Two years ago I made a decision to stop using the words slut, whore, ho and all those other "exciting" terms used to describe "inappropriate" women.For the more enlightened of us, this is neither momentous nor something to be proud of, as much as something that is long overdue: These are all terms that have overstayed their welcome in society, terms used to berate women our social standards deem "promiscuous."

Do I sound like a broken record? I probably do. We hear these arguments over and over again: Women are sluts and men are studs. But, this isn't the issue. What is at stake here, is, in my opinion, much more contentious: If we have all heard this time and time again, if we have all heard this to the point where it is okay to roll our eyes at feminists, if we have heard this to the point that this idea is engrained as one more soundbite, then why does this double standard still persist in our society? More importantly, if we scoff at feminists as anachronistic and pass, then why haven't we still reached equality?

I don't think I will ever understand the backlash against feminism. I can understand the backlash against a certain blatant media stereotype of feminism -- but I cannot understand a society in which young women scoff at feminism, completely unaware that without a movement they now consider radical and unnecessary no one would even be asking them their opinions in the first place. In other words, the reason that I, a woman, have this chance to write a column is due, in large part, to feminism. The reason that my female classmates are my female classmates at Brandeis, is due to feminism. The reason that my mother is an engineer, is due to feminism. And yet, our foremothers rarely get a thank you or an acknowledgement. Instead, today people almost prefer to think of them as radical, hairy bra-burners; imagine that.

Still, I only wish this was the biggest problem of the backlash against feminism: After all, it is a personal choice whether or not you want to build a shrine to Betty Friedan. What is so much more threatening and problematic is the belief that feminism has reached a certain plateau; that feminism is done, that there is nothing left to accomplish. For me this is almost terrifying.

Feminism comes from a French term -- feminisme -- that is essentially the idea that gender is culturally, rather than biologically created. This is the root of feminism as a concept. More concretely, then, feminism is the idea that there are few female plumbers not because "women don't want to be plumbers," but because women are raised to see plumbing as a purely male task. This is, then, the fundamental point of the movement -- a point we have yet to realize. Instead, in our disgust with feminism, we have produced generations and generations of women who have come to embody our cultural stereotypes instead of living up to their remarkable potential.

Our still patriarchal society has continuously pushed and cornered women with stereotypes: Women are emotional, women are nice. We get sitcom after sitcom, movie after movie about "those crazy female antics," and the poor men who just want to watch a basketball game. We learn that women are overly emotional and that men must merely learn how to appease us in order to get some rest after a hard day of work! We learn that women who refuse to be appeased are bitches, and women who don't need to be appeased are sluts. After all, society tells us that sex is just sex for a man, and God forbid a woman ask for something more; shouldn't we just be thankful that they are sleeping with us in the first place?

We get movie after movie based solely on the fact that a woman cannot be fulfilled until she is married -- movies that are otherwise unobtrusive and generally feel-good insist on portraying determined career women as rigid bitches who really are not looking for a career at all, they are only substituting their career goals for the lack of (male) love in their lives. Go watch Angelina Jolie in her new movie "Life, or Something Like It," and then decide if you want to be a determined career woman. The worst part? The makers of this movie are likely not even aware of the markedly sexist undertones of their product, because these gendered approaches to life are just that ingrained in our society.

This is the very issue at stake. Moving past all the buttons and the slogans, moving past all the organizations and all the pithy quotes, we have yet to achieve a level of certain respect and equality between genders. And by equality I don't mean such cosmetic bullshit as inserting "she" into word problems on standardized tests, and I don't even mean the use of the generic Ms., as opposed to Mrs., or Miss. Don't get me wrong -- those are big accomplishments -- but these changes pale in comparison to that which we have yet to achieve. What I am talking about is complete and total respect. Not the faux respect which essentially translates to protection, not respect for women as "women," but respect for women as individuals, respect that breaks the boundaries and lessons this patriarchal society hammers into our heads from the day we are born.

When we finally reach this place, women will no longer do 70 percent of all the household tasks (like they do now, even if they work outside the home), because that is disrespectful. Employers will no longer assume that any married woman is bound to get pregnant, and women will no longer feel that they have to produce children in order to be fulfilled. When we get to this place, fear of commitment will no longer be drilled into the heads of every young man. Think about it: We live in a society where men -- no matter what they look like -- claim fear of commitment, consistently thinking that something better is going to come along.

And, while the sudden shock and pain these men will experience when they realize that nothing better will ever come along is satisfying karmic retribution, it is nonetheless a symbol of our male-glorifying society. Because really, what is fear of commitment besides a over-estimation of one's positive attributes -- an assumption that years of society-induced low self esteem has beaten out of women. From this standpoint then, women who have this so-called "fear of commitment" are viewed as bizarre anomalies, while men are normal.

By now, if you have read this far, you are probably thinking that I am fairly bitter and angry, I bet you are also thinking that I have PMS or that I recently got dumped or that I am just a bitch -- and this is precisely my point. Women cannot have raw emotion on their own -- it must be caused by either biology or a man or their simple "bitchiness." A woman cannot be angry in her own right, her anger cannot be justified.

I'm not going to tell you anything about my personal life -- make your own decisions. To provide an explanation at the end of this column, or to dispel any preconceived notions would be to merely cater to those cultural beliefs I consider so repugnant. Instead, think what you want -- that is, after all, your right -- but think for yourself. And maybe, next time you call someone a slut or a bitch, think about why you are choosing those particular words. In the end, we are going to spend our lives in this society, perhaps it has come times to really live outside its boundaries.

--Yanna Krupnikov '02 submits a column to the Justice