“I find it really irritating when guys are teasing their guy friends and they’re saying, ‘C’mon, man up, don’t be a pussy.’ It’s like, really? It’s a vulgar, pornographic term out there for a women’s anatomy, and that’s what you call a guy who isn’t man enough? Why? Where did that come from? It seems like not a big deal at the end of the day; I hear it all the time and I understand that it’s not. But when you really start to think about what the subtext of it means, it’s interesting. I see it every day. I’m a woman who works at a job that is mostly populated by men. Most of the film set is made up of men and I watch the way that the people relate to each other, I watch the way that they make comments about women on the set and I work with lovely people and I pick up on things that I don’t think are 100 percent awesome all the time. I think it’s important to really make sure that we’re reinforcing, especially from a young age, respect for women. When you think that one of the most powerful things that men can do is put us down, that’s obviously because we’re incredibly powerful if we’re built up. It’s something we need to know and women need to own. If you’re going to get called a bitch for standing up for yourself, for being educated, for having opinions and for using your voice, then fine, let them call you a bitch. If a man was doing any of those things he would be complimented and they’d say, ‘Oh you know, he’s really got balls, he’s really strong, he’s really assertive.’ But a woman who’s assertive immediately gets sort of categorized as difficult. I don’t agree, I say go ahead, be loud, make them listen to you.”
