Feminist Pub 14: The Bluestocking, a place for feminist chat and feminists to chat

[YonicScrewdriver]

Welcome!

This is the 14th incarnation of the Pub and is meant as a place to drop by with random thoughts and meandering chats, on feminist or other related themes. Anything you want to mull over but not necessarily start a thread about. Alternatively, flop onto the chaise lounges with some

We have a pub goat, a feminist cannon for firing at crazy sexists and a variety of drinks and snacks. And stools/bar counters at female friendly heights. And a crèche in the back somewhere

Will link the last pub in the next post!

Oh Fibonacci, I forgot to mention, in an effort to be a size 2 or 4, The Patriarchy's Most Fuckable Blonde does not appear to eat . In the 2 months I have been there, she seems to exist on those packet cuppa-soups that you buy from the supermarket. She said she was going to buy a sandwich for lunch the other day - I nearly fell off my chair .

There are some downsides to being who she is, and its not just the not eating thing (I am starting to wonder if she has an eating disorder). She is the sort of personality type who has to 'control' everything in her world - a tiring and difficult way to live life. This one too will probably benefit from the status as Miss Fuckability, but there are also many downsides to that portrayal. And believe me, it is a portrayal, a facade .

Very uncomfortable with the unsisterly tone re "TPMFB". What a nasty expression.

The expression is certainly, eh, interesting, but...do we have to be sisterly with the women that align themselves with the patriarch, helping perpetuate beauty standards in order to get ahead, at a bit personal (not eating!) and group (the other women who have to stand by and watch them get promoted) cost?

Come on it's indefensible. And makes us all look bad too if this sort of hatefulness is "excused" by "feminism".

Anyone in mainstream job is playing the game, colluding with patriarchy to some extent, drawing their own personal lines as to how far they will go to earn a living / do well / compete.

This woman has been told her whole life that looking good, a certain way, is important or necessary to be accepted and encouraged by society. It's sickeningly double edged though because while some men will only hold a conversation with her because she looks like that, others (or the same ones) will also despise her for it and consider it makes her "fuckable" (seriously? that's a word, we can use about other women, as an insult, because of the way they look? What does that mean? that we despise her because she might do sex? or might like sex? or men might want to do sex with her, which makes her despicable... why? and how close is "fuckable" to suggesting something like "always consenting, or need for consent suspended".... and what does that mean if women, soi disant feminists, think that we can say that about a woman because she is slim and blonde and dolled up?)

I have been many bright young women at work, with a penchant for dolling up, being dismissed by men and women as if dolling up is incompatible with intelligence. For heaven's sake let's not be doing that on this board of all places.

I do not think for one moment that this woman has single handedly "perpetuated beauty standards" to anyone's significant disadvantage. If she's doing well - for whatever reasons - there's a potential ally. Maybe not, if you really don't like her, or like her working style. but you can make those judgements without sneering about someone being too "fuckable"

I have been on the receiving end of "you can't look like that AND be intelligent" more times than I care to remember (although it's certainly tapering off now that I'm getting into middle age) so you won't hear me criticise other women for liking to look pretty. That is not a problem per se, but I personally have been professionally harmed by another woman in my team who lay it off rather thick in terms of flirting with the menfolk. Her work was good, but my work was better. Yet, the ranking system at work meant that one of us had to end up above the other, and guess who that was. So I am willing to admit that maybe I was just jealous or resentful - I'm not that certain of myself as to dismiss that possibility, but at the time, particularly given that I believe that women should help each other in a male dominated work environment, I felt betrayed because I felt that the flirting and the eyelash batting and the casual hand on the arm helped her get ahead, and that sucks for those of us who, while still being nice to people at work, draw a line at flirting with management.

But do help me out here - is the feminist choice to make to embrace that kind of thing as "free choice"? Was she just one step ahead in colluding with the patriarchy and is that kind of behaviour acceptable? For me I guess the rule of thumb is "are the men doing it?" and nope, I don't see it happening, not even with female managers.

I can see how one would be exasperated at being shafted by a system that doesn't recognise your work, while it does recognise that of someone flirtier than you. But that's the system, it wasn't invented by the flirty one. Yes you can nobly refuse to engage with that (and i have always avoided tht route not from nobility, but from fear - men hate and resent women they fancy and flirt with almost more than those they don't - though it is expressed in different ways at different times - and I instinctively didn't feel equal to opening that can of worms. Sometimes it wasn't my choice though as to whether the whole swx thing would rear its ugly head. All in the past as I am an old boot now so it doesn't come up)

but I still think we need to be really careful about the language we use about other women.

You can feel critical without calling someone a "Fuckable Blonde".

Am I really the only one who is so uncomfortable with that?

Without justifying it I can completely understand how an amibitious woman channels her ambition into work, and making sure she looks "perfect", and running the two endeavours side by side as if one and the same. Any working woman who doesn't worry about how she looks is very unusual and very sophisticated emotionally and politically. and probably also very good looking ;) You might think that the amount of energy going into being skinny is misplaced and sad and I would agree. it wouldn't make me hate the person doing it. honestly I would find it hard to assure a woman, in a heart to heart, that if she stopped doing it, it would not realistically damage her prospects, in some fields.

Eilis I agree, its not a nice term, and I make no excuses for coining the term either. Perhaps you would like to come up with something else? I am not asking you to use the term, and I agree with Fibonacci - I can assure you there is no 'sisterly' feeling between this woman and any of the other women in the office. She sees us all as 'competition' to overcome, something (no not someone, something) to dominate, and as objects, not people. She is the quintessential Mean Girl. How is it possible to feel 'sisterly' with such a person? One person remarked to me recently that the Mean Girls in the office can't even be nice to each other, on an ongoing basis. They are similarly horrible to the people they profess to be friends with, as with those they don't like. How do you maintain a 'sisterly' connection with people like that?

And Empire is absolutely correct in that it is a double edged sword. The Fuckable Blonde is a cautionary tale to other women who might see this as a viable tactic to take in our male dominated corporate world.

"How is it possible to feel 'sisterly' with such a person? "

this isn't about your feelings, it's about what you say

" Perhaps you would like to come up with something else?" no not really, but if you are remotely swayed by my points, maybe you would like to come up with something that doesn't sound like old school patriarchal sexual humiliation. Up to you of course.

"One person remarked to me recently that the Mean Girls in the office can't even be nice to each other, on an ongoing basis. " so there is an acknowledged posse of Mean Girls, whom you and at least one other person don't like and talk about as a group, and as Other. If I were you I would be asking myself very stringently what my part in this dynamic is. You don't have to ask yourself in front of us, of course.

"And Empire is absolutely correct in that it is a double edged sword" yes, as was I when I made that point too, and was kind of suggesting that you are wrong if you see her as someone who holds all the cards and is cheating their way to certain victory.

Look I am bowing out now, this is your work place, your relationship, your dynamic, you know all about it, and i know nothing. Lord knows I am no stranger to tense and frustrated work relationships, and they can send you a bit loopy and to forget your better judgement. But seriously, and these are the last things I am going to say on the matter:

• using "fuckable" of a woman as an insult is beyond dodgy and in this context made me actually wince

• wild guesses here but it sounds like you are entrenching a polarised "you sexy and bad, me serious and grumpy and good" dynamic that is doing you no favours. I mean I am not talking about feminism now but about honest direct relationships of integrity in which all parties can be as good as they can be. I know you are going to say something like "but there is no good in her, there is no possibility of integrity" - but there is. You can have integrity, and it will be the best thing for you in the long term and perhaps even in the short term you can flip this dynamic into something healthier. On the other hand, in the context of the other stuff you have been saying about this work place, if absolutely everyone is incompetent, lazy and stupid and violently sexist, then maybe your scope of influence here is limited; maybe that is what is fucking with your head and making things like "fuckable" seems acceptable; maybe you should consider your options.

THE END

I am off now because this is not a thread on which I wanted to have to have an argument like that

Oh. Well, I was going to slouch in for a quick drink before getting back to work - it's a bit like my RL local in here tonight, after a few people hit the booze a bit hard and got all earnest and sweary

Anyway, I have to go and finish a report on changes needed to an obscure piece of legislation before the bit of the public service I work in has its arse sued off it by the right test case. I was supposed to finish my report earlier but got distracted by making a tiny Christmas tree from Lego for the Shelf Elf, and decorating it with teeny gauze balls, stick on jewels, cut out snowflakes and mini candy canes. I wish I knew how to post a picture, it's a tour de force. As I'm sure my report will also be by morning...

Right, I'm off.

The woman at the centre of the UVa gang rape allegations has been named on Twitter, by a man who thinks he's some sort of hero for doing it.

There are now discussions between the various MRE groups about what they're going to 'do with her'. There's already talk of sending her to the morgue.

Why? No criminal case was brought, no names named and yet they are talking about killing her.

But there's no need for feminism anymore, because all the battles have been won.

Oh no

YY Ellis. Just wanted to say I agree. There are all kinds of women in my workplace and we are all in this shit together - let's stick together.
Not very articulate but I wanted to pipe up about it

Jeez Puffins what a hideous X post - obviously I didn't mean your post when I said earnest. I'm really sorry about the juxtaposition.

I have been thinking about Jackie since reading that article, how awful that she's now got yet more to go through. And no one is interested in exposing the rapists and splashing their names all over the web I suppose.

Never thought you did EE.

It's all just horrible. Really horrible, so I'm going to bed.

YY Elis. And I know people who don't dare to wear certain things to work so as not to look more out of place then they already do - ie, like women.

Have been busy socialising and not paying attention to news. Don't understand how people can be so nasty.

Hmm, I am thinking my post about this woman has hit Eilis far closer to home than she is willing to admit... Time for some self-reflection, Eilis? Some 'truths' are really hard to swallow - aren't we all here to raise our consciousness to the next level? You've admitted that you aren't sitting where I am, aren't dealing with the dynamics that I am dealing with, and I am glad that you are willing to leave it at that. Thank you for your judgmental post though.

I will admit it has hit close to home, in the sense that I feel personally upset for personal reasons. I admitted upthread that I have been close to a lot of attractive dolled up women who have not received the respect they were due at work. In one case I was her manager and I witnessed first hand several people, including one very senior woman, trump up nonsense rumours that she was a workplace bully, because they didn't like that she was so attractive. I took place in a full enquiry run by HR (there was nothing in any of it and I was glad I was there to ask the right questions and go into it all fully) - and the awful stuff, about the machinations that had taken place in order to discredit this woman, were appalling. It really stayed with me how deeply misogyny has entrenched our culture, and how hard some men, and women influenced by men, find it hard to like or respect a pretty woman.

(In the interests of full disclosure. I am not pretty, or glamorous. I've got 99 problems, but that ain't one!)
(but yes, to drag up a hackneyed phrase, some of my best friends are pretty women. Some of them are glamorous too.)

In fact everything about how women are treated in the work place hits really close to home to me at the moment. I have a lot of heart ache on this subject right now. And excuse me for being a terrible old slushy fool but I want to come to these boards to find a little love for women, to soothe my aching heart.

On that note I would like to apologise for introducing a note of discord to our usually very friendly pub. I would like to apologise for whatever part I have had in it. but I really don't feel I brought it here. I really don't think our pub is a woman-friendly place if it is ok and unchallenged to express annoyance at a woman you work with by disparaging her as a "fuckable blonde". If I have dramatically misjudged the tone of this place and I am, in fact, the problem, tell me now.

Zazzles, I don't mean to be judgemental and I promise you that I am looking to "win" or anything here. I truly have nothing against you and am not being fitey for the sake of it and hope to avoid any kind of entrenched resentment. It is clear from all your posts about work that it is a pressured, stressful situation and I get that. I hope you are getting some time off over xmas.

Hey Eilis, that's fine . Many of us have been that "woman that the patriarchy would like to fuck". It comes with the territory of being female. I have nothing against the person I have described up thread, but it is interesting to note these 'strategies' women take on in order to survive in a male dominated corporate world. Its fine that you don't like the term that I have used - I am ok with that. Not everything I write will be met with acceptance. And I am sorry that those words caused offense - there is, and never was, any offense meant.

And if it makes you feel any better, the first job I was hired for was because I was young and 'patriarchably fuckable' (although I did have a degree to back it all up). I was appalled when I went to a company meeting to find that I was just one of about a hundred beautiful young women in this company . As a former sales person in my industry, its all about a woman's looks.

The male patriachy is doing enough as it is, it doesn't need any more help!

I remember a chat with a women couple years after graduation whose male boss was fast tracking her as she was doing so well, and she was being stonewalled by other women in the team and she had heard rumours being spread that she was screwing him. She was adamant he had not made any moves - not like that.

Wheeeee my mam has just been discharged by the breast cancer consultant fill the bar!

Really pleased for your DM Trev, what a splendid Christmas present