Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Your ass is yours






















I ran across this post at Shakesville today--in case you don't feel like clicking, it's a love letter from Melissa McEwan to Emma Thompson, lauding Ms. Emma for protecting her young co-stars from pressure to become sylphs. In fact, Emma goes all Mama Bear and makes them eat, according to Hayley Atwell. Now, I'm pretty keen on Emma Thompson myself, and I certainly respect Melissa McEwan, but the idea that poundage fosters female self-worth is as ridiculous--and anti-feminist--as the endless quest for size zero.

Yes, it's disturbing to see actresses and models who look like walking skeletons presented as beauty icons. It probably does encourage unhealthy dieting in young women, though it certainly is not the primary cause of anorexia and other eating disorders. I was an anorexic for nearly ten years. I'm lucky to be alive, and if there's one thing I know for sure, it's that nobody ever starved herself to death because she wanted to be pretty. It's a lot more complicated than that. Trust me.

I'm all for defying the beauty burden placed on women in a consumer culture, but you don't do that by defining yourself in opposition to it and demanding that other women do the same. That's just another form of control, another distraction from the things in this world that ought to matter. It's galling to me to see this fake notion of owning the body pop up so often in female discourse. It gets lip service all along the feminist spectrum: from suburban mommies (from whom, frankly, it seems a lot like camouflaged envy), to Goddess girls who like to sit around on their abundance and declare it sacred.

The truly radical act is to claim your body as your own and do with it what you will, independent of imposed notions of beauty--and yes, health. If you want to fast until you look like a greyhound, go ahead. Get as fat as you please. Pierce anything you like. If you're really certain you'd still want them if you were stranded on a desert island, get the fucking breast implants. Whatever. But do it because it is what you want to do. Take charge of your body and leave other women alone to do the same.


ChloƩ, Jules Joseph Lefebvre, 1875. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

What I want is to look like the girl in that picture ...

BitterGrace said...

Why?

chayaruchama said...

Rah, Rah.

Anonymous said...

'cause she's beautiful ...

BitterGrace said...

She is beautiful. Which should make us want her, but it seems strange that her beauty makes us want to be her. I mean, I want to look like her, too--at least there was a time in my life when I did--but it seems wise to be suspicious of that desire.

Anonymous said...

I like all you women too much to think that there's anything in need of changing in any of you. But none of you go doing the implant thing, 'kay?

Signed
idealist L

Perfumeshrine said...

Dear M,

EXACTLY!

This holier than thou aspect of body discourse and pseudo-feminism gets on my last nerve. Balloing oneself isn't proving a stance against anorexia: it's just an excuse.

BitterGrace said...

Yeah, Leo, I dunno why anybody would want the plastic puppies. But then, I dunno why anybody would want to eat a raw oyster. The world is full of mysteries...

Pseudo-feminism is right, E. Why trade one oppressive orthodoxy for another?

Mary said...

I'm coming in late here on this....I have to chew on this for a while to form an opinion that I can express.

BitterGrace said...

I hope you'll come back and share it, Mary. I don't expect everybody to agree with my POV on this.