It comes as no surprise to me that eleven-year-old girls look at the adult female bodies on display in newspapers, magazines, TV, social media, and elsewhere on the internet and say, "That's not me, and I don't want be that."
Of course they don't. The vast majority of women they see are entertainers, and today's female entertainers, even when they are elderly or enormously fat, wear outfits that would make a 19th century prostitute blush.
Today's commonplace sexual displays are unseemly for adult women, but they are totally inappropriate for 11-year-old girls. Children should not be exposed to adult sexuality; this used to be common knowledge. It is abysmal that, entertainment having become so important in our society, children spend much of their leisure time in the virtual company of hyper sexualized adults.
What was also common knowledge, when I was a child, was that although girls-in-general have a preference for "girls' stuff" and activities, many girls enjoy "boys' stuff"and activities. As I've mentioned before, when I was a kid traditional boys' stuff and activities were considered innately superior, so it's no wonder my generation of girls at least tried out the magic of Meccano after tiring of Lego and demanded to play street hockey with the boys and whatnot. Girls who said things like "I don't like dolls; I prefer playing with toy cars" obviously thought this rendered them superior to the vast majority of womankind.
Nowadays, unfortunately, honestly preferring Matchbox and Meccano to Barbie and ponies runs girls the risk of being told they're boys trapped in female bodies. This appalling horror is probably also a result of the dumb dualism that divides human beings (but not any other living creature, you'll notice) into minds occupying bodies. As anyone who has lost their temper simply because she was hungry or tired should know, there is no real separation between our minds and our bodies. Our bodies are not spaceships we drive around in (to quote a lady in my Eschatology class 20 years ago); we are our bodies. We are ensouled bodies.
And the problem with being an ensouled body in the 21st century is that there is a vast overemphasis on our reproductive functions (while, perversely, devaluing actual natural reproduction). Of course, the sexual vulnerability of girls has always been a part of human existence. However, the importance of capturing (instead of discouraging) male sexual attention--or looking like women who could capture male sexual attention--has never been so prominent or exaggerated. No wonder there are 11-year-old girls who would just rather be boys.
As you could guess, I think I have solutions to this problem. Although my readership may find them problematic, at least they aren't as stupid as bra-burning. (Admittedly, bra-burning might not have been stupid when bras were all padding with wires sticking into you, but it would certainly be stupid now.)
Solution One: Get involved in sports, involve girls in sports, watch women's sports on TV
Yes, I spent my childhood trying to avoid sports, but part of the problem was that nobody ever told me what the rules were. If the girl you're trying to get into sports is a bookworm, give her books about sports, especially helpful books that explain the rules and techniques. If I had known what "offside" was when I started playing hockey, my teammates might not have hated me quite so much.
I am not sure how much of a problem this is nowadays, but if people tell you (or the girls in your life) that sports are for boys, I suggest telling them that "boys' sports are for boys, and girls' sports are for girls." A girl's sport, incidentally, is any sport that girls--that is, ensouled female bodies--do together. Male and female bodies are so different, the sports themselves--even they have the same name and rules--are at least slightly different.
Naturally there are sports that we associate more with girls, like solo figure skating and rhythmic gymnastics and synchronized swimming. It would be nice, I think, if girls were brought up watching and trying other women's sports as well, like soccer and karate and speed skating.
Why? Because it would show girls that women are subjects of action, doers of deeds, and not primarily passive objects, there to be looked at, our value determined by how many people admire our looks. Presumably a chap in his 60s might still find 50-something me a cutie; I'd much rather, though, that he admired my newfound ability to waltz.
Solution Two: Give up artificial beauty
There are women who start dying their roots in university, and I can see that giving that up might be harder than sitting down with a wriggly little girl to watch women's soccer. However, I do not dye my hair, and my husband hasn't yet left me over my grey hairs. I also do not wear makeup, except for lipstick at parties. [Update: A contact lens-wearing reader has very correctly pointed out the unreasonableness of this following remark, which really doesn't apply, as everyone who wants and can have peripheral vision should go right ahead: Oh, and I gave up contact lenses after an infection left me crying and half-blind in an emergency ward in Warsaw. I wear glasses day in and day out, including to parties, and I'm fine]. I'm not suggesting anything I haven't done myself.
If we all gave up--hear me out here--make-up, wigs, fake eyelashes, hair extensions, and tooth veneers, it would not only save us a lot of money, it would emphasize that what makes women female is not a collection of artificial cosmetic enhancements but our very own unvarnished selves.
We should by all means strive to become pictures of health through sleep, good nutrition and exercise, of course, and I have no objection to pretty clothes. I would just like to show girls that cosmetics do not make the women; this would be a good lesson for gender-confused males, as well.
Solution Three: Back to physical exercise
Competitive sports are no fun if you absolutely dread letting down your teammates, which I so often did. Also, whereas it can be inspiring to watch Simone Biles do astonishing acrobatic feats, girls may need to be reminded that there is a wide and enjoyable middle-ground between couch potatoes and the elite.
Thus, I would also recommend encouraging girls to do recreational activities like swimming, skating, hiking, folk-dancing, and any other appropriate physical activity that gets the heart pumping, the blood flowing and the endorphins making them feel good to be alive.
Solution Four: Discourage Prevent your children from using the internet unsupervised
Well, I rarely say this, but do leave a comment if you agree or disagree strenuously with my thoughts.
Update: Another reader has brought up the issue of body hair. This is a really tough one. In fact, this is a centuries-old tough one. There is no real taboo on not-dyeing and not-wearing-make-up-or-nail-polish. However, there is a massive societal taboo in the West (at very least) on female body hair. And it seems incredibly unfair that female body hair is 100% normal and yet women are now expected to remove it. Hair removal is so common, movie stars make headlines just for not shaving their underarms, a practice that wasn't universal in Europe, by the way, when I was a child. And removing leg hair was not really a thing until hemlines went up. Hair-over-the-lip, though, is something women seem to have always fought, and until this morning (when found an article about it in the Guardian) I thought it was rare in women.
The point of this post was never to create more burdens on women but to think out loud about how we could, as a sex, make being adult females less scary for pre-teen girls. Body hair is something grown by men and women alike, so it's not a man or woman thing, it's an adult thing. My thinking is that if you want to smash the body hair taboo, and you've got the guts to do it, do it.* If you'd rather not, don't. If your 10-year-old wants to know why that lady has hairy legs, you can do future generations a favour and say, "Almost every lady has hairy legs. Some are brave enough to keep them hairy."
*Update 2: On second thought, the taboo against female body hair is so strong in the West, I would not recommend trying to smash it yourself, if you can help it. The generations of women who did not shave their legs did not display them publicly either.
ReplyDeleteCommenting against my better judgement. I am leery of posts that suggest the broad application of one person's prudential judgement which is, by its nature, individual. Conversations that must begin by pleading with another to recognize the individual circumstances and humanity of others' or oneself rarely improve from the starting point.
We humans are unique, unrepeatable, ensouled bodies, so we must be prepared to acknowledge that seeking the good of others means accounting for their physical good - which will necessarily be different than our own. So, while contact lenses might fall into the category of "artificial beauty" for some, I don’t think they belong with hair extensions. Contacts function as a prosthetic for those whose eyes don't allow for proper focusing own their own.
As a result, for myself, and perhaps for some part of the female share of the 41.6% of myopic Americans, solution two eliminates solutions one and four. Although I prefer glasses for most activities, they are impractical and sometimes dangerous to wear for many exercises and sports. In addition, mine have always been expensive - such that until I got married, I was never able to afford a spare pare. Not being able to afford to replace my glasses if they broke (or fear of facing my parents with broken glasses!) really limited my options for physical activity for 2+ decades of my life.
I am grateful for the availability of inexpensive* contact lenses - which weren't yet common when I was young. I first bought contacts as a 30-something out of vanity - I didn't want to wear glasses in my wedding. Thanks to that purchase, I have been able to swim again for the first time in years, run in comfort and safety and without the risk (not abstract) of breaking my glasses**, canoe/kayak/paddleboard, and take walks even in the winter without damage from blowing ice/salt. I cannot imagine playing baseball, soccer/football, or any sport with a projectile while wearing glasses.
"I'm not suggesting anything I haven't done myself." Yes, but what is good for one body is not always good for another, even if both bodies are female. I will not be giving up contact lenses.
-EA
*"6 mos supply of contacts" - which lasts me almost 2 years - costs less than half what the lenses alone for my glasses cost.
**I used to solve the problems with running in glasses - nosepads would wear out, glasses constantly threatening to or actually falling off - by running without them, in the various not-too-safe urban neighborhoods I lived in. This was unwise - I couldn't see and could not be aware of my environment or the people and hazards it contained. I do NOT recommend any ladies do as I have done.
Goodness gracious, yes. It was clumsy of me to mention contact lenses in the same breath as hair extensions and all those other things. Yes, contact lenses do make many (or most ) sports and other physical activities easier and safer. If I were Queen of the World and tyrannically banning most kinds of plastic, I would allow contact lenses on the grounds of medical use. (But I would force manufacturers to sell contact lens fluid in glass bottles.)
DeleteThis is a fascinating list! You don’t often see “watch women’s sports” given as advice, but I totally agree with your explanation.
ReplyDeleteI’m currently dyeing my hair, but I’m annoyed at myself for it haha. In my defense, I had a particularly stressful couple of years and wasn’t quite ready to show to the whole world just how much the stress had impacted me. I do think I’ll stop dyeing it soon, though, because right now it’s just a little salt-and-pepper-y naturally. So I either better stop now or commit to the next 30 years, in order to avoid any shocking transitions. I do appreciate that people of my generation (late 30s/early 40s) seem to be embracing their natural hair color much more than older women. I almost see more gray hair on people my age versus women my mom’s age!
I’m curious how you would categorize hair removal (leg/armpit/facial) — in the same category as cosmetics, or different?
Oh dear! I forgot all about hair removal. I would indeed categorize it differently because there is still such a taboo on women's body hair. (I wonder when it started? I remember in the early 1980s Canadian children being astonished that European ladies [like Nena of "99 Red Balloons" fame] didn't always shave their underarms. Hairy legs were the norm before skirts rose in the 1920s. I don't know anything about the history of women's facial hair.) However, I'll point out nobody "needed" a bikini wax before women wore bikinis, and more extreme depilation in that area is something no 11-year-old should ever hear of.
DeleteOh dear oh dear. No. Can't agree about makeup - at its worst it is only a way to hide imperfections (like breakouts); at its best it is an art form that takes nobody in. It's fun, in short, and should be regarded as no more than such.
ReplyDeleteViews on this subject are partly generational, I think. Being 10 years older than you, Seraphic, I can still remember a time when dying one's hair or having pierced ears (yes, really) were still considered 'fast' for respectable middle-class women. So mildly 'naughty' practices don't seem that bad to me.
As for leg/underarm hair, all European cultures regarded its removal as beyond the pale, until some time in the late 1960s. Sophia Loren is said to have *cried* when her managers tried to insist that she shave her armpits, because only p****** did that. (Have you read Rumer Godden's The Greengage Summer? One of the main protagonists shocks her sister by shaving her armpits.)
Clio, my mother thought pierced ears too fast for girls, but her argument was theological: "If God had wanted you to have holes in your ears, He would have put holes in your ears." I think this can be taken too far, though: if I were a sailor, I would certainly have big gold rings put in to pay for my funeral. Yes, Robertson Davies wrote in one of his book about only w****s shaving their armpits. And I have indeed read The Greengage Summer. I loved it--and anything by Rumer Godden I've read so far.
DeleteI'm afraid my parents were probably more concerned about the respectability of ear-piercing than the God's-will element. My father, in particular, was always convinced that English standards were the only true gauge of propriety - not a rare attitude for Franco-Cdns of his generation.
DeleteAs for Rumer Godden, I love her work but she deteriorated in the last books of her life - starting in when Five for Sorrow, Ten for Joy was published in 1979. It was still a good book, but some later ones, like Coromandel Sea Change and Cromartie vs The God Shiva, were not, or so I thought.
I do understand what and who you are talking about. The women who are absolutely deflated when they scroll instagram, looking at filtered, surgeried, injected, lasered, tooth-capped lovelies that most of us can not - or do not want to - replicate. And believe me, just about every single person you see in a movie, tv show, print ad or even newscast has had something done to their face if they’re over 25 years old. I have a couple of plastic surgeon friends and they won’t name names, but they’ll talk procedures and it’s ubiquitous. This has been going on for decades; even Marilyn Monroe had her jaw remodeled and her nose done.
ReplyDeleteBut there is a compromise that I think you are overlooking. You are not taking into account that there are different stages of life for everyone, especially with regard to their job, their environment and their city. As someone from New York, who is in the entertainment industry I can tell you that if you show up for an audition without make up and without your hair done you are not getting the job. And for musicals, you had better be wearing tights and a dress or skirt short enough above your knees to show your legs or you won’t get the job. If you get asked for a dance call back, you have to wear something akin to a tank top and leggings, or you will not get the job. For film/TV/commercial work, your teeth absolutely matter, a lot. It’s probably the only time in this field being straight and white is a plus, lol!!
And yes, whatever you can do to look younger than you are is almost always a guarantee of more work. Roles disappear as your age goes up and your entire professional world changes once you look 40+.
It also applies to other fields, like the fashion industry, some upper-level corporate environments, law, etc. You just can’t come to work dressed how you want, with undone hair and zero makeup, in those cases.
For whatever role you play in life, you’ve got to look the part.
Well, no. I am not talking about adult women; I am talking about prepubescent girls who are disgusted and frightened by the hyper sexualized images of womanhood they constantly see online. Of course, any woman who wants a career in the entertainment industry will have to put on its livery. Worse, she may have to choose between her art and becoming another terrible role model for girls. Fortunately, I don't think women have to wear makeup or dye our hair or show our thighs to make our living in the professions. By the way, I'm not at all suggesting that we owe it to 11-year-olds to look like frumps. Au contraire. Tidy hair (if you can manage it--I ignored a lecture on "professional hair", as I hope any woman with 2/3C hair would do) and modest feminine clothing--whether professional, casual, or elegant--presents girls with an image of adult female life to look forward to. It would be amazing if even New York women fell in with my plan to destroy the cosmetics-fake nails-hair-extensions complex---or at least to give it back to the theatre word, from which it sprang and where it belongs.
ReplyDelete