something on Facebook or Twitter and expect it to change. You can rant about something on Facebook or Twitter, write or call your elected leaders, and then expect it to change (in time, with a fight, and your continued haranguing of your leaders).
• Call your healthcare providers and insurance companies to find out what is covered in your healthcare plan. 
• Find out if your male counterparts at your job are making the same salary you are. If they are, great! If not, you need to decide whether you'll take it up with your employer or not.

Here is the best thing, in my opinion, we can do to affect change:

• If there is something about which we are unsatisfied because it illuminates inequality between the sexes and we want it to change, we must take action. We must take action! But (and I wish I could emphasize the gravity of "but" more than just putting it in italics!) we must ensure that the action we take is intelligent and is relevant and, beyond everything else, does not take away from the reason for the action.

It is my opinion that the UC Feminists and LGBTQ groups have gone out of their way to create a shocking scene with "Re-envisioning the Female Body." And it will be shocking. This project will get attention. It already has gotten close to 15 minutes of air time on our local ABC station alone. But will it get attention for what the supposed point of this project is? I really don't know that it will. It will be remembered, but not for a gain for women's rights; it will be remembered for 12 giant vaginas and possibly a lawsuit.

I am so impassioned about my rights, about all women's rights, but passion alone does not create change. It must be accompanied with reason, with purpose, and with strategy, none of which that can possibly be misconstrued as emotional or confused and so take away from the intention of the initial passion and function of the action.

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." --Gandhi