The Mary Beard Appreciation Society

No, I really, strongly, don't think it is that, riveting. I'm not angry with you making the suggestion, but I am bloody furious that this is the suggestion that is constantly made.

Jeanne could it perhaps be because resisting patriarchy is so bloody difficult? You're already struggling to come to terms with being abused, maybe suffering the discomfort and insecurity that comes from resisting patriarchal norms would just be way too much emotionally?
When I was going through a period of depression a few months ago (I'm bipolar) I was thinking of ways to cheer myself up and the first things that sprung to mind were 1) joining a gym, and 2) getting my teeth whitened. Then I thought WTF?!?!? This is what will improve my mood? Making myself prettier? Crazy... but it's also true that feeling like I'm being a good girl, looking pretty, performing femininity correctly lifts my mood. It takes real strength and effort to be ugly, loud, smelly, fat - femininity is usually the path of least resistance.

No, you're fine - I got that, I was agreeing, perhaps over-emphatically, having looked back in the thread where it seemed people were worrying that some choices look like 'good' navigating and others like 'bad', when, as you say, it's really something we all just do as best we can.

archery - yes, of course we all navigate patriarchy as best we can. I'm absolutely not denying that at all.

The whole transphobia thing is getting a bit ridiculous with claims that we should no longer talk of "female" genital mutilation and say abortion is a "women's rights" issue. And then you've got ridiculous people like Stavvers claiming lesbians who don't want to shag trans women with penises are transphobic. You couldn't make it up!

Sadly, not charmingly French.

Jeanne-I'm thinking about your post. But I thought I'd tell you that your typo made me decide that you were charmingly French.....rather disappointed now!

Gah. And you know I meant to type 'interested' not 'interesting' in that first post.

I'll go back to lurking.

... and, I would say, this is one of the things that makes me feel conflicted about privilege. Because, if I am correct that I'm performing femininity in part for these reasons (and I think I am), then I look very privileged in my female identity, but that look results from something that is part of structural misogyny.

Sorry, I am jumping in, if I may?

I am interesting in this question about dresses etc. There is something I've been really struggling to articulate to myself. Now, I dress dead 'feminine'. I wear heels and dresses and so on. I can't work out why, but I will say I am pretty sure this is to some extent connected to getting over a bit of sexual abuse, which made me feel fairly conflicted about my body. Somehow, dressing like this makes me feel stronger and more confident, while dressing in jeans or less overtly feminine clothes makes me feel as if I'm hiding. I suspect it's a very simplistic and boring mental jump from 'this thing happened to me because I'm female' to 'damn it, I get to be the person who admits I'm female, and I will show it off, you don't get to make me feel femininity is weak'. To make that leap of logic, I do know I'm accepting that this thing called 'femininity' can be symbolized by the heels and the skirts and so on, and I know that's dubious in all sorts of ways. But for me, for now, I am happy with it.

I hope no one minds me saying that. It's just something I've been trying to untangle lately, in this context of gender and why people might want to look the way they do.

Trojan horse. That's a very powerful image wrt this topic!

I am always droning on to younger women like the Old Crone
Spectre at the feast that they should guard their freedoms because they were hard won but easily lost. I never dreamed they would be lost to Trojan horse........

We need to capitulate, totally and completely to the whims of Trans people and their hand maidenly allies I think.

Well, fuck that!

The fact that a person watching on another thread thought it was more important that we use the pronoun of choice of a person who's stated aim is doxxing and abusing women who don't conform to their view of how women should react to them, rather than the woman who has had her and her children threatened by this person has revolted me. It should revolt people. What have we become if we're more concerned about the feelings of an abusive arse than the fear caused in their victims?

I am failing to perform feministy very well. I am too angry now to be capable of being fair and reasonable. Does this mean I have to take off my pretty top and wear a plaid shirt now?

It was a piece that bent over backwards to acknowledge the conflicting positions.. And she's thinking like a rapist?

I don't understand what that thinking like a rapist remark means. Personally, I thought the article was very brave and personal.

I think this article sums up how I feel about this

Agree that 'perform' doesn't just mean 'acting' in this context: it also means to actively do something but in a more neutral way, eg. like 'to perform an action'. It does have connotations of stage performance too, but it is closer to meaning that gender is performed in the sense that it is actively carried out - it is something that keeps repeatedly being done, just as I am constantly performing actions in the world, I'm also performing gender in that it's a dynamic process that I don't just do once, but keep on doing through my actions all the time.

I agree that stilllost has got the definition of performing being "putting on an act" when the academics on here don't mean it that way

It's been explained in very simple terms so that even I understand it a number if times so if stilllost isn't getting it I think it's because she doesn't want to