Stop claiming; Start caring.

I can't remember the last day I didn't wear any make-up. Not this week. Not last. Maybe once or twice this semester. Maybe not. I also can't remember the last day I consciously thought about putting make-up on, or tried to look "special" or "pretty" or whatever. Usually I just aim for awake and/or human.

And although I'm being facetious, that's exactly what Sandra Lee Bartky is getting at in her chapter "Foucault, Femininity, and the Modernization of Patriarchal Power" of The Social Construction of Women's Bodies; femininity is required for women to be taken seriously, but femininity is not implicit in femaleness. Femininity is constructed, no, it is chiseled. It is choked. Women are held a much higher standards than men in terms of their everyday appearances and social behavior. 

To women, I ask: in re-claiming femininity, what are you claiming? Is claiming enough, or must we restart altogether? Does "claiming" still recognize an androcentric system? Should we be using different, more drastic language? 

These are big questions, I know. I do not think claiming is enough. We need a stronger vocabulary. We need to erect a new feminine. By recognizing that the "choice" to be feminine to is implicitly controlled and made inferior by male dominance, one must realize that "claiming" feminine as-we-know-it is insufficient. We must work on defining feminine without dichotomizing it with dominance. Secondly, we need to stop attacking or judging other women (and non-women) for not adhering to the system.

Bartky focuses on the ideas of Michel Foucault--who emphasized society's production of docile bodies or bodies complicit to social expectations--and applies Foucault's ideas to the unique and underrepresented experiences of women. In Foucault's prison design Panopticon, prisoners were visible from a guard's tower with the threat of potentially being watched at all times. This possibility forced the prisoners in a "constant state of conscious and permanent visibility" (Bartky 79).  Through this allegory, Bartky relates how women are likewise imprisoned by internalized social expectations of acceptable appearances and behavior, and how women must negate the natural processes of their bodies in order to remain culturally relevant. 

Alternative solution: let's all wear scary masks

Through countless examples of daily female altercation of appearance, Bartky proves that being born female does not equate to being born feminine, highlighting the pressures of the modern female to“construct a “feminine” body out of a female one” (Bartky 86). Society today has callous expectations for women and the body is seen as the enemy. Women are expected to uphold standards from slenderness to meekness, fighting fiercely against natural inclinations. Even the creases of an expressive face can cause unsightly wrinkles that "subvert the disciplinary project of bodily perfection;" therefore, women should suppress their emotions to stay young, coy, and docile (Bartky 81).

Inspired by Julia Serano of Whipping Girl, particularly of her chapters on femininity, I ask, in claiming femininity, what are we claiming? In class, with the guidance of Serano, we discussed the inevitable "Catch 22" that women face with their appearances in daily life. If women dress up to go out, it is presumed to be for the attention of men and they are either mocked for being slutty or blamed "looking consenting"; conversely, if women put less effort into their appearances, then they are viewed as sloppy or careless or gross. Is it anti-feminist to choose to dress up for men, or for whatever damn reason? Or does any choice fail to subvert the system?

Although women can make day-to-day personal choices about their appearances, participation in this society is not a choice. It is marketed as a choice. Women are thrust into this system of meticulous scrutiny.  Make-up is marketed as expressive and artful and frivolous, but harshly implies that "a woman's face, unpainted, is defective" (Bartky 85). Female, without the painted feminine, is defective. It's exhausting to me how Fausto-Sterling's Sexing the Body illustrates how massive the influence of the rigid male/female dichotomy is on our culture, yet "female" as a category is necessary but not sufficient. In claiming femininity, what are we claiming? The illusion of choice?

In Bartky's perspective, traditional femininity is enslaved to the male gaze. Women may dress up for men, or in competition with other women, but to be taken seriously at all, a woman must dress up. Traditional femininity is the modern-day foot binding of stilettos, it is "a spectacle...in which virtually every woman is required to participate" (Bartky 86). WHAT REALLY IS femininity when it is unprompted, unrestricted? What is femininity when it is not being contrasted with dominance, power, and male?

To me, it seems like "claiming" is not sufficient if what we're claiming is shaped by male dominance.

And why is this system being perpetuated at all? By law, women are not required to wear make-up, to dress up, or to act submissive. Bartky explain that there are no authoritarians enforcing these cultural ideals; there are strong influences from visual media, parents, and social circles, but nothing forcing this upon women--"the disciplinarian is everyone and it is no one is particular," or in other words, it is "institutionally unbound," and it is largely self-regulating (Bartky 86-89).

This. Should. Sound. Absurd. WHY would women participate in this rigid regulation? According to Bartky, the lack of clear authoritarians administering these social "rules" helps add to the illusion that dress-up is only harmless and creative and voluntary. 

You too are beautiful

In my psychology junior seminar on morality, we have been discussing similar self-regulating systems, particularly how propriety morals and interpersonal morals are taught and how they perpetuate in society. There are certain social rules we uphold: don't cheat on tests, don't park in handicapped spaces if you're able-bodied, don't shoplift. Most of the time, people are concerned about "appearing" moral, rather than actually "being" moral. They are also more concerned with getting caught. These systems are compatible with the Panopticon; that is, when people are reminded that they are being watched (and could face consequences for immoral acts), they are more likely to exhibit moral behavior. Even when these "reminders" are superficial. People are more likely to cheat on exams in dimly-lit rooms than a well-lit ones; researchers proposed that a darker room creates a false sense of anonymity that catalyzes cheating. A darker room seems less monitored. Studies show that people are even less likely to cheat when there is a large decal of an eye in the room; while a picture of an eye clearly isn't doing any watching itself, this visual reminder prompts cheaters to feel more self-conscious about their immoral behavior. The eye acts as a metaphor for the watchtower of the Panopticon. This article from The New Yorker recaps some of these studies in morality and surveillance. 

Society self-regulates interpersonal morals like "don't cheat" for the better of a collectivist community; a cheater rips off the hard work of others; a cheater spoils a fair system; a cheater ensnares innocent workers; a cheater creates tension and distrust. Everyone is brought down by a cheater, and that is how the self-regulating system is perpetuated.

But a woman who doesn't wear make-up? What does she steal from society? What does she detract from other women? What injustice does she cause? 

She causes an injustice to men. If femininity is defined SEPARATE from men's views, if it DOES NOT contrast men's power, than it refuses to ENFORCE male as dominant. Although there is freedom in the way women dress, there is a platform for creativity and self-expression, there are practical components, appearance is NOT without male influence. And by influence, I mean chokehold. 

So how can women stop self-regulating this system? Here are some fun tips:

• stop putting down other women
• don't call people ugly
• stop caring about what other people wear
• don't wear stuff you don't want to
• be nice