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the new misogyny.
I used to think I was a feminist, but now I don't feel comfortable saying I am. Of course I'm for equal rights, and I'm pro-choice, and I don't think that women ever deserve/ask to be raped. But I no longer want to associate myself with the feminist movement today, because I think that the way a lot of feminism is taught to little girls - at least the way it was taught to me, as a preteen - was that feminism means the end of femininity, the elimination of men, and the usurping of masculinity. I'll explain and create three characters: Sarah, Jessica, and Katherine.
If you haven't noticed, it is no longer normal to call yourself a feminist in this world and wear skirts or dresses. That is, there is a norm against feminists wearing anything but pants. Young feminists also have certain very prescribed goals: to excel in the maths and sciences, to be sporty, to speak loudly and often in class, and while not to be anorexic, to be either thin or conservative in dress, because real feminists do not have curves, or if they do, they ought to be ashamed of them. I think that modern feminist literature teaches girls to aspire to be the idea of what a "man" is. Ironically, of course, they perpetuate their own stereotypes by insisting that the prevailing norm is that science, or sports, is masculine. Sarah was the first girl to get on the soccer team, participated in math day, wore jeans, sneakers, and ponytails and smiled brightly - everyone loved Sarah.
Not that feminists are allowed to want to be men, or even to be manly or masculine. They seem to want to live in a world where men don't exist. As in, there were never any men in the girl power books I was given. No father figures, only mothers. Occasionally in the fiction books, there were girls who wanted boyfriends and wore makeup, but these girls were always, always evil - not only that, but stupid, spoiled, and selfish, and boys never liked them. The girls that were construed as traditionally "feminine" were the bad ones, and girls and boys and adults alike were all encouraged to see these girls as whores. Jessica wore mascara and got up at nine a.m. to put it on correctly - she pierced her ears and wore hoop earrings, and she was always chasing after Tommy, the most popular boy in school - Jessica was a whore.
Feminists do, however, want to incorporate the masculine and call it their own thing - girl power, probably. Girls that can't move into the realm of the former masculine but yet don't seem to be evil or whorish become, first, useless, weak, and pathetic. These are the girls that are, above everything else, not. Katherine was not like Sarah and not like Jessica. Katherine didn't play sports, wasn't good at math, didn't want a boyfriend and didn't wear makeup. Katherine didn't speak in class and didn't smile. Katherine wasn't strong, and Katherine wasn't pretty. Katherine just wasn't. For fear of audiences empathizing with poor pathetic Katherine, however, feminists were quick to turn Katherine into a figure no girl would want to be - a bitch. It made perfect sense - with Katherine having neither Sarah's true happiness nor Jessica's shallow satisfaction, Katherine became unhappy, hateful, and resentful. Katherine was a bitch.
As the young feminist grows up, the older feminist will give her older books, books that are meant to keep her on the right path as she enters the real world, where she discovers several things: that Jessica has a boyfriend and is well-liked, that Katherine might be good at other subjects if not math, and that, well, boys and men exist. Faced with questions from the young feminist about these inconsistencies, the older feminist will show her the future.
Jessica will get pregnant at age 16 and not know who the father is. Rumor may have it that Jessica was raped, but everyone will know that Jessica was a whore, and even if she was, it was hardly surprising, and no one would pity Jessica much less believe her. Jessica will have to drop out of school to raise her baby, but her parents will kick her out, and she'll end up living in a trailer park and she'll never go to college, because she's stupid. She'll just try to find someone to marry her and take care of the baby for her, because she won't think to get a job, because Jessica doesn't like to work.
Katherine will become a drug addict in high school, start smoking, and cut her wrists. She'll go gothic or punk, she'll be sullen, and no one will ever love her. She'll graduate high school, but she'll be thrown out by her parents for being such a bad child, and she'll wander the streets spreading ill will, spitting on other people, and stealing in order to buy more drugs. She may also start spraying graffiti, and she would not object to stealing bigger things, like cars, if that would thrill her for a moment. Katherine will go to prison forever, probably for murder.
Sarah, on the other hand, will go to Harvard and double major in biochemistry and engineering. She will get an academic and athletic scholarship and she'll be an Academic All-American too. She'll graduate summa cum laude, get an internship working for her local senator, and spend her summers backpacking in the Alps with the boys. Everyone, and I mean everyone, will continue to love Sarah.
The interesting effect of the feminist categorization of teen girl roles is that every type is hated by the other two types, but because "Jessica"s are seen to be so very stupid and airheaded, the real adversaries become Sarah and Katherine, and feminists end up disliking bitches even more than whores, because bitches are an actual competitor for the perfect girl, Sarah. Not that feminists like whores either. And what, of course, do "bitches" and "whores" have in common in this world? Femininity.
Repeat the mantra: to be feminine is to be weak. to wear skirts is to be weak. to like english is to be weak. to be in choir is to be weak.
and that's why I'm not a feminist. As Madonna says, and I've probably quoted, many times, "girls can wear jeans, cut their hair short, wear shirts and boots, cuz it's okay to be a boy, but for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, because you think that being a girl is degrading." While I think Madonna was talking to men and the orthodoxy, I'm using it to talk to feminists.
and the lyric from the song, "Destroy Everything You Touch", by Ladytron, that I used in the title:
destroy everything you touch today, destroy me this way
anything that may desert you, so it cannot hurt you
I used to think I was a feminist, but now I don't feel comfortable saying I am. Of course I'm for equal rights, and I'm pro-choice, and I don't think that women ever deserve/ask to be raped. But I no longer want to associate myself with the feminist movement today, because I think that the way a lot of feminism is taught to little girls - at least the way it was taught to me, as a preteen - was that feminism means the end of femininity, the elimination of men, and the usurping of masculinity. I'll explain and create three characters: Sarah, Jessica, and Katherine.
If you haven't noticed, it is no longer normal to call yourself a feminist in this world and wear skirts or dresses. That is, there is a norm against feminists wearing anything but pants. Young feminists also have certain very prescribed goals: to excel in the maths and sciences, to be sporty, to speak loudly and often in class, and while not to be anorexic, to be either thin or conservative in dress, because real feminists do not have curves, or if they do, they ought to be ashamed of them. I think that modern feminist literature teaches girls to aspire to be the idea of what a "man" is. Ironically, of course, they perpetuate their own stereotypes by insisting that the prevailing norm is that science, or sports, is masculine. Sarah was the first girl to get on the soccer team, participated in math day, wore jeans, sneakers, and ponytails and smiled brightly - everyone loved Sarah.
Not that feminists are allowed to want to be men, or even to be manly or masculine. They seem to want to live in a world where men don't exist. As in, there were never any men in the girl power books I was given. No father figures, only mothers. Occasionally in the fiction books, there were girls who wanted boyfriends and wore makeup, but these girls were always, always evil - not only that, but stupid, spoiled, and selfish, and boys never liked them. The girls that were construed as traditionally "feminine" were the bad ones, and girls and boys and adults alike were all encouraged to see these girls as whores. Jessica wore mascara and got up at nine a.m. to put it on correctly - she pierced her ears and wore hoop earrings, and she was always chasing after Tommy, the most popular boy in school - Jessica was a whore.
Feminists do, however, want to incorporate the masculine and call it their own thing - girl power, probably. Girls that can't move into the realm of the former masculine but yet don't seem to be evil or whorish become, first, useless, weak, and pathetic. These are the girls that are, above everything else, not. Katherine was not like Sarah and not like Jessica. Katherine didn't play sports, wasn't good at math, didn't want a boyfriend and didn't wear makeup. Katherine didn't speak in class and didn't smile. Katherine wasn't strong, and Katherine wasn't pretty. Katherine just wasn't. For fear of audiences empathizing with poor pathetic Katherine, however, feminists were quick to turn Katherine into a figure no girl would want to be - a bitch. It made perfect sense - with Katherine having neither Sarah's true happiness nor Jessica's shallow satisfaction, Katherine became unhappy, hateful, and resentful. Katherine was a bitch.
As the young feminist grows up, the older feminist will give her older books, books that are meant to keep her on the right path as she enters the real world, where she discovers several things: that Jessica has a boyfriend and is well-liked, that Katherine might be good at other subjects if not math, and that, well, boys and men exist. Faced with questions from the young feminist about these inconsistencies, the older feminist will show her the future.
Jessica will get pregnant at age 16 and not know who the father is. Rumor may have it that Jessica was raped, but everyone will know that Jessica was a whore, and even if she was, it was hardly surprising, and no one would pity Jessica much less believe her. Jessica will have to drop out of school to raise her baby, but her parents will kick her out, and she'll end up living in a trailer park and she'll never go to college, because she's stupid. She'll just try to find someone to marry her and take care of the baby for her, because she won't think to get a job, because Jessica doesn't like to work.
Katherine will become a drug addict in high school, start smoking, and cut her wrists. She'll go gothic or punk, she'll be sullen, and no one will ever love her. She'll graduate high school, but she'll be thrown out by her parents for being such a bad child, and she'll wander the streets spreading ill will, spitting on other people, and stealing in order to buy more drugs. She may also start spraying graffiti, and she would not object to stealing bigger things, like cars, if that would thrill her for a moment. Katherine will go to prison forever, probably for murder.
Sarah, on the other hand, will go to Harvard and double major in biochemistry and engineering. She will get an academic and athletic scholarship and she'll be an Academic All-American too. She'll graduate summa cum laude, get an internship working for her local senator, and spend her summers backpacking in the Alps with the boys. Everyone, and I mean everyone, will continue to love Sarah.
The interesting effect of the feminist categorization of teen girl roles is that every type is hated by the other two types, but because "Jessica"s are seen to be so very stupid and airheaded, the real adversaries become Sarah and Katherine, and feminists end up disliking bitches even more than whores, because bitches are an actual competitor for the perfect girl, Sarah. Not that feminists like whores either. And what, of course, do "bitches" and "whores" have in common in this world? Femininity.
Repeat the mantra: to be feminine is to be weak. to wear skirts is to be weak. to like english is to be weak. to be in choir is to be weak.
and that's why I'm not a feminist. As Madonna says, and I've probably quoted, many times, "girls can wear jeans, cut their hair short, wear shirts and boots, cuz it's okay to be a boy, but for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, because you think that being a girl is degrading." While I think Madonna was talking to men and the orthodoxy, I'm using it to talk to feminists.
and the lyric from the song, "Destroy Everything You Touch", by Ladytron, that I used in the title:
destroy everything you touch today, destroy me this way
anything that may desert you, so it cannot hurt you
