(no subject)

[explorateur]

Gawd I am so sick of reading about Third Wave Feminism. I read Manifesta and it was a bunch of shit for the most part and mostly only relevant if you're rich, living in New York City and have friends with record contracts. I read Listen Up! and got sick of reading about how being fat is some how fighting a war against patriarchical conventions. My God, I just want to look good and wear my high heels. Think of that what you will, but I don't think wearing a short skirt, tight jeans or sexy shoes is somehow playing into some conspiracy rich white men created.

I'm tired of feeling bad about not fitting in the Third Wave box. It annoys me. I'm not going to feel bad for wanting to be sexy and I'm not going to pretend that the way I look is a big deal.

I know it's important to talk about these issues, but why are they at the center? Let's talk about welfare reform and universal pre-K and Roe v. Wade. Let's talk about diversity and immigration and other actual issues other than how long a skirt is or what the scale says. I don't care if your fat. I don't care if you shave your legs or not.

If the revolution is starting over whether it's oppressive to wear a miniskirt or not, I don't want to be part of it.

Comments

[inne.livejournal.com]

but isn't the third wave all about feeling sexy?

[explorateur.livejournal.com]

It seems torn between being like Carrie Bradshaw and not being like Carrie Bradshaw. I think tonight i just read a lot of articles that were anti-sexy and it just annoyed me. And in general, I think that the 3rd Wave is too focused on image and not on the issues as much as they should be.

[toiveajattelu.livejournal.com]

Those issues definitely don't have to be at the center, and if you look around there are lots of feminists and feminist authors (including quite a few of the contributors to Listen Up!) whose interests are more aligned with yours. It's good that you're picking your battles.

A lot of third wave feminist writing can come across as if it's trying to make you feel bad for wanting to look a certain way, and I think that's unfortunate. In those cases I think it's feminists getting in the way of feminism. I also want to feel sexy and wear miniskirts, I think the vast majority of women and men, including feminists, want to feel good about how they look. When I shave my legs and feel weird about it, my issue is not that I feel like I shouldn't be shaving my legs, it's that it's strange to me that I care enough to shave them, because normally I don't care enough. And I wish feminist body politics would focus more on everybody's right to be happy looking however they happen to look naturally, in addition to the body as protest and the body as social construct.

Anyway, amen to your particular feminism, whatever it may be.

[explorateur.livejournal.com]

I know body politics are an important part of feminism and just every day life for the media but I don't think they should be at the center. Yeah, conversations about mini skirts and fatness/skinniness are important to have, but they are not the issues I think we need to be concerned about.

My problem is that I feel like Roe v Wade will be overturned. And while the third wave is arguing about Sex and the City, they'll miss the important battles.