Sarah Ditum on Cool Girl Feminism

[AskBasil]

Storming

A DM?

I'm sure Buffy is thrilled

I've just read that piece by Sarah Ditum and have nodded so much I think I have whiplash. :o I think I have to show it to DD1, who has form for sly digs at some of her female peers.

"The most radical thing you can do is love women". This made me think 'well, durr' at first, but when I actually thought about it I realised I'm not the target audience for this article: women are. So I suppose it is radical for a woman to love women (not in the sexual sense, but in a sisterly sense. Fuck, that is a bit clunky) as opposed to being hoiky.

This final paragraph:-

What can be true of sex can be true in our intellectual lives as well. It's the moment of contact that makes change possible. Feminism is the opposite of the singular, virginal May Queen on her lonely throne, or of the perversely inviolable Cool Girl, eating and eating without ever showing the signs of it on her body. Being a feminist means accepting other women’s trust and letting ourselves be transformed by it. Love women. Everything I learned under the May Pole, I unlearned through the kindness of feminists.

Is just wonderful. It's also accurate and honest. And she's right about the kindness of feminists. I've been treated with nothing but kindness and patience by those who populate this forum, you've helped educate me no end, which in turn has helped me educate my own DCs.

Being feminist is definitely about being kind and generous to others, to me and not about saying women are betraying the sisterhood or any kind of competition. It's about fighting sexism, misogyny and just wanting equal rights and consideration, whether your hobbies are shopping, football or something else entirely. I don't think it was a brilliant article though, it doesn't make any original points to me and the prose in the first few paragraphs is pretty poor and the May Queen issue could have been summed up in one paragraph.

I like that it raises the "Cool Girl" thing though from the Gillian Flynn book as that bit really made me think when I read Gone Girl.

I do genuinely like sport and football as I grew up in an avid sport-watching household and my dad taught me to kick and throw a ball, and later out running with him in the same way as he would if he had had a son (I like to think anyway!) And grew up in a football mad area where everyone has to pick a team to support in infant school and stick with it until you die - bit of a foreign thing to DH who, asked which team he supports says he "quite likes Fulham" (sometimes). Also I do genuinely like beer and am quite conversant with technology and gaming (up to a point) among several other subjects...anyway the Gillian Flynn thing made me wonder if I am a "Cool Girl" just pretending to like these things to impress men. Or a "ladette" or "Such a boy!" or other things I have been labelled as (often by other women) in the past.

But you know, I've been married ten years now and I still like these things, and I don't think I need to constantly impress my husband, it's just some things we have in common. And by the way he really likes shopping for himself and on the quiet, is a bit obsessed with shirts and shoes. Does this make him gay?

So I am not a "fake" though some people who don't know me very well may see it that way. I also notice that some people go through their lives trying to impress the same gender - men do it with cars, Top Gear is the very epitome of this behaviour, women do it with designer or "must have" clothing. I don't get into that, at all, as the impressee or the impressor, and that is enough to really piss some people off.

I guess I just wasn't brought up to think girls do this and boys do that, a pint of beer for the man and a glass of wine or fruit based beverage for the lady. Some people clearly have and it confuses them when they can't put you into a box immediately.

I've read the article twice now and I'm pretty underwhelmed.

It is quite honest with regards to the author herself but I'm not getting anything more than that from it. Seems to be a self absorbed piece of writing from someone who comes across as quite self absorbed.

I agree that caring for all women and solidarity is important to radical feminism, but I disagree that it is the most radical thing a feminist can do. That is entry level radical feminism - to not pit yourself against other women/act out of internalized sexism. It is a big step in relinquishing the role of handmaiden that is so socialized into us all but I take issue with it being terribly radical (although I could see how it might appear very radical to someone like the author).

Sorry Basil, I wanted to like it, but I just didn't.

LOL, don't apologise Beach, you don't have to like it!

I can see why you found it underwhelming as it's second nature to take the things she talks about for granted once you've been round feminism for a while.

But I loved it because it's appealing to a mainstream audience and so the ideas are so new to them. I often forget how way out my ideas are in RL and then when someone says they read something fabulous and amazing by Caitlin Moran, I'm reminded how very unusual my ideas are. I'm just always surprised and delighted to see properly feminist ideas in the mainstream.

Good point Basil.

I probably forget how far from the mainstream my politics are - particularly in these times where we are all supposed to be "post-feminism" AKA not noticing the backlash.

Feels a bit like a low point in women's rights politics when women have to be reminded to like each other and support each other rather than man please.

We need a second second wave to shake things up a bit.

I don't think it is radical for a feminist to love women. I think it is radical for a person to love women. I think it is genuinely transformatively radical for women or men to approach women from a position of empathy, trust, respect, and in the assumption of good faith. It is genuinely transformative to do this actively in every minor and major encounter - it is absolutely going against the grain of our society - and it feels bloody brilliant, it is a joyous attitude (if you are a woman) - because the love bounces back.

Similar to this - someone on another site writing on a thread about body issues said that she had started looking at women's bodies with active love, especially visibly "not-perfect"ones. I am ashamed to say that when I started actively choosing to do this, the first thing that happened was not the love but the pre-love - the turning off the criticism. "too big / too skinny / too tight clothes/ vpl / colour doesn't suit her / she can't walk very well in those / crap crap crap". Turning all that off and replacing it with a flood of love for big, small, fast, slow, moving, still, sexy, draped, wobbly, hard, stringy, young, old women's bodies just feels like blissful calm and I walk around the world in my own saggy, useful, tough body in a completely different way.

That's a great way of looking at it bones

I agree that you see your own body differently when you stop judging female bodies according to patriarchal beauty standards. And it is very liberating and feels nice to be looking at fellow women without being critical of something so superficial as their outfit choice.

Also agree that if men and women treated women with respect and empathy in all interactions (ie. as proper humans), the world would be transformed. But only if that empathy and respect resulted in a halt to male violence against women.

Look I'm not educated in fwr. I just am one. It really wasn't a great article. That might enthral bridget jones but heavens to betsy most of it was still self indulgent twaddle.

Bridget Jones was Everywoman though wasn't she? Weight issues , trying to stop smoking, romance problems, making a fool of herself at work. Or is that just me?

I can't help liking Bridget Jones in spite of myself.

Minnie - I think I'm with you on this one. I didn't like it. It smacked too much of "I used to be a bit of a bitch, but now I've had a moment of self-realisation and realised that wasn't very nice of me, now can everyone give me a cookie and a pat on the head for doing something nice that I should have been doing all along." Which isn't to detract from any of the very sensible things that have been said - that in a patriarchy, scoring points off other women can be a winning strategy, or that there's something liberating about consciously weaning yourself off, say, the social expectation to pass judgement on other women.

There's a kind of half full versus half empty aspect to this--do you concentrate on what she used to do, or what she does now (assuming she's being honest)? I think there's something useful in the reminiscences of a person who was doing the wrong thing, and who now realizes what was wrong about it and talks about what impelled her to do it. As it says in the Bible somewhere, there's more joy in Heaven over a sinner who repents than over some-large-number-of people who never sinned in the first place.

Yes and I think sometimes when people do that, they hit a nerve with some of their readers who recognise themselves, don't they?

I think there's a place for self-indulgent introspection. Might as well have some in the New Statesman occasionally, it makes a chance.

change even

In general I am not nuts on Ditum for exactly this tendency to lengthily state the "lib fem "common sense"" in a prolix and self congratulatory way. this article actually grated on me less than they usually do.