Femagination » Society-at large

The Nature of War

Ellen Keim — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 15:30:45 +0000

Poater by Michaelsen Rolf (Norway)

After I wrote my last post about women impinging on men’s territory, it occurred to me that I had hit on the very reason why there’s a war between the sexes in the first place. Because what is war anyway but a conflict over territory? Even when the purported reason for the war is to protect some ideal or philosophy, it all boils down to a battle for territory.

Take the war in Iraq. Bush justified it as a fight for democracy, but in reality it was to protect our territory. Those who orchestrated the war wanted to make sure that no one (read terrorists) would ever be able to take over America. And, to be honest, it was also to protect our “territory” in the sense of our access to Middle Eastern oil.

Everyone has territory. It can be physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual, philosophical, familial—you name it, we all have it. The reason why territory is so important to us is because what we “possess” makes up a great deal of our identities. Who would you be without your possessions, both material and immaterial? Without your home, your family, your religion, your ideas? And make no mistake, even with those things that are also possessed by others (like religion), we will still protect our version of it.

One of the things we possess is our roles. If anyone tries to take over our “God-given” roles, we become defensive, even aggressive. Thus the man feels threatened when his wife makes more than he does, because his special role is to be the provider. And his wife tends to shut him out of the things that define her role as a wife and mother: nurturing and consoling the children, decorating and maintaining the home.

That’s why it’s hard to let go of these roles even among egalitarian couples. The father might be all for his wife contributing to the family’s net worth, and yet resents it when she does it better than he does. The mother is all for sharing parenting and household tasks, but finds fault with everything her husband does.

It’s not so much that we want to prevent others from trespassing on our territory, it’s that we want to retain control over it. They can “visit” all they want; we just don’t want them to take over. You can see this dynamic when women become mothers. It’s especially hard when our children are infants, for instance, to relinquish control over their care. We want our husbands to help out, but we feel uncomfortable or even angry when they try to do too much.

By the time our children are older and we could really use help taking them to doctor appointments and attending their school events, not to mention disciplining them, the pattern is already set. We may chafe under the responsibilities of child-rearing, but by then we’ve bought into the idea that they’re our responsibilities.

And it’s not just men who make us feel threatened when they attempt to usurp our parenting role. Sometimes we feel even more threatened by other women: the nanny, our mothers, our exes’ second wives. One of the things that made me hate my children’s stepmother when they were little was when she had their hair cut short (really short) during a summer visit. I still can’t believe the gall of that woman! Who did she think she was—their mother?? (And of course, I blamed my ex, too, for allowing her to do it; he impinged on my territory.)

It seems to me, however, that it is men who feel the most threatened than women do by the opposite sex’s intrusion into their territories. Men have a thing about defending their territory. They also like expanding it.That could be what gets us into wars. Would the world be better off if more leaders were women? Not necessarily. Because once we’ve identified our territories, we can be just as ferocious as men in defending them.

It’s normal for humans to want to have areas of expertise that are unique to them. But can we afford the idea that we don’t have to share with anyone else? Look at the United States. It prides itself on being the epitome of democracy. But that only makes us look down on all other forms of government. And it makes us feel that we can tell (or force) other countries to do it our way.

Our insistence on protecting our territory is one reason why we refuse to co-operate with other countries. All we care about is protecting our own boundaries. It makes sense that the U.S. enjoyed the most good will during and after World War II, when it co-operated with other nations against Hitler’s and the Japanese’s attempts to take over the world. Compare that with the world’s attitude toward the U.S. now that we’re going it alone in Iraq. Or when we refused to participate in the Kyoto Protocol against global warming.

The reason this last point is significant is because co-operation is exactly what is needed in order to prevent war, whether it’s war against other countries or the war between the sexes. We have to stop thinking in terms of territory and open our boundaries to the influence of others.

Unfortunately, we’re not seeing many instances of co-operation these days. That could partly be because we protect our territory more when we feel it’s being threatened. Those who have recently or historically held the upper ground are feeling threatened by groups they feel are attempting to take over. Christians feel threatened by Muslims, Americans by terrorists, Republicans by Democrats, conservatives by liberals, Arizona by Mexico, Wall Street by Main Street, the rich by the poor, men by women.

War should always be a last resort. But too often it is the first reaction to a breach of territory. There are other ways to achieve ends that will satisfy the majority. But using them requires that we give up control over our perceived possessions (which can include intangibles like power, expertise, birthright, etc.). And that is something that few people are ready to do.

The World’s Worst Mother (Video)

Ellen Keim — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 11:39:21 +0000

Ayelet Waldman tells how her essay about how she loves her husband more than her children caused a furor after it appeared in The New York Times. She is now officially known as the “World’s Worst Mother.” The video is 52 minutes long, but it is funny and gossipy and contains a lot of insight about the dilemma of modern motherhood. Fathers, there’s a message here for you, too.

Enjoy! Video here.

Read what Sandra Tsing Loh has to say about Ayalet Waldman’s bad motherhood in The Atlantic Monthly.

Embrace Your Fat!

Ellen Keim — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 19:39:31 +0000

Before I start, let me make it very clear that I do not think it’s a good thing to be seriously overweight. No one in her right mind would purposefully gain weight she didn’t need. (Except for actors for roles and people like Donna Simpson, the 600-lb. woman who wants to get to 1,000—and you could certainly argue that she’s not in her right mind.)

But I’m sick of people (who are usually not overweight) characterizing fat people as weak, disgusting, even immoral. Prejudice against fat people is stronger than ever, what with all the emphasis on being fit and healthy (it is commonly assumed that fat people can’t possibly be healthy) and, of course, thin.

Then there all the statistics that inform us that 60% of America’s population is overweight (not obese, just overweight, which could mean that they’re packing an extra five or ten pounds) and that over 30% is morbidly obese (which makes it sound as if they’re the size of elephants). When people read those statistics, they shake their heads in disapproval and condemnation.

No one ever feels sorry for fat people. Their weight is always their fault, never mind that they gain weight easily, have a slow metabolism, a different body type, are on medication that causes weight gain or are restricted in their activity by a disability. They’ve “let themselves go” and that simply will not be forgiven.

I admire people like Kirstie Alley (above) and Kathleen Turner, who refuse to let their weight gain send them scurrying into the shadows in shame or embarrassment. (I’ve read that Turner’s weight gain was originally the result of the prednisone she took for her rheumatoid arthritis. Alley states that hers is the result of eating too much.) They are both beautiful, talented people and they shouldn’t have to apologize for being fat.

And then there’s the word “fat.” When I was a fat little kid, my mom used to say that I was “pleasingly plump.” There are lot of euphemisms designed to spare fat people’s feelings: chubby (for children), plus-size, large, big-boned, curvy, being a person of size, weight-challenged, full-figured, voluptuous, built for comfort—I’ve heard them all. I especially like it when people say, “But you have such a pretty face!”

I don’t like being fat. I try to control my eating, but one bad day can set me back for two weeks. I put on five pounds each year for the past two years when I broke my foot (yes, twice in a row) and was rendered immobile. I haven’t been able to get those ten pounds off and I hate myself for it, because I was once lighter and I don’t understand why I can’t get back there again. I admit that I don’t get as much exercise as I should, but I don’t see why I should have to put myself through the tortures of hell in order to lose enough weight to call myself slim again. (Yes, I used to be slim, although I never ever thought so. Now I’d love to be as “fat” as I was even thirty pounds ago.)

So what is the alternative? Could it be that I could actually accept myself the way I am? Or could I take it a step further and learn to embrace my fat?

That’s the goal of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance (NAAFA). Started in 1969, NAAFA’s goal is to promote the idea that being fat does not automatically mean that you are stupid, lazy, smelly, slow, lacking in willpower or self-control, socially inept, a burden on society or unattractive. (Even thin people can have any or all of those attributes.) It does mean that you will be discriminated against. Fat people are less likely to get hired or promoted, to receive adequate health care (everything is blamed on their being fat, and many doctors refuse to help them unless they lose weight), to receive the same level of service as a slim person and, of course, to find clothing that fits and is attractive.

People of average or lower-than-average weight can’t begin to fathom what it’s like to be fat in our society. Instead of being understanding, let alone accepting, they attempt to shame and lecture fat people into losing weight. What they do end up doing is creating an environment that is so judgmental and punishing, very few fat people are able to escape feelings of self-loathing. That only makes matters worse. And when a fat person does indicate that he would like to lose weight, he is expected to “just do it.”

These are the same people who think that depressed people should just “get over it” and that poor people should just work harder. It’s never that simple. There are a slew of physiological, psychological, sociological, economic and environmental issues that affect a person’s ability to lose weight.

It’s almost easier to lose the weight than it is to stop feeling bad about yourself once you’ve been branded as a “fattie.” It’s not at all unusual for a formerly fat person to continue to think that she’s fat. That’s one reason why it’s so hard to keep the weight off: she believes society’s assessment of her so much she’s uncomfortable trying to become something different.

It takes a lot of courage to buck the system and ignore all the messages that try to tell you that you’re inferior. But the only way to find happiness is to tell all the critics to go to hell. Embrace yourself the way you are. You deserve it.

Privilege

Ellen Keim — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 06:26:16 +0000

Even though as a feminist I write for the benefit of all women, not all women will listen to me. I am especially suspect as a Second Wave feminist because I belong to the cohort that seemed to run things during the era of the women’s liberation movement:. The problem is that, according to some, I’m a woman of privilege: I’m white, straight, middle-class and able-bodied. Women of color, lesbians, the poor and the disabled felt that they need not apply.

Actually, this has been a criticism of the feminist movement as far back as the First Wave, when feminists were more concerned about getting women the vote than in eradicating slavery.

And I’m not sure that things have changed that much today. Where once feminists were represented by the Susan B. Anthonys and the Gloria Steinems, now we have the Jessica Valentis; all white, straight, middle class and able-bodied.

Some women have even refused to join, or have left, the feminist movement, because they feel that women of privilege monopolize it. They feel that they’re not being listened to. They resent not being able to influence the course of the feminist movement (although I would argue that this isn’t entirely true).

And isn’t that what we’re talking about anyway? Being shut out of the party? It’s like in high school when the “in” crowd seems to run everything. That’s what being privileged is really all about. Being the one who’s picked first, who gets most of the recognition and is given more opportunities to get ahead. Being given more because you had more to begin with. Having advantages that start you out ahead of everyone else.

It’s natural to resent that kind of privilege. We want those who are “on top” to pay in some way for their privilege. We want them to feel guilty, to apologize, maybe even to give up what they’ve been given. But is that really fair?

Let’s take this a step further: what about male privilege? Feminists talk about the advantages men have just by virtue of their being born male. But what do we expect them to do about it? They can’t very well stop being men. (Well, they could, but that’s a rather drastic solution.)

Feminists do often seem to want men to feel guilty and to apologize for their privilege. But what feminists really want is for men to acknowledge that privilege. And to be willing to stop hogging the resources that are bestowed upon them.

That’s all that anyone wants of those who have privilege. We want them to say, “Yes, we realize that we have things easier than you do. And that we didn’t do anything to earn what we’ve been given. So from now on, we’re going to accord you the same privileges we have. ”

But even this is a touchy solution. It smacks of the lords giving rights to the peasants. What we really need is to change society’s attitudes toward privilege. We need to stop rewarding those who have it and penalizing those who don’t.

In fact, what if we got rid of the concept of privilege altogether? What if it was no longer seen as an advantage to be male, white, straight, rich and able-bodied? What if all conditions and characteristics were seen as valuable? What if we stopped dividing people into the haves and have-nots?

Yes, I know I’m being idealistic. I know that we’ll probably never see a society where people are willing to give up the power that being seen as privileged brings them. But if we would stop attaching so much power to certain qualities, we would find this world a much better place for all of us.

Fashion Goddesses

Ellen Keim — Sat, 15 May 2010 10:00:16 +0000

The April 19, 2010 issue of Newsweek magazine included an article about Grace Kelly‘s clothes. For those of you who don’t know who that is, she was an actress (think “Rear Window” with Jimmy Stewart) who married a prince (literally: Prince Rainier of Monaco). While highly acclaimed as an actress, it was her cool and classic look that got her the most press. Fifty of her outfits are being displayed this week in an exhibition at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum. The title of the exhibition is “Grace Kelly: Style Icon.”

She was an actress for eight years and a political wife for almost 30, but all anyone thinks of when they think of Grace Kelly is how she looked. Granted, she was beautiful and she had a great sense of style that suited her perfectly (no pun intended). But she was also a human being. What do we know of her beyond that?

I remember the “reign” of Jackie Kennedy; I was 11 when her husband was assassinated. She was the fashion icon of the ’60s and beyond. Everyone copied her well-cut clothes and pill-box hat. But, besides being the wife of the 35th president of the United States (and later wife to one of the richest men in the world, Aristotle Onassis) nothing else about her was considered to be newsworthy. Oh, the press regurgitated every bit of information about her that it could find, but their main focus was her style. The week of her husband’s inauguration, it was her picture, not his, that appeared on the cover of Time.

It wasn’t until I was reading the book Where the Girls Are, by Susan J. Douglas, that I found out about her command of French, Italian and Spanish, and that on at least two occasions, when accompanying her husband on diplomatic missions, she spoke to the crowds in their native languages while JFK stood off to the side. She attended Vassar and the Sorbonne before graduating from George Washington University with a degree in French literature. She oversaw a historic restoration of the White House. After Onassis’ death, she became an editor at Doubleday until her death in 1993 of cancer.

But what do we think of when we hear the name Jacqueline Kennedy? The way she dressed.

Princess Diana is another case in point. She tried hard through her charitable work to become more than the wife of the heir to the British throne and the mother of his children. But she became known throughout the world for her fashion sense more than for anything else. Even though she contributed to this fascination by making sure that she always appeared fashionably clothed, it must have been frustrating for her clothes and hairdos to be the main things that were reported about her (until her horrific and untimely death at the age of 36).

Judging women by the way that they look is hardly a new phenomenon. But it seems to be especially egregious when it is done to political wives. I’d like to think that these three had more going for them than their fashion sense. Not all politician’s wives come under this type of scrutiny. But those who do are trivialized by being made into fashion goddesses.

HIV/AIDS Prevention: Do We Really Care Anymore?

Ellen Keim — Mon, 10 May 2010 10:00:45 +0000

I remember the anxiety and sometime hysteria about AIDS in the ’80s. The initial identification of AIDS as a “gay disease” was soon countered with the information that you could also get it through heterosexual sex, as well as from tainted needles and blood transfusions. Everyone became paranoid about getting the disease. Disinformation was everywhere: you couldn’t get it if you were a woman, or straight; you could get it from sweat, or a toilet seat.

The Reagan Administration was slow to respond to the crisis. In fact, the Surgeon General at the time, Everett C. Koop, was forbidden to bring it to the public’s attention. He finally did anyway and dissemination of information about how to prevent it followed. Other than avoidance of all sexual contact, the only way to prevent the transmission of AIDS was to use a condom. Koop, who was a committed Christian, saw no problem with saying so.

And then came abstinence-only sex education, which, as you should know, not only teaches abstinence as the only absolutely sure way to prevent pregnancy and STDs (a fact which can’t be argued with), but also refuses to disseminate any information about birth control methods…unless it is misleading. (Such as the “fact” that condoms fail 31% of the time to prevent HIV/AIDS infection.) That’s because abstinence-only sex education relies on scaring kids out of having sex. If nothing works to prevent pregnancy or STDs then it is assumed that kids will avoid sex altogether. It’s inconceivable to these “educators” that kids might go ahead and have unprotected sex, because after all “nothing works anyway.”

What abstinence-only sex education does is erase any frank talk about sexual issues. The message that sex outside of marriage is bad has even affected those who are presumably old enough to make their own decisions about sex. Young women especially are afraid to carry condoms or ask their partners to use them because they think it makes them look “fast.” If sex just “happens,” they can convince themselves that they didn’t mean for it to, therefore they’re still “good girls.”

The upshot is that HIV transmission has, after falling dramatically since the ’80s, begun to creep up again (for instance, a 15% increase between 2004 and 2007), and other STDs like syphilis, gonorrhea and chlamydia are also on the rise. Even though HIV/AIDS is no longer the death sentence it once was, it is still no picnic to live with, is very expensive to treat, and can still be fatal.

As part of the new health care reform, the federal government has committed to spending $50 million annually for the next five years on abstinence-only sex education. I say this is at best ill-advised, and at worst, fraudulent. Abstinence-only education shouldn’t even be called “education;” it is nothing more than indoctrination. But apparently our government thinks it’s a good idea to tell our children nothing substantive about how to prevent pregnancy and sexually-transmitted diseases.

Meanwhile, HIV/AIDS and other STDs (not to mention unwanted pregnancy) continue to plague our society. But, hey, that’s okay. At least people aren’t doing it on purpose.

Sources: Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports; an article in the June 2010 issue of The American Prospect magazine (you have to be a subscriber to read the whole article online).

Tuesday Tirade: Tough Talk About Immigration

Ellen Keim — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 10:15:05 +0000

Imagine you come from an area in Mexico where hundreds of women have been murdered over the last couple of decades. Or that you live in a neighborhood where you have to worry about gunfire as you take your children to school. You want a better life for yourself and your children. You decide to emigrate to the U.S. But doing it legally could, and often does, take years. Your children are young now.

Personally, I think immigration policy in this country is, and always has been, too restrictive. We are a huge country, with plenty of room and resources to support many more people than now live here. We just don’t want to share. We don’t want to have to make accommodations. And we most certainly don’t want to take on the problems of other countries.

Well, guess what, folks? We’re going to be affected by world-wide events whether we like it or not. Take Arizona for instance. From what I’ve read, Arizona has good reason to fear the violence coming over its borders from the south. But is the answer to stop any suspicious person on the street, demand identification and possibly arrest them? All we can do is deport them. What does that solve?

We need to work harder to forge alliances with the countries we interact with so that we can aid them in their efforts to better their situations. Instead, we stick our noses in their business, stir things up and then refuse their people access to our country when they find life untenable in their own.

Take Iraq for instance. I’m against the war, and always have been. But even if I were behind it, I would still feel that we need to help those whose lives we’ve disrupted. Instead, we make it next to impossible for an Iraqi to emigrate to the U.S. Even those who have served as translators for the U.S., and are at risk from reprisals, find it difficult to find refuge in America.

There are several issues related to immigration that we need to come to terms with:

Racial profiling, both here in the States and overseas. Our immigration policies favor certain ethnicities and nationalities. If we don’t like them, we don’t let them in. And once they’re here, we make them feel unwelcome.
Self-interest. We ask not what we can do for others, but what they can do for us. That’s the bottom line. And we consider ourselves a Christian nation.
Favoring the most fortunate. Instead of offering refuge to those who are most vulnerable, we leave women and children, for example, in the lurch. Too bad for them.
Being influenced by fear-mongers. Those who whip up anti-immigrant sentiments usually do so with fear tactics. We never stop to ask ourselves if their tirades have any basis in fact.
Thinking that there is only one kind of acceptable ‘American.’ We all have this ideal in our minds of what makes a true American and if a prospective immigrant doesn’t fit the profile, we don’t want him or her.
Being selfish. We just don’t want to share even though we have more to offer than almost any other country in the world. Part of the problem is that we use more resources per capita than any other country in the world. We don’t know how to, or don’t want to, divvy up our resources.
Arrogance. We assume that everyone in the world would storm our borders if we had a more open immigration policy. Well, guess what? Not everyone wants to live in in the U.S., often for very good reasons. Contrary to popular belief, there are other quality places to live in the world.

I don’t propose to be an expert about immigration, and I’m sure there are plenty of people out there who would like to set me straight. I’m also sure that I would be labeled a “bleeding-heart liberal.” If that means that I think our country should put its resources where its values are, then I’m guilty as charged.

National Poetry Month: Feminist Poets

Ellen Keim — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 10:00:19 +0000

What makes a feminist poet? Is she a feminist who is a poet, like Audre Lourde and Adrienne Rich? Not necessarily. When I looked up “feminist poets” on the Internet I found lists that included Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay. As far as I know, neither of those women was ever associated with the feminist movement.

But here we fall into a philosophical argument: is it possible to be a feminist without identifying as one? I think it is. And nowhere is this more evident than in the case of poets who write for and about women. I’m not talking about hearts-and-flowers love poetry or sentimental paeans to motherhood. I’m talking about poetry that describes what it is really like to be a woman. The poet doesn’t have to be a feminist to get inside a woman’s heart, mind and soul and write about what she (or he) finds there.

So we find women on these lists who were never feminists, maybe didn’t even care about feminist issues, but who still were able to access the themes that define a woman’s life: sexuality, gender roles, position in society, relationships, marriage, motherhood, spirituality. Today I’m going to contrast two of my favorites who, although they came from different centuries, both had their fingers on the pulse of a woman’s heart.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The first is Elizabeth Barrett Browning, a British poet who lived from 1806 to 1861. I call her a feminist poet even though she was an invalid for much of her life and, on the surface, didn’t accomplish much other than her poetry. She certainly wasn’t an activist of any kind, although she was interested in the world around her. Many people think of her as a Romantic, probably based mostly on her love poems such as the one we are all familiar with that starts: “How shall I love thee? Let me count the ways…”

Browning was married to the poet Robert Browning who wooed her from her invalid bed and talked her into eloping with him. (Her father later disowned her, as he did all of his children who married.) They went to live in Florence where she had their son at the age of 43. (She died when she was 55.) She may not have identified as a feminist, but she certainly “got it” about women in her society. At one point she wrote:

…and is it possible you think a woman has no business with questions like the question of slavery? Then she had better use a pen no more. She had better subside into slavery and concubinage herself, I think…and take no rank among thinkers and speakers.

Anne Sexton

The second is Anne Sexton, an American poet who lived from 1928 to 1974. She, too, was a poet who didn’t have much, if anything, to do with feminism. Her poetry is often called “confessional.” She was a master at tearing out her own guts and displaying them on the page. Like Browning, she was married (1948-1973) and had children, but it was always her poetry which defined her. It may have saved her, too, for a while: she started to write at the urging of both her therapist and her spiritual advisor, but ultimately committed suicide at the age of 46.

Any woman (or man) who reads Sexton’s poetry can’t help but think more deeply about her themes: religious quest, transformation and dismantling of myth, the meanings of gender, inheritance and legacy, the search for fathers, mother-daughter relationships, sexual anxiety, madness and suicide, issues of female identity. She is, in a way, a spokesperson for issues that concern women. I doubt that she thought of herself that way; her poetry was very personal. But as I learned in writing class, it is often the individual experience that speaks to the general public; the personal is made political, as many feminists say.

The following poems illustrate the feel that these two poets had for the female experience. I chose them for what I see as their similarities, in spite of the fact that they were written over a hundred years apart.

Browning’s is from Sonnets of the Portuguese (written around 1845-46) and is titled simply “VI”:

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand / henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore / alone upon the threshold of my door / of individual life, I shall command / the uses of my soul, nor lift my hand / serenely in the sunshine as before, / without the sense of that which I forbore—/ thy touch upon the palm. The widest land / doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine / with pulses that beat double. What I do / and what I dream include thee, as the wine / must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue / God for myself, He hears that name of thine, / and sees within my eyes the tears of two.

This is an except from Sexton’s “The Touch” which was in Love Poems (published 1969):

For months my hand had been sealed off / in a tin box. Nothing was there but subway railings. / Perhaps it is bruised, I thought, / and that is why they have locked it up. / But when I looked in, it lay there quietly. / You could tell time by this, I thought, / like a clock, by its five knuckles / and the thin underground veins. / It lay there like an unconscious woman / fed by tubes she knew not of…
Then all became history. / Your hand found mine. / Life rushed to my fingers like a blood clot. / Oh, my carpenter, / the fingers are rebuilt. / They dance with yours. / They dance in the attic and in Vienna. / My hand is alive all over America. / Not even death will stop it, / death shedding her blood. / Nothing will stop it, for this is the kingdom / and the kingdom come.