She Struck Me

Feminist blog about women, or anyone or thing really, that has taken me aback or really struck a chord with my soul

[shestruckme]

Makeup Strikes Me

I am a makeup amateur at best, and I want that to be considered before you read the rest of this. I am looking at this issue through the eyes of someone who sees the value of makeup as an art, but doesn’t feel that it is necessary for everyday life. Disclaimer done. Here we go.

In Alicia Keys: Time to Uncover, Alicia Keys comes out in support of no-makeup looks. She talks about the entertainment industry and how she “started, more than ever, to become a chameleon. Never fully being who [she] was, but constantly changing so all the "they's" would accept [her].” 

She then details an experience with a photographer, Paola, that changed her perspective. Paola wanted a “raw, real” look, just like what Keys’ album gave to listeners, and so she decided to shoot Keys without makeup, straight from the gym. 

This was the result, and Keys is stunning. She says she wants to break free of what people expect from her, and be herself:

Cause I don't want to cover up anymore. Not my face, not my mind, not my soul, not my thoughts, not my dreams, not my struggles, not my emotional growth. Nothing.

This is admirable and wonderful. Something that has struck me about the #nomakeup movement is how it is being applied to children’s media. 

Realistic-looking Disney princess art has become all the rage, and it brings up a lot of questions as to why we are putting these unrealistic images of beauty into children’s media. 

The change is not drastic, because these princesses are still fantastically beautiful, just like Keys, but the fact that they have makeup on in their situations gives this unrealistic expectation of beauty and the effort that girls have to put in 100% of the time. Who is putting makeup on when running away to build their own ice castle? Or when they are being secreted back into their father’s castle only to be cursed with a sleeping spell? This is also prevalent in things like why women in post-apocalyptic stories or all-female societies bother with makeup, or shaving their body hair.

Why does Wonder Woman shave her armpits? In the early 1900s, when razors for that didn’t really exist? Coming from a society of all women who don’t care about body hair? In the crisis that she is in? Who has time for that?

I think that Keys has brought up a great point about being yourself with #nomakeup, and I think that filmmakers and media creators need to look at the women, and men, that they are creating. They need to begin putting realistic beauty standards on their characters, realistic in that it needs to be what would be feasible and possible for the characters, so that little girls and other media consumers know that they don’t have to put on makeup and a bra before saving the world.

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Androgyny Strikes Me

In Why We Should Think Twice Before Idealizing Ruby Rose and our class discussion, we often said that what is problematic about the commodification of androgyny is the fact that it is not intersectional in the least. 

When the only celebrated expressions of androgyny are idolizing those who are conventionally attractive, thin, white, able-bodied, and assigned female at birth, many of us who fall outside of these expectations can begin to feel as though we are not enough as we are, and that we are not androgynous unless we can conform.

The article also mentions that if you Google androgynous, “you will see an overwhelming sea of white, hollow faces, thin, curveless bodies will be hiding underneath suit jackets and pinstripe trousers,” and they aren’t wrong. I Googled it, and there are no people of color, mostly female-presenting people dressed in bowties and suspenders, as if those are what makes someone appear more masculine. Why has this become what we think of when we hear androgynous:

and not this wonderful human:

or this one:

or:

or one of my favs:

Looking at these icons playing with gender makes me realize just how saturated the market of androgyny has become with the idea that “passing” and being beautiful while doing it is important. While these icons definitely are beautiful, non of them ever tried to “pass” as another gender, they are just trying to be who they are. 

I really don’t like that Ruby Rose has become who we think of when we think of androgyny when these wonderful examples were doing it long before her, and in my humble opinion, much better than her (even though the expression of gender isn’t a competition and everyone is great at however they want to express themselves). I just think they do it better because Ruby Rose still tries to fit into the binary, being either extremely feminine or extremely masculine, and none of these icons did that. They tried to break the binary, and I think that is what needs to be done. 

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Fashion Police Strike Me

In Why Yoga Pants Are Bad for Women by Honor Jones, the author describes how they believe yoga pants and other forms of this new style of athleisure are “making it worse[,]” it being the pressure women feel all of the time to be sexy and beautiful rather than comfortable. I can see their point when they say:

It’s not good manners for women to tell other women how to dress; that’s the job of male fashion photographers. Women who criticize other women for dressing hot are seen as criticizing women themselves — a sad conflation if you think about it, rooted in the idea that who we are is how we look. 

I do have to agree that the fashion industry is run by men for female consumers, and that is problematic, but I also have to play the devil’s advocate a little bit here. Women can dress however they darn well please, and it is usually other women that tell one another when they are dressing problematically.

A perfect instance of this was the controversy over how the Amazons were dressed in Wonder Woman versus how they were costumed in Justice League. 

There is an obvious difference in the amount of skin shown, and many fans were upset about the prospect of these oversexualized versions of the Amazons. The pictures first came to light when twitter user Atte T at their handle @Rosgakori tweeted them out with the caption:

In case you wonder: Here's a picture of how the Amazons looked in Wonder Woman...next to pic how they look in Justice League. First designed by Lindy Hemming, second by Michael Wilkinson. Some steps backwards, methinks.

However, one of the actresses/stuntwomen came to the defense of Michael Wilkinson, and in particular the director Zack Snyder:

Samantha Jo, the actress who played Amazon warrior Euboea in the DC Comics films (and worked with Snyder on many of this productions in the past), said: “I think that the Amazons (being a race that lives with only other women) should be free to wear as much or as little clothing as each individual wants. And this was reflected in the variations of the armor that was tailored to each individual. I think that the sexualization happens largely in the intent of the creators. In this case. I’ve heard Zack Snyder and Michael Wilkinson’s name being thrown about.”

Jo continued by explaining her experiences with Snyder and costume designer Wilkinson have been nothing but positive. “I have NEVER felt more empowered than I have on Zack Snyder sets. I have never once been told to sand in a pretty way or perform something with more skin or feminine movements. I have been most appreciated for my strong stances and posture in my fighting. I’ve always felt not just comfortable, but confident in what I was wearing and how I was being represented,” she said.

She then addressed the issue that in Wonder Woman, the Amazon warrior costumes did not appear nearly as sexualized as they did in Justice League, which according to Jo “came with a cost.”

“Yes, the Wonder Woman costumes might have covered some women up a little more, but at least with my experience… there was chafing, scrapes, pinched and bruised skin at my shoulder/arm joint, stepping on my leather straps and tripping,” she said. “For practical reasons, I personally was very happy when Michael offered up solutions for my Justice League costume that made me the most comfortable in my work and in my body.”

I have to agree with Samantha Jo. The criticism of the costumes comes from people who didn’t have to wear them, people who were judging the decision before the film even came out. I think we live in a culture that loves to criticize without looking into the reasons behind decisions first, and trying to be understanding. There was obviously a lot of thought put into these costumes, and each one is tailored to the actress that is wearing it. I have to say, I honestly think they look more powerful in the “bikini suits” as some have called them, because none of their natural power is covered up. Their muscles are there, and they can move much more freely, which is how women fight. Women are not big, so our strength in fight comes from agility, which a breastplate and ridiculous fringes hinders. 

I would have to be an idiot not to acknowledge the sexism within fashion that has led to these remarks, both about yoga pants and these costumes. My counter is, please actually look into issues before you criticize. The world is so full of criticism, we really don’t need any more.

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Beauty Terrorism Strikes Me

Bell Hooks is exceedingly wise and I would give my firstborn to have lunch with her, but was calling Beyoncé a terrorist really the right thing to do?

So Bell Hooks called Beyoncé a terrorist for upholding impossible beauty standards and making them seem easily achievable to young, impressionable minds. This kind of psychological damage, not just to young girls but to the image of what a woman should be in society, is what Hooks equates to terrorism. I think for what Hooks was trying to accomplish, and the context of the time she used it in and her own life experience, she was right in using the word terrorist. It conveys the impact of what she believed Beyoncé was doing to the portrait of a woman, and to beauty standards. My question is, would she have used such language if it were a man, or is a man being a “beauty terrorist” even possible?

So I googled “most beautiful man in the world” and I found a super interesting story. Meet Omar Borkan Al Gala:

He was reportedly kicked out of Saudi Arabia for being too handsome. He was too much of a temptation and too likely too get into mishaps because of his attractiveness apparently. Who knows if this is the real reason for his expulsion from Saudi Arabia, but the chance to talk about beauty, terrorism, and how terrorism has been linked to all things Arabic was too much for me to pass up. 

Bell Hooks could not make her statement today without serious flak. She got a lot of flak when she made it, but today we have ingrained in our collective subconscious the misconception that terrorists are Arabic. There is this repulsion for Arabic-ness that would make people balk at Beyoncé being compared to it. Omar here is one of many beautiful Arabic people to be a prop in the narrative that Arabic nations are barbaric and unjust. To kick someone out for being handsome? Ridiculous! What is even more ridiculous is that we all believe this narrative and refuse to look deeper.

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RBG Strikes Me

Audre Lorde in The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House  explains that using the tools given to us by those in power to attempt to change the system cannot work, and I heartily disagree. It only takes one look at history or at current events to see that working within the system can work, and often produces better results than working outside or against it. 

An excellent example of this is Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Before she was ever a Supreme Court Justice refusing to die so that a court that should not hold political opinions relevant in their decisions would be more balance in its political opinions, she was an amazing lawyer fighting against gender discrimination on many fronts. 

My favorite case of hers was in the case of widower and single dad Stephen Wiesenfeld, who was ineligible for single parent benefits because he was not a woman, even though he was suffering the same hardships a single mother would be suffering. RBG won that case, getting Wiesenfeld the rights he deserved as a parent. She won many others in the fight for equality, and has been the force behind many laws and policies changing in favor of equality. How can you say she has not dismantled the “master’s house” with his own tools? Isn’t that the perfect irony of using the master’s tools? It is so much more satisfying to take down the patriarchy using the systems that it has set in place against it. 

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Twerking Strikes Me

In a study of Nicki Minaj and how she uses personas and black culture to further her brand, my brain immediately goes to twerking. Merriam-Webster defines twerking as “sexually suggestive dancing characterized by rapid, repeated hip thrusts and shaking of the buttocks especially while squatting.” Urban Dictionary defines it as a “mating ritual performed by primates in which the female repeatedly shakes its ass up and down in order to attract a mate,” and “something that Miley Cyrus should never, ever do.”

These highly differing definitions portray the dichotomy that twerking, as a phenomenon, and Nicki Minaj faces in her portrayal and marketing. Nicki Minaj “is, instead, a commodity who has gone rogue by upending gender norms, detouring from the politics of respectability for black women performers, and taunting the audience with queer performances while denying a queer identity”  (Hunter and Cuenca 33). She is powerful and empowering but she is also problematic.

The question to ask here is whether or not using her platform as a space to push back against societal norms justifies her commodification of that pushback. Twerking is an excellent thing to dive further into the matter in a simpler, more easy to understand way.

Twerking derives from African cultural dances. “Kelechi Okafor, an actress and twerk instructor in South London . . . looks at twerking as a movement that empowers women and helps them to keep in touch with their cultures, not hypersexualizing them.” This may be true for some, but there is an undeniable difference between this:

and this:

With the women literally made into animals and lyrics touting having a “pussy so wild they should throw it in a cage,” it is hard to believe the argument that women twerk to respect their African ancestry. 

However, an argument can be made for the dichotomy of twerking in empowering while also being problematic. It has become a symbol of a sort of sexual revolution, with women shaking their asses for themselves and for others, daring people to judge them for their promiscuity. While this message of embracing your sexuality is great, the fact that the dance also comes with a racial history makes everyone embracing that message problematic.

Apart from that performance just being bad in general, Miley’s use of the dance to liberate herself sexually while not acknowleding it origins is problematic. She is using twerking to market herself, much less successfully than Minaj, and has left out the bit about empowering others that Minaj and other artists inherently embody because they can claim the dance’s origin as theirs. 

Overall, I believe it is ridiculous to think that pop stars have any responsibility to empower others other than it making them a profit. They are individuals just like you or me, and I would not expect everyone I pass in the street to stand for something in everything that they do, so why should we ask or expect it from celebrities. 

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Vaguely religious labels strike me

There is a wonderful short essay titled Madonna Speaks Truth to Sexual Power by Gloria Feldt, and there are many things to say about it, but something that struck me was the list of stereotypes she gives that women have fallen victim to over the ages. I have them listed at the end of my post if you want to read her words on the matter, but I have some things to say about stereotypes and labels if you want to take a gander.

Feldt’s stereotypes she lists are the whore, the evil temptress, the eyelash-batting manipulator, the clueless incompetent, and the virgin. What really strikes me is the inherent religiosity in the definitions of some of these concepts. Feldt uses Mary Magdalene, Esther, and Mary as 3 of her examples, the whore, the eyelash-batting manipulator, and the virgin respectively. Women of the Bible are often erased from the narrative, but when they do show up they are often there to turn what is known, the status quo, on its head. 

Mary Magdalene was a whore, but that is not what defined her. What she is known for is being the most prominent female follower of Jesus, one of the most devout people to ever exist. 

Georges de La Tour,  Magdalen with the Smoking Flame, c. 1640

Esther was and eyelash-batting manipulator, but she was also a Jew and a queen. Her husband’s advisors tried to hurt her and her people at every turn, but she literally just told her husband what was up, and he changed his course of action based on her advice. She didn’t manipulate him with her feminine wiles, she spoke to him plainly about a tense political decision.

Lilian Broca, Queen Esther with Scroll, Queen Esther Mosaics

The Virgin Mary may not have even been a virgin. I personally believe she definitely was when she birthed Jesus, but there are passages in the Bible and other accounts that suggest Jesus had siblings and Mary had other children. As a Catholic, I believe that a core aspect of marriage is sex and the bond that creates between a couple. Contrary to Catholic teaching, I believe there is no way that God would have let Mary and Joseph have a sham of a marriage when they were meant to be an example of a perfect married couple. 

These examples all just go to show that these women are multifaceted, just like all women. History has relegated them to stereotypes, but we have the power to bring them out and share their real stories.

·        The whore, who needs no definition. Like Mary Magdalene, she sometimes has a heart of gold despite her morally fallen state. Hers is the most straightforward power transaction, and if she’s a smart businesswoman, she makes sure to get paid before delivering the goods.

·        The evil temptress, like the iconic character Matty, as played by a sultry-voiced Kathleen Turner in the 1981 film Body Heat. Her lover Ned, played by William Hurt, says that Matty “shouldn’t wear that body,” by which he excuses the intensity of his desire (he smashes windows to get to her and murders her unwanted husband at her behest).

·        The eyelash-batting manipulator, who might even be noble if her manipulations were in the service of others, such as the Biblical Esther who saved her people through her feminine wiles. Another example is Scheherazade, who kept her king mesmerized night after night to save other women’s lives and end his brutal practice of getting a fresh wife every night and then killing her the next morning.

·        The clueless incompetent, personified as the dumb blonde hypersexualized Marilyn Monroe model that seemed to define most of womanhood in most men’s eyes most of the time. “In men’s eyes” are the operative words. The Barbie doll was born in 1959, a year after Madonna; her tiny waist, big boobs, and long shapely legs represented the objectified feminine ideal— sexy but not too overtly sexual.

·        The virgin, a.k.a., Mary, the original Madonna, morally pure because she is sexually untouched. The paradox of the very concept of virginity, as authors like Hanne Blank (Virgin) and Jessica Valenti (The Purity Myth) have demonstrated convincingly in their books, is that the idea of virginity itself is socially constructed, with no objective meaning of its own. If you think about it, the belief that a woman’s hymen is what gives her value to a man is among the most ridiculous in human history. I think that’s why I have always loved how the ironic humor in Madonna’s lyrics: “Like a virgin . . . touched for the very first time” punctures such ancient notions. – Feldt 83-84

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“It” and the WWE strike me

Joseph Roach does a bang-up job of describing what “It” is. “It” can be charisma, animal magnetism, charm, moxie, spunk, big dick energy, or any number of other synonyms. You don’t necessarily have to be conventionally attractive to have “It,” or have a lot of talent. There is a dichotomy to “It.” “It” necessitates a sort of innocence and experience, or sexiness, at the same time, which is why women, whose innocence and childishness is often fetishized, might have an easier time of been seen as having “It.” However, there are many men that have “It” as well. 

A group of men that strike me as having “It” consistently are professional wrestlers. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, John Cena, Hulk Hogan, and Andre the Giant are just a few examples, but they’re who I’d like to focus on because they are household names for non-wrestling fans as well. The Rock is an especially good example, the first paragraph of his WWE bio shows why:

He has been dubbed The Great One, The People’s Champion and The Most Electrifying Man in All of Entertainment. Mere words fail to capture the essence of the most charismatic Superstar of all time, though the catchphrase “boots to asses” comes awfully close.

While these men are attractive in their own ways, especially the Rock *swoon,* they exemplify the trait of “It”-ness that says you don’t have to be conventionally attractive. I mean, just look at Hogan’s mustache for a second and tell me with a straight face that he’s conventional:

These particular men also exemplify the dichotomy of “It”-ness very well. They may not fall under the innocence category, but they do fall under a related category of wholesomeness. Watch The Princess Bride, The Game Plan, or Scooby-Doo! WrestleMania Mystery and then try to tell me these men aren’t blessings. And while they may not be your cup of tea, there is no denying that these men are all sexy in one way or another. Beautiful, wholesome men. 

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Colloquialism Struck Me

In 3 Reasons Why Orange Is The New Black Is The Most Queer Feminist Thing Ever: Taco fest, swirrrrrl, swirrrrl and Voldemort, Francesca Lewis uses highly colloquial slang terms and hyperbole, which has become somewhat of a colloquial fad in the titles of pop culture articles, to describe the show and its impact. Taco fest refers to how woman-centric it is, swirrrrl, swirrrrl refers to diverse and intersectional narratives within the show, and Voldemort is a reference to the infamous Harry Potter villain that can’t be spoken of and is in reference to topics that are taboo to talk about but that the show openly addresses, such as race, religion, sexuality, and abortion. 

The language of this article really struck me as representative of the show itself. It is for younger audiences, and Lewis proves it with the internet slang she uses to try and reach who she believes, and is, the audience of Orange is the New Black. I am not a huge fan of the show, but I can respect it for what it is: an extremely talented and diverse cast introducing controversial ideas to its audience through comedy and drama. Grace & Frankie is similar in that it has an extremely talented, though not nearly as racially diverse, cast that introduces controversial ideas to its audience, with a little more comedy than drama in this case. The key difference is audience. 

The audience of Grace & Frankie might not click on an article that references taco fests or Voldemort. It is aimed at an older demographic, with its leads Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin being 81 and 79 years old respectively. Shows with younger leads tend to have wider audiences, because older demographics were once that age and can relate, but older leads have a hard time being relatable to younger demographics. Grace & Frankie reaches their target older demographic easily on the streaming platform Netflix. 

Both shows are telling important and diverse stories to different audiences. In the process, they are normalizing things, like interracial relationships and coming out, that used to be, and still are in parts of the world, crimes. Media is powerful like that.

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Shakespeare’s sister and the women of Burundi strike me

Virginia Wolfe’s A Room of One’s Own details the possible struggle of the sister of Shakespeare, if she had existed. What really struck me about Wolfe’s piece was her reference to the fact that women throughout history were usually anonymous, and this is mostly due to them not having the titular room of one’s own to work within. This figuratively illustrates that women were denied space in men’s fields that they could have thrived in and literally illustrates that women had never been allowed to be left alone long enough to work on anything other than housework, literally going from sharing beds with siblings to sharing beds with husbands and children. They had no outlet for any genius or passion that they might possess. 

I recently read a BBC story on how lesbians in Burundi use secret internet memes to communicate and connect with one another. 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/secret_lesbian_language

“In 2009, the government signed into law a new criminal code penalising same-sex relations between consenting adults. Penalties include imprisonment of up to two years and/or a fine of up to 100,000 francs (US$55).” 

These women don’t have a room of their own in which to be who they are. They meet in public places, wearing secret symbols on their t-shirts so they can recognize one another. The author of this article used a violet, like the one pictured above, as a substitute for all of their symbols. 

They are different from Shakespeare’s sister in one key aspect, in that they have the internet as an outlet, as an escape. The internet is their own room, but it is only a room for the around 4.4% of the population that has access to the internet. You know who has access to the internet? Ellen. 

Ellen has become an LGBTQ icon. I don’t want to take away any of her achievements, but it has to be said that she is a white, western LGBTQ icon. She has a room of her own, as a white woman in the west. Now as a celebrity worth millions, she has a few very large rooms of her own, both physically and metaphorically, that she hasn’t done a fantastic job of sharing with those that have none. 

It bothers me slightly how Ellen has taken being gay and made it a part of her brand. The fact that being gay can be part of someone’s brand bothers me in general because someone’s sexuality should not be that large of a defining factor in their success, but it is especially troubling in Ellen because she really epitomizes a form of Western feminism that can overlook people and communities like the one in Burundi very easily. I definitely do not want to negate Ellen’s struggles, but being a white woman in the United States has definitely made her life much easier and allowed her to experience privileges that can make her, and most Western feminists, oblivious to the struggles of others.

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Being ‘too lesbian’ strikes me

Something that really struck me in She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry was how lesbians were kicked out of a movement that they helped found and build from the ground up. It was tragic, and it shows how selective social movements have been and have had to be in order to get their message across. It harkens back to women’s suffrage, when women of color were left out of the movement to appease racist white women and men. Lesbians were forced out of the movement because it didn’t appeal to the masses, or rather to the people in charge. While their style of communal living without men was unsustainable (and not necessarily a healthy way to deal with the issue), it was a way for them to escape into their own world and build their identity. It allowed them to come back swinging.

Modern LGBTQ+ have created a sort of world of their own as well through the perpetuation of the LGBTQ+ community. They have taken persecution and turned it into unity within their own ranks, and with people that support them.

Ellen’s shunning did something similar for her. In Relatable, her Netflix comedy special, Ellen talks about girlfriends she had and dates she went on. The death of her first love is what sparked her desire to enter the world of comedy, which threw her even more into a world that would not allow her to be fully who she was. Her sitcom was a huge success, but the moment she came out to the public it was all taken away from her. She was able to take that disappointment and turn it into one of the longest-running, most-watched daytime talk shows of all time. Being gay is part of her brand, although she can’t be too gay. 

I was talking with a friend the other day about Ellen and her style. She has to maintain a wholesome image, so her style is a little butch but not enough butch to scare the children or conservatives. It is carefully tailored baby blue or navy fitted blazers and other distinctly feminine forms of masculine clothing with a pixie haircut that every mom over 40 gets. My friend and I wondered how much more butch, or not, Ellen would be if she didn’t have to maintain her brand at all times. Is she kept from being her whole butch self in order to maintain balance, or is she actually much less butch and is just playing into her gay brand? There is no way to know, but if it is working for her, then I hope she is living her truth and has been able to represent her identity how she wants it to be represented.

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School Dress Codes Strike Me

Miss Representation details the state of female representation in the media, which is pretty dire. When women are represented, they are inaccurate, over-sexualized portrayals, and it leads to a belief in women that they must be perfect all the time. Here are a few examples of that that struck me:

One scene that struck me in Miss Representation was towards the beginning when there are a bunch of students giving testimonies describing the culture of portraying perfection that surrounds their everyday activities. One girl says:

I have close friends that, like, in between break periods, they will go to the bathroom and put on like 10 pounds of make-up and, you know, comb their hair and do all this pampering you know, and you're at school to learn. When is it gonna be enough?

Dress codes make sure that bullying based on classism is curbed among students, but their another, much more prevalent purpose is to make sure students, *cough* boys *cough,* aren’t distracted by the way other students, *cough* girls *cough,* dress. This regulation on creative expression is tolerated for this reason, but it is still ok to require, socially, young girls to emanate perfection at every turn, causing them to be distracted. This inherently values the attention of male students over that of female students and forces female students to put up a façade of perfection.

Ellen has to put up a façade of perfection because she is a woman as well. In her Netflix special, Relatable, she does a bit where she talks about how she always has to be nice because that is now a part of her brand as a daytime talk show host. She jokes that she doesn’t need a horn in any of her cars because she can’t ever use it. *Sarcastic gasp* it would be a PR nightmare if Ellen got angry enough at someone while driving to honk her horn. She has to keep up this image of being the “nice lady” as she calls it, in order to keep her status as an upbeat, kind talk show host.