Posted 7:44 PM by Blah blah

To cowriters: if you have a long reply to a post, please post a new entry instead of answering it in the tiny comment window.

Sylvia replied:

ray, i read your post earlier today but didn't really get a chance to read it carefully until now. Most of the stuff I agree with without comment, but number six really makes me uncomfortable: "'Feminism' (in a good way) means to feel free to speak up, be decisive, and be strong-willed while dressing and acting girly and taking on 'female roles.' Women should not feel less feminine for doing so."

Why put feminism in quotation marks, and why rationalize it as "in a good way"? That kind of puts me on edge. I'd argue that feminism is about equality between genders; especially in regards to power relationships. Women *should* feel completely empowered and confident. I think we should have the freedom to dress or act however we want, free of societal sexual pressures. I don't think it's really appropriate to say that feminism should be primarily characterized as the freedom to "dress girly" and taking on "female roles". I think it should be about dressing however you want, taking whatever roles you want, and liberating those things of a gender affiliation. When I read through your post the first time, I was pretty puzzled as to what the word "feminine" is supposed to mean. To me, "feminine" is a term you can use to describe a fashion style, or maybe in historic cultural terms. It almost seems like an anachronism to me. I can't really imagine describing anyone or anything, besides clothes, as feminine. And clothes only as a label to describe a visual trend.

As for the whole female body image, "using what you've got", I'm not entirely sure how to communicate what I feel about that, but it makes me inherently uncomfortable. It makes it sound like women should be encouraged to sell themselves out based on looks. I concede that people enjoy beauty *and* intellect, but I think an overemphasis on looks in our media-driven age is pretty dangerous.
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Thank you for your thoughtful reply, Sylvia. I am trying to summarize what Esther and Unica Hija said, which was not easy. Maybe I was imprecise. What do you guys think about this?