Post 4: Women's Bodies

Women’s bodies are policed constantly, be it through laws, social views, controlling family members, or even their own insecurities.They are told how they should look, how they should act, and how they can express their sexuality. They are the other, the foil to men in a patriarchal society. The policing only increases for women who are ‘others’ in other ways, i.e. queer women, women of color, disabled women et cetera. Through gender roles, the male gaze, advertising, politics, and contributions to poor body image, women are treated as less than, and learn to treat themselves as such. 

I think this speaks for itself.

Gender as a concept, at least in its contemporary application, is where the policing begins, as the binary has typically been enforced as the only option. According to Julia Serrano in Performance Piece, the reality is that, “gender isn't simply some faucet that we can turn on and off in order to appease other people, whether they be heterosexist bigots or queerer-than-thou hipsters. How about this: Let's stop pretending that we have all the answers, because when it comes to gender, none of us is fucking omniscient." In practice however, gender, specifically the female gender, is quite regulated. And while people shouldn’t be lumped all together based on gender identity, women have typically shared the struggle of demeaning gender roles. 

In growing up as a woman in this society, I haven’t escaped my role. I was taught to change diapers and do dishes by 8 years old. I helped with the cleaning, would serve guests, make dinner, and was taught the importance of keeping a home. In a vacuum, none of these skills are negative, but the problem is that it is typically the women who do all the vacuuming. My brother has rarely been asked to clean or cook, and my dad is typically free of chores because he works. My mom also works, but as a nanny, and childcare is typically not seen as real work. My experience is not unique in any sense, as the housewife role has existed for a millenia. 

Housewife, but happy to do it. 

This servitude does not just concern meeting men’s needs, but on keeping them engaged visually, as a woman’s worth boils down to her appearance. In Ways of Seeing, John Berger wrote “Men survey women before treating them. Consequently, how a woman appears to a man can determine how she will be treated” (46). In media and in life, this means women are more akin to objects than to equals. This gaze, typically the gaze of the old rich white men that run the country and thus contribute to most of the policing, project fantasies onto women, and expects them to conform accordingly. 

Sexuality also falls under this gaze. It is my firm belief that conservative men are against the women in the LGBTQ community because they can’t have sex with some of them. It is the parallel of when you reject a guy who’s hitting on you, and he immediately starts calling you an ‘ugly bitch.’ These misogynists have no use for something that doesn’t serve them. While same-sex marriage is legalized in the U.S., trans women’s legal protections are precarious at best. The homicide rate for trans women, and trans women of color in particular, just continues to increase, and this is paired with Trump’s desire to prevent sex changes on legal documents. In gazing at queer women, misogynists are ignorant, and thus hateful.

This ignorance relates to all women in the realm of reproduction and sex. While there are no longer laws in the U.S. that mandate women as their husbands’ property, tendencies and beliefs are still downright archaic. Birth control is as hotly debated as abortion, as pro-lifers want fetuses to live, but once alive, want to regulate their sex lives. Some people take birth control to ease periods or regulate hormones, while some take them because they want to have sex without conceiving. It is this pleasure that so many have a problem with, as a woman’s pleasure is not necessary for reproduction. 

According to Tanya Steele, “in the overall American marketplace, female desire and pleasure is neither supported or promoted. As a result, there is no counter-attack to the religious conservative onslaught to restricting our desires. There is no group, no lobbyists, no ideology that advocates for female pleasure. Therefore, conversations about our bodies and birth control stay within the confines of conservative ideology” (2014). This framework teaches women that they do not have a right to enjoy sex, and if they do, it is shameful. 

This shame is used to stop women from having abortions, and I believe it has nothing to do with preserving life, but with regulating life. A woman with a choice is dangerous, because she can choose to not have sex with you, to not follow your rules, and to set her own path, so the men in charge want to take away that choice. Yet in doing so, they forget that, “Women were forced underground for contraception and pregnancy termination before and we will go underground again if we have to” (Gay, 2012).

Going underground is dangerous, but it is a reality within the patriarchy. This system is as pernicious as it is pervasive, and a larger problem is that it is simply accepted. In Understanding Patriarchy, bell hooks wrote that, “patriarchy is the single most life threatening social disease assaulting the male body” (17). It hurts men too in that they are not allowed to feel emotion and are put into specific gender roles. It is their silent pain that leads to the policing of women, as it gives them control. They are able to take out the frustration of their bottled up emotions on the lower class: women. 

There is room for sympathy for these fragile men, but none for inaction. According to hooks, the “imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” (18) is strengthened when women accept male dominance as a given. In this way, women contribute to their own policing by way of complacency. They also do so by giving money to companies that reinforce the control. In a capitalist society, your money is worth more than your word, and thus women need to not give financial support to those who strengthen the power imbalance. This involves being a conscious consumer of advertisements, which are key distributors of societal tropes. 

Ads show women with perfect skin, perfect teeth, and itty bitty waists. They are often hyper sexual and show women the ideal they need to achieve. They tout their products, such as weight loss pills, cosmetics, or cleaning products, as the way to be the best wife, lover, or mother, and these roles are the only ones that matter. In Sex, Lies, and Advertising, Gloria Steinem discussed the fact that women’s magazines are almost all ads, and how hard it is to get ads for ‘traditionally male’ products. This polices women’s minds and bodies in that it shows them that they matter little more than the products they buy, and tells them the products in particular that they need to purchase.

Ads and women’s magazines also contribute to regulations on body image. By providing photoshop images as the ideal, women are taught that they need to achieve these unachievable images and when they can’t, they feel shame. While there are pictures of impossibly thin women, at the same time, food is presented as a comfort, such as ice cream to heal a broken heart. In discussing this relationship at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Jean Kilbourne said “the bulimic is the ideal consumer.” In this way, ads, and social pressures in general, police women’s health. 

Ads play on women's insecurities, such as not having the perfect bikini body.

Food is presented as a reasonable way to deal with emotion,
but women are still expected to be skinny. 

Again, I must say that women need to take action against these social trends. This is not to put all the blame on women, as it is men who designed the framework that oppresses them, but it is to say that all is not lost. The women’s march and the Me Too movement are examples of what can be done, but the work isn’t over. The effort needs to be intersectional, but even more than that it needs to united against the same enemy: misogyny. Women on women attacks only reinforce the attacks of the patriarchy. 

Wise words of Tina Fey.

References
Berger, John. “Ways of Seeing." London: BBC Enterprises, 1972: 45 -64

Gay, Roxane. "The Alienable Rights of Women." The Rumpus, 2012: https://therumpus.net/2012/03/the-alienable-rights-of-women/

hooks, bell. "Ch.2 Understanding Patriarchy" in Will to Change. New York: ATRIA Books, 2004.

Steele, Tanya. "Hobby Lobby and a Woman's Right to Sexual Exploration." Rewire, 2014: https://rewire.news/article/2014/07/10/hobby-lobby-womans-right-sexual-exploration/

Steinem, Gloria. "Sex, Lies, and Advertising" in Ms. magazine. Arlington: Liberty Media for Women LLC, 1990: 18-28