Recently I had a talk with a teenage girl about being a woman in a male-dominated world. She’s a smart high-schooler who has a lot of questions that, although she doesn’t know it, basically boil down to “How do I live in the Patriarchy?” What should she do or not do to win social approval, or avoid rejection? When should she stand up for herself? How should she look? She’s starting to develop a good bullshit detector, especially when it comes to double standards: why boys can eat as much as they want but girls shouldn’t, why boys can get angry and yell but girls can’t. She sent me an e-mail last week fuming: “Why don’t boys have to shave their legs? They’re way hairier than us. And they should wear makeup to cover their zits too.” I tried to explain that society holds women to one standard when it comes to looks and holds men to another. And then she asked, “Yeah, but you shave your legs and wear makeup, so if you think it’s bullshit, why don’t you just quit?”
She got me there. Because I do shave my legs and wear makeup and I think it’s bullshit, and yet, I don’t plan to quit anytime soon.
Shaving and makeup are compromises I make with the Patriarchy. Also: I pierced my ears, spend hundreds of dollars on haircuts, occasionally put on a short skirt and high heels. I freely admit that I’m willing to do things that I think are silly or pointless or chauvinist in origin because I like men…a lot. I want to have sex with them, ergo I want them to find me sexy. Like it or not, the Patriarchy defines what’s sexy. Personally, I draw the line at anything that will damage or alter my body permanently, such as breast implants or too much time in high heels. Thing is, every woman’s threshold for pain or alteration is different, which means I have to constantly check myself when I want to judge women for making compromises I wouldn’t.
About that: when you feel that judge-y tingle, it might be time to re-read Rachel Hills’s excellent post “We’re All Bad Feminists, Really.” If there’s a feminist out there living an ideologically pure life who hasn’t made compromises with the Patriarchy, I have yet to meet her.
But just as all of us have personal compromises that we’re willing to make with the Big P, we also have our limits and I tried to explain that too. There are things we feel we can’t compromise on. For some women, makeup and shaving might be deal-breakers. For me, it’s letting someone make off-hand misogynist remarks or use misogynist language in front of me. Some women—including feminists who I respect—are willing to let those small remarks slide, preferring to pick other battles. Not me. This can occasionally lead to some head-butting with DaddySharper or the Brothers Sharper, who, like most men, will occasionally throw out some thoughtlessly dumbass remark or call a woman a degrading name and think that it’s no big deal. (This is your brain on Patriarchy, fellas.) The contradiction of being willing to appear as Patriarchially acceptable as possible while voicing, harpy-like, some anti-Patriarchial views is not lost on me, but that’s the way I get by in the Patriarchy.
What are the compromises you make with the Patriarchy? What are the ones you refuse to make? What would you have told my teenage friend?
I let customers call me pet names. It seems like it’s either let them do it or lose my job because I’m too abrasive. It’s even more demeaning because there’s the added bonus of I’m transgender, so not only am I being mistreated, I’m also being misgendered.
I let my dad call me his “little girl,” even though it misgenders me and feels infantilizing. I also sometimes listen to music with ridiculously misogynistic lyrics because it’s catchy and I like the beat. I’ll go see movies I know will frustrate me (few women, no women, women-as-eye-candy-only) because it’s escapism or because I’m going with someone who really wants to see the flick.
I don’t wear make-up ever (unless I’m trying to go goth) and the only pair of heels I own are only two inches and I haven’t worn them since 2004.
There are also times when I take advantage of being read as female, like yesterday — I helped a friend move, and I was the only female-bodied person helping. The guys just assumed I’d carry the lighter boxes and not help out with the furniture. I could’ve tried to make them let me help carry the couch and bed, etc., but I didn’t bother.
Sometimes I feel like if I have to get constantly misgendered and judged, I might as well take advantage of the few benefits I get from it. (Although they’re bittersweet… I’m not sore today, but neither did I take the opportunity to prove their gender assumptions wrong.)
I only wear makeup when I actively want to look attractive – so not for work, not for normal going out to pubs, only when i’m properly ‘dressing up’ – which equates to about three times a year. I do have pierced ears, but eight times, it’s never really occurred to me since growing up that it was a patriarchal thing as most of the men I hang round with have more piercings than I do.
It is all about finding the things you find acceptable and not, and then standing up for them. Sometimes you need to pick your battles, sometimes you need to keep the peace. but ultimately you’ve got to be able to sleep at night with a clear conscience.
I don’t mind pet names in context (although why, out of the four people who’ve ever been brave enough to give me any, two of them chose treacle and two chose kitten I have no idea – am I like a cat covered in molasses?) but the red mist comes down when anyone calls me good girl.
I do call people out on sexist comments, especially if they seem to be doing it unconsciously – if they’re doing it to get a rise out of me I generally ignore it. I’d rather use my energy trying to make people think about what they’re saying when they really didn’t realise, than have an argument with someone who’s just trying to wind me up.
Social approval? How much do you want it? It took a long time of me doing as I please and getting flack for it before people just accepted that I do as I please and there’s no point getting shirty with me because I don’t give a flying one. Nobody bothers me now about the ‘unacceptable’ things I do, like not drinking, not wanting to go out on NYE, not wearing makeup, etc. I needed to draw on all my innate orneriness and stubbornness when I was growing up though, not to give in. Luckily I’ve got plenty.
Avoiding rejection? For me, the people who are going to reject me for doing things I’m uncomfortable with are not the people I want to be around. I had this discussion with a friend last night – she was angsting about how to ask a dude out, wondering if he’d think she were stalkery – I said did she want to be with someone who was uncomfortable with a woman who asked a dude out? With hindsight I should have told her to go and read The Rules, and do the polar opposite of everything they suggest. It is easier said than done, especially when you’re younger, but it’s worth it.
@Becky – I think the concept of compromise in the big P is how I would have spoken with your friend. The harpy borg mind at work – FTW!
As for personal compromises – I find that I am lucky to live in a big enough city that I have found people who accept me as I am (call me on bullshit of course! coz that is what good friends do!!), and not mind so much that I don’t defuzz regularly, don’t wear make-up, am not up with the latest fashion, don’t get most MSM pop culture references, like to talk politics/ economics/ philosophy/ all those great topcis, and generally don’t engage with the big P when it comes to my physical body and brain.
However I love bad trashy television – big bang, 30 rock, gilmore girls, gossip girl anything that is so full of faff that your brain could leak out of your ear. I find after a long and hard day that this helps the relax process. However I’m not a fan of “reality tv” shows.
I play sport and try to exercise regularly, and even though I think I am healthy, I occassionally have my doubts about my body and how it looks. So even though I know that I am ok, my body is pretty cool coz I do great things with it, the big P is a slippery little sucker and can get you at a weaker moment.
I guess reality is not just what happens to you but also how you react to it. For every action there is a reaction.
My boss is an idiot macho guy. He treats me that way. But I always reply with pride. I’m sure when I’m gone working with him he won’t have changed my ways and I won’t have changed his. So for example in this situation to call it a patriarchy is not correct. He tries to make it that way, but I don’t accept it.
I don’t like to give names to things like this because then it’s like playing victim. I’m not saying women are not discriminated by their sex, they are. That’s the “action” part I was talking about. But I think to fight it (“reaction”) one must not recognize the offender, with words such as patriarchy. I want to be a person, not a woman or a man. I want my freedom to be gained as a person, not a woman in a man’s society.
Do you see my point?
PS. I don’t make any compromise with patriarchy. I just live my live according to my own internal set of morals and tastes.
But I think to fight it (“reaction”) one must not recognize the offender, with words such as patriarchy. I want to be a person, not a woman or a man. I want my freedom to be gained as a person, not a woman in a man’s society.
I get your point, Luisa, but personally, I don’t think that refusing to name the problem or pretending the problem doesn’t exist helps to solve the problem. I think it’s healthier to say “This is sexist. I see the sexist bullshit. Here’s how I’m going to deal with it.”
We ARE living in a male dominated society and we are seen not as gender-neutral people, but as women, with all the baggage that goes along with being women in a male dominated society. Pretending otherwise won’t change that, although a little pretending might help us get through the day, and might be necessary for that reason.
Luisa, I’ve thought along your lines before. I felt that I could rise above other people’s sexism by not acknowledging it. Also, my name is recognizably Hispanic and I live in the US. I thought that never affected me either.
My early formal education was in STEM fields. Maybe for me, that education focused me on small, concretely solvable problems. It took me a really long time to appreciate social science problems and contexts. Maybe you are in a similar situation.
All of this is a really long winded way of saying that the culture we all live and breath seeps into us without our even knowing it. To walk against the tide is very difficult because we can’t even see the tide. That’s the point of Becky’s question, I think. Where are the places where you just.can’t. walk against the tide.
OK anyway, here’s a cartoon that sums it up:
http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=4051
Anyhooo I made a big huge fat large compromise with the patriarchy that was almost certainly a mistake.
I started a business with my husband in his field. I was his office manager, second in command, etc. It was most definitely HIS domain. I did it because I love him and also because I had two very small children. Being my own boss let me come and go. I could attend to the kids (It was me who attended to them because you know, patriarchy? duh).
But I took a HUGE hit in my own career. Ultimately I couldn’t stand to work in his field anymore, because it was never my choice to begin with, and didn’t really fit my personality.
When I went back to my stuff, the damage to my career was mostly irreparable.
Is this weird? I’ve never thought about it, so maybe I’m applying sausage gravy to banana nut bread (get it?).
I think I’ve tried to play the “walking against the tide” game. Instead of laughing off the comments about how girls can’t run faster than boys, or men are stronger than women, I’ve kind of bulldozed my way into the middle of the stereotypes and found myself stuck (and admittedly frustrated). I’ve pushed myself really hard to “prove” that, physically, I’m just as valuable in the workplace – I am a large animal vet tech, wrangling all manner of creatures, doing heavy lifting, and enduring long hours on my feet. I love it… but I wonder if my attitude towards always feeling like I have to prove myself against The Good Old Boys Club has been more damaging for me (physically – I have rheumatoid arthritis) with not much gain.
I mean, I’m still chubby, I still run slow, my joints are shit…
*shrug*
If you’re a woman, and you choose to wear high heels, or you choose to apply makeup, or you choose to dress a certain way to be attractive to men, then that, to me anyway, is feminism. The Patriarchy loses its grip on women where they make choices for themselves and not because it is expected of them. I think if women take ownership of these choices, and let men know they have done so, that breaks some of the grip The Patriarchy has. A woman who does what she wants and isn’t afraid to let everyone know it, I think, is what a feminist truly is.
Newt, I suppose the problem with what you state is, well, how will men know that I am wearing heels for myself and not for them unless I let them know it at every available occassion? I’m all for women doing female-typed things because they honestly prefer them, like them for their own reasons or whathaveyou. The problem is that society as a whole is not going to distinguish motives from actions.
I wear a lot of makeup, for example. I don’t do this because I think a part of my face needs to be changed. I do it because I am a trained makeup artist (went to a technical arts high school) and I was trained to see makeup as a real artistic pursuit. And that is why I wear makeup often. However, do most people who see me daily know I am wearing what I consider to be an art piece on my face? No – they think I am wearing it to appear more attractive, to hide flaws, to invite attention. That to me is the problem with centering the analysis around motive.
Newt, I don’t think it’s as easy as just making “choices.” Choices are never made in some magic vacuum free of patriarchal expectations. Moreover, as Rodriguez said, a lot of the time you can’t even see the tide that is pushing you in one direction or another because you’ve been acculturated to it from day one. Simply declaring something to be a choice doesn’t loosen the patriarchal grip on women if those choices, as guided by the tide, largely correspond to what the patriarchy wants women to do/be anyways. That’s why I think it’s so important to honestly interrogate your choices. If you do so, and decide that a certain battle isn’t worth your time, or that you enjoy or need whatever privilege certain “choices” allow you to accrue in this society, then hey, do what you gotta do. What irks me is the refusal to even ask the questions or consider the possibility that your “choice,” which just happens to perfectly fit a patriarchal standard, isn’t really a feminist act.
And to be clear, making non-feminist choices doesn’t automatically brand you a bad woman or a bad feminist. Swimming against the tide can have real, detrimental consequences that not all women can shoulder (because of a lack of socio-economic power, societal or familial support, etc.) Sometimes the technically non-feminist choice is the only realistic choice. That’s life. But every time we question, I think it inches us a little further along the path, even if the choice we ultimately make prevents us from taking the big leap that we’d ideally like to take. Those inches matter.
When I was younger I worked in a male-dominated field and I definitely let crap get said that I wouldn’t stand for now because I was young and scared of losing my job or being, ha, ha, called a harpy.
After a while I gave up on putting up with that shit and didn’t lose my job surprisingly to me, so that was good.
As to the rest I don’t wear makeup because I can’t actually be arsed and I don’t shave very often because I am lazy, neither of these things are evidence of a moral stance, more of my not so inner slattern.
I do however wear heels, a fair amount, I’ve always had a weak spot for heels.
I tend to differentiate between expressing femininity and performing femininity – and it’s true that others might not see the motive, but given that everyone who is identified as a woman will be judged by the same nonsense criteria, it’s no win.
So for example, I love nail varnish. If I were a man, I imagine I’d wear nail varnish when I could. I like applying it, I like having some colour on my fingers and toes. I also like longish hair – if I were a man, I wouldn’t have my hair short. And I’d wear earrings and slightly flamboyant clothes. That stuff is self-expression, and my sense of self is of course highly influenced by culture and such, but it *feels* comfortable to me.
When I was younger, I used to wear make-up all the time, attempting the “natural” look because I had acne and felt obliged to disguise it (I quite enjoyed this F Word post last week In defense of fake beauty). Of course, I couldn’t disguise it completely and the slap made my spots worse, but I felt that I was subjecting others to disgust and revulsion if I didn’t try. I’ve had similar relationships with hair-removal, weight control and certain sorts of clothing. That stuff was all about performance.
I think feminists who forego all the trappings of femininity do so chiefly because that’s comfortable. They are expressing themselves – and of course, even they don’t get to do it in a vacuum. The concept of gender-neutral dress, hair etc. is as culturally specific as masculinity or femininity. I’m always suspicious when someone describes the way they present and cites feminism as the reason they don’t wear a bra or make-up or shave their legs. Feminism merely validates that choice and hopes for a world in which everyone feels they have that option.
I think perhaps this is what Nefarious Newt was getting at.
I wear makeup, I shave, I show off my massive (and AWESOME) cleavage and I’ll wear heels.
But you know what? I also don’t wear makeup, go months without shaving (it’s cold), wear men’s clothes and spend time in flats.
Basically I do what I want, when I want, because it makes me happy. I recognize the patriarchal components of my more “feminine” habits, but some of us really are jazzed to make pink, black, gold and green eyeshadow work all at once.
I understand the critique of NN’s post, but I agree with him in principle. (I also miss him on fb-hi, Newtie!) Feminism tells us that what matters more that we have the power to choose than what those choices are. To the extent that we fail to support the choices other women make, we let the P rule us. I don’t care if a woman is personally anti-abortion, as long as she’s pro-choice, for instance, because that tells me that she respects the choices of others.
Maybe the path we took to arrive at the many choices we have was not one we devised. But we have them and we should celebrate them, it seems to me. If we make our own choices about our dress and appearance and other people misinterpret our motives, that’s their problem. However, we’re in a time of transition, and that means that we feminists have to do some educating. We have to make the effort, at least sometimes, to clue them in. Yeah, it’s a drag to have to do that, but it will pay off for us.
We are trying to get people to do 2 huge things: first, understand that their perspective on women’s lives has not been created or shaped by women, and second, to change that perspective so that women’s choices are automatically given the same respect that men’s choices are given. In 40 years, I think we’ve made amazing progress. I believe the change will happen, if we keep up the pressure.
[...] by this post: Conversations about the patriarchy: part 1, and this one: We are all bad feminists, really, and by a conversation with Megan on Twitter [...]
[...] by this post: Conversations about the patriarchy: part 1, and this one: We are all bad feminists, really, and by a conversation with Megan on Twitter [...]
So, I typed out a really long post, but I’ve decided that it’s rude to post such long things in comments. So I started a tumblr where I put all the stuff I want to reply in comments sections of blogs but that got too long. Is it rude to post a link to that here? It might be. I’m sorry if it is.
Anyway, this is the blog post. If this is rude please tell me and I won’t do it again.
The main point is that it’s impossible to separate one’s “authentic” desires from one’s socialized desires, so considering the harm of one’s patriarchal compliance (regardless of how much you want to do it or not) is is a better metric for shit like this.
I will not compromise on sexist comments (especially rape jokes), calling myself a feminist, talking about feminism, using words like “patriarchy.” I compromise because I present as a female woman, wearing skirts and having “feminine”hair and sometimes wearing makeup.
Newt, I agree! I *choose* to wear make up a few days a week; I *choose* to wear high heels from time to time. But. I never let a sexist, racist or homophobic remark pass. I have teenagers, and just this week our entire family (myself, hubby, and 3 kids) called my son’s 15 year old friend on a remark that he claimed “I didn’t mean to be sexist”.
@mischiefmanager: thank you for stating my case more eloquently than I did. The gist of my argument was supposed to be that you can’t “fight” the patriarchy; it’s too ingrained in men for them to understand that they are part of it. It means women will have to work at showing men that the choices they make don’t necessarily involve a conscious decision to do it “for the menfolk,” that if a woman indulges in things men approve of, it is more coincidental than intentional.
It’s not going to be easy. Some men — and I include myself in this — already have an idea of it, but we’re too few in number to break the grip patriarchy has on men in general. It will take a concerted and continual effort to keep the focus on women being free to make the choices, not on the choices themselves.
And we women have to do the same thing, NN. We have to be conscious about shifting our focus to valuing what we want and need rather than automatically doing what we think others want and need. It’s not that doing so in individual instances is bad or wrong; I don’t want to sound like I’m channeling Ayn Rand. But where we are vulnerable is the presumption that our preferences and needs are not as important as those of others around us.
When a man dresses up, puts on cologne, gets a haircut, or whatever, and goes to a club, no one tells him that he’s whoring himself out. The desire to meet someone for a short or long term relationship, or just to feel good and look good, are seen as perfectly respectable, even laudable, behaviors. When it’s the same for women, we will have reached equality.
I’m a male who has decided that I’m happy with myself and don’t want a relationship. Before I get called a misogynist or whatever buzzword you like to use, it has nothing to do with women, it’s more to do with being mobily independent; For the same reason I keep very few friends.
As such, I have stop caring about trying to attract the opposite sex, and have put on weight, grown a beard and wear comfortable raggy clothes.
Funnily enough, women don’t pay me attention any more. Yet when I worked out, wore designer clothes and fastidiously groomed myself they did.
So I fail to see what the patriarchy has to do with women being forced to keep themselves to a certain aesthetic standard when the same applies to me as a male.
Perhaps I should be writing diatribes blaming the matriarchy for my woes.
@Anthony: If we lived in a matriarchial world, you could certainly write that diatribe blaming the culture of female domination for all your woes. Until then, blame the Patriarchy, since it’s the culture of male domination which dictates to men (and women) that men are not manly or worthy unless they’re powerful, rich, and muscular.
Can definitely see how women might feel a bit uncomfortable ‘dolling up’ knowing makeup was invented for men, by men etc. What about purses. When women and men are truly equal, will nobody carry a purse, or will we all carry purses do you think? I would guess, half will of both genders, and half won’t.
So this quote was an eye opener:
“When I was a student at Cambridge I remember an anthropology professor holding up a picture of a bone with 28 incisions carved in it. “This is often considered to be man’s first attempt at a calendar” she explained. She paused as we dutifully wrote this down. ‘My question to you is this – what man needs to mark 28 days? I would suggest to you that this is woman’s first attempt at a calendar.’ It was a moment that changed my life. In that second I stopped to question almost everything I had been taught about the past. How often had I overlooked women’s contributions?”
Sandi Toksvig
It’s funny how the “norm” is automatically male, not not a neutral gender. I thought the following quote summed up so much about how I (and others) think about the world.
It reminds me that in art, as well as in life, women are so often overlooked, pushed to the back (Ray Eames, Lee Miller, even in the Bible where often the women are just “so -and-so’s wife”). I am so guilty of this.
(Found the quote here)
http://ill-iterate.com/post/11913711059/when-i-was-a-student-at-cambridge-i-remember-an
I don’t like to give names to things like this because then it’s like playing victim.
Um, no. Not naming something means the problem stays nebulous instead of being clearly defined.
That might allow you to have plausible deniability when people try to make you conform…or it might just be another way to pretend to yourself that you’re exceptional, that you’re just more “rational” than the crazy feminazi man-haters. Either way, it’s just, well, trying to lie about reality.
Name names. Define. Specify. Clarify. It’s a lot easier to scoop a turd into a jar than to catch a fart in one.
[...] Sometimes it’s hard to practice what you preach. I, like Becky Sharper who authored that post, live within a set of rules which I think are utter fuckery, yet I don’t plan on changing my ways anytime soon. I wear makeup. I wear high heels. I like showing off my legs. Is this wrong? (Pursuit of Harpyness) [...]
I do not wear makeup, shave or “doll up”.
without details, this as a point of pride, if only because It is considered “counter- cultural”.
I got into alot of grief over wearing dresses- the fact that I preferred not to AND the fact that I could not wear certian types.
But this was because I was not allowed to in my conservative home. Same thing with straighteing my hair. It was seen as disrespectful to alter “god’s creation”.
As an adult, I do not wear make up becaues it IS a con to sell product in a line. I shun heels becasue they are BAD for your feet. Dresses are for “Dress up” only. Any my hair ( all over my body) stays natural because that’s the way it was meant to be.
I cant seem to find the explanation for why. I can only find elements, but never the full story.
Im sorry if this is long. Its only my view from here.