Recently, a male Facebook friend of mine became a fan of a Facebook page called “I’m the boy. You’re the girl. Make me a sandwich, or we don’t talk today.”

The first thing that came to my mind when it came up on my News Feed was, gee, how original, a sandwich joke. Then, I became furious. When I typed in “make me a sandwich” in the search box, I was disgusted by how many results I got. One of them is even titled “*backhand* MAKE ME A SANDWICH.” Furthermore, a good majority of the fans of it are girls and women.

What is wrong with our society when females are actually proclaiming themselves as “fans” of domestic abuse and taking on subservient roles to men?

Well, when I drew this to the attention of a few female friends, some agreed with me. But one of them actually said “Oh, lighten up. It’s just a joke.”

Really?

First of all, even if it was “just” a joke, all jokes are rooted in fundamental truths about society. That’s why they’re supposed to be “funny.” 

Secondly, last time I checked, women are not treated the same as men in this society, as much as people would like you to believe that they are treated equally.

Women are still paid less than men in almost all occupations. The only jobs that women earn more than men are – drum roll – modeling and prostitution.

The other night I went to see “The Vagina Monologues” here at the University of Massachusetts. What I saw was a display of women proclaiming themselves as independent and free, and proclaiming it loudly. It was awesome, and it showed just how powerful women can be when they stand up for their rights.

But how is it that there are still so many men out there that think that making jokes about women waiting on them and getting hit as a thank you are funny?

At my high school, sexist jokes were made all the time. Teachers sometimes even laughed at them. This is something that astounds me when I think about it now.

And if an intelligent girl responded, the joker would respond with a witless “Why are you even here, shouldn’t you be in the kitchen?” Or just another request for a sandwich.

The same dynamic is going on in these Facebook groups. When a female responds in the group, guess what? She gets the same dumb responses such as: “You have a computer in your kitchen?” Wow, so clever, guys.

And when one girl dared to make a similar, reversed joke in response, the guys in the group started insulting her, and not about her intelligence, not about her personality, but they insulted her on her appearance. Because that’s the most important thing about a woman.

Forgot that. Next, she was called a lesbian. Because only lesbians stand up for their rights as human beings. I forgot about that one, too.

Feminist backlash has been going on for far too long. And it seems like too many women have taken it to heart. While I identify myself as a feminist, a majority of the girls I know don’t. They believe women should be equal, that we should have the same opportunities as men and be paid as much as them for the same work. But they won’t call themselves feminists. Why? Because feminists don’t shave their armpits, feminists are lesbians, feminists hate men and feminists are too radical.

Yes, asking for what we deserve is so radical. And asking for men to not joke around about backhanding women and demanding things from them is radical, too, and makes you unattractive to men, I guess. Well, if a man finds that unattractive, why would any woman care?

I don’t mean to generalize about men. I know that there are males in the world that don’t find this funny, that respect their girlfriends and listen to what women have to say. I know that there are males that identify themselves as feminists.

And I actually realized that the first page I mentioned is in response to a page called “I’m the girl. You’re the boy. You text first or we don’t talk today.”

I don’t think I have to point out that that page is ridiculous as well. I’m all about equality.

It wouldn’t be so infuriating if there was no meaning behind these jokes. But we live in a world where women are treated as second class citizens, and it’s not acceptable.

These boys need to grow up and learn how to respect women. And these girls need to take a stand against sexism, not get behind it.

Lauren Vincent can be reached at [email protected].