Did Susan Boyle have something to prove?
April 16, 2009
I’ve never seen American Idol or most of its counterparts. Let’s just say that reality television isn’t really my thing. It doesn’t make me feel good about myself to watch other people make fools of themselves before a large studio audience and the masses watching from home. I’m not “above” it; I just don’t like it. I take the contestants’ public humiliation personally.
I stumbled across the “singing sensation” Susan Boyle and her rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” on CNN.com while perusing the news. People have posted her Britain’s Got Talent performance on YouTube and the video has garnered more than 12 million views (as of 12 p.m. EST 4/16/09) in less than a week. Now, there’s talk of her winning the top prize in the competition and the possibility of her performing in person for Queen Elizabeth II as a reward. She’ll also cut a record, perhaps before she officially wins.
Why is this clip popular?
It’s a matter of opinion, but some say her voice is “extraordinary.” By that reasoning, millions of viewers have tuned in to listen, not to mock.
But I believe the real reason this video is popular is the same reason I shared it with my husband and watched it three times myself: joy! Oh, it is joyful! It’s a perfect, little narrative of an underdog rubbing smug spectator cynicism in their smug spectator faces. Boyle is set up to fail. She confidently marches out on stage and takes her place at its center. All eyes are on her - the self-proclaimed never-been-kissed, 47-year-old unemployed charity worker from Blackburn, West Lothian, Scotland, who lives alone with her cat. People in the audience roll their eyes and snicker thinking, “This old hag hasn’t got what it takes; just look at her!”
Just look at her.
Susan Boyle, Singing Sensation
It would seem that Boyle had something to prove: she had to prove that she could sing…well. Not just because she’d stepped up to the plate and promised that she could. Not just because all eyes were on her, by her own choice. The main reason she had something to prove to us – the viewers and consequently her judges – is because she is (arguably) ugly. “Just look at her,” we tell ourselves when watching the YouTube clip, feeling superior in our state of moderate attractiveness. “She’s too ugly to be a really good singer. Nobody has ever kissed her. Nobody ever will. And now, sadly, the whole world will know about this pathetic loser because she’s deluded enough to believe that she can sing. Hah! She should have stayed home.”
And then she did sing…and everybody – including the prejudging judges such as hateful Simon Cowell – melted into her song and forgave her for looking the way that she does.
When I shared the video with my husband, I cried. Oh, the joy of seeing and hearing Boyle’s prejudgers respectively drop their jaws and eat their words! “I like her,” my husband said. “I like her confidence.”
I realized that sometimes I forget that my husband, in his quietness, has the most noble thoughts of anybody I know. He never looked at Boyle and thought to himself, “She’s too ugly to sing.”
He never thought that the standards of beauty that keep Angelina Jolie in film roles and Jessica Simpson in a perpetual state of body weight scrutiny would limit this jolly woman’s vocal abilities. He never questioned her: if she claims she can sing, then she can.
I didn’t consciously prejudge her either, but I did find myself falling into the mob’s mentality, and all of the laughing and hissing and eye rolling convinced me that what was about to happen was going to be terrible – even painful – to hear. And then afterward, the mob would huddle together and say, “I knew she couldn’t sing. Just look at her!”
Just look at her.
We have become so conditioned to value a person’s worth by his or her appearance that we forget that vocal ability has nothing to do with hip measurements, skin clarity or fashion sense. Vocal ability has nothing to do with what’s on the outside and everything to do with what’s on the inside: the size and shape of one’s vocal chords and lungs, the size and shape of one’s heart… But American Idol voters often consider looks and not just talent when they vote. I can’t say for sure because I don’t watch, but from what I hear around the water cooler I have discerned that people watch the show to mock appearances more than to celebrate ability, raw and trained alike. And beauty standards are higher for women than they are for men.
My first reaction to Susan Boyle’s performance was smiles and tears. I was ecstatically happy for her: she proved the naysayers wrong.
But when the first judge told her that she had handed him the biggest surprise of the competition, I felt sick to my stomach, and that queasy feeling continues today. Basically, that judge was telling her two things: “You look like you can’t sing and if you didn’t surprise us with your good voice, we would laugh at you and consider you worthless.”
And if Boyle hadn’t wowed them all with her talent, and they had laughed at her instead of cheered, what would have happened to her? Would she have lost that self-respect, which my husband praised her for and which carried her to the competition and onto the stage in the first place? Would she have cried as the audience continued to laugh and jeer? Would she have traveled home to her cat Pebbles and gassed herself with her oven in a fit of self-loathing?
Somewhere, in that audience or watching on television or YouTube, there is a person (or two) who is less than conventionally beautiful and who additionally can’t sing well. What can that person do to prove his or her worth? Nothing?
The things I value in my loved ones can’t be performed on stage or seen on television. My husband’s ability to discern Boyle’s “best” quality is what makes him dear to me. And where I love, I find beauty…and he is beautiful to me because I love him.
Perhaps because she can sing beautifully, someone will kiss Susan Boyle sometime soon. But if she had failed on that stage and suffered our scorn and righteous indignation…then it’s doubtful that anybody would kiss her, isn’t it? That’s tragic. The real reason she should be loved by others is for her self: her confidence, her humor and her love for humanity.
I hope she knows that she had nothing to prove to us beyond the boundaries of her vocal ability; she only had something greater – something about her character – to prove to herself. And she proved she is brave just by getting up on that stage and singing, however skillfully (or unskillfully, if that’s your opinion). If people are tuning in to listen to her song in droves in order to experience vicariously the joy of her achievement rather than gawk at her “unlikeliness” to achieve it, then that’s a very good thing indeed.
Good news for the women of television
March 30, 2009
Their stories are getting very interesting! (Apparently, the writers got my memo.)
It may seem as though I do nothing but watch television and movies. There’s a lot to write about because – I am pleased to say - women are being written rather well, in some cases. They’re increasingly dynamic. Unlike ”chick” shows where several characters add up to one ”real” woman, each character embodying a facet of the female psyche (think: Sex and the City, Designing Women and The Golden Girls, to name a few), some of today’s women have a little more in the mix: they’re allowed to be sexy and smart and confused and confident…all at the same time. What a novel idea!
Over the years, I’ve generally stuck to the programs on Showtime and HBO: Sex and the City, Deadwood, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, The L Word, which I wrote about two weeks ago, and Big Love, which I’ll probably write about in upcoming weeks. I generally avoid network television (I watch Damages, The Office and 30 Rock right now) because commercials are annoying and the content doesn’t usually interest me. Believe it or not, the lack of sex, violence and profanity that you might expect me to applaud given my reaction to Watchmen coincides with a reduction in substance. Unless the television show is about flying nuns, there should be a modicum of each to keep it real. (Think: Watership Down – bunnies with blood and guts…and fascism. Very interesting!)
I estimate that I watch between six and eight hours of television per week; and in that six or eight hours, I try to keep my feminist perspective honed. It might surprise you that The Office – very funny though generally devoid of topics for intense discussion – contained a golden nugget of feminist historical significance several episodes ago. I highly doubt that the writers were aware they’d created this landmark occurrence unless one of them was attending a college English literature seminar at the time… I just became aware of it during a second viewing of the episode last night.
Jim bought a house for his new life with fiance Pam, and he reserved for her the stand-alone garage as an art studio. When he surprised her with the house, he’d already set up the garage. He gave her just what every woman needs: creative independence. According to Virginia Woolf, every person should have ”a room of one’s own.” And this space must have a door with a lock and key. It must be hers and hers alone, Woolf advocated, apart from the spaces of home and work or home/work united.
Because Jim has given Pam this space for her unique liberty, she has no need to abscond with her creative ideas later on, the way that Edna Pontellier does in Kate Chopin’s The Awakening, a landmark feminist text. Edna – the quintessential oppressed wife and mother – recedes to the cottage behind her middle class American home to express herself through art after she meets a mysterious single women named Mademoiselle Reisz. Reisz plays the piano hauntingly, casting a kind of spell over Edna who subsequently becomes inspired to create the separation between herself and her family. She wants to make her own music, so to speak.
In the case of Pam, as a wife and mother, she’ll feel little or no need to assert her independence. All she has to do - in order to feel herself again - is step out her back door and cross the lawn to her makeshift art studio in the garage. “It gets great light,” Jim announced when he presented it to her, canvases, easel and necessary art utensils already in place.
Meanwhile, “over the hill,” and unarguably overweight office chum Phyllis is happily married to Bob Vance, Vance Refrigeration. (In case you missed it, he does own his own business!) Phyllis is perhaps my favorite character on the show because her narrative arc shows that romantic dreams really do come true for nice women who aren’t the aesthetic ideal, but who wait their turn with thoughts optimistic. Bob once paid $1,000 for a hug from his wife at a charity auction (the top moneymaker)…and in a later episode, the happy couple abandoned their dinner guests (Jim and Pam, no less) for a sexscapade in the handicapped restroom. (Pam ate some of Bob’s French fries, and helped herself to a bite of his steak too! It just goes to show you that there are two kinds of couples in this world: those who enjoy sex in public bathrooms, and those who wish they did!)
These characters and their antics make me laugh so much that I re-watch episodes, often three or four times. But sometimes I need a little intrigue and that’s when I turn to Damages, starring the incomparable Glenn Close. Her character, Patty Hewes, is wicked to the core and a firecracker of an attorney to boot: in other words, she’s Snow White’s evil stepmother crossed with Alan Dershowitz.
It seems that all the shows I like are wrapping up their seasons – or even going off the air permanently – right now: The L Word (cancelled), Big Love (hiatus), Damages (hiatus), etc. But the one I’ll miss the most – the most revolutionary program in television history, which I just finished watching on DVD in rapid fire succession with the final episodes purchased on Apple TV: Battlestar Galactica. Though it has no mainstream accolades to show for itself, CNN reports that the cast and writers of the show executed one final diplomatic operation at the United Nations before fading into the past. It seems that the struggle for the survival of the human race after its near-anihalation at the hands of renegade cylons (machines, or “toasters”) really struck a chord with post-9/11 political leaders. Like their 1978 shortlived predecessors, Battlestar Galacticans utilized their own expletives (“Frack!” “Mother Fracker!” ”Gods dammit!”) but found a way to stay human(e) in the face of near extinction. What can we learn from them?
Captain Kara Thrace and President Laura Roslin
For starters, we can learn that women have just as large a role to play in preventing the Apocalypse as do men. So there! The original series portrayed an ill-equipped elected civilian leader who led the human race to ruin with the help of a corrupt count, both male. In the 2003-9 re-imagined series, the civilian leader is transformed from a one-dimensional character into a force to be reckoned with: former Education Secretary turned “dying leader,” President Laura Roslin (Mary McDonnell). Though suffering from breast cancer for the greater part of the show’s four mammoth seasons, Roslin rarely lets her authority slide. She’s tough when it’s warranted and warm-hearted when she can afford to be. And her winter romance with Admiral Adama is one of the most thoroughly convincing love stories ever to air on television, despite Roslin’s failing health. (I think the original President Adar would have stayed in bed.)
The re-envisioned show also transformed the swashbuckling, womanizing Captain Starbuck (played by pretty boy Dirk Benedict) into the swashbuckling, seductress (I hate the word “slut!”) Captain (Kara Thrace) Starbuck (Katee Sackhoff). I’ve read comments by some women who don’t like this re-imagining because Kara Thrace is rarely feminine and mostly a hard-drinking, hard-punching sex instigator. “Why can’t she be a tough girl who is still a girl?” they wonder.
What do you want her to do? Put on make-up and knit a sweater? She’s a pilot who’s bunk mates with a bunch of other (male) pilots. She’s bound to be a little crass. She smokes cigars, drinks liquor and plays cards with the rest of the pilots…of either sex. It’s how they unwind after a long day of heroics and it sounds good to me!
I like Kara. I like both of these women because I think they work hard and make sacrifices without self-pity, proving that they have the right to be where they are. In the first few episodes, the qualifications that they bring to the table are questioned, first by a cylon skin job (one disguised as a human) and then by the Admiral, among others. I don’t remember anyone ever saying “because she’s a woman” – the show is too subtle for that. It was implied that the question arose as to how much of the burden these women can carry because of their sex. The answer: all of it! Kara Thrace could pilot a colonial viper after a few rounds of whiskey and Laura Roslin led the survivors of the twelve colonies to “Earth” after a few treatments of chemotherapy.
Even though Battlestar Galactica has ended, there may be an evil cylon or two left in the universe. I guess it will be up to Patty Hewes to…hire a contract killer to assassinate them…or sue them – whichever angle works out best in her favor.
A little about violence against women: Watchmen and beyond
March 20, 2009
Two of the top-grossing movies (#2 and #3) at the United States box office this past weekend (3/14-15) contain brutal (man on woman) rape scenes. It wouldn’t be such an issue if one of the two films didn’t trivialize rape to the point where ignorant viewers confuse sexuality and violence.
In Watchmen (#2) – which I’ll admit I walked out of after an hour because I was miserable and I’d been tricked into seeing it by some marketing geniuses who had fashioned a movie trailer that recalled the glory and action bliss of director Zack Snyder’s previous hit 300 – a scantily-clad female hero is nearly raped by another “hero” (and it is implied that she later fails in her attempt to fend off the same culprit with the same intent). He says all of the cliche lines: ‘No’ as in Y.E.S.? You wouldn’t put those clothes on if you didn’t want some action! (I’m reproducing those quotes from memory. They may not be entirely accurate…I’m not going to watch the film again to confirm them, even in the spirit of good journalism. No!)
I subsequently had a revealing conversation with a tween on The Internet Movie Database Watchmen message board. He told me that he was disappointed with the relatively “small” amount of violence in the film. He said that 300 was much more exciting because of its heightened levels of bloody action and because the rape in that movie happened on screen. He condemned the current graphic novel adaptation for failing to present the sexuality that the source material calls for (I’m paraphrasing – he was neither eloquent about his views, nor did he spell all of his words correctly!)
I responded that he needed to reconsider: “Are you clamoring in favor of a ‘real’ rape scene?” I asked. “Why would you want to see that?”
“I don’t want to see a rape,” he argued, adding that he just wanted to see “sex of any kind” in the scene where the Comedian beats up Silk Spectre and attempts to penetrate her with his penis before their interaction is interrupted.
I pointed out that “sex of any kind” in such a scene would constitute a rape. Rape isn’t really sexual. It’s really just violent.
Radio silence.
The critical reception of the film is mixed. There isn’t a mainstream feminist film critic writing as an authority on this issue, but I’ll turn to two mainstream critics who did address this man on woman rape/violence occurrence, however briefly.
You want to see the attempted rape of a superwoman, her bright latex costume cast aside and her head banged against the baize of a pool table? The assault is there in Moore’s book, one panel of which homes in on the blood that leaps from her punched mouth, but the pool table is Snyder’s own embroidery…Amid these pompous grabs at horror, neither author nor director has much grasp of what genuine, unhyped suffering might be like, or what pity should attend it; they are too busy fussing over the fate of the human race — a sure sign of metaphysical vulgarity — to be bothered with lesser plights. In the end, with a gaping pit where New York used to be, most of the surviving Watchmen agree that the loss of the Eastern Seaboard was a small price to pay for global peace. Incoherent, overblown, and grimy with misogyny, “Watchmen” marks the final demolition of the comic strip, and it leaves you wondering: where did the comedy go?
The theory I espouse from Lane’s review is that the creators’ blatant disregard for human (including female) suffering explains the overall desensitized reaction to the film. Rape is painful for the victim; it should be painful for the viewer too, especially when the viewer should identify with the victim. Claudia Puig of USA Today didn’t mention the rape (attempted or otherwise) in her review, so perhaps it didn’t bother her. Apparently, it didn’t bother Sara Vilkomerson at The New York Observer either (not to mention the fact that she used the word “gender” incorrectly in her review - arrrgh!). And Lisa Kennedy of The Denver Post liked the film.
Michael Phillips of The Chicago Tribune pitted the attempted rape in Watchmen against the onscreen rape in The Last House on the Left (#3) in his review of the latter film:
“The Last House on the Left” hinges on humiliation and vengeance, which makes it like most other modern horror titles. Its focus on sexual assault, however, puts it in a different, more primal league. The way director Iliadis shapes the key misery-inducing sequence, there’s no hype or slickness or attempt to make the rape palatable or visually “dynamic.” For that you have to go see “Watchmen.”
Sara Paxton in "The Last House on the Left"
Both films contain rape content (The Last House on the Left is about vengeance resulting from the act), but Watchmen presents this violence without a caveat. Instead, the film justifies the rape by (I’m told) making the Comedian repentant and by (I’m told, although it’s also obvious) structuring the story so that Silk Spectre’s heir apparent is conceived during the Comedian’s successful, albeit violent, conquest. The movie should have shown the rape and not just its unsuccessful precursor. And it should have condemned the violence. Instead, it delights in violence of all kinds. A pedophile therein doesn’t just kill a little girl…he leaves her bones to be chewed on by dogs. Isn’t the first half of that thought horrific enough on its own? Why must it be compounded?
It really scares me that my tween forum buddy craves more violence than Watchmen offers up; but it scares me more that he was allowed to see the movie in the first place, when – clearly! – nobody is helping him understand the dark material he witnessed. I keep promising myself that when I’m a parent, I won’t restrict my kids’ viewership on the basis of sexuality or language in film, but will censor violence if need be - if my children are as sensitive to it as I am. I probably should go and see The Last House on the Left so that I can make a fair comparison. I’ve read about all of the gory parts on KidsinMind.com and I once stomached the original 1972 mess. I’d like to have an intelligent discussion about violence against women with somebody in person or online; but, I realize that the target audience for both of these films is not me. And it’s not teenagers with feminist parents either. Perhaps that’s why there’s a lack of sensitivity and understanding out there when it comes to this topic: nobody is talking about it.
Violence against women in our American culture has reached a celebrated status: we love to know all about and judge the Rihanna affair. A CNN.com article about violence against an elderly woman in Saudi Arabia - sanctioned by the government, no less – reached “Latest News” status last week, but then was downgraded in less than an hour in favor of stories like “Boat made of plastic bottles to sail to Australia” and, in “Popular News,” “Oprah comments on Rihanna.” The Rihanna scandal is a circus. Violence against women is real.
The message this flip flopping sends to me is that we (the general CNN-viewing public) are only interested in violence against pretty, young women.
There seems to be some confusion out there that rape and violence are one and the same thing. I’m sure that Watchmen tween isn’t alone in his confusion about rape and sexuality. And I really can’t blame young viewers when cinema marketers are targeting movies at them that they can’t possibly understand. Their age group has been weaned on similar movies like Sin City, wherein all women are either prostitutes or exotic dancers except in the case of a lone female police officer (also played by Carla Gugino, the Watchmen rapee); but she’s still naked just like all of the other women and, in a particularly sadistic form of castration (read: weakening), her hands are cut off by a serial killer. She is therefore rendered powerless. (Is it just me or does Gugino need a new agent?)
When I left the theater in the middle of the movie – which skillfully manifests a bold and seamless apocalyptic aesthetic, I’ll admit – I read the Lane review on my husband’s iPhone, lamented that I hadn’t read it before I plunked down my 10 bucks, and subsequently went to visit the “real” characters of The Wrestler (loved it!). Unfortunately, that made me think about how many abusive males were nominated for Academy Awards in 2009: Mickey Rourke, Sean Penn, and – most recently – Josh Brolin have each been accused of assault.
I guess it’s okay, though. Brolin, like the Comedian, has been forgiven. (That’s sarcasm.)
Malin Akerman in "Watchmen"
When Watchmen let out, I wandered back down the corridor to find my husband but instead found a group of teens who “absolutely loved” the film. A pretty and – of course – terribly slender young woman stretched her arm behind her back to fondle the tips of her long blond hair. “Do you guys think that I could be Silk Spectre (2) next Halloween?” she asked her friends.
Great! Not only does she want to dress in next to nothing and masquerade as the anti-heroine, but she’s also responding to a lackluster performance by the world’s second blandest film actress, Malin Akerman (Kelly Preston gets my vote for number one). I wanted to drag her down the hall and force her to witness the depth in Marisa Tomei’s fine performance.
Also on the news radar last weekend was the brawl that broke out in the audition line for the upcoming new season of America’s Next Top Model. I wonder if Halloween’s Silk Spectre was the culprit of that “violence against women.”
Ladies, we really are our own worst enemies. We don’t need any help from Alan Moore or Zack Snyder if we’re beating each other up over who gets to be America’s Next Top “Insect.”
Farewell to The L Word: “this is the way that we live”
March 12, 2009
I have many topics to rant about these days (misogyny in the Watchmen movie, the debate over castration of sex offenders in Europe, Campbell Brown’s ludicrous claim that her opinion-based “news” broadcast on CNN contains neither bias nor bull, the Rihanna scandal, etc.). Isn’t it a lovely time to be a woman! (It’s raining out and I’m entitled to be grumpy!)
After last Sunday’s broadcast of the final episode of The L Word, it got less lovely, I’m afraid.
The show’s creators claim to be astonished that so many straight women have feverishly tuned in to watch the lives of Los Angeles lesbians unfold over the past six seasons. Why? What other television programs do we have that are devoted entirely (and seriously) to women? Other shows about women often depict lives that revolve around men. Not The L Word.
True: the show does have its schmaltzy moments. It’s gone out with a bang: the “Who Killed Jenny Schecter?” bang. But it has also given us a lot to chew on over the years when it comes to the difficult challenges that face all (or many) women, gay and straight. I’d like to pause for a moment of silence in memoriam, and then tell you what this heterosexual woman learned from The L Word, and why she will miss it.
The L Word gained notoriety early on rather than being swept under the rug owing to some pretty impressive star power. Many actors worry that “playing gay” will land them in typecasting hell. But once the beautiful – and surprisingly soft spoken despite the often harsh tones employed by her character – Jennifer Beals signed on to play Yale-educated, interracial art connoisseur Bette Porter, all of the rest of the chips fell into place. Beals - perhaps best known for the movie Flashdance (1983) - brought poise and intelligence to this keystone role. I love that the creators adapted some of her most interesting attributes for the character: Beals is a Yale graduate with interracial heritage.
Before long, actresses like Margot Kidder (iconic for her role as scrappy reporter Lois Lane in the Superman films) and Kelly Lynch - and even cultural heroines like Gloria Steinem - were making cameo appearances on the show. And by the end of its six seasons, controversial, full-figured comedy actress Cybill Shepherd, out and proud lesbian funny lady Jane Lynch, and Oscar winner Marlee Matlin (playing the first deaf lesbian romantically involved with a hearing lesbian in television history) were regulars. Throughout, Bette, Tina, Shane, Alice, Tasha, Max, Helena and Jenny would meet and eat at The Planet, owned by Kit (Pam Grier – renowned tour de force black American actress). (If any of those descriptions sound insulting, I assure you that they are all reasons to be proud in my book!)
According to its before-the-finale special, The L Word challenged many of the stereotypes heterosexuals believe about lesbians: they hate men, they wear flannel shirts and Birkenstock sandals everyday, and they experience “lesbian bed death” the longer they sleep together. Because some of the sex scenes have been very explicit over the years, the show also lifted the veil over female same-sex sexuality. I confess that I often found the career and friendship exploits more enticing than the steamy love scenes, but it was definitely interesting to learn and understand the mechanics of a sexuality that I haven’t personally been privy to.
The L Word brought lesbians to a mainstream audience, and with “Les Girls” came some of the most important revelations for women in television history. I cried with Alice when her best friend Dana died from breast cancer. I looked with horror upon Dana’s amputated breast, clearly shown for all the world to see. We never get to look at breast cancer that way. We never get to see that butchery to women’s bodies.
Similarly, it’s also uncommon to spend time with a female character who identifies as a male and works toward transitioning from one sex to the other. Bravo to actress Daniela Sea (Moira/Max) for portraying this difficult life alteration with dignity and honesty. I cried for him every time he had to look in the mirror and see himself wearing a “costume,” the female body he was born with.
Kudos to the show for bringing smart alec Alice into our lives. I related to her desire to ”figure out” the world we live in by creating “The (Sexual Connection) Chart,” forcing the issues, pushing people’s buttons and speaking her mind. Come to think of it, I need to get myself one of those “I Love Alice” tee shirts from the show’s online store so I can wear it with pride: gay pride and feminist pride. (That’s right! I’m a straight woman with lesbian pride.)
I cried with Bette and Tina when they took their daughter Angie to the hospital with a high fever and the receptionist demanded that they decide which parent would represent Angie because the receptionist couldn’t comprehend one child having two mommies. I sympathised with Jenny when she sliced open her skin on the bathroom floor (as she’s done since childhood) and Shane found and comforted her. I cheered for Kit when she and Helena bought back The Planet and threw that witch Dawn Denbo out on her butt! I’m cheering now even though I know it’s time to say “goodbye.”
But the most important moment I experienced while pondering The L Word was to finally understand the politics behind the lesbian identity. It used to bother me when people (children) would tease me for my feminist ideals saying, “You must be a lesbian!” Why must I be? Not all lesbians are feminists and not all feminists are lesbians.
In late 2007, while writing an MA English paper on warrior sex and gender in an epic poem, I realized that I actually am a lesbian: I am a metaphorical lesbian. It dawned on me that, just as lesbians fight to be taken seriously as individuals in a world that applauds beauty and simple-mindedness in women and validates strength only in women who stand behind their men, I too fight to be taken seriously as a woman: just me, not me in relation to my husband or father, not me in relation to femininity. I refuse to model myself after a feminine ideal that isn’t natural for me. As a queer theorist, I reject the notion that sex and gender must always go hand in hand.
I wrote:
The “metaphorical lesbian” has been established, first by Bonnie Zimmerman in her essay “Lesbians Like This and That: Some Notes on Lesbian Criticism for the Nineties,” and then again by Elizabeth LeBlanc in her essay “The Metaphorical Lesbian: Edna Pontellier in The Awakening.” There is a political component to lesbianism that hasn’t always existed for gays. Historically, gay sex has been acceptable for free men, so long as they were in the active role of penetrator. This active role is associated with masculinity, while passivity is associated with femininity. According to Freud, it “is clear that in Greece, where the most masculine men were numbered among the inverts, what excited a man’s love was not the masculine character of a boy, but his physical resemblance to a woman as well as his feminine mental qualities – his shyness, his modesty and his need for instruction and assistance” (10). Kirk Ormand refers to some women of Ovid’s poetry as “impossible lesbians” because, with two female and thus passive participants, sexuality is at best limited and at worst unachievable. Lesbians therefore have something to prove: they must proclaim their active and yes, masculine, nature, and furthermore, they must convince the world that this nature is acceptable or even “normal.” “Because ancient Rome perceived sex as essentially predicated on an asymmetry of power, one of the two parties must be active and, if a woman, therefore monstrous” (Ormand 85). Lesbianism, as a political force, is thus parallel to feminism because both movements seek to achieve acceptance for socially unacceptable women: the active/masculine woman or metaphorical lesbian.
I never could think about lesbians without stereotypes until I got hooked on The L Word, and thus I certainly could not think about myself in relation to them. If someone accused me of being a lesbian today, I’d tell them, “Yes, I am.” Like “political lesbians,” I refuse to be defined by my relationship to men: daughter, wife, etc. I refuse to be compared to the feminine ideal and found lacking. I am a masculine woman. I wear dresses and boots. I’m pretty and tough. I’m not afraid to stand up for people and animals who can’t stand up for themselves…just like Alice!
I’ll miss the girls. I really liked them all…except for Jenny…but everybody is missing her these days anyway.
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