So there you have it. My generation’s feminism is shallow, exploitative, a fake veneer over hyperfeminisation. Except, well, no, it’s not.
So many things to love about this post.
There is some good stuff in this article! I like this section:
“Like so many things with regard to weddings, thoughtful people owe it to themselves and to others to ask themselves whether what they’re doing is out of personal desire or social pressure. Most likely, it’s both. Nobody gets married in a vacuum. The decisions we make about our weddings and our marriages affect other people—our peers, our families, and if we Kim Kardashian, the devoted readers of shitty celebrity magazines.
The elaborate public proposal ups the stakes in the worst way: are you any less in love if your fiancé proposed over take-out pizza instead of a white tablecloth? Is your marriage any less beautiful because it took place in a courthouse instead of a cathedral? Of course not. These are not the ways in which reasonable people evaluate their relationships, which are built day-to-day, month-to-month, year-to-year, in how we take care of and support the people we care most about.”
A Practical Wedding ran a fantastic post yesterday on women and body image. It focused on weight gain after marriage, but it got at so many truths about weight gain, feminism, body image, and emotional eating, and it is definitely worth a read.
One of my favorite lines:
But still, I felt like I’d failed in my responsibility to be a hot wife (I know, I know, I’m rolling my eyes too). I grew up in Suburbia, I’d watched the sitcoms, I knew what people expect of women after they get married (hint: it involves Christmas sweaters, Crocs, and elastic waistbands). So in some twisted cavern of my brain, I felt like it was my job to rebel against this expectation and reclaim the definition of wife…with my body.
I LOVED this line. I think a lot of the pressure to not gain weight after marriage (or getting into a relationship) comes from a fear that I think a lot of smart, take-charge, feminist women have — the fear that being in a relationship will change us, and in a bad way. People talk so negatively about women getting married and having kids; they treat it like it’s a death sentence. I get the message repeatedly — from the mass media and other women — that my life is now over, that I’m boring and only care about my partner, that I sold out the sisterhood, and OOPS THERE GOES HER CAREER.
I know I’m not the only woman who was told that getting married equals giving up. Both men and women get shit for being “domesticated” and changes to one’s appearance is an easy target for the friends and family who aren’t happy with the life changes. So I can see, then, why women work so hard to not gain weight at this point in their lives, and take it so hard if they do. Maintaining your weight becomes a way to say, “SEE, I’M STILL ME!” after you get married. It’s a very clear way of showing the world that yes, you’re in a relationship, but you’re still who you were before. The problem, of course, is that your weight has nothing to do with whether or not you are still you.
Still, I can see why it’s so tempting for so many women to fight the negative perceptions of marriage and married women in such an obvious, physical way. But maybe we need to find a way to start fighting that perception and stop fighting our bodies.
On the one hand, we are aware of the cultural importance of physical beauty in our society. And on the other, we’ve been educated time and again that our worth is greater than the sum of our parts. So when our bodies change in ways that we haven’t signed off on, our guilt is two-fold. There is the visceral reaction to what’s happening to my body (I’m uncomfortable with my appearance). And then there is the logical reaction to the visceral response (I am ashamed of the discomfort I feel about my appearance, because it is frivolous and makes me seem like less like of a confident, intelligent woman). Great, now I’m not only disappointed in how I look, but I’m also disappointed with how I feel. AWESOME.
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| — | A Practical Wedding editor Maddie in her amazing post on women and body image, The Weight of the World. |
