Week 3 and Me

I just want my girlhood back 

I actually feel prettier when I look like I just cried for 15 minutes

John Berger, Chapters 2+3

“To be born a woman has been to be born, within an allotted and confined space, into the keeping of men. The social pressure of women has developed as result of their ingenuity in living under such tutelage within such a limited space. A woman must continually watch herself.”

While I feel comfortable with my identity as a woman, I also feel saddened that our sex and gender ultimately dictates so much about how people view us and about how we interact with the world. I often feel uncomfortable with taking up too much space, showing too much, being too much. I want to feel small, body wise and also generally, physically, so eyes don't get put on me.. in any way. Before my partner, the gaze of many men in my life didn't feel friendly. It felt forced. 

“If a woman throws a glass on the floor, this is an example of how she treats her own emotion of anger, and so of how she would wish it to be treated by others. If a man does the same his action is only read as an expression of his anger.”

I hate hate hate double standards. The judgments imposed on both sexes are not only harmful but honestly laughable. Women are seen as sluts and they have multiple sexual partners but men are seen as popular. Men can be seen as intimidating and cool for being dominant and strong yet for women it's overbearing and bossy. It's strange because there's also a lot of complexity here, as it goes both ways too. (This is just an example, hopefully this isn't too contextually out there). Men are seen more likely as abusers for their dominant anger, while women abusers aren't as taken seriously because they're women. Statistically domestic abuse is mainly men abusing women, but the power dynamic assumptions are still so odd. Women's anger is seen as overly emotional and sometimes explosive but not enough to be taken seriously if they're being emotionally or physically abusive. On one hand, women can be seen as disruptive and over emotional. On the other, women aren't strong enough to physically do anything serious. Obviously these are stupid ways of thinking but I also feel like the whole thing is just a mess. Somehow women are disruptive enough that we can't be in positions of power yet also aren't taken seriously and aren't a threat? Again, this view of anger is mainly derived from distribution of power and dynamics, but our biases of gender and social stigmas are so messed up. 

Understanding Patriarchy by Bell Hooks

“The recollection of this brutal whipping of a little girl daughter by a big strong man, served as more than just a reminder to me of my gendered place, to all my siblings, male and female, and to our grown woman mother that our patriarchal father was the ruler of this household.”

I feel like many young people become traumatized by the dynamics in their household, thus affecting them later in life. I'm not sure how personal I can get with my responses, but as a general summary; I was raised by a father who constantly demanded respect but never gave respect to his daughter nor his past partner, a.k.a. my mom. Luckily she had the sense to leave him emotionally, but the demands of respect were based on ideas of superiority and power. My mother was raised in a household where she was told a man would take care of her. This was obviously not the case, but she went her whole life living this belief, thinking she couldn't get a job, and so on. The gender roles of her life have restrained her, and the gender roles of my father have made him aggressive. His demands about respect are rooted in dominance, aggression, and narcissism regarding his role in the family. It is not about true respect, but it's the idea of masculinity having to triumph over the wife, daughter, stepdaughter, and so on. He wanted to be considered the provider, and the man in control, regardless of not taking care of us. I, too, was always the little girl not allowed to speak back, having to respect the man of the house regardless of how he treated the women of the house. While his issues are very.. deep, I truly believe his ideas of being the dominant person in the family are definitely a major stem for this. Issues of patriarchy are oftentimes internal and the external expression of these issues can cause it to spiral and cycle as well. Seeing this issue depicted in another person's writing feels intimate yet uncomfortable, as I know the impact can be painful. Especially with physical scenarios. Not only have my experiences affected my idea of men in my life, but also of adult authority figures. I wonder what life could be if power dynamics and gender weren't so laced, so flawed. 

“To indoctrinate boys into the rules of patriarchy, we force them to feel pain and deny their feelings”

 

Young men and boys are oftentimes treated badly for expressing their emotions and having "feminine interests”. Anything deemed as feminine, weak, or unmasculine can automatically become a target. Young men can internalize these feelings and feel as though they cannot like certain things, act certain ways, or express their emotions. Mental health issues in men can often lead to suicide, as their mental health is not only not taken seriously, but they can be more afraid to ask for help or admit they NEED help. So many young men are forced to hide their feelings and “be like a man” that they become almost physically incapable of letting those emotions out. The idea of “a man” just being tough, not feminine, and dominant are not only strange but harmful. A man very close to me who I adore struggles to show vulnerability and physically can't cry anymore despite saying how hard he wants to, due to the way he was raised by his patriarchal, sexist father. His emotions would be picked on and used as a target for years, to the point where he had to become visually numb to turmoil as a sort of self defense mechanism. This is not a way to live, and I hope this perspective of going about life will die out eventually. It's okay for men to seek help, therapy, love, and acceptance. It's okay for men to like “feminine” and gender neutral things. We shouldn't force either gender into feeling pain to “toughen up”. That's giving them trauma, which some people cannot work through. 

“By placing the blame for the perpetuation of sexism solely on men, these women could maintain their own allegiance to patriarchy, their own lust for power”

The Oppositional Gaze by Bell Hooks

“The child who had learned so well to look the other way when necessary. Yet, when punish, the child is told by parents “Look at me when I talk to you”

Of course, this is a totally different context, but I struggle to look most people in the eye. As someone neurodivergent, it's just a difficulty I have. BUT, I also know this fear was given to me by my family as well. Looking someone in the eye, especially when being scolded or if you're in trouble, feels insanely vulnerable. I meant no disrespect by anxiously looking around and not being able to stare in the face of something intimidating, but it probably seems disrespectful because looking away can seem like you're uninterested, not paying attention or being defiant in some way. At the same time, staring too much can also be an opposition, or a threat of some kind. At certain points when it just gets too much, too tiring, I give a knowing, tired gaze; long enough to get the point across, without a word spoken. I'll look, alright, just not in the way you want me to. 

“Amazed the first time I read in history class that white slave owners punished enslaved black people for looking, I wondered how this traumatic relationship to the gaze had informed black parenting and black spectatorship”

The generations of trauma directly inspired by slavery are not only heartbreaking but also so difficult to repair. Unfair power dynamics still remain, power is still to this day stripped from people of color and women, and perspectives are heavily underrepresented and neglected. 

What is the Male Gaze? Female Gaze? Oppositional Gaze? 

Each “gaze” is built upon perceptions of gender; how we perceive our own, interact with them, and how they interact with us. The male gaze is described as a way to sexualize and objectify women, focused on the male viewer, the male creator, or the male perspective of the man in relation to a woman. The male gaze affects not only how men view women, but how women view each other. Our faces, breasts, clothes, sexuality; every part of ourselves that we judge is not only rooted in societal beauty standards and gender expectations, but the patriarchy and male gaze associated with them. Tons of films, for example, focus on portraying a woman as being attractive for the common heterosexual male viewer. Many tropes are built upon the male protagonist's interactions with a female protagonist. The idea of the manic pixie dream girl, for instance, describes a quirky, pretty, fun, adventurous girl who's a bit weird but also fixes the flawed, unlikable heterosexual male protagonist. In reality, the manic pixie dream girl honestly sounds like a neurodivergent woman stripped of all the issues and complexities of being neurodivergent, highlighting the pretty/quirky/funny/weird side as being “not like other girls”. This “woman” is an idea; a generalized, stripped down image of a person. Sure, people like this may exist, but that's just one facet. A real woman, who might seem this way when heavily masked, can also have meltdowns, traumas, anxiety issues and so on… but the trope is focused on the girl being quirky and serving the protagonist to better his own life. Of course, this is just a random example in a sea of tropes.

The female gaze focuses on the visual and emotional perspectives of women. Well the male gaze focuses on allowing a heterosexual male audience to experience a woman in a certain way, the female gaze focuses on portraying a woman-like experience, when that is understandable and real. In theory, the portrayal of a female character will not solely be her body and typical attractive personality, but also the deeper complexities of the character, how she interacts with herself and others, and how it can be interpreted by the audience. The female gaze will oftentimes have a female protagonist or predominantly woman focused rather than male. 

People of color have been oppressed, neglected, and mistreated for centuries. They've been underrepresented AND misrepresented. The gaze imposed on them has not been their own for much time, and there should be more opportunities for people of color, especially women of color, to take back their “gaze”. Bell Hooks remarks how the oppositional gaze is based in power, a resistance of black people reclaiming their gaze when it was repressed.  Looking is posed as an act which provides strength and power, resilience and reclaim of autonomy. Being able to see and be seen poses a power dynamic in a way, and for quite a long time (even now), the dynamics were unfair. After being forced for so long to not look, to keep their heads down, the desire to look, to see, became oppositional. The agency in being strong enough to look brings back power. 

Female Gaze: Art that Looks at What Women See | NYTIMES

• “It is important to really just present the artists with their portraits and then let visitors make the comparisons themselves,” Ms. Vischer said.”

• “In Mr. Grau’s view, these artists are often explicitly interested in the relationship between the artist and their sitter, and they depict that dynamic on the canvas.”

  
  

Ana Mendieta: Artist Who Pushed Boundaries | NYTimes

• “She urged viewers to disregard their gender, race or other defining societal factors and instead connect with the  humanity they share with others.”

• She invited an audience to the made-up crime scene, where she  remained bent over the table with blood dripping down her legs and pooling at her feet as they discussed the incident.