Anuna Rocks Her First Comment: What is Femininity?

I’m linking to Twisty’s site today because I’ve just been inspired. I don’t want to lose yesterday’s post, Blamer Brain Trust Action Request, in which Twisty asks the Feminist Hive Mind to help a friend out with a school project. Her friend frames the question:

Hi everybody. I’m doing a project for my “Dress and Society” class, and I’m asking you to help me if you can. This time, I’m asking you to answer the question, “What is femininity?” There are no rules – your answer can be short, long, metaphorical, literal, poetic, sarcastic, whatever. I’ll cite your first name and city/state. If you’re not comfortable with that, give me an alias to use. If you’re interested in reading the final project, let me know and I’ll be happy to email it to you.

Thank you in advance!

Marcia

The results have been glorious thus far. The comment thread is nothing less than a thing of beauty, so I feel the need to cut into my beauty sleep to blog about it.

For the uninitiated readers out there, feminists differentiate between the descriptive terms “womanly” and “feminine.” Instead of blathering on about their differences I’ll present a few 1000-word examples:

Breasts are womanly. Bullet bras are feminine.

 

Women’s hips are womanly. Corsets are feminine.

Women’s feet are womanly. Bound feet and high heels are feminine.

Motherhood is womanly. June Cleaver is feminine.

Partnering with a man for life can be womanly. Brides are feminine.

The lovers of men can be womanly. The Stepford Wives are feminine.

Menstruation is womanly. That not-so-fresh feeling? Feminine.

By Georgette I think we’ve got it! In short, femininity is artifice: Those socially constructed behaviors women are expected to perform to be accepted. Feminine behaviors are submissive gestures that diminish a person and make him or her subordinate and less threatening. Subordinate women are desired and rewarded by men, and our “reward” is to be allowed to exist for one more day. Submission to masculine authority is presented to us as a fun game; unfortunately it’s deadly serious business. Nothing less than female survival is at stake.

(“Beautiful Fatima,” the Moorish standard du jour in the 1800’s)

(Fat is beautiful in Mauritania, where girls are force fed to obesity)

(Minstrel show: The one in the hoop skirt is actually a dude)

(Hindu women)

Femininity is a moving target: Always changing with time and location. Women scramble to toe the line because the consequences for not meeting the Feminine Standard du Jour can be dire. Men still own most of the world’s resources, and they’ll only share their toys with those women they find pretty and useful. Unfortunately, it’s fiendishly difficult to measure up to the Beauty Standard:

(Jayne Mansfield)

(Twiggy)

(Angelina Jolie)

 

If one takes the time to think about femininity and what it means (i.e., submission to an impossible-to-meet standard for the sake of patriarchal favor) it becomes clear that the anxious and relentless pursuit of femininity is an energy-sucking trap for the independently-minded woman.

Now, on to my inspiration: Anuna posted her first comment on IBTP today and it was a doozy! I can’t wait until she starts her own blog (?). Her comment needs some more play so I’m reposting it in its entirety here:

Femininity is the bandage society enjoins us to wear to hide the wound it has made of our womanhood. Woman is what I am. In my woman’s body I find my strength and the expression of my creativity, my sexuality, my dreams and desires. To be a woman is good. It is NORMAL. A woman is not a damaged man, or a lesser form of man, or a creature designed to take second place to man or be a slave to man. Indeed, if “man” supposedly means “human,” then a woman IS a “man.”

But this sick, crazy culture tells me that as a woman, I am somehow much less than that. A woman is less than human. My vagina is defined as dark and dirty, my vulva as smelly and messy. My sexuality is either too much or too little, and always to be controlled by men and their definitions and desires. My body is not my own, to do with as I please. It belongs to others, to the hands and eyes of others, who define, defame, deride and detain me. My body is not supposed to be a source of pride or strength for me. Instead, my body becomes an object, not only to others but also to me. It is an animal to be tamed and imprisoned, an artifact to be carved up and operated upon. I’m not allowed to feel my own body. Nor am I allowed to know my own mind. A woman has no self.

Femininity is what I am issued to replace my woman-self, which has been found dangerous to men and declared non-existent. Femininity tells me what I can like and not like. Femininity tells me what to eat and drink. Femininity tells me what work to do, and how to do it. Femininity tells me how to speak, how to look, how to stand, how to walk, even how to lie down and sleep. Femininity is a muzzle that restricts my food intake. Femininity is a set of handcuffs that restrains me from picking up a gun, or a hammer. Femininity is shackles for my feet, making sure I walk in bondage even when I seem to be free. Femininity is an abuser who crawls into every crack of my body and mind and stalks me mercilessly even in my dreams, even on my deathbed. I can never relax for a moment, because I must maintain my femininity, like a mask that has to be maintained over the hideous scar that, in the minds of the patriarchy, constitutes naked womanhood.

If I ever stop being feminine for a moment, I will be revealed as nothing but a woman, and that would be so horrible to the patriarchy that they would no longer be able to tolerate me. Femininity makes the world safe for men. It turns a free-striding goddess into a simpering slave. Through femininity, we are forced to bow to the protection racket of the patriarchy. We agree to our own diminishment, hoping that if we don’t defy them, they will pity us and let us live. We agree to divert them and be pleasing to them, hoping to buy some time. We know that time will eventually run out–old women are despised, no matter how many years they’ve spent being feminine–but we don’t know when, so we live in this uneasy pretense of security.

I say “we,” but I shouldn’t, because I both reject femininity and am excluded from it. Femininity is that which declares me, as a woman, NOT to be a woman. Femininity makes it impossible for me, as a woman, to buy “women’s” clothing or “women’s” shoes. Because, as defined by femininity, no woman could be the shape or size I am. Femininity is that which declares my woman’s arms to be “man arms” and my woman’s walk to be “walking like a man.”

Conundrum: Q: What is the only force in the world that can un-woman a woman?
A: Femininity.

If femininity pertained to being a woman, or was relevant to being a woman, then how could it be that a man could conform to its standards better than a woman? My conclusion: Femininity is the anti-womanhood.

Anuna, Pennsylvania

(In case you can’t tell, this is Rupaul, and he’s a dude)

So what have I taken away from this little exercise? Oh, about two hours of much-needed sleep, that’s what. Moi will put on my tres-feminine negligee and retire to my boudoir to think about it, though. Or maybe I’ll just think about it tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day!