Scared male: the question I didn't ask of two feminists

Feminists usually aren't all that scary to me. But tonight I wimped out on asking a question of two who teach at the Oregon State University Women Studies program.

We were into the Q &A and guest speaker portion of the Salem Progressive Film Series showing of "Killing Us Softly 4," a documentary about advertising's image of women. Sexy, skinny, silent, and childish is, of course, promoted over sexless, fat, assertive, and mature.

The movie showed the filmmaker, Jean Kilbourne, giving a talk. As she made a point, we saw photos and videos illustrating how advertisers present an image of idealized femininity that is far removed from everyday female reality.

(Along this line, for someone who is 68 Kilbourne looked pretty good in "Killing Us Softly 4," almost exactly like her Wikipedia photo. My wife and I suspect she dyes her hair. And that either she has great genes or embraces feminist plastic surgery.)

Now, I'll confess that as I watched the advertising examples from Victoria's Secret, Gucci, and many other companies, countless times my male mind wordlessly responded with Wow, that chick is hot!

Yet in the late 70's, along with my young daughter and feminist first wife I listened a lot to Marlo Thomas's "Free to Be... You and Me." Back then I read Ms. magazine every month. And I wasn't many years removed from living with my mother, a strong, independent divorced woman who worked outside the home at a time when not many women her age did.

So when the opportunity to ask questions of the post-movie guest speakers came, I wanted to say something like this to Beth Rietveld and Amanda Littke:

Neuroscience knows that the human brain is made up of some very old parts, and some much newer parts. Our cerebral cortex, where we do our thinking, is a fairly recent evolutionary development. Emotional parts, instinctive parts -- they're much older.

So when it comes to how women are seen by men, and also how they see themselves, it seems like we need to take into account these differences between what we could call our "higher" and "lower" selves (I'm not speaking moralistically, but evolutionarily).

Can't it be argued that the objectifying of women shown in the film, and the emphasis on sexy youthfulness, is a holdover from our cave man heritage which still is reflected in those more primitive parts of the human brain?

I chickened out, though.

As Women Studies instructors, Rietveld and Littke were appealingly passionate about their commitment to rooting out sexist, male-centric cultural attitudes. Not having been in a college classroom for a long time, I was thrilled to hear one of them use the term "deconstruct," a post-modern feminist tool that wasn't around when I was in school.

I was worried that my question would be fodder for one of their classroom lectures.

"You wouldn't believe what this gray-haired guy asked us after a showing of Killing Us Softly 4 in Salem. This is a great example of deeply embedded attitudes toward women that are preserving the misogynist status quo."

So I didn't ask it.

However, the question I did ask was founded on the same sort of neuroscientific premise. Namely, that how we think and how we feel (or act) often are quite different. After I raised my hand and got a microphone handed to me, I said:

Perusing the offerings at the grocery store checkout lane, my male eyes are pleased to notice that women's magazines feature photos of beautiful half-naked women, and that men's magazines also feature photos of beautiful half-naked women.

Thus the ideal female image promoted by advertisers, and decried in the movie we just saw, is embraced by those who buy women's magazines -- who are almost all women.

Doesn't this imply that women are the ones who are perpetuating a supposedly overly idealized and sexist view of femininity? Or at least that women are as much to blame as advertisers for keeping that ideal alive?

Well, that's close to how I asked my question. I was sort of nervous about asking even this toned-down question, so rambled on even more than I usually do.

The answers I got from Rietveld and Littke were disappointing. I can't recall much of what they said because their responses didn't seem to address what I was getting at. Or maybe I expected them to understand the subtext of my question, that our primordial human instincts often outweigh our more modern reason and logic.

(I've read that in most cultures across the world, men tend to marry women younger than themselves; a certain curvaceous female form is valued; and beauty is more important to men than it is to women. Thus advertisers seem to be tuning in to how people actually feel, whereas feminists tend to emphasize how people should feel.)

A better answer came from an audience member later on in the Q and A session. She referred to my question, saying that women's magazines are part of a cultural mileiu that females grow up in and end up internalizing.

Yes, agreed.

But I still wonder to what degree feminists are swimming against a powerful evolutionary current, and whether it is even desirable to eliminate all of the supposedly sexist aspects of modern culture.

(Third wave feminists apparently don't think so.)

Comments

[Willie R]

Bringing a fertilized egg to full term and then nurturing an infant human is the sole and entire purpose of a female body. Most female bodies accomplish this task. There is no penalty imposed upon a female who does not accomplish this biological directive. The genes do not care.

All the rest of life is how this does, or does not, get accomplished. It does not get any simpler than that.

[Rain]

Well as a woman but not necessarily a feminist even though I do believe in female power and espouse it for my granddaughter now and used to for my daughter, I still like to look sexy. I don't buy magazines to do it though and barely have noticed what ones are on the newsstand beyond that Elvis is still alive and doing a drag show in Louisiana.

Now to be stupid about it at my age (67) would mean I'd look like a drag queen but it is possible to wear clothes, hair, make up that still is very female and not go over the line to a bad joke. I've seen women who just give up, those who try too hard, and those who just let what is natural to them happen which for some is to stay sensual in clothing and style. I gave up miniskirts shortly after turning 60 and do try to follow some of the rules for appropriate look for a woman of a certain age but you know it's just fun to be a womanly woman and I don't plan to give that up until I have to which I suppose might come but hasn't just yet. I don't do it for men though or other women. I do it for me. I do notice though that men approve of it and generally not in a crass way. Incidentally I also like men who are still looking virile and sexy too. Viva la difference.

[Willie R]

Nothing wrong with looking your very best, Rain. Vanity is universal.

I view feminism as a valid countermeasure against overbearing male domination and the tendency to demand that females be subservient to males unequivocally and without question. The human species could never survive for long under such conditions. It just seems that feminism's most outspoken proponents seem to have an axe to grind about the gender role that was forced upon them by birth.
It's just plain tough to be a human being, period, (no pun intended) regardless of gender.

[Corrie]

Not totally sure how/why i ended up reading this blog post almost 3 years after it was written - the joy of the internet is that these things are timelessly available to all. I'm wondering if perhaps you are missing a key part of the feminist message - that we should not be satisfied with status quo. The same instinctual concepts that you have noticed could be argued to be a major reason for obesity - our instincts tell us to eat calorie dense food "just in case". But our reasoning brain tells us to fight this.
Let's say advertising IS targeting this primordial soup we call brain stems, are we satisfied to resort to our lowest common factors? Should we not argue that we are more than the sum of our parts? Can't we ask more of ourselves than what instinct wants for us? I'm sort of rambling, and i do think that women are a big part of the problem, but i think the answer you may be looking for is this - feminists (and i'm not one) are asking us to consciously evolve past our caveman roots.