Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Body Positivity: Figure Drawing

My cousin-in-law is an artist and, when I was 11, she began taking me to a figure drawing studio every other Sunday.  This continued until the studio closed six years later, but then I took honors art classes in high school and those involved figure drawing.  And then I kept doing figure drawing throughout college.

It took a few years, especially since my mother poked my belly and called me fat when I was in middle school, but this exposure to naked bodies dramatically changed my beauty standards.  In figure drawing, the most interesting bodies are "flawed" - fat, saggy, scarred, and marked.  Drawing different bodies so frequently shifted my understanding of the "ideal" body, so I rejected the mainstream standards in favor of every body.

The best way to develop body positivity, especially in children, is to see every kind of body in a welcoming setting over a long period of time.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Sexual Objectification EDITED

I admit that I was frustrated and flustered when I wrote the original Sexual Objectification blog entry, therefore it isn't well written.  Here is the edited version, beginning with some definitions:
sexualization: prioritising the sex, sexuality and sexiness of a person.
sexual objectification: treating a person as a sexual object.
feminism: the belief that people of all genders and sexes should have equal opportunity and choice.
the women's movement: the history of feminism, particularly in America in the 1960's/'70's

http://www.livescience.com/21609-self-sexualization-young-girls.html

A friend posted this on her facebook.  She and her peers are religious, involved mothers and they all commented about how relieved they are that being religious, involved mothers combats early sexual objectification.
I pointed out that I was under the impression as a child that I would marry by 16.  My mother and the mothers who volunteered at my Catholic school (which, I discovered much later on, was an extremist parish) all emphasized that little girls should prepare for marriage constantly until they're at the altar - sexual objectification was encouraged, though in manners less obvious than skimpy clothing.  Religious, involved mothers can do more damage than good - another lady commented about how her mother actually pushed her in the opposite direction and hated sexuality.
Nobody in this discussion on the article replied to my point, but eventually one of them commented "It's as though the women's movement created more objectification than less of it."

Because of the correlation between the women's movement and shifts in advertising, this can appear as a causation.  In the years leading up to the women's movement, sexual objectification in advertising was minimal - women still appeared in advertising as service objects, only fully clothed.  The levels of sexual objectification, particularly of women, in mainstream advertising are at a disturbing high today in American culture.


However, women were more sexually objectified, to the point of being considered property of father/husband before the women's movement.  Higher education was discouraged for a woman because it made her a less serene servant - and nobody saw the problem in proclaiming this conundrum bluntly.  Women themselves chose to abandon education in order to objectify themselves.
So I replied to this lady " the women's movement made it illegal for a husband to rape his wife...so no."  What more obvious example is there that the women's movement gave women human status?
She replied "that's a law, this article is about culture."

.....WHAT?!?!?!?  Don't most laws come about through cultural shifts?!?!?  The women's movement is incomplete, it isn't finished.  It gave women choices, that's what feminism is.  However, because woman-as-sex-objects are still very highly valued in our culture - as evidenced by advertising - many women make the ill-informed choice to objectify themselves.  I argue that a choice made without awareness of other options isn't an autonomous decision at all, which is the difference between sexualization and sexual objectification.  If you want me to elaborate on how I know these women's decision-making, please ask.
Feminism is still working to elevate women's minds to equal societal value.  I hate to say it, but the women who choose to be sex objects, as opposed to sexual human beings, are perhaps the biggest obstacle to feminism.

And yes, I'm aware that my privileges are showing...I'm working on it.

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Street Harassment

I got off the Megabus at 12:45am and had about a mile to walk to my hotel in Chicago. The streets were almost empty and I was walking briskly.

A black Mercedes Benz from Connecticut, with 3 young men inside, drove by and slowed down when they saw me. I was crossing a large & empty intersection and they very slowly turned, right behind me. The front passenger leaned out his window and called “hey sweet ass. Sweet tart ass.” Had I stopped, slowed or turned around, they would have been able to grab me. Instead, I ran onto the sidewalk. I was walking east and this street was a 1way going west.

THEY CIRCLED THE BLOCK. When they pulled over by me again, a huge crowd of partiers was right next to me so I guess they realized what a bad idea it was to bother me.

This was horrifying.

Sexual Objectification

http://www.livescience.com/21609-self-sexualization-young-girls.html

A friend posted this on her facebook.  She and her peers are religious, involved mothers and they all commented about how relieved they are that being religious, involved mothers combats early sexualization.
I pointed out that I was under the impression as a child that I would marry by 16.  My mother and the mothers who volunteered at my Catholic school (which, I discovered much later on, was an extremist parish) all emphasized that little girls should prepare for marriage constantly until they're at the altar - sexualization was encouraged, though in manners less obvious than skimpy clothing.  Religious, involved mothers can do more damage than good - another lady commented about how her mother actually pushed her in the opposite direction and hated sexuality.
Nobody in this discussion on the article replied to my point, but eventually one of them commented "It's as though the women's movement created more objectification than less of it."

At first glance, that line of thinking isn't illogical.  Magazines, commercials, billboards, etc. show highly sexualized women, which didn't exist before the women's movement.  Women in advertising back then were still objectified and portrayed as stupid, only they were fully clothed.
However, women in general were more objectified, to the point of being considered property of father/husband.   Higher education was discouraged for women because it made her a less serene servant - and nobody saw the problem in proclaiming this conundrum bluntly.  Women themselves chose to abandon education in order to objectify themselves.
So I replied to this lady " the women's movement made it illegal for a husband to rape his wife...so no."  What more obvious example is there that the women's movement gave women human status?
She replied "that's a law, this article is about culture."

......WHAT?!?!?!?  Don't laws come about through cultural shifts??!?  
The women's movement is incomplete, it isn't finished.  It gave women choices, that's what feminism is.  Because women are still valued most highly as sex objects, many women still CHOOSE to fulfill that.  Feminism is still working to elevate women's minds to equal societal value.  I hate to say it, but the women who choose to be sex objects are perhaps the biggest obstacle to feminism.