Back in high school I occasionally watched the first couple of seasons of Everwood on the WB. I found it enjoyable but when I moved away to college my tepid devotion to the show got lost in the transition. Due to a summer without work or school I’ve recently rediscovered the series, and I’ve found particular enjoyment in watching the relationship between bumbling but well-intentioned womanizer Bright Abbott and sweet, unassuming book worm Hannah Rogers. And lately with all the talk of body image on the site, I thought it would be interesting to take a closer look at an episode that deals specifically with that topic; the season 4 episode “Getting to Know You.”

Read the rest of this entry »

I think it’s about time for another round of body image links.  It’s always helpful to know that I’m not the only one struggling with self/body acceptance, so I thought I’d pass these along.

Image linked at gimme some feminism!

Struggling With Body Image [fbomb]

I’m not happy with the way I look. I may tell you that I am, but I’m not. I constantly worry if I’m too fat to wear certain clothes, too fat to be desirable, too fat to be beautiful. Who should I turn to for support? My friends? My family?  They feel exactly the same way. All of them, every single person I know says the same thing, that thinness is interchangeable with beauty, that skinny=good and “fat” = bad.

Power and Beauty [feministe]

Because it must be granted that women who fit a certain standard of appearance can sometimes get perks from that. It may be easier for them to find romantic partners. It made the news a while ago that women who were considered attractive tended to earn higher wages. Even if they might be too pretty to work in a bank or a traditionally male, blue collar workplace, you know, worse things could happen to a person than being born into a conventionally attractive female body.

In the news today is a story about “flying pasties” – stickers that women can wear under their clothing to protect their privacy when going through full body scanning security booths at many US airports.  I haven’t done enough investigating to tell whether this is just a joke or a serious “countermeasure” to one’s privacy being invaded in the name of national security, but I can say that it’s got me thinking.

Having flown on multiple occasions out of the SLC airport, which has a full body scanner in addition to four of the normal metal detectors, I’ve been through the full body scan.  It reminds me of those tubes that you put checks in at the bank teller drive-thru.  You step into a cyllendrical chamber, hold your arms up, and the doors zip back and forth around you.  Then you step out, and if you’re lucky you’re free to go (if you tend to roll up the cuffs of your jeans, you can count on having those patted down).  It was kind of weird and futuristic, but I didn’t really think about it much.

Until today.  First on Bust and then on Jezebel I saw a story about “Flight Pasties” which can be worn under your clothes to protect your privacy when you go through the full body scanner.  And my first thought was “wow, that’s kind of ridiculous.”  But my second thought was “I probably should have thought about this more on one of the many occasions that I went through the scanner.”

Being a middle class, white, cisgendered female I carry a lot of privilege.  I don’t belong to a religion that emphasizes modesty, particularly when it comes to the female body.  My class and skin color mean that I’m not exceptionally likely to be treated as though I’m some sort of threat.  One could argue that being a woman puts me at an increased level of risk, but I carry enough privilege that I’m usually oblivious to threats FROM authorities.  And the body beneath my clothes matches my experience of gender.  But if all of those things weren’t true for me, the full body scanner could very reasonably be a major threat to my personal security.

So, after putting more thought into this subject than I had the first few times I went through that scanner I find myself thinking about it differently.  Are Flight Pasties the solution?  Um, no.  It seems to me that they’d just draw more attention to the areas that they cover, and would provide “protection” from little to nothing.  But they could be useful in highlighting some of the problems that are inherent in the full body scanning system.  At the very least, they led me to examine my privilege.

Here are some more recommended articles on dealing with body image concerns:

My Body Is Not Your Fairytale [amplify]

So, dear Unilever, dear NBC, dear Jillian Michaels, dear anyone else who’s ever tried to sell me fictional “health” in order to make me feel like a failure so that I’ll buy more of your crap: Eff you. You can be my fake friend all day and all night, and I’ll still see you for who you really are: the enemy of my strength. And don’t be mistaken: I’m getting stronger every day.

I Used to be a Skinny Person [eat the damn cake]

And you know what’s ridiculous? I don’t even really believe that whole thing about skinniness. I see heavy women all the time and think that they’re gorgeous. And I see women who aren’t skinny all the time and think that they’re gorgeous. But when it comes to myself, I have this impulse to make all the stereotypical corrections. I don’t know why.

Loving My Body—Kinda, Sorta, Sometimes [sexis]

Part of me was hesitant to even broach this topic, because it doesn’t feel very “feminist” to be worried about my weight, and yet I do—worry, obsess, berate myself… There’s a fine line, for me, between generally trying to be in good shape and questioning every bite that goes in my mouth.

I guess the answer to the question I proposed a couple of days ago (“Anyone else having a rough body image week/month/year?”) is a resounding “yes.”  The bad news is that it sucks to feel like crap about the body that you inhabit, and this is something that the majority of women experience from time to time at best, and most of the time, well, most of the time.  The good news is that we have platforms where we can talk about our feelings, experiences, and the culture that puts these ideas in our heads.

Here are a few more posts from the last few days on body image.

Being a Comfortable “Other” [fbomb]

Renowned scientists and doctors agree that low self-esteem, poor body image, depression, perfectionism, and rigid thinking patterns can lead to anorexia in adolescent girls. All of these are things that can come from viewing negative images of women in the media. Studies have shown that even a small exposure to these types of images can cause immediate drops in self-esteem, positive body images, and happiness. Rigid thinking patters can come in the form of stereotypes that girls feel the need to conform to, and the idea of perfectionism collides with the idea of the “perfect” body.

My Day As An Anti-Feminist (Role) Model [the ms. education of shelby knox]

After I got to New York and into feminist activism, I gained a perspective on beauty that eased my body hatred a bit. I realized that what’s ugly in one culture is desirable in another and vice versa and that this constant pressure –- applied to women by the media, our friends, our family, random strangers on the street and online -– to be unnaturally thin is another form of sexism that at best hobbles women by making us spend unnatural amounts of time concerned with our appearance and at worst, kills.

Anyone else having a rough body image week/month/year?  It’s funny (in the sad and ironic sense) how much thought we can put into body image, how conceptually we can understand media pressure and unrealistic expectations and photoshopping, and yet these messages still affect us on deeply personal levels.  That even when we “get it,” we still feel badly that we don’t look perfect.  Because even if we’re doing it all, it would be better if we were doing it all while maintaining the perfect body.

Here are some powerful readings on the topic, which might also be useful to pass on to friends/partners/spouses/parents that can’t understand why you have to change your clothes six times before leaving the house.

on language, and body, and fear [feministe]

Let’s talk about: letting herself go. Watching your weight. Language of being on guard, of control, of threat, of shame. Constant vigilance. If you are not reigning yourself in, you should be ashamed. If you are fat, you will be subject to ridicule and shame, you will be unworthy of love and affection, you will not be deserving of basic respect unless, maybe, you are trying with all your energy to change it. Never mind spending energy having fun, being a good friend, discovering your passion. You can do those things when you’re thin.

Body Image and How We Haven’t Progressed as Much as We Think [gender across borders]

The same woman who pities the corseted girls of the past may very well go to the gym five times a week to do a hundred sit-ups on a Swiss ball and an hour of aerobics.  Most likely she is exacting about her diet, eats foods that have been stripped of various life-sustaining elements and thus keeps her body fat to a minimum.

Women and body image: a man’s perspective [telegraph]

For men the holy grail is within reach – you just need to get fit, and then you’ll be fine; then you can think about something else. But the messages aimed at women are much more complex and confusing. As the American social commentator Warren Farrell has pointed out, women’s magazines often contain articles about being Superwoman, which are next to adverts about being Cinderella.  In other words, the words tell women how to be independent and in control. But the adverts, where the money is, tell them they have to be beautiful.

A lot of interesting links floating around out there regarding Sarah Palin and what it means to be a feminist.  And if those two things are mutually exclusive.  I’ll let you make up your own minds about that business and recommend the following links in your investigation.  However, I was pretty astonished by the following quote from Ms. Palin and wanted to throw that out there as well:

“To be judged on or to be talked about on appearance, say chest size — it makes me wear layers. It makes me have to waste time figuring out, What am I going to wear so that nobody will look in a area that I don’t need them to look at? I want them to hear what it is that I’m saying. It ends up wasting time and that’s just very, very unfortunate.”

- Sarah Palin on her boob-job rumors (via jezebel)

Sarah Palin, False Prophet [jezebel]

This is what I think of whenever I hear people talk about conservative Christian women “reclaiming” feminism, or blaming those mean and nasty “traditional” (read: “actual”) feminists for keeping them out. You don’t even want [it]. But you’d rather turn it into a lump of mush that nobody wants than let anyone else have it.

When feminism and conservative women collide [feminocracy]

As someone who has considered myself a feminist for quite some time, it’s amusing to watch feminism declared “dead” or “irrelevant” for years – or, paradoxically, responsible for everything from the divorce rate to crime and Everything That Is Wrong With America – then have it be resurrected and trample the political landscape in a zombie-like fashion, with little thought put into the use of the term by its new appropriators and eating all our brains, as those of us who didn’t shy away from the label internally combust from its perversion.

Who You Callin’ A Feminist? [this ain't livin']

I still don’t think it’s my business to determine who is feminist or not, and I hold to that. I am not interested in stripping people of the identities they claim. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t think that we should have conversations about the co-option of feminism, and about whether people who identify as feminist bear that identity out in their actions. I think that, evaluating Palin’s life and work, it’s pretty evident that her actions are not feminist.

Feminist Does Not Mean “Strong Woman” [red vinyl shoes]

Feminist does not mean “strong woman”. Conservative feminists conflate the two entirely, which is why they feel they can get away with calling themselves feminists while holding beliefs and supporting causes antithetical to feminism. By labeling every female Republican primary candidate “feminist” when they mean “strong woman” they seek to redefine the word so that they can appropriate it for their own benefit.

Pat Robertson has made it into our archives of misogyny before, but this one is really something else.  Remember that time that Tina Fey hosted SNL and implied through her tear-down of “Bombshell” McGee that a husband’s cheating is more the fault of the mistress than the husband?  Pat Robertson takes it a step further and educates us all on how it’s the wife’s laziness that drives her husband to cheat.

E-mailed Question: “My husband has always been a flirt and loves to talk with other women he finds attractive.  He says he would never cheat on me, but his actions are starting to get to me.  What should I do?”

Robertson’s response: “First thing is you need to make yourself as attractive as possible and, uh, don’t hassle him about it.  And why is he doing this?  Well, he’s doing it because he wants affirmation that he is still a man, that he is attractive, and, uh, he gets an affirmation of himself.  That means he’s got an inferiority complex that’s coming out, and, uh, he’s not gonna cheat on you – he’s just playin.  But you need to not drive him away, start hassling and hamming on him, but make yourself as beautiful as you can, as fun as you can, and say ‘let’s go out here, let’s go there, let’s go do the other thing’ so…”

Co-host, laughing: “He has a lot more grace than I do.  Let me just say, we’d be having a serious conversation.”

Robertson: “Affirmation!  Affirmation, dearheart!”

Co-host: “Yeah, yeah. A little bit of affirmation goes a long way.”

Wow.  So much fail.  I need to take this apart, bit by bit. Read the rest of this entry »

The following is a cross post from Electric Emily over at Jukebox Heroines – be sure to check out all the other great music-based info she’s got at her blog!  If you are interested in cross posting or guest posting at feministhemes.com, please send your ideas to ms.wizzle@feministhemes.com.

Lady Gaga was on Larry King on June 1st, 2010. I just watched it, and once again, female artists have to defend themselves for their art, presentation, and politics.

Larry King asked if Gaga was a feminist, she said:

“Yes. Yes I am. I am a feminist. Does this settle the ongoing debate once and for all?”

Why is it so hard for people to believe that Gaga is a feminist? I have a few thoughts on the matter.

Is it because she is a pop-star, and somehow we have obscured pop music/stardom with instant sell-out status, misogyny, and manufactured faux empowerment?

That isn’t to say that there is some of that in music, and that pop music, like every other music genre has issues with gender, race, class, looks, etc, but presuming this of pop music limits one from experiencing some amazing talent. Just because you can dance to is, and it is accessible to the majority of people don’t make it lesser than. Pop music has a long-standing tradition of being seen as feminine, and as “of the body,” which is seen as less artistically sound and worthy than the masculine, “of the mind” rock or indie music scenes.

Is it because Lady Gaga is an attractive woman and hence, could never be a feminist, because you know, feminists are ugly, fat, hairy, bra-burners!

Ha, you know that one. All the myths associated with feminism, I’ve heard them all before! They never seem to go away. Let’s run them down: feminists are only women, they are not attractive (ugly), hate men (perhaps because their ugliness denies them a suitable mate), hate children, are lesbians, angry, don’t wear make-up, witches, choose career over family, cock-blockers, want to rule over men….did I get them all?  These myths serve in separating women from each other, and deter women from joining a movement that is about social, political and economic equality for not just women, but all.There is nothing wrong with that, except that it challenges a system of inequality in our culture that continues to keep women in a second class status. Challenging that is dangerous. Therefore these myths exist to maintain the status quo and silence any opposition.  And why would a beautiful woman want to get involved with any of that? She apparently has everything right? Oh, how wrong that assumption is, and Lady Gaga isn’t fooled by those myths. She smashes them with a sequined, flame-engulfed hammer.

You could say Gaga even makes fun of the whole bra-burner myth via her fabulous spark-bra. Read the rest of this entry »

An email was forwarding about the internet not long ago regarding Barbie’s 50th birthday.  Maybe you got it.  Maybe you didn’t.  And by “it” I mean the email, because the humor part is kind of lost on me.

You see, after 50 years Barbie has let herself go.  She now eats Chinese food in bed with empty soda cans and a cat on her bed with her laptop on her expanding thighs.  She lazily surfs the internet, probably looking for a replacement for Ken, who certainly wouldn’t be interested in her anymore thanks to her expanding calves, tummy, arms, and multiple chins.  Ha ha ha, that Barbie – “it’s about time this happened to her.”

It’s really easy to hate Barbie and her perfect body.  You know, the perfect hair, perfect nose, perfect waist (just ask Heidi Montag)…  This is the unrealistic, impossible “standard” that has been set for women.

But this isn’t really fair either.  Because wishing fat on beautiful women (heh heh, she deserved it) is yet another way of pitting woman against woman, world against woman, and woman against herself.  It says “this is what normal slobs look like, and beautiful women deserve it.”  “It” in this case being stereotypes about the overweight and obese as lazy slobs.

I’m not usually a fan of Sarah Silverman, but she does have this going for her:

“I don’t really care for like fat jokes about women, specifically.  Because I feel that we live in a society where fat men deserve love, and fat women do not deserve love — at least in white America. And so I feel like that’s an ugly thing, and it doesn’t make me laugh.”

Or is this just another example of feminists lacking a sense of humor?