Issue #2

by Rijn Collins

I am a feminist, but doing Women’s Studies at university set my teeth on edge. I thought I hated it, loathed each lecture and its content, until I realised that storming out of each class filled with the passionate desire to rant and rave encapsulated quite a large part of what uni was about. It absolutely challenged and stimulated me, and at the very least, gave me something to write about…..but Jesus, what a ride it was.

For a strong-minded and confident woman whose favourite bands, authors and inspirations are female, whose religion of Witchcraft is firmly rooted in the feminine divine, and who was born into a female-centred family, it took me a surprising amount of time to decide to enrol in this subject.

What was I afraid of? To be brutally honest, I had absolutely no need to sit amongst 200 women who believe that to be female is to be a victim. That’s it.

I am no victim. I’ve been abused, addicted, mad, I’ve fallen down and fucked up, but I’m no victim. I take responsibility for the choices I’ve made in my life, be they wise or not, and it frustrates the hell out of me to hear women blame the big bad patriarchy for all of their problems. I feared this was the viewpoint Women’s Studies would take, a fear that seemed grounded once I flicked through the readings for the subject. Derisive dismissals of pornography and prostitution as ‘faux sexual liberation’, suggestions that feminists who enjoy sex do so to identify with males, statements that the compulsion to imitate the ‘thin ideal’ is not something women actually choose, but is rather something ‘being done to us’……Voluntary victimisation. I wanted no part of it.

Perversely, I couldn’t stop considering enrolling. It drew me back time and time again, and I tried to put my prejudice aside and look at the subject objectively: it was literally the study of women, and wasn’t that what I’d spent many of my twenty seven-years on this earth doing?

I enrolled. And I did learn. I was told of the differences between radical & post-colonial feminism, liberal and socialist feminism, just what constituted the first and second waves, the differing feminist outlooks of white and Aboriginal women in this country, the structuring of society through binary thought processes, and so much more. From a purely knowledge based viewpoint, the subject was beneficial. But what frustrated me beyond belief, what caused me to walk out on lectures in disgust, was the underlying attitude of many of the women.

Victim feminism doesn’t seem to adequately describe what I felt I was up against. Time and time again we were passed on the oh-so-subtle message that we are powerless, that we cannot compete with the beauty industry or the media, how we have no choice in the roles we’re assigned in this society. I squirmed in annoyance at watching a video in class that told us “worrying about your weight is part of being a woman” and “all women measure themselves against the modeling ideal” when I do not feel this way. I realise that many women do, but to say that literally all women do, was dishonest and sensationalistic, and made me snarl. The way the information was presented seemed to offer no alternatives to this oppression, no hope for improvement and no scope for revolution, just a sour rendering of what was, what is, and what ever shall be. Time and time again I watched the young teenage students nodding in agreement and writing down statistics, and I worried about the options they were being presented with. I felt that in dealing with a new generation of feminists, the subject had a responsibility to present the myriad of glorious possibilities out there that enable us to overturn such obstacles and be positive, strong and accomplished women. But the course didn’t progress that far. To me, it seemed to present us with the dispiriting facts, such as they considered them, and then stop. This is how it is girls, so just get used to it.

It’s not how it is for me. I’m well aware that I’m looking at this situation from the eyes of a (relatively) healthy, privileged white girl in a prosperous nation, but for me, I feel that to be female is a blessing from the Goddess. I love it; I feel able to argue without insecurity, eat without self recrimination, fuck without restraint, demand without guilt, bleed without disgust, and love and respect men without bitterness. What really pissed me off about this course, what infuriated me, was that this viewpoint was met with suspicion by some of the women in my class, even flatout denial, as though they resented me for feeling so empowered when they clearly didn’t. This kind of bitterness appalled me, and made me view each class with further trepidation.

One week we were asked to bring an image of femininity to class with us. Knowing that I didn’t view the term as meaning something as simplistic and fatuous as ‘long hair, slim, submissive, nurturing’ etc., I searched for both my own definition and an image that exemplified it perfectly.

I found her on my loungeroom wall. Feminine to me means characteristic of being female, and the beauty of that definition is that it could relate to almost anything - feisty or serene, long hair or a shaven head, chaste or exuding an earthy sexuality; if it contributed to an individual’s identification as, and celebration of, being female, then it qualifies as feminine. As Kaeti Humphrey of ‘Pirategrrrl Zine’ says “when femininity and feminism become just as synonymous with each other as with beauty, health and truth in the minds of girls, that’ll be a REAL revolution.” And Squid Sid, bassist of the glorious New York City female punk band the Lunachicks, was my image of femininity.

With her fierce facial expression, full pierced lips in a defiant pout, black hair in plaits, guitar slung low over her lovely round belly, full sleeve tattoos flowing out of her golden latex top proudly proclaiming CHICKS whilst giving a peek of her full breasts…..a magnificent, dazzling punk woman. Absolutely feminine.

As I presented the photo to the class, I watched their confusion. Placed amongst their images of femininity - a pile of photos ripped from fashion spreads and car magazines, of scantily clad skeletal models or demure earth mothers cradling babies, discussed with such contempt that the ‘F’ word was spat out with venom - well, Squid was an anomaly.

The contrast between my photo and theirs, as well as the reaction this photo generated in the tute, showed quite clearly that my interpretation of femininity was vastly different to the majority of the group. In addition, I felt that several members actually doubted that I could find such a woman feminine. I was annoyed to have it implied that such a punk interpretation couldn’t really stand up ‘in the real world’ - where am I meant to be living then?! I apply these beliefs every day, not in some idealised punk universe: they DO stand up. In addition, my definition of femininity, that is, whatever helps a woman connect to and celebrate their ‘femaleness’, is more positive, freeing and active than the hegemonic interpretation of blonde/skinny/passive that we see in so much advertising, so I don’t see why it was so quickly rejected in the tute. Why are women so afraid of reclaiming words, and tend to pounce on those who aren’t?

‘But Rijn, how can THAT be feminine?’ I was hesitantly asked. “I mean, no offence’ (eyes discreetly averted from my own arm tattoos) ‘but tattoos……well, they’re just an appropriation of male culture, aren’t they?’
Sigh.

I questioned my choice to enrol in the class.

It pained me that each topic we discussed revolved around men. It pained me that these women seem to prefer to fixate on the negative instead of focus on the positive - and there is so fucking much to be positive about. It pained me that my class reader contained the line “all women are positioned as inferior to men of their own group” when I have NEVER felt this. It pained me that some of the people I love with all my heart are viewed with suspicion and sometimes outright enmity because they were born male. It pained me that so many of these young women feel the need to disassociate feminism from sexuality, so much so that I spend half an hour arguing that yes, a woman can indeed enjoy giving a blowjob, only to be met with the angry denial that in such a situation, ‘men have all the power’. It pained me that sex is often seen only in terms of power.

I wanted to be standing out in front of the lecture hall. I wanted to rip up ‘the beauty myth’ and hand them all copies of ‘CUNT: a declaration of independence’. I waned to play them the Lunachick’s ‘superstrong’ . I wanted them to read ‘kill the real grrrls’ and ‘cuntfear’ zines. I wanted to let them know that yes, the situation can be seen as fucked, but we do have options, and we have a responsibility to expound upon those options with other women, and definitely to include men. I want women to see.

The semester exasperated me, but strangely, I have to admit it also invigorated me. In a degree focusing on languages and linguistics, I hadn’t yet found a subject where I could let fly and argue, debate passionately about the merits of pornography or the possible power of prostitution. I’m back now to studying subjunctive conjugations, and the Germanic tribes of pre-medieval Europe, far away from the hotbed of feminist rhetoric. And you know, I think I miss it.