In these readings and in the documentary, it was obvious that women were not treated as equals to men. Like I discussed in my last post, the policy of having one child perpetuated the inequality between men and women especially in marriage. Something I have always found interesting but never learned much about was foot binding. I never knew why the tradition originated or what exactly happened to women’s feet. I found this idea intriguing because it kept a woman from being able to walk or move and would keep her oppressed. She had no escape in the most basic usage of the phrase. The tradition is thought to have originated in the 10th century by a woman who was a dancer. The size of a woman’s foot directly related to her marriage perspectives, and a three-inch foot was seen as the most desirable. Although it is easy to look at this process and assume that it was a horrible act of violence that could never happen here, it is important to look at our own beauty standards that subject women to pain. Foot binding was not unlike corsets that kept women’s waists tiny and kept them from moving around freely. It is easy to judge China and this cruel practice, but before we do, we must examine ourselves and see the inequalities that we are still perpetuating today.
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