There Is No Such Thing As “The Perfect Feminist”
I often see clips online of women entering marriage or motherhood, followed by comments mourning who they used to be: “She lost herself.” “She used to be so independent.” “Marriage ruined her.” “Why does she have babies?” “She is putting women back 100 years.” There is an assumption that somewhere between falling in love, becoming a wife, and raising children, a woman has surrendered her subjectivity.
I understand where this anxiety comes from. For centuries, women were expected to become wives and mothers, their value measured through beauty, fidelity, obedience, and domesticity. Feminism fought to prove that women could exist beyond these roles.
Yet somewhere along the way, rejecting one model of the “perfect woman” seems to have created another: the perfect feminist.
Who Is the New Ideal Woman?
She is independent, ambitious, emotionally self-sufficient. She works a “big girl job,” earns her own money, recognizes every red flag, establishes perfect boundaries, and never allows romantic love to compromise her sense of self. She does not need male validation; sometimes, she is expected to demonstrate her feminist credibility by rejecting men altogether.
None of these qualities are inherently bad. Independence is empowering, and so are ambition and financial autonomy. However, these shouldn’t become measurements as to what a “good feminist” should be like. To be a feminist shouldn’t require prerequisites, as if ticking off check boxes.
What happens if a feminist wants to become a housewife? What if she wants five children? What if she earns less than her husband, enjoys cooking for him, or falls embarrassingly in love? What if she stays too long in a relationship she knows is bad for her? Does she become less of a feminist?
If feminism demands a specific answer to each of these questions, then it risks recreating the system it sought to dismantle.
A Different Rubric Under the Same Cage
Women have always been graded.
Once, the criteria were modesty, virginity, beauty, obedience, and devotion to family. Now, in certain feminist spaces, the criteria can become ambition, assertiveness, independence, and emotional detachment. The standards have changed, but the impulse remains disturbingly familiar. Past or modern day alike, we are attempting to define the correct way to be a woman.
Perhaps the ideal woman of one century wakes early to prepare breakfast for her husband, while the ideal woman of another wakes at five for Pilates before running her startup. Neither life is inherently oppressive or liberating. The danger begins with the word “must”.
“You must marry” changes to “You must not center on marriage.” “You must depend on your husband” changes to “You must never depend on a man.” “You must be pure” changes to “You must be liberated.”
I Am Not a Perfect Feminist
I certainly cannot claim to be one. I can criticize society’s obsession with romance and still desperately want to be loved. I can know that another person’s attention does not determine my worth and still let someone's attention affect me. I can recognize beauty standards as constructed and still look in the mirror and dislike what I see. I can understand unhealthy relationship dynamics and still miss someone who hurt me.
Knowing the language of feminism does not make women immune to insecurity, desire, dependence, or bad decisions. Understanding patriarchy does not magically remove us from the society shaped by it. Sometimes we know better and still make mistakes! Instead of deeming it as the failure of feminist consciousness, it can represent the messiness of being human.
Liberation Must Include Imperfection
This does not mean every choice a woman makes is automatically feminist. Choices are shaped by economic pressures, social expectations, family, culture, and unequal power. We should absolutely question the conditions under which women make them.
But questioning a system is different from condemning the woman living within it.
Instead of asking whether a woman’s life looks feminist enough, we might ask whether she has meaningful alternatives. Is her labor respected? Does she possess financial and personal agency? Can she change her mind? Can she leave safely? Those questions reveal more about freedom than whether she works in an office or a kitchen.
Feminism, to me, is not a label earned through ideological purity. Feminism is a practice that cannot solely stay on the textbook page. Feminism, to me,is a way of recognizing and resisting structures that restrict women’s lives. It should therefore create more possibilities for women, not establish another immaculate standard they must satisfy.
A woman can be a CEO or a housewife, ambitious or ordinary, fiercely independent or hopelessly in love. She can contradict herself, make terrible decisions, change her mind, and begin again. The goal was never to replace the perfect wife with the perfect feminist.
Women have spent enough of history being graded. Feminism should not become another rubric.
Written by: Penny Wei
