I haven’t blogged in months and I’m thrilled with the discussion that resulted from my dive into the deep end. The downside is Kevin is accusing me of scaring his friends. He’s nervous- I can tell by the way he jumped from talking about “rule of thumb” to “two women one cup”* while describing culture and shared meaning. In an effort to give the comments enough thought and time, here is Raising a Girl Part 1-A- comments are in block quotes.
I love this post. But I hope it’s okay if I present ‘the dissenting opinion’ and dig deeper into some presuppositions with which I’m not sure I agree.
I’m happy to delve deeper into this discussion, particularly if we’re going to do so without dangling prepositions! While your tweet started me down this road, what ultimately sent me over the edge was a post at huffpo suggesting that Hillary Clinton’s feelings might be hurt that there was no PCILF website. While I’ve since recalibrated my expectations, I originally believed Huffpo would be in line with my feminist values.
I just don’t see VPILF carry all the connotations you suggest. It’s an objectification to be sure and the discursive power of a label is powerful, I agree. But why can’t a VPILF have a powerful mind? Why can’t she be ambitious and strong? Or intuitive and emotional? Or have a business in finance, or solar energy, or construction? Nothing of course. At least, not to me. The notion that the VPILF comment carries the “and I wouldn’t vote for or listen to or respect such a VPILF†seems more an assumption you (at that particular time) were projecting on this whathisface.
VPILF is different from “Wow, she’s hot,” because of the word “fuck”. When I hear “fuck” I don’t think of a romantic evening, or even a meaningless roll in the hay, I think of being screwed. That’s why when you hear, “I’m fucked,” you don’t think, “wow, she must have had a great time last night.”
A vice president is powerful. Fucking the vice president is an easy way to diffuse that power. Certainly you might vote for a powerful, attractive woman, but the fact that you can call her fuckable reduces her power to that of a barbie doll.
And, as the whathisface, I, with great respect, politely resent that. 🙂 As a proud third wave feminist, I believe a person is a complex personality with a plurality of facets that cannot be reduced to a single label. So whether a candidate is a VPILF or VPINLF has no bearing on whether she gets my vote.
VPILF at best skews the focus to her sexual attributes rather than her credentials (or lack thereof). A simple test for sexism is to ask yourself if you could change the genders in the situation and have it make any sense. While it might be simpler to argue that no sexy men have been vice president, the truth is, male presidential candidates are not judged as much as women on whether or not they are sexually attractive. There’s no PILF website despite the fainting at Obama rallies.
The princess thing strikes a different chord. I have a niece and nephew and I view much of my feminist reading through the lens of helping raise Lily. The aunts love to get her princess toys and gear. I’m the uncle that buys her soccer balls and throws her equally hard around the room when we play games like Kung Fu Panda or Star Wars (I am always the villain who gets defeated).
Several of the commenters mentioned parental influence in princess indoctrination and that’s a piece of it, but the underlying problem is a societal system that forces women into one of several unappetizing stereotypes- princess being one of them. Kudos to you for offering your niece opportunities to punch out of those molds.
But if someone were to mistake Jack for a girl – that’d be okay. That’s a mistake. But Princess? . . . I can feel (internally) my emotional reaction for the mistake-as-princess is different than the mistake-as-girl. I think it is because of the marginalizing connotations embedded in our cultural consciousness of damsels in a dress in distress. Your version of a princess is far cooler, and if someone mistook him for *that* princess, I can feel my internal reaction changing entirely.
Thanks! I am pretty damn cool. I hadn’t thought of the distinction between mistaking him for a girl, and mistaking him for a princess- and you’re right. I suddenly felt empowered picturing Matilda at Disney asking, “what makes you mistake me for a princess?” Changing that internal vision of girls, princesses and vice presidential candidates is central to a more egalitarian society and discussions like this one help move us forward.
From my perspective at least, it seems to me that it’s not the boy-as-girl mistake that causes distress at all — it’s the boy-as-’weaker sex’ that distresses me. [And that is of course my projection on ‘princess’ as mediated by your post.] The only difference in those two is that one has ‘weaker’ in it. We must seek out and destroy those ‘weaker sex’ connotations, I agree wholeheartedly (and I wonder if it relates to the make-up video you link to). To do that, we will probably have to tear down some ’stronger sex’ connotations as well.
Calling a boy a girl is calling him weaker. I disagree with it, but that’s the connotation our society has given it. There are people who are horrified at the notion of Carter being mistaken for a girl and it goes deeper than homophobia. It’s because deep down, they think being a boy is somehow better. It’s just anecdotal, but I’ve never heard anyone complain about being pregnant with a boy, and I’ve reassured more than one tearful friend that her husband will still love her child, even if it’s a girl.
You’re right- we have work to do on both fronts- tearing down negative stereotypes of both genders. Barbara Ehrenreich wrote a great book about problems men face as a result of our patriarchal society.
But we will also have to raise children (even those not our own) with a skeptic eye for underlying assumptions. And we must challenge those underlying assumptions, even when they’re their – or our – own.
Well said, Sean. Thanks for the conversation. Feel free to drop by for some holiday cheer, candy, cookies or kung-fu panda.
*Isn’t it really cute that he substituted “woman” for “girl” in an effort not to infantilize the stars of this video?