I think I've figured out the source of most of society's ills, including many pertaining to feminism.
When I was very little, I went through a phase of only wearing dresses and skirts because I was afraid people would think I was a boy. Later, I went through a "not-girl" phase of shunning dresses, pink, etc.
Did any of you go through something like this?
It seems to me that much of the angst around us revolves around ourselves and the manipulative forces around us decided what we aren't . Women and feminists go nuts trying to not be the good girl, the bad girl, the made up woman, or the unshaven makeupless woman. Are we really being a certain way, or are we just in a state of avoiding another label?
(On another note, are women ever beautiful or thin, or just not-ugly or not-fat?)
In the world of men, men want to be manly, but what is manly, other than not female and not gay? If women claim the right to art, intelligence, intellectualism, and power, then that makes men dense, stupid, uneducated, and impotent, because masculinity is "not-femininity."
If women keep themselves up, then men don't take care of themselves at all. It seems the "not-gay" element has exacerbated this so that being unhealthy and "letting it hang" is held up on a pedestal as a paragon of manliness (whatever happened to the centuries upon centuries of flamboyant men's fashion?). Men pride themselves on this state of nature having taken its course whenthey let themselves go. When it comes to personalities, they pride themselves on being insensitive and dense (whatever happened to the men throughout history who wrote love poems?).
When women do this, even if they take care of their health, they are not "feminine," because femininity, the state of being female, is that high maintenance state. Therefore, without the makeup, the shaving, the clothes, and the constant touchups, a woman isn't a woman. Consider that ad posted to the regular blog a while back for the skin cream, the one that defined "being a woman" as having attractive, soft, maintained skin, the kind that's marred by... the wear and tear of married life.
... oh, yeah. And then there's our good friend Virgin/Whore. Talk about states of not-being. A virgin is someone in the state of not having had sex. Consider how little that says about someone and how quickly that changes! The sin of not being a virgin isn't that you "are" something, but that you "aren't" something. I wonder if this ties into how easy it is to ignore every other aspect of a woman's life when she loses her virginity, since the most important thing about her was not an "is" but "isn't," or rather a "hasn't."
(Women are fighting for the right to "Be!")
So, if you're not a virgin, you must be a wild, girls-gone-wild, rampant, diseased whore! If you're virgin, or you're not being a sex object, then you must be an overreligious prude with a chastity ring with no sexual side! What if you had sex and don't want to again until marriage? Well, if you simply regret it the rest of your life, you'll not be a wild sexy tramp, and that's good enough.
Think about "Traditional Marriage." Never mind that there have been many, changing traditions and that traditions that never change are dead. Is it really "marriage is between one man and one woman" or "marriage is not between two people of the same sex?" I think that, deep down, there's a fear that if the "not us" becomes "us" then "we" are going to have to change, because "we" are not "them." Since gay people aren't straight people, if gay people marry, then straight people's marriages will change because straight people are so different from gay people. It's not about saving marriage, but remaining secure in one's label, which is defined as being the opposite of something else.
Consider race relations and all the "you can't do this if you're___" implications, as well as the idea that you're betraying your race if you're not upholding the "not ____" status.
The political scene runs on not being associated with certain people or qualitites. Groups pick names and mission statements just so that their opponents can be framed as "not us" and "not general concept" instead of letting their specific goals and agendas stand on their own. Do you really want to be caught arguing against something with a wholesome name describing a general, positive concept? How often have you seen, instead of a specific grievance, a reminder of "not us-ness" brought up? Can Red states and Blue states even talk to or about each other without treating the other like some sort of evil/stupid sub-human with absolutely nothing in common?
It is important to discriminate and identify things. However, we can drive ourselves bananas when we take, reject, and maintain labels. When you give something a name, you limit what it can do and be. Consider all we could be if we decided to recognize when we're limiting ourselves with labels and "opposite" labels.
So, I want you all to keep an eye out for when you or people you observe are screwing themselves over by trying to be the opposite of something. Free yourself!
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oddly, i went through both of those childhood phases. i don't think i consciously thought about being afraid to be mistaken for a boy, but i ONLY wore dresses and skirts for about a year and then wouldn't wear them at all after that for quite a while.
Wow - this post is incredibly philosophical. Sounds like someone likes logic :)
For the first question, I was very boyish as a little girl (8-13), meaning that I cut my hair short, wore boys' clothes, that sort of thing. However, after I became mistaken as a boy too many times, I grew my hair out a little and began wearing makeup. Now I'm just *being*, whether it means I'm wearing masculine or feminine clothing.
Your take on marriage definitely gave me food for thought. I don't think that people are so afraid that their labels are going to change as they are of having their religious ceremony "tainted".
I also think we eventually becomes ourselves by finding out who we don't want to be. Consider dating - why do most people date several people before they find that special someone? The people you date beforehand all represent characteristics you aren't interested in (you also find out some things that you do like!). The same can go for other areas of our lives.
As a feminist, I've found that picking and choosing between the two extremes of femininity ("high maintenance" and the unshaven Amazon woman) has helped me find who I am and become comfortable with that. (It's like a multiple choice test - you find the right answer through omitting wrong answers).
This post was great.
True. Many people pay for lavish church ceremonies out of a huge expectation of what marriage "is" and is supposed to be. There are so many rituals and dos and don'ts, and on top of that there are the dinners and barbecues and what have you. No wonder people don't want anything about that to change. It's stressful enough just keeping it up! "The most important day of your life," one ad for a reception hall says. I think what most people don't realize is that unless the change happens within themselves, even after the ceremony, they will still be boyfriend/girlfriend instead of husband/wife. It's why I don't place that much value only having sex after marriage--after marriage, most people are still the same boyfriend/girlfriend idiots they were before, but now they have a piece of paper.
How many people just get the cheap City Hall marriage? My parents did, before their "proper" church wedding to satisfy relatives (and even that was in a tiny chapel). That ceremony only lasts a few minutes, and doesn't involve special outfits. You know, in a number of countries, the City Hall service is a prerequisite for a church wedding. I wonder if it changes how people treat marriage...
(Maybe this deserves a new post XD)
And a postmodernist would point out that all of this is based on false binary distinctions. For example, our culture encourages us to think in terms of "masculine" and "feminine" as discrete categories when in fact nobody fits into either category. Think of every person you know. All of them have at least some characteristics that are thought to belong to the other gender. So in fact everyone exists on this continuum and nobody (in the real world) is truly "masculine" or "feminine." Sure we have these types represented in movies and TV shows, but they're just caricatures, and not all that believable. Kate Bornstein has some great material about the ridiculous binary thinking of our culture.