Is Mari anti-feminist?

Born in the 50s and coming of age in the 70s, Mari was influenced by the second wave of feminism.  With suffrage accomplished, this wave reached into equality within sexuality, family, workplace, reproductive rights, and standing legal inequalities regarding domestic and marital rape, custody and divorce laws. Mari sees herself as equally physically strong, capable (“able”)  and brave as Jack, willing to take risks, hitchhiking and adventuring, and bucking societal norms.

But Mari in Sidetracked, and others in her generation, struggled within relationship an in the workplace to find room for women’s ideas and innovations. She was constantly elbowing out space for herself and what she believed in. Was Mari anti-feminist, as in opposition to some forms of feminism, in that she gave up her education to hitchhike with Jack? 

She and Jack struggle with what we now know is structural injustice in relationship, and in later episodes of Sidetracked, within the workplace and society.  Upcoming are the episodes of Mari when she works in the corporate environment and encounters more structural injustices.

Yet both Mari and Jack also fall under the umbrellas of the white, privileged, heterosexual, and in Jack’s case, male, oppressive identities.

These are great discussion topics around this film for viewers. Film premier projected for September 2021.