Us v. Them

I am baffled by the in-fighting between women.  It seems no matter where you go it's always there,  a party, a new job, the swimming pool.  A lot of women, maybe not all, put other women under such a critical microscope.  There is an unrelenting competition going on here.  
As much as I try not to participate, I catch myself in negatively divisive thought.  "Oh, look at her! Such a young, beautiful woman with such an awful tattoo."  Or, "Dang ... she's too old to be wearing that!"  It's her business, not mine.  I make assumptions based on first impressions way too much.  People may make similar pre-judgments of me, too, which isn't fair.  And such over-emphasis placed on looks and youth.  So superficial.     
MissRepresentation encourages us:

"For the next week, let's all make a concerted effort to see women as allies instead of enemies; and let's stop judging other women for their success, their talents or their looks."

The newsletter suggests the "assumption of scarcity and the feeling that there isn't enough room for all of us" is the impetus of such competitive judgement.  There seems to be some unnatural criticism that I can't fully understand, almost as if we're pitting against one another for ubiquitous attention from an unknown force.  Is it innate?  I hope not.  It seems we are cultured to be catty, and we have to end the vicious circle with our own self-realization to stop acting this way.  

Instead, I'd like to hope there are many more women like Marina Keegan, a young Yale writer, who tragically lost her life just days after graduation.  Her last essay, The Opposite of Lonely, has gone viral since her untimely death.  She said, "We can’t, we MUST not lose this sense of possibility because in the end, it’s all we have.

Such positivity!  Her wonderful attitude and hope scream from the page.  She had such great plans for her future.  Regardless of a grim job outlook for new college grads in sketchy economic times.  I think she spoke to the universal human experience, one where we must help sustain each other.  

This kind of unity and support is what I wish was viral.  People uplifting each other with great expectations for themselves and humankind.  Young women reaching out to other young women to seek out the positive aspects within their time on earth and not hatefully compete with each other.  May we all have tomorrows to do so.  

Twitter party - media representation of women

Jennifer Siebel Newsom, CEO and Founder of MissRepresentation.org, has been quite an inspiration to me lately.  It seems I'd never post if it weren't for MissRep.  At the very least, her writing has inspired several of my blog posts here.  Her latest call to action includes:

Coupled with the recent news that the Kardashian family's reality TV show has been renewed for another three years, I am especially worried about the message the media is sending my daughter, my son and their generation. Who are their role models? Why are we rewarding reality TV's exploitation of women's bodies? Are looks, for women, more important than their brains or their talents? Is hyper-sexualization and self-objectification now a legitimate path to success in America?
These aren't rhetorical questions, but part of a real conversation we want to have with you - because each of us plays a role in healing our culture. Next Tuesday, at 4 PM PST, we're calling a Twitter party with hashtag #WhyKardashians to get to the root of America's increasing fascination with superficiality and the objectification of women in popular media. 

I keep going back to #TheConversation.  The conversation springs from the unrealistic images of perfection purported throughout the media.  We should, instead, consider what we can do to better value ourselves.  Our culture has been permeated with a distorted way of showing women and girls. I'm glad there are people fighting for an "international action-oriented conversation" around these issues.  I had begun to type our "American" culture, but the misrepresentation of perfect expectation is an international phenomenon and not specific to the U.S.  The status quo is not limited to American movies, television, books and advertising throughout all those venues.

My young life was spent with a slump-shouldered gait and an androgynous mousy brown pixie haircut that got me mistaken for a long-haired boy in our class.  Mother was always telling me to stand up straight, and I kept my posture the way it was just to spite her.  Our "measure of perfection" at the time was Charlie's Angels, a latter-day fictional Kardashians. 

If boys were going to kiss you during the moonlight skate, you had to look as angelic as possible to gain their interest.  Needless to say, I wanted to instead fade into the background.  Even if my mom wasn't telling me to stand up straight to necessarily boost my self-confidence, much less get me my first adolescent kiss at the roller rink, I wish I had heeded her coaxing anyway.  Not to gain the boys' attention, but simply to help me project a better self-image than I had back then.

Women now witness an even more overt push toward perfection by the current size two to four females in the media.  Charlie's newer angels were even updated a few years back to a politically correct modern-day troupe and later another (failed) television show.  


Young women apparently have to embody that kind of flawless figure and magazine cover made-up face to be attractive enough to draw positive male attention.  Realizing it is currently the look-at-me generation, girls are trying more than ever to get anyone and everyone to look at them.  Are they hoping to mirror the K sisters or some other cookie-cutter pattern?

I hope they choose to stand up straight for themselves and not for the gaze of others.

Represent!

A thought-provoking newsletter comes out from MissRepresentation.org every week inviting readers to not only speak up but also take action for the rights of women. We must keep struggling for the sake of the girls and young women who are only learning these inevitable truths in their own lives.  As their mentors, women need to question all the misleading images of girls and women rampant in all forms of media.   


I try to keep the ideas at the forefront of my mind and incorporate positive actions into my every day life.  It's difficult to keep #TheConversation (Ashley Judd's article) going, even though I vow to myself that I will help the young women around me realize they are feminists regardless of whether or not they self-identifying as such.  


Women who have public voices and followings, such as Jessica Valenti and Naomi Wolf, can reach a vast audience via social media or various public appearances. Fortunately, there are many other informed women and men who are also online discussing important subjects like the Violence Against Women Act (VAMA).


While I have nowhere near that reach, I can keep the conversation going among my peers, students and other young people I meet or already know.


From the MissRepresentation.org newsletter: 

It's an opportunity to not only challenge the media's limiting labels, but to question how we value ourselves and the women around us. 

Another great blog entry about why feminism matters is at Fem2.0, which would give many people food for thought if they'd dare read it.  I linked to it through a post on another blog I follow(Anything But Beige). Take the @RepresentPledge today at www.missrepresentation.org!