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Whose Fault Is It That We Saw Your Boobs?
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No, I didn’t watch the Oscars. Yes, I heard about the opening number, “We Saw Your Boobs.” Yes, of course, it’s sexist, immature, offensive, disrespectful… and the fact that several of the so-called boob sightings are associated with rape scenes is disgusting. Of course.
And… what about all the actresses and celebrities who were sitting in the audience having to listen to this dreck?
And… what about all the actresses and celebrities who were sitting in the audience having to listen to this dreck?
Well, what about them?
You mean the actresses who are, for the most part, wearing gowns specifically designed to show maximum cleavage of cleavage already maximized by underwires, padding, boob tape, and cosmetic surgery? The actresses whose efforts to maximize cleavage exposure has caused the Grammy Awards this year to issue a dress code banning “bare fleshy under curves of the buttocks and buttock crack,” “bare sides or under curvature of the breasts,” and “sheer see-through clothing that could possibly expose female breast nipples.”
Was that really necessary? I mean, what kind of professional musician would need to be told not to expose her nipples? Um… Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Janet Jackson, Rihanna, Britney Spears...
Oh, but wait… That was the Grammys, and this is the Oscars. This is about actresses. We all know that musicians are paid to put on a show.
You mean the actresses who are, for the most part, wearing gowns specifically designed to show maximum cleavage of cleavage already maximized by underwires, padding, boob tape, and cosmetic surgery? The actresses whose efforts to maximize cleavage exposure has caused the Grammy Awards this year to issue a dress code banning “bare fleshy under curves of the buttocks and buttock crack,” “bare sides or under curvature of the breasts,” and “sheer see-through clothing that could possibly expose female breast nipples.”
Was that really necessary? I mean, what kind of professional musician would need to be told not to expose her nipples? Um… Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Janet Jackson, Rihanna, Britney Spears...
Oh, but wait… That was the Grammys, and this is the Oscars. This is about actresses. We all know that musicians are paid to put on a show.
Okay… actresses. Actresses who have exposed their breasts off-duty. Let's see... Emma Watson. Penelope Cruz. Elizabeth Hurley. Keira Knightly. Kirsten Dunst. Salma Hayek. And then there was Anne Hathaway at the premiere of Les Miz… the film for which she would win a Golden Globe, the Screen Actors Guild Award, the BAFTA Award, and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Does any celebrity really not know that there will be a fleet of paparazzi hoping to get a crotch shot when a famous actress gets out of a car? Does any celebrity seriously think it’s not going to be an issue to go without underwear while making that maneuver?
And I am hearing it already… Don’t blame the victims! If Anne Hathaway wants to go commando, well, that’s her own damn business! If these celebrities are forced by their publicists and studios to show ever-more-daring décolletage, who can fault them for the inevitable wardrobe malfunctions.
Three words: Clothing. Reform. Movement. Ever hear of it? Well, it was part of that first wave of feminism, when women began to understand that women’s clothing was not just impractical, but downright dangerous. Try carrying a child up a dark staircase, with a lantern or candle, while trying to hold the floor-length hem high enough to avoid tripping. How many women broke their necks, killed their babies, and/or caught on fire because of Victorian dresses?
And what about those pioneer women on Oregon Trail crossing hundreds of rivers on makeshift rafts on their way from Kansas to the Pacific? Not even an Olympic swimmer could keep her head above the water with eight yards of fabric wrapping themselves around her legs. And what about those tight-laced corsets… 80 pounds of pressure per square inch causing miscarriages, displacing organs, increasing blood pressure and restricting breathing.
The Clothing Reform Movement was an organized attempt on the part of those First Wave Feminists to reject the traditional garments for women in favor of safety, practicality, and clothing that would actually allow for full range of human movement. Because women are, you know... human.
It was an awesome movement. The women who had the courage to wear the bloomer costume—harem pants over a short skirt—were met with taunts and catcalls, barrages of excrement, and violence. Actually, “bloomer” was a dismissive and insulting term invented by the media. The activists who wore the outfit called it the “American Dress” or “Reform Costume.” They were deeply involved in abolition, temperance (which was a movement confronting domestic violence), and women’s rights. They were a real movement. Yeah, movement.
And what about those pioneer women on Oregon Trail crossing hundreds of rivers on makeshift rafts on their way from Kansas to the Pacific? Not even an Olympic swimmer could keep her head above the water with eight yards of fabric wrapping themselves around her legs. And what about those tight-laced corsets… 80 pounds of pressure per square inch causing miscarriages, displacing organs, increasing blood pressure and restricting breathing.
The Clothing Reform Movement was an organized attempt on the part of those First Wave Feminists to reject the traditional garments for women in favor of safety, practicality, and clothing that would actually allow for full range of human movement. Because women are, you know... human.
It was an awesome movement. The women who had the courage to wear the bloomer costume—harem pants over a short skirt—were met with taunts and catcalls, barrages of excrement, and violence. Actually, “bloomer” was a dismissive and insulting term invented by the media. The activists who wore the outfit called it the “American Dress” or “Reform Costume.” They were deeply involved in abolition, temperance (which was a movement confronting domestic violence), and women’s rights. They were a real movement. Yeah, movement.
Lady Gaga recently had to cancel a tour because of a tear in the cartilage around the hip joint. Not too surprising, given how many times she falls down. In Atlanta, in Mexico, in New Zealand, in Houston, in New York, in Montreal. She falls off a piano, she falls off a runway, she falls at the VMA’s, at Heathrow Airport, at a photoshoot with Annie Liebovitz. And why is she falling so much? Take a guess.
What if there was a song about Lady Gaga called, “We Saw You Fall?” Would we be outraged at the callousness? So what if she likes sky-high heels? Isn’t that her business? What kind of feminist would want to suggest that maybe, just maybe, she has made herself a target of ridicule by wearing such obviously dysfunctional foot-hobblers… foot-hobblers that male performers would have more sense and self-esteem than to wear.
If the actresses don’t like a song that says, “We Saw Your Boobs,” then, I say, don’t show them.
Don't even think of telling me they have no choice. They have a choice. It's the same choice I had. Buy into it or opt out. And, yes, that is a real choice. A choice with steep consequences, but also ample compensations. A choice.
Choosing to show major cleavage contributes powerfully to the marginalization of the actresses who don’t have huge breasts, who aren’t willing to undergo surgery to enlarge them, who don't feel comfortable--for any number of reasons-- in dressing like a sex object. And choosing to show major cleavage, choosing to stage coy "nip slips" and oopsy commando photo ops may be great in terms of web hits and viral videos, but they wag the dog in terms of the stories these actors can be hired to tell and the characters they will be considered for portraying.
These are not the career moves that lend themselves to telling stories of women who have survived sexual abuse, who have organized in resistance to the patriarchy, who have recruited and healed other women. These are not stories of liberation. Contrary to the dictates of faux feminism, conflating a woman’s complicity in her own oppression with empowerment is just plain stupid. It’s kind of like applauding the independence and initiative of the strikebreaker who crosses the picket line to work for a substandard wage, undermining and betraying the workers who are holding the line to improve conditions for all.
Yes, the isolated actress who refuses nudity in a scene, who refuses to sexualize her appearance is going to be punished. Of course. That’s how it works. Ask any union organizer.
But a movement... well, a movement moves things. And the Clothing Reform Movement never really died. There have always been women refusing to sexualize themselves, to compromise their health or their safety for a fashion industry dictated by mostly male designers and based on distorting, controlling, and exploiting women. There have always been women willing to disqualify themselves from the jobs that require a dress code intended to pit us against other women and to estrange us from our dignity. There have always been women who wouldn't want a job where they were expected to show more skin than the men (a primal display of submission), where they were expected to wear a mask or hobble their feet.
Movement. But for a movement to happen, you have to be able to move.
But a movement... well, a movement moves things. And the Clothing Reform Movement never really died. There have always been women refusing to sexualize themselves, to compromise their health or their safety for a fashion industry dictated by mostly male designers and based on distorting, controlling, and exploiting women. There have always been women willing to disqualify themselves from the jobs that require a dress code intended to pit us against other women and to estrange us from our dignity. There have always been women who wouldn't want a job where they were expected to show more skin than the men (a primal display of submission), where they were expected to wear a mask or hobble their feet.
Movement. But for a movement to happen, you have to be able to move.
Once again your insight has opened my eyes to the true Feminist perspective; the perspective that will move us forward.
I admit I was furious when I saw that insipid song and dance-but as Feminist as I think I am, I never once considered this viewpoint. I am sorry to say.
Brave women unite!
And thanks for the education about the Clothing Reform movement--it's interesting how such concerns are trivialized (like the "bra-burning" of the early 1970s feminists) but they are not trivial. These fashions are intended to keep women down--to make sure we remain sexualized and powerless--how can we take her seriously, look how she dresses.
And those Lady Gaga shoes look like a museum display on torture--I always say, if you had told me in the 70's that women would wear shoes like that again, i would not have believe you.
thanks for this!
One thought I have is: there is this social contract that applies almost everywhere in which men don't openly admit what they are doing, the malice behind what they demand, and in which women go along with men's demands in hopes that it doesn't get too ugly or go too far. The openning of the Oscars was an admission by some men, which was ugly and "went too far."
I don't think you are blaming the "victim" here, but maybe putting too much blame on those who are "coping," and almost all of us cope in one way or another, making the best of the options.
Even if a woman is rolling in money, she might also be mentally colonized, and completely ignorant of feminist alternatives. You say that you "opted out," but maybe the luxury there was that you were exposed to feminism, and most women don't get that exposure.
My second thought is: it is hard to be sexual in a patriarchy without being "sexualized" or objectified. In fact it is impossible. It is impossible to be a woman without being sexually objectified. When I was in my twenties, sexual harassment was a constant experience. The sexual harassment didn't lessen when I wore "masculine" or loose fitting clothes. In fact, I noticed that I was treated with a little more respect and less explicit harassment when I dressed up in a feminine way. Heels, not too high, make up, not too much, form hinting dress, not too tight, a short skirt, not too short. (I have to admit I feel a little nervous admitting this to you. Really, feminism MUST stay away from clothes policing of women.)
I have noticed looking at the the graffitti in subways in NYC that the pictures of women in ads are always targetted, violent, sexualized defacing images and words. Sometimes "faggot" is written on a picture of a man if he looks feminine in some way. But it's usually the images of women that get the grafitte. The images of women most likely to escape the graffitti are the ones in which the women are totally sexualizing themselves already. It's like... I'll do it to me, or else you're going to do it to me.
There's also the good and great fact that we are sexual beings, and we have a right to be our own sexual subjects, and the right to express who we are in the world, and to expect respect for who we expressing ourselves as sexual subjects. The same right to aesthetically express ourselves as the right to do sports, to travel, to whatever. If sexist men objectify female athletes, does it fall upon women to not play sports in public? Or that we should play sports in a way that doesn't inspire objectification? "Don't bounce, don't you know how they are looking at you?"
I don't want to accomodate objectifying men, even though I find I must. I like wearing clothes that express me, and I like being appreciated for being sexy. (Very nervous here.) It's just so rare that a woman gets appreciation and respect for her sexuality. I don't think there's a way out of the objectification, though what we where, how we act, etc. Just getting the movement going, by criticizing the ones creating the problem, rather than the ones who are coping with it.
It is awful that you lost your job because you didn't wear a mini skirt, but that is grounds for a sex discrimination suit. Or reason to organize among the workers against sexist dress code. It doesn't make sense to blame the women who wore skirts when there was no organized movement for them to stand with or against, as there is with established unions and strikes.
I carry this a bit further and say, yes, you had a choice not to do sex "work". No, it's not fun working at Mickey D's, or Sears, or being a waitress or a check out clerk at the local grocery store or any of the other pink ghetto jobs. More often than we feminists want to admit, there is a choice not to. We have just been seduced into thinking 'we have no choice' or "it's going to pay my tuition". There are other ways, you just didn't take them, they were tough, dirty, demeaning, and rape culture told you you could make so much money with that booty, those breasts. And you'd be loved. Six of one.
It's reactionary to be told you must not blame the women who are helping men bring back sexist dress standards for women at work. Of course it is.
And Andrea, why are you targeting Butches who are already so targeted in patriarchy that Butches are not even allowed to be shown in the patriarchal or "Lesbian" media? No, saying no to male rules about male-identified femininity is not "masculine." It's the opposite. It means something that men reserve the most comfortable and sturdy and dignified clothing and shoes for themselves, and that women are so forbidden them that they train women to police other women into obeying their rules. It sounds like you're recommending the "funfem" agenda, which is anything but attractive.
This is basic feminism.
But there is also the level of being only among women and how differently women treat those who reject male-identified femininity and those who obey male rules. It means being welcomed into the women's club, rather than policed and insulted. It matters on every level, which is why so many Butches, particularly those with additional oppressions, die so young.