I have spent far too much time removed from the company of mid-west middle-aged women in the last few years. In no way do I mean that I ought to fully immerse myself in that culture, but rather that my tolerance, my immunity to such prattle, is far below the standards required for prolonged social encounters.
I want to be clear: I am not referring to every middle-aged woman living in the mid-west. I am referring to a very specific set of creatures that I have encountered in abundance during my recent and extended experiences in the mid-west. They have all happened with women of a certain age (middle), with a certain family situation (in a heterosexual marriage with somewhat-grown children), and some sort of job (varies from part-time to full and from unskilled to highly degreed). For these reasons I have lumped together a group in my mind, though to be fair, this group is not exclusive and could include any variety of self-hating people from anywhere.
I have had lunch with a group of these women all week, and the number of times we have discussed dieting makes me want to rush out and buy all of them a copy of Kate Harding’s Lessons from the Fatosphere . If I weren’t absolutely broke (and absolutely a chicken) then I might do just that. Instead, I made a few unnoticed comments about eating what one wanted in balance and left the rest of the conversation to those who preferred its repetitive tracks.
I felt supremely uncomfortable in these conversations. Uncomfortable and quite agitated. In the most recent years of my life I have cultivated my group of friends and urban family rather specifically. I have surrounded myself (and been surrounded by) those who seek to be at peace with themselves- their bodies, their emotions, their place in the world. I have grown so accustomed to the concepts of Fat Acceptance, Self-Love, Feminism, Trans-Alliances, and general acceptance that it is jarring to sit like a sponge in their blatant self-hatred.
Is self-hatred too harsh a term? Perhaps it sounds a bit sharp on the tongue, or maybe it sounds self-righteous. It’s easy to fall into a self-righteous dynamic in these situations, and though I can’t claim complete innocence of that particular quality, I’d like to ignore it for this moment, because the issues at root here are bigger than my predilection toward pretension.
What these women do to themselves on a daily basis is a slow but potent form of self hatred. I remember what it was like when I was on a perpetual diet. The constancy of my self-dissatisfaction and self-shaming along with my utter lack of balance and nutrition were the only things constant about those behaviors. So much of my energy was sapped by my blatant inability to love myself for all of me, to accept my thighs and my stomach and the wrinkles that developed as a result of my fleshy curves. I am appalled when I think of all the things I could have accomplished with that lost energy (literally years robbed by shame) I am deeply saddened and angered. And those feelings are inexpressibly magnified when I consider the collective creative and intellectual prowess that is being spent on belly-shame. There is no question that this self-hatred, a perpetual and derisive self-hatred.
It doesn’t end with the dieting, either. After lunch one day one of the above women was talking to her husband on the phone in front of me. The end of the conversation was annoying to her. It seemed to me that her husband was expressing some insecurity, and when the call ended, she shook her head and said to me, “He’s worse than a woman.”
She made this statement with such general disgust. I was mortified. I have since been told that “worse than a woman” is a saying that plenty of women use as a description often enough, but I could not recollect its ever having been used around me. Think about the implications of a woman describing a man as “worse than a woman”. Does that mean that men are, by definition, better than women? That her annoyance was the result of her husband’s departure from the status quo? That it is unacceptable for a man to reach so low as to be worse than a woman?
Does she realize that she is a woman, and that by invoking such a misogynistic phrase she is putting herself down? Or does she see herself as an individual and not part of the group ‘women’, so that her condemnation of femininity is not as potent a form of self-hatred? I don’t know, and I doubt that she’s ever stopped to question that colloquialism.
Of course at the root of such a statement is the basis of sexism and one of the greatest disservices our culture does us. This statement further defines and separates the concepts of man and woman. Two separate entities, they are, with the ability to be ranked (man always above woman, with all the associations of the ever-cliché missionary position). I would even say there is a cultural obligation to rank them. Male and Female, so definitively different. To be male is Supremely Superior, but to be a male who traverses the definite lines of separation is abominable . No man can express the feminine and continue to be better than the feminine. We must uphold our system of superiority!!
What a corrosive concept to perpetuate. It seeps into everything in our culture until you don’t even realize what you’re saying. Until you find yourself berating your male sons for crying over a scraped knee. Or giving your teenaged daughter a talking to about how ‘nice girls’ don’t talk like that. Or you start putting your husband down by saying that he is worse than a woman.
Women are bad because they have no choice but to express their femininity(?), but a man, a Supremely Superior being, who indulges in expressing parts of his femininity is by far worse. After all, he has a choice, right? Supposedly to choose to embrace a male's femininity is just plain stupid and shameful. This is the lesson we are taught so deftly that we can not even distinguish the moment it begins.
This type of thinking is always subconscious, which is why it is so insidious. It infects so rapidly, because we spread the contagions without ever thinking about it. I don’t know how to engage this woman in an examination of internalized misogyny. I don’t even think it’s my place to do so. I can only be present, live my life as it is, take whatever lesson I’m supposed to absorb and pass it along.
And perhaps next time I will feel a little braver. Perhaps I will ask what she means when she says that her husband is worse than a woman.
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That was a great post. I live in the Mid-west, and I am middle aged. What you say rings true. I'm just glad that I did not grow up here; it gives me perspective that many of my friends lack. This is a sad, terrible, and lonely place to live. If anyone deviates an iota from the normative heterosexual monogamy that results in biological offspring and shows signs of failure in any other way (inferior house, car, highlights in hair, etc.), that person is made to feel terrible about it. Oh, and if you are not a Christian who belongs to a church, you can also forget about having a social life. The list of "shoulds" is miles long and deeply etched. I partially read this experience, in addition to how you do as self hatred, as being purposed for one event in life-- motherhood, repeated as often as desired. These regulations that Mid-western women tend to impose on themselves and each other seem to be attempts to assert themselves as being more than reproductive units, but everywhere they look, the message is the same-- "You're a mommy or you are erased. If you want a 'career,' then it comes second."
It really depends where in the Midwest you live. The Minneapolis/St. Paul area, for example, is fairly progressive because of the diversity of people who live and work there (college students, professionals,fairly large GLBT community, etc). But, I do agree that in general, the Midwest mindset is about the "perfect family". The ultimate goal, or so it seems, is for folks to get hitched and make babies - and it can suck for those, including myself, who do not fit that mold.
You started the gears in my head moving. By taking your blog apart, putting certain parts of it together in another way, it creates this picture of patriarchy that is astonishingly accurate. I think even though this wasn't in the order that I'd list things you have essentially given us a message about every single thing the patriarchy does. We can take the messages you have put across, make them main branches from the evil tree of patriarchy, and branch every other problem that we face directly from this. I don't know if this is just a severe manifestation of how the patriarchy has infiltrated and remained after the fifties (because this sounds like the fifties ideology here) or if it is a new uprising of it that will turn around and sweep over the entire country. I hope that it is the former, because we can slowly take that and beat it until it is gone. However, if this is the start of a trend that is going to pick up (because yes things are bad everwhere in the country but from what it seems the midwest is worse than everywhere's else, except the south but that is another problem all together,) we are in serious trouble. I don't think we have the capabilities to rise up against this anymore. We have brought in the "new" kind of feminist fighting which involves writing letters, call me old fashioned but I'd like to know what we really have gotten done by letter writing. I don't think that letter writing is going to do anything if we return to the way it was in the fifties. And yes this is fear reaction, but I would rather overreact to misogeny than underreact and have to start all over again. I think that we are headed towards that if this is a new trend, and I think we need to do something to stop it.
"Does that mean that men are, by definition, better than women? That her annoyance was the result of her husband’s departure from the status quo? That it is unacceptable for a man to reach so low as to be worse than a woman?"
I think you're right. I liked your post, because it also reminded me about something else that I've been thinking lately, something that kind of gets annoying to me that I think is going on in your experience as well. I feel like a lot of the women I know, who are starting to be in their 30s, are interested in empowering women, but I feel like their way of empowering women is to focus on what they make out to be some innate nature of women to be dissatisfied with themselves. They seem to bond with each other over this quality of judging themselves harshly, and it seems like the conclusion ends with individual women gaining the courage to overcome their inner nature of being judgmental toward themselves. It kind of drives me crazy, because this is NOT how women just ARE! Everyone gets down on themselves sometimes, men included (and they should be allowed to), but if it's more common with women, then there are a lot of societal reasons, and it's not something that should be dealt with on an individual basis, in my opinion. To me, the better solution is to get outwardly angry rather than this inner introspection about how to overcome our own selves.
Now, I applaud your sentiment. Deconstructing sexism's pernicious influence and exploring internalized misogyny--that's great work. Kudos to you.
However, I'm taking issue with some of the language in your post. In short, you're being incredibly classist and showing your privilege in the worst way. As you actually wrote "predeliction toward pretension," I think you might be aware of this. Yet, instead of stopping and maybe rethinking your thesis or your approach, you throw in some weak pandering stuff about "oh, I don't mean EVERY woman in the Midwest, just [insert housefrau stereotype here]" and "yeah, I know I can sometimes be pretentious." That doesn't cut it, sister.
Check your privilege and maybe think that these women are human beings that deserve your understanding, compassion, and maybe (if you deign to enlighten them) some of your knowledge.
"Check you priviledge" sounds pretty pretentious,too.
Oops, should be privilege.......
"In short, you're being incredibly classist and showing your privilege in the worst way."
-In case you find it interesting, the women I was referring to share the class that I was born with. In fact, most of them have more education than me and greater economic stability. At no point in time did I suggest that classism was part of this equation, and though I'm sure that classism infects just about every human interaction, I find it quite interesting that you would immediately assume it was the major mitigating factor in this case. I do not agree.
"you throw in some weak pandering stuff about "oh, I don't mean EVERY woman in the Midwest, just [insert housefrau stereotype here]" and "yeah, I know I can sometimes be pretentious." That doesn't cut it, sister.
-I think your estimation of my entire paragraph explaining the parameters for my experience as 'weak' and 'pandering' is unfair. I did not slip in a random sentence that was half-worked and slimy. I did not shy away from taking ownership of my perspective. I devoted the second paragraph, in its entirety, to explaining the specifics of this situation. I was neither pandering nor excusing myself, nor was I making an absolute statement. I was, however, using a specific experience as a jumping point to discuss an endemic problem. I believe this is an excellent way to learn more about oneself and the world. This is why I owned up to my 'predilection to pretension' and further explained that I wasn't going to spend this post exploring that. Because this post was not about those women in specific. This post is about self-hatred on a greater, sub-conscious scale. This post is about examining the philosophy behind our culture, and my experience with these women helped clarify some of my thoughts.
"Check your privilege and maybe think that these women are human beings that deserve your understanding, compassion, and maybe (if you deign to enlighten them) some of your knowledge."
-I think that you are perhaps projecting some of your own experiences here. I have re-read this a number of times, and I don't think that at any point did I treat these women as anything less than human beings. In fact, the point of this discussion was the disservice that our culture has done and continues to do to these women, myself, and you. It seems likely to me that you have perhaps encountered other experiences that you are associating with what I have to say, and thus making assumptions about my underlying motives or who I am as a person. If you read the words I wrote, I think it's pretty clear that I view these women as human beings.
Also, in case you're not aware, you might want to read through your comment again. As you stated, your main problem with my post was with my choice of language. That my words were "privileged", "pandering", "weak", (dehumanizing), and "classist". The words you have chosen to address me have not been very kind. That I would have to 'deign to enlighten' these women is incredibly rude and presumptive about who I am and how I interact with others. It also made me feel immediately offended, and thus defensive. If you want someone to hear what you have to say, I recommend approaching with a bit more compassion, especially if that's what you are asking of them.
Well....I must admit to having used the comment "worse than a woman" to my ex boyfriend when he made us late (I was at his house and ready to leave) for a concert because he was acting insecure and tried on 10 outfits and complained about how they all made him look and kept asking me how they looked and then took another 30 min to fix his hair. I don't think I have hate for other women or myself but I can see how the comment would be interpreted as that. I don't think there is something innate to women that makes them care more about how they look or more insecure, or take longer to "get ready", etc. (As I stated, I was ready to go and wore the first thing I threw on). I also did not mean that all women take forever to get ready to go out. Upon refection I believe that what I meant was that he is acting as though he is the "stereotypical woman" that society shows us. I also resent a lot of the pressures I have on myself as a female to always look beautiful and I meant that he was acting like as a male he has those same pressures when he actually doesn't. (Though perhaps I was being a little too harsh cause he must have some kind of perceived pressure to be acting that way). Anyways, sometimes I feel like there are women who totally buy into the whole "this is how a woman should behave" bit (such as maybe the women you describe) and then there are the women that I love who blow the stereotypes to shreds. When I compared my ex to a woman I was comparing him to the first type. There are some women who totally conform to what the media and society tells them they should be and seem to buy into it and sometimes I am around so many of those women only that I start to think that I don't like women (and then wonder how I can call myself a feminist and become very concerned) until I realize, no, I just don't care for women who act and think in those ways and remind myself of all the cool women I have known. Really, what I don't care for is women or men who strictly conform to gender stereotypes.
Oh, also wanted to point out that forms of self hate like complaining about weight or hair or whatever....have been taught to women as ways to bond. It isn't limited to the women in the segments of population you describe, either. I live in the East and see it all over, in old ladies, young mothers, young single women, teenagers, etc. Most of these women probably saw their mothers do it. They were taught either by people in their life or the media not to be proud but instead to be insecure and constantly looking to improve how they look. They were taught these things should be their focus so naturally that is what they talk about and they probably also do it out of habit now. It is also illustrated and modeled culturally (Those Baked snack commercials from I believe, Lays, and the tampon ads about not going to the beach because of "bloat" come to mind but there are countless others) For some women it is a reassurance that the other woman has her own insecurities and is not judging her and that they are all "in the same boat" with their struggles. (However, they haven't realized that their bodies are not the problem-culture is [or they are choosing to try to conform anyway]) Maybe if they feel bad enough about themselves they think voicing it to others will help. Of course it is not healthy or beneficial in the way that these women are doing it. I think if women got together and bonded in a positive, strong motivational way over issues it would create change and scare a lot of people and perhaps harm the beauty and weight loss industries. I know how frustrating being around women like that can be and it really can start to take a toll on you. One of the things that helped me get over my ED was making new friends who didn't complain about their bodies (much) and didn't have unhealthy eating habits.
Very interesting read.
I picked out a few of your comments that struck me as being a little harsh on the women.
"[...] it is jarring to sit like a sponge in their blatant self-hatred."
Even though you do ask yourself if the term 'self-hatred' is a little harsh, you do seem to believe that these women do not like themselves.
So? If they are indeed overweight - and you give no information on that point - then I would say that trying to do something about it rather to be applauded than frowned upon.
Not all could do something, and not all will actually do anything about it, but I am appalled at the present acceptance of 'anything goes' - mainly because it suggests that we are not masters of our destiny. By encouraging all sorts of 'acceptance', we are removing people's will to get a grip on their lives.
(Rant over on that point. Please accept that this argument should not be taken to extremes.)
On the 'worse than a woman' part, now. You are being oversensitive, and drawing conclusions too far from a fairly innocuous remark.
I won't go into a long discourse. Just a question: if a man had said 'she is worse than a man', would you have written so much on men being inferior to women? That he was putting himself down? On his self-hatred?
I'd venture that you would not. Why?
"By encouraging all sorts of 'acceptance', we are removing people's will to get a grip on their lives."
I'm sorry, what? Are you including "fat acceptance" in that blanket statement? Because that would be unwise.
(SIGH) YES, I'd find it weird if a man said "worse than a man". But we never hear that, do we? What she heard was "worse than a woman" and then she was informed that this was a common expression. So no, I don't think it's "oversensitive" to want to question why that is.
Yes, I would find plenty to discuss about the hypothetical comment "she's worse than a man". Have you ever heard this comment?
However, I put forth that a major reason one would not hear this comment often has to do with the fact that it is inherently assumed that women are worse than men.
Unless, of course, the comment was with regards to cleanliness. I could absolutely imagine this comment being made about a woman who lived in a state of great disorder and with a gross lack of cleanliness. In which case, this still does not redeem the concept of the statement. A woman is only better than a man at cleaning??