So, the professor who “educated” me on how I was a traitor to the feminist movement stopped by my office yesterday afternoon. It’s time for my evaluation, you see. My evaluation last year had an unfortunate result, so I started campaigning months ago to insure that if a raise was there to be had, I would get it. Because that $675 raise hasn’t taken me real far this year. Anywho. Part of campaigning for a better evaluation is making sure that the people that actually work with me rave to my supervisor about how I am the coolest thing since the Flat-D Flatulence Control Thong Pad. (Oh, internet, see why I love you so?!?)

I met yesterday with this professor because she directs my actions in one department, and I wanted to get a feel for what she might say in my evaluation. I have received nothing but great compliments from anyone in my departments, mind you, so I was surprised to hear her say:

“If I have one piece of feedback, and I don’t think I’m even going to put this on your evaluation, it’s that you have to be careful in faculty meetings not to act like a faculty member. That’s off-putting to the faculty. When we’re in those meetings, you should really run those things through me rather than say them yourself. You just come off in those meetings as… considering yourself the same as them, and that’s rather off-putting to them. There’s a hierarchy, and politics that you just don’t know anything about.”

Blink.

Blink.

So, her “one piece of feedback” for me was that I a) consider myself equal to faculty and b) need to cow-tow to the folks with the PhD’s so that I don’t injure their ego in any way.

I shared with her that I was not unaware of the egos and politics involved, that I had, at one time, run my own department. That I know about politics. I just don’t care about politics (I’m an asset to that husband of mine every day, I tell ya.) I don’t care how things have been done in the past, and I don’t care about your self-perceived superiority, and I don’t care about saving your ego when I’m doing my job and serving students well. The politics thing? The hierarchy thing? Been an issue for me before.I can behave like I’m “supposed to,” but I mostly don’t because I think that those imaginary lines are silly and hold humanity back. And they’re based on the concept that someone is better than another person just because of the job that they hold. I’m not insulting, mind you. I just… don’t play the game very well. I am much too straightforward for that. (A person with a negative view of this trait might say that I lack a filter.)

So to be slapped and then bitch-slapped again psychically by the same person in the span of 48 hours has left me sort of reeling. And my thoughts are these:

Equal. You and I? We are equal. We are all equal. I am not less or more than you because of the degrees I hold, the color of my skin, where I live, the money in my bank account, the clothes on my back, my choice to work or not work, the status of my job, or the genitals in my pants. Respect is what makes this world go ’round, not deference but good ol’ respect, where we treat one another like we have worth and value because we simply do.

I have been accepted to a PhD program. Twice. I haven’t ever started my PhD because I simply do not find it to be a priority or a passion for me at this time. So my lack of letters before my name is again rooted in choice and not in inability. So the idea that it was the expectation that I sit down, shut up, and let the “thinkers” do the heavy lifting is ridiculous.

I have debated whether or not to discuss this with her. She’s a very nice woman, and I am sure she didn’t mean either comment the way I perceived them, but… Still. Even I play the game well enough to know that I should wait until she submits my evaluation to bring it up.