Today is the tenth anniversary of NOW’s Love Your Body Day. I had a bunch of stuff I wanted to say on the subject, but I’m busy editing my novella, so I will share this essay I wrote for another website:
Role Models
A lesson in humility is walking down the street with a much younger and much thinner woman and feeling practically invisible as men of all ages stare at her. Thankfully, my ego can take it, but I can’t help but feel sorry for those men because they’re missing out on so much. No-- not me-- I’m not interested, but there is a veritable banquet of older women— radiant, passionate, sensual older women— just waiting to be sampled. Actually, I doubt they’re waiting for anything. Women of a certain age tend to take what they want without waiting for someone to give them permission.
On several occasions at the coffee shop where I go to write, I’ve noticed two older women in particular. The first is in her mid-sixties, a plump woman with ample curves that suggest fertility even though she is long past her childbearing years. Her hair is a shock of white, pinned back from her face. Long strands of that white hair often slip their confines to trail down her wrinkled cheeks. Her eyes crinkle when she smiles, as does her mouth. If I had to guess, I’d say she smiles a lot. Her waist is thick, probably in part from the rich desserts she orders with her black coffee. She wears clothes that border on frumpy, yet there is always something about her outfit that suggests a sensuality most people wouldn’t notice at first glance. Her skirts come below her knees, but she doesn’t wear stockings and her shoes are open-toed sandals that reveal a fresh pedicure. Her blouses are conservative, high-buttoned and in neutral colors, yet they’re often unbuttoned enough to reveal a hint of cleavage or a wayward bra strap in some not-so-neutral color as turquoise or hot pink. There is something about her smile-- playful, almost secretive, that makes me think she’s a satisfied woman—in all ways.
The other woman is younger than the first, probably mid-to-late fifties. Her hair is a dramatic shade of strawberry blonde, falling below her shoulders. The only makeup she ever wears is lipstick—some glossy shade of dark pink so that her hair and her lips are the first things you notice. She’s slightly thinner than the first woman, but the extra pounds she carries don’t weigh her down.. She often wears flowy, calf-length sundresses, sleeveless but with a high neck. They’re brightly colored, unlike the first woman’s wardrobe, but not what I’d call sexy. The last time I saw her, however, she revealed a lot of leg when she sat down because of the thigh-high slit running up the side of her purple dress. She didn’t pull and tug at the fabric to cover what she’d bared. In fact, she always seems very comfortable in her own skin— and in revealing it. Like the first woman, she smiles a lot and her laughter is that easy, quiet laugh of someone who is at peace with herself. She’s American (or, at least has no discernible accent), but on two occasions I’ve heard snippets of her cell phone calls—one was in Spanish, the other in French.
These two women captivate me. There is something about them, some intangible quality so rarely seen in women of any age. Though they bear the wrinkles and spots and sags and pounds of age, they seem ageless. I wonder what has made them that way, what experiences and philosophies they have embraced in order to be so at ease with themselves. I wonder if they’ve always been this way or if they grew into it. So many women seem to be in a constant state of perpetual unease, uncomfortable in their own bodies and hiding from the world beneath baggy clothes and hunched shoulders. Not these two women. They have a presence about them that makes them impossible to ignore. They are luscious, vibrant women and they know it. Maybe that’s what makes them seem so much more alive than other women— they know, and love, who they are.
Spending fifteen minutes watching women like this is so much more valuable than reading women’s magazines with airbrushed covers and diet articles. This is something I can aspire to be. This is something I want to be.
One last thing relating to body image: this educational Illustrated BMI Categories photo set by Kate Harding provides an interesting visual for those terms society deems ugly, non-sexual and unhealthy. Do the terms “morbidly obese” and “triathlete” belong in the same description? Apparently, they do.
My friend Amy posted the following in the comments section of my Gloria Steinem post and her thoughts bear repeating:
Sexism starts early… I never thought twice about scheduling my son’s first playdate in our new town with a little girl. It seemed perfect: Everett was three weeks old and Aaron was 19 months while my friend’s two girls were aged 6 weeks and 24 months! And it was perfect. Aaron and his new best friend got along fabulously. She kick-started his verbal skills while they both learned to share. And suddenly he became interested in toilet training! It was with surprise that I realized that many mothers only schedule same-sex playdates for their sons. Not that there isn’t a time and place for boys only events (as well as girls only activities), but to never have played alongside girls??? How are these kids supposed to get along with each other in the workplace later in life if they have never learned how to play together? Plus they learn from each other, even at an early age. In a roomful of two year old boys (my son included), you generally do not hear even two words strung together… If a child speaks it is to an adult and usually in reference to a snack! Add a few girls and everyone starts talking. Aaron has a fabulous vocabulary for a little tyke, but he doesn’t use it playing with just boys. So it’s clear to me that little boys have a lot to learn from little girls. I’m sure it goes the other way around too, but then again, maybe girls really are superior in every way (hee hee).
I think Amy makes an excellent point-- sexism is learned behavior, much like any kind of discrimination, including racism and homophobia. People tell their children they can be anything they want-- then they limit them, and allow others to limit them, by gendering everything from color to clothing to toys to playground activities.
Every mother who stands in the toy aisle of a store and says to her daughter, “What little girl doesn’t like crafts?” and every father who says, “No son of mine is going to play with dolls.” are teaching their children about the world in which we live-- and it’s not a pretty lesson. Of course, it’s a lesson that will be repeated, over and over again, throughout their childhood. By the time they reach elementary school, they’ll know the rules and their assigned roles. Resistance is futile: that was the lesson they were taught when they were six and wanted to do something only the opposite gender can do. Equality does not exist and all you have to do is turn on the television to prove it. Who is mopping the floor in the floor wax commercial? Who is eating the “Hungry Man” dinner? ("Hungry Woman” dinner just sounds silly. Women aren’t allowed to be hungry, after all.) Who is selling the newest diet craze? Who is promoting the latest technological gadget?
So what’s a parent to do? Be aware of sexism, especially subtle sexism-- it’s the most insidious. Question everything, including yourself-- why do you feel this way or that way about what interests your child? Consider what it means-- and what you’re teaching your children-- when you call your infant son a “little man” but call your infant daughter “daddy’s girl.” Words are powerful things. Even words meant to compliment can leave a lingering (and stinging) mark of sexism, discrimination and limitation long before school even starts.
Angel. Cupcake. Diva. Princess. Babydoll. I’ve seen these words on clothing for infant girls. Last weekend I saw a teenage girl (and she was barely a teenager, at that) wearing a T-shirt that said: “Love sucks. True love swallows.” Is it silly to make a connection between a pink onesie that says “Heartbreaker” and a pair of short-shorts worn by a fourth-grader that say “Juicy” and a T-shirt that promotes the oral sex skills of an underage teenage girl? I don’t think it is. One follows the other as naturally as a boy who is taught not to cry (and is spanked if he does) will find some other way to vent his emotions-- and perhaps someone smaller and weaker to vent them on.
The gender discrimination boys face seems similar in some ways to the discrimination girls endure: No pink clothes. No silky pajamas. Absolutely no dolls. No Betty Crocker Easy Bake Oven. No ballet lessons. No diary, journal or self-expression of any kind (including art, unless it’s for a school project). No reading, unless it’s comic books or sports magazines. No crying, under any circumstances except a funeral. When it comes to clothes, boys may have more limitations on color, fabric and decoration than girls. Girls may wear blue as well as pink, denim as well as satin, but never the reverse; girls may get away with a cute little fire engine on their shirt but boys are never allowed to have a kitten on theirs. When they’re babies, boys’ clothes have trucks and cars and footballs on them. When they’re in middle school and high school, their clothes are emblazoned with stripes and numbers and sports teams.
However, the clothing limitations placed on boys at least allow more range of motion, more modesty, more comfort than girls are ever given. Girls in elementary school are teetering around on wedge lace-up sandals while the most uncomfortable pair of shoes a boy ever puts on might be the dress shoes he wears to church, if he’s made to dress up at all. Where girls’ clothes are cut to define the body and accentuate the feminine, boys’ clothes are non-constricting and accentuate (or increase) their physical size. The message is this: Girls are mere decoration, boys are a presence to be reckoned with. Girls (regardless of age) are labeled with descriptive words, as if merchandise for male consumption. Boys are dressed for their own comfort and pleasure, no one else’s. The teenage girl in the provocative T-shirt probably thought she was being brave, daring, maybe even shocking, but she was simply filling the gender role that was assigned to her the first time someone said, “Isn’t she precious? I bet she grows up to be homecoming queen!”
A homecoming queen who swallows. What more could a girl want to be?
Gloria Steinem rocked the house last night. I drove home in a daze, mesmerized by her words. I’m still mesmerized. The woman influenced my whole way of thinking when I was a teenager/young adult-- or maybe she simply reinforced ideas that I believed were true but weren’t validated by the adults in my life-- so to be in the same room with her and hear her say all those things I’ve read for the past twenty-something years was incredible. As I listened to her, I wished everyone I knew was in the audience, especially the young women who don’t know who Gloria Steinem is (and don’t think women’s rights are an issue anymore) and the parents who don’t understand how their own ingrained sexist attitudes are affecting their daughters-- and sons.
Scholars, Witches and Other Freedom Fighters is a transcript of a speech Gloria gave at Salem State College in 1993. It’s a little dated, but I like the title and her message hasn’t changed. What’s funny is that she opened last night’s speech in a similar way-- “Thanks for coming out and taking a chance on a stranger.” Stranger? No… long lost mother.
Addendum:
I hunted around and found Sex and the Feminist Revolution, a recording of a speech Gloria made at Indiana University in 2003. It’s the next best thing to hearing her in person.
March is National Women’s History Month and it’s also the 30th anniversary of the Women’s Center at Old Dominion University and the Women’s Center has scheduled an eclectic array of feminists to celebrate both. Here’s where I’ll be in the coming weeks (along with some quotes):
Margaret Cho, March 16:
“I am so beautiful, sometimes people weep when they see me. And it has nothing to do with what I look like really, it is just that I gave myself the power to say that I am beautiful, and if I could do that, maybe there is hope for them too. And the great divide between the beautiful and the ugly will cease to be. Because we are all what we choose.”
Gloria Steinem, March 21:
“I’ve yet to be on a campus where most women weren’t worrying about some aspect of combining marriage, children, and a career. I’ve yet to find one where many men were worrying about the same thing.”
And one that I really identify with:
“Writing is the only thing that, when I do it, I don’t feel I should be doing something else.”
Guerrilla Girls, March 30:
“Pop Quiz
Q. If February is Black History Month and March is Women’s History Month, what happens the rest of the year?
A. Discrimination.”
Save the Children is sponsoring Caps to the Capital, a program to provide knitted and crocheted hats to newborn babies in developing countries. Their downloadable “Caps to the Capital” kit says in the introduction:
“Can something as simple as a knit or crochet cap help save a newborn life? In many poor countries, the answer is yes. Four million newborns die each year within the first month of life–- half within only the first 24 hours after being born. But a package of simple health measures provided to mothers and babies worldwide, including antibiotics to fight infections, training for skilled birth attendants, immunizations against tetanus, education on breastfeeding and basic care such as drying a newborn baby and keeping it warm (this is where the caps come in!) could prevent 70 percent of these deaths. These babies need more than caps – they need your voice, too. The United States can lead the way in saving young lives by increasing funding for these critical health measures for mothers and children in developing countries. But we need your help. Let America’s leaders know that you’re willing to do your part, and together we can do much more. ”
If you knit or crochet, this is a fun, easy project to provide babies in developing countries with something that is provided to every baby born in a U.S. hospital. You have until January 2nd to mail your finished caps and you get to include the following note to President Bush:
“Dear Mr. President,
In recognition of the 2 million babies who die each year in the first 24 hours of life in developing countries, I made this cap. I am sending it to you today to demonstrate the need for our country to do more to help newborns survive.”
Jay is the knitter in the family and I can sort of manage to crochet, so we’ve made a few caps. I thought our efforts might inspire other people to participate in this worthy cause, so I asked Sam the Bear (who is roughly the size of a newborn) to model our caps. I think Jay’s caps are the inspiring ones, my um… oversized… efforts will simply make you laugh. What can I say, my skills are limited but my heart is in the right place. Maybe there are some newborns with big heads in need of warming.
Jay’s first effort, a cute brown wool cap
Jay’s second cap, jaunty, fuzzy and red
My first cap, in a multi-colored baby yarn
My second, and possibly last, attempt
Make a hat, save a baby. Download your own “Caps to the Capital Kit” at Save the Children and send those hats off by January 2nd. Oh, and keep those hats small, I have the big-headed babies covered.
Life. Love. Writing. Friendship.
Sex. Books. Movies. Travel. Politics. Feminism. Academia. Insomnia. Rants. Raves. Chocolate. Lots of chocolate. Some names have been changed, some stories have been embellished. Thanks for stopping by and beware of the dog. Read more...
