CULTURETAS: FEMINISM, WHAT IT SHOULD BE

Photo: The Procrastinator (some) Times @ Roubaix's La Piscine Musée.

By Ariana Basciani.

A few days ago after going out of a friend bar, I started thinking about what makes women mad.  Why do we have to be feminists? Why going through all of this? Why do we have to diet? Why do some women achieve success and others just don’t? Anyway, a whole bunch of questions sparked by beer.

Doing some research for the blog, I ended up watching a few documentary about the woman's body and how the sexist theme has humiliated us; why the Italian or Venezuelan TV shows sell woman as a sex object and not as a human being with brain and thoughts; and why women have to be fighters and not allow to be treat it that way.   

After an information overdose I stopped. What should we do, and why do we have to do something in the first place? This question is addressed to a group, and precisely that's the thing: what's with this "group of women". I’m not a bunch of women, I am unique. I’m me, with my attributes, my flows, fears, scars, cellulite and a list that goes on and on. I’m me, not my best friend, my roommate, my mother, my grandma or bloddy Scarlett Johansson.

What I’m trying to say is that maybe there is no real women revolution today because we live in a world that is pretty individualistic, and maybe the faster we release ourselves from those questions, from those “should be” of feminism and start listening to ourselves a little bit more, it will be much easier to all women come together as a gender and make an adequate to us all.

It can curious, but I never felt inadequate for growing up in the “country of the most beautiful women”  (also known as Venezuela) and for having Italian roots (which means prominent curves by nature). At the same time I never felt like being part of the Venezuelan women who wear high heels and go to the hairdresser every day to look absolutely perfect. No, I never felt the pressure that supposedly fuck you up as a woman and at the same time becomes the driver to rebel against it.

I’ve always wear sneakers, ever since I found out about Converse back when I was 11 years old. Since then I haven’t changed much. Don’t get me wrong, I love high heels; love how they help the feminine silhouette look longer and thinner, yet I wear them so very little. There are even days when I would love not to be so lazy and embrace the pain caused by the killer/pretty shoes. Actually I envy (in a good way) when my friends are able to wear them during a whole night. They usually say that the important thing is to find the ones you like and then you focus on comfort (if any).  What I like the most is that these same friends wear their Converses as much as they wear her high heels. Bravo. As the great Gilles Lipovetsky would say: women love traditions, we won't get rid of them.

And probably because I didn't wear high heels everyday, as I was growing up I was also incapable of understanding why some women love going to the salon and expend hours there, telling their secrets to a hair stylist. I started enjoying dying my hair at 16 -that whole thing about “being different” always starts with the hair. Its was a tough welcome into that world. I’m not much of a people's person or at least I wasn’t one at the time. I was extremely shy and seeing all these cheerfulness covered by superfluousness used to caused me the chills, but then again, as the years go by, I now understand that… that’s what you do at hair salons! And sometimes you even go there just to complain about your life. I have never spent more than 4 hours at this place but I have learned the art of speaking very little to the stylists without being impolite. I succeeded in being me! I was able to understand and to adapt myself to that place!

With feminism it’s a whole other story. I don't know how blend in. I can’t forget the 60-70s feminist’s movement that brought us so many rights as women. However, I believe that complaining about male sexism nowadays it’s a step too far. I believe feminism has become a weapon in politics (regardless of the party in power). Feminists groups have lost their authenticity or maybe they didn’t find the way to evolve their discourses.

Complaining because women on TV, aren’t treated properly or because the porn its not feminine –even when pornstar females make a lot more money than their male counterparts, thanks to porn business being so sexist). To me it seems even more sexist than sexism itself, because I think that if it was your decision to be in a show modeling underwear or getting a $3000 salary for sucking some guy’s dick and on top of that you enjoy it, well good for you. If you don’t know yourself that well and took the job, well that’s another story and that’s your responsibility as well (of course if you where told you were going to dance and ended up trapped in a prostitution network, that’s obviously another thing and it’s totally illegal and punishable.)

Feminism gave us the possibility of deciding lots of aspects of our lives –we still have battles to win, of course, but today, the best feminism from my point of view is taking the time to really get to know yourself and from there, be authentic and wish and decide what do you want to be, without having to label yourself of sexist or feminist.   

Let's stop being falsely apologetic using phrases like "I like sex and I’m not a whore”, or “I don't want to get married and don't have the Peter Pan's syndrome”; “I have boobs, but I’m smart”, etc. The only flag that we should be waving is a massive one that says:  “I'm in charge of my decisions and I embrace full responsibility for them”.

Before you act, get to know yourself. If you already screwed something up, just don't judge, embrace it, and don’t try to blame anyone. Start being responsible for our acts and making smart choices its the best sign of freedom and the one thing that I think feminism has been pursuing all along.

P.D. Possibly many of you would love to kill me after reading this article, don't! I’m really open to dialogue, because this is just my opinion, but I'd love to hear yours! 

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This article was originally published (in Spanish) in Culturetas, culture with boobs, a great website situated at the intersection of culture and femininity. Culturetas are our new contributors and we are delighted to have them. Have a look and say hello to them!