Tell me about it, Svetlana. Women are so powerful they hide it deliberately by getting paid 80 cents on the dollar for the same work men do? That’s a very clever way to hide that women are in control. But, wait, I found one:

Mary: Hello? Yes?

Me: So why do you work for 80 cents on the dollar.

Mary: Don’t tell any women I said this, especially not conservative women who dislike feminists and side with men who call them feminazis, but I’m doing my part, working the same # of hours and the same kind of job as those men over there — but for 80 cents on the dollar — so we can remain in power!

Me: In power?

Mary: Yes, women run everything.

Me: Then why is health care so slanted away from treating women’s pain issues?

Mary: Part of the conspiracy. If we got equality in medical treatment, then the feminists would think we were in power. We are, but we want it to be a secret from the progressives who “control the narrative.”

Me: “Control the narrative”? Who said that?

Mary: One of our secret leaders: Svetlana on Medium. She said feminists control the narrative, but we hold the power.

Me: But why aren’t you leading the boards of companies? Why are you disproportionately the victims of sexual assault and domestic violence? Why are you 51% of the population but 21% of the Senate? Why? I just don’t get it!

Mary: Because we want to hide how much we are in power. We hide how much power women have by relinquishing all visible forms of power that anyone can imagine and by claiming feminists control the narrative.

Me: I get it. You and Svetlana are uber women who are smarter than feminists. Feminists still think equality is needed, but they’re dumb, right? Since you have all the power, you don’t need equality in jobs, in government, in health care, in religious leadership, in the journalist jobs…

Mary: Right! If we had an even number of women journalists and editors in high positions, they’d be onto us, and we would no longer hold power. As long as feminists control the narrative by whining about not having equality, men will think men have the power, when women have all the power.

Me: Wait, I thought you set it up so that feminists control the narrative. You’re saying they do when most of the journalists and heads of media outlets and editors are male. How can that be?

Mary: Because just like we’re a secret conspiracy of women who hold all the power, just not any visible or tangible or measurable form of power in government, in business, in anything, there is a secret conspiracy among male board members, among male journalists, and among male government officials to grant feminists the narrative, even when feminists are grossly underrepresented among their ranks.

Me: These secret conspiracies don’t make much sense to me.

Mary: Ah, but they should. If things were as they appear to be, as can be measured by #s of people in power [business, government, etc], then Svetlana and I wouldn’t be able to exhibit what uber brains we are — decoding the undercurrent to demonstrate how powerful women are by relinquishing all forms of tangible and visible and active power in business and government.

I guess I don’t get it, Svetlana. I cede to your superior intellect. In the meantime, observing what I observe, I’m just going to try to make sure women get equal representation among seats of power because I’m a simpleton that way.