More talking about boobs. I just watched a video by Rachel Bloom called Heavy Boobs. It’s very catchy and I agree with the sentiment…. but she says she’s Double D. That’s not heavy. That’s what I said I was when I stopped buying bras, but I knew I was MUCH bigger than that. Much. Like, Z big. Yes, I know that’s not an actual size, but someone with Double Ds is average. I just Googled. The average bra size is 34DD.
Of course, we all know that women’s clothing and numbers are bullshit. It’s one reason I just don’t any longer. I stick to clothing that is S, M, L, XL, XXL, and higher. Oh, yeah. XS and going in the other direction as well.
The reason I gave up on jeans is that when I was as my skinniest (eating disorder, yo), I could not find a pair of jeans that fit properly. In theory, I was at the ‘perfect’ size to find a pair. I could not. I spent hours in a dingy Target changing room with lights that hurt my eyes, discarding pair after pair while my then-boyfriend waited with four or five pairs of jeans in his hand. Jeans he was going to buy without ever having tried on because men’s clothing goes by measurement, and not some nebulous number system that has no basis in reality. At the time, I wore anything btween a 0 (yes, there is actuallly a size 0 for women, or at least there was twenty years ago) to 11, depending on the brand. That’s awide range.
I could not find a single pair of jeans that fit. I was getting more and more depressed as I tried on the jeans, and then I realized, “Fuck. I don’t need to wear jeans.” And I haven’t since. If I have to wear pants, then I wear flowing pants that have elastic at the waist and are comfortable. What a relief!
Hm. So at the end of the last post, I was writing about how women are often the worst for upholding the patriarchy. So many women who think women’s bodies are gross just makes me incredibly sad. I can’t even get angry about it. Going through life with that much safe-hatred is tiring; I jnow this from experience. And if you’re wasting so much emotion on hating yourself, well, that’s time you can’t spend doing literally anytihng else.
This was something I realized in my late twenties (though I could not fully embrace it for decades): It benefits the partiarchy to have women focused on hating their bodies because it means they won’t think about other things–including how much the patriarchy sucks. In the last decade or so, there has been a slow movement towards the idea that an indidual of a minority can’t do anything wrong. Menaing, if a woman does something, the action in and of itself is feminist.
Not true! Women can be just as misogynistic as men–and because of how patriarchy works, more so at times. More to the point, women can contribute to the patriarchy even if their individual choices weren’t meant to do so. An example. During the pandemic, more women than men have left their jobs because of child care issues. Here’s an overview of the situation. And the money quote:
But, as we’ve seen, America’s child care crisis is disproportionately affecting women — moms in particular. Parents should be able to make the choice that’s right for them and if a mom decides she wants to stay home she should be able to – not forced to because there’s a lack of stable and affordable options. –First Five Years Fund (FFYF) Executive Director Sarah Rittling
In discussions about this on Ask A Manager, women will argue strenuously why it was the right choice for them. Or why they chose to take their husband’s last name. Or why they wear makeup. Which, I want to stress is fine. People are allowed to make choices for whatever reason. But that doesn’t mean that these are feminist choices just because women are the ones doing the choosing.
I know I’m old, but we still need to talk about systemic sexism rather than just “I made this choice so it’s fine.” I’m not saying this is specific to sexism because it’s the same with any ism. There’s a letter about gentrification at AAM right now, and so many commenters want to dismiss the issue as relevant to the issue the letter writer is bringing up. But it’s the fabric against which the letter is written and can’t be removed from it.
It’s like, racism is embedded in our society. We can’t just pretend it doesn’t exist when we talk about, say, crime and how justice is meted out in our society (badly, by the way. It’s meted out badly and in uneven measures). To say we can’t mention racism while talking about our prisom system is ludicrous.
Also, I just want to repeat that women can be sexist. Often, women are more sexist because they want to be the cool girl. I was like that in college. I hung out with a bunch of guys, and we would laugh at the airheaded girls who only liked fashion and makeup. I wasn’t aware until much later that I was their friend on severance. I was only cool until I disagreed with their dismissiveness of ‘girly’ behaviors and attitudes.
As someone who didn’t care much about that stuff and much preferred ‘masculine’ pursuits, i had women who did not like me, eithr. They saw me as a threat in so many different ways. I just resigned myself to being on the outside, which, let’s be real, is where I’m the most comfortable.
I will be honest. One of the reasons I’ve moved away from the ‘woman’ level is because of this shit. After a lifetime of being told I was not a woman BY OTHER WOMEN, I just…gave up and gave in. Fine. I’m not a woman. You win. Then, I moved past it because I realized that I did not care so much about it. Look. Let’s be real. I don’t have children and never wanted them. I don’t have ayn job in which I need to use my pussy or boobs to do anything. I do need to think about my boobs when Ido Taiji, but only in terms of balance and them not getting in the way. I like having hair down to my thighs, but more because I’m an extremist. If I were to cut it, I would chop it off at the ears or just shave it off.
I chose genderqueer at first because I am queer and I like the word. But, it didn’t really capture the flavor of what I was looking for. I like androgynous, but it’s not a gender identity and it doesn’t really reflect me. I settled on agender because I really don’t care about it, much like I feel about religion. It just doesn’t matter to me. Hm. Come to think about it. Same as how I feel about children. I should call myself achildren. Anyway, not identifying with any gender makes it even clearer to me how silly gender is. If only society could catch up with that viewpoint.