Written May 99
A possible essay for a class. "How Sexism has crossed my path", etc... - Annie
btw, if u don't feel like reading the whole thing, i recommend reading the "The Corporate Angle" part....
My whole life has been affected by sexism. Right now it is so hard to explain how I feel because my pain has been building up inside me for along time. There are so many things I could write about to show how I hurt and how loud I wish I could cry out for help instead of sitting alone in my room writing a paper.
Growing up in a society where supermodels look like toothpicks is part of the whole problem I am about to discuss. My mom was always thin up until the last few years when we got to be about the same size. She was constantly nagging me about it, urging me "not to eat this or that" or excercise. We would be looking in a catalog and I would point to something and say "I like that" and she would tell me, "ok, lose some weight and I'll buy it for you". I'm not even what most people would call "fat". I'm more of a "overweight for my height" or maybe not even that. One person said chubby a while back and another said healthy recently. I am really confused about it.
I started doing drugs my senior year of highschool to lose the weight. I don't remember how my parents treated me while I was gaining weight, but I do recall my mom made a point of saying that "since I was so thin, she wanted to buy me both of the outfits I liked" for graduation time.
I stopped doing drugs and gained all the weight back (but am probably losing again). This has affected my self-esteem, my relationship with my parents and many other things. Maybe this isn't really about fat, but about the effects of depression from not meeting certain standards of the people that you are supposed to look up to as a kid. I have realized over the years that I have a few problems dealing with reality. It is hard to explain, but imagine being told by your parents that you shouldn't act a "certain way" with guys because they will get ideas that you don't want them to. But, oddly enough, they tell you this years after you've been dating and after the emotional and physical damage to your body is already done.
I imagine it is hard for the average girl to grow up in this situation, being constantly reminded of a "flaw" in yourself and not having anyone to actually help you change it. (Only people willing to remind you). But, I also had other factors to deal with. I don't like to wear "average, normal, american girl" clothes, so I dress different. My parents don't know what the hell to buy me because of my style and I don't think anything looks very good on me because I feel like my body isn't shaped right. A nice paradox to feed my insecurities. In one setting, I would be able to fit in nicely with my parents ideals and just be "overweight", in the other setting I'm happy to be myself, but I still don't feel like I fit in. So, even though people associate me with punk and freedom of expression I'm actually very insecure and it impacts the kind of friends and boyfriends that I end up with.
Over the past couple of months I have been losing some weight because I don't eat animal products and I excercise more. My mom actually denied that she ever told me I was fat. Sometimes I wonder if I am crazy because she denies that she ever said or did things.
Dependance
Why has this affected me so much? I seriously don't think I would have the same problems to deal with if I was male. For one thing, I have been brainwashed with the idea that I have to be a "certain way" to be attractive to males and the subliminal message there is that I should always be looking for a male to attract (and if you want to go further into analysis, it means that I need a male in my life in order to be right). My family has vocally encouraged me to be independant and successful in any field that I want to. At the same time, I have had to deal with being sheltered by my parents because I am female and not getting actual help in gaining independance or learning the skills from society to do it without help. In families with more than one child, the younger ones usually get more freedom than the older ones and the males usually get more freedom than the females. I am an only child and recieved all strictness of being a first born and female.
In independance, I am not exactly sure why I feel so helpless. I am twenty-two years old and have never applied for a driver's permit. Whatever concrete reasons there are for me not driving, it keeps me dependent on my parents but moreso on friends. Relying on friends (who are usually male) and boyfriends to drive me around perpetuates my insecurities about not being attractive to males. All this could easily be changed by my own independence but when I've been in a rut for years on end it is not half as easy as it sounds.
Some days I sit around and do absolutely nothing even though I have ten page papers due in less than a week. I know procrastination is common among college students but my procrastination goes deeper than just putting something off. I don't spend my time doing anything else. I forget to remember what I wanted to do back when I had some motivation. The reason I got absolutely nothing done this weekend, was that a week ago I was dating this guy and realized I didn't love him, but he loved me. I had to be honest with him and he didn't want to be just friends so we don't even talk now, even though we hung out at least every other day for maybe two months. So now that I don't have many "just friends" to hang out with and I don't want to keep repeating the cycle of friend becomes boyfriend becomes chauffeur, I sat at home and did nothing.
What does this have to do with feeling overweight? I'm so unhappy with myself sometimes that I just sit around and do nothing. As I hope I've explained, what I've learned to actually do is different from what I've been "encouraged" to do. Between conflicting signals, what I've learned is I need to be pretty and thin so that guys will want to take me out and spend money on me. I know how sexist that makes me, but sometimes I get caught up in it until I realize that I shouldn't have to depend on some guy to be happy.
I have learned from my own experience with males that they don't seem to be as hung up on fat as I am. In fact, I feel like I make my problems worse when I talk about it around guys because they don't really seem to care. It's also hard to talk about it with girls because I don't feel that thinner girls could have the same issues and I don't want to offend girls that are bigger than me. My whole point of view is distorted by this issue and it shouldn't even matter.
In reality, fat shouldn't matter, but in our society it is a big deal. In fact, it is such a big deal that people like me who aren't "really fat" have an unnecessary complex about it. It is part of the same problem that has kept women less than equal for a long time. Society in general seems to be sending out mixed signals to women everywhere saying "buy this make-up to look natural" or "lose weight the easy way" as if that is the real problem in their life. If we had the status to change the rules of society we wouldn't be so controlled by products and ideas and we would be able to afford to live in a free easy-going world like nature intended.
Instead of women standing up for their rights, many are too worried about issues like these. Smoking cigarettes, if you've noticed, has come to equal appetite suppressant. When there's a huge advertizing industry set up to make people, women specifically, feel that they should be as thin as possible (making eating like a sin), it is no wonder that people keep buying into the tabacco industry. In fact, alot of women are afraid to quit smoking because they fear gaining weight.
This essay was supposed to be about sexism. And I don't think I've gone too far astray on side notes. Weight loss products and make-up and cigarettes are all played up on the same emotions in women. Men, although some wear make-up and many go on diets, are mostly targeted for cigarettes and even then it is not advertized as a way to control appetite. This hold that corporate power has over us (women moreso than men) seems hard to get around but I still believe there are ways to live our lives without it.
This year (1999) I have: stopped smoking, stopped wearing make-up as a normal part of my routine, stopped eating animal products, stopped drinking heavily, stopped buying leather and wearing or using most of what I already have, and started to work on getting me the way I want to be more than ever. I listed out these things to show that its not as hard as you might think to change your lifestyle if you really want to do it. Women especially need to take care of their bodies because, it is likely they will give birth sometime in their life and they need more strength, more nutrients, and more well-being to provide the best for the next generation of activists. (hehe, ok.. maybe I'm going overboard.. but it is true, if you are having kids, you want them to have good role models and a good healthy start in life).
As far as this paper and myself go, I'm going to end it on a hopefully positive note. I am coming to terms with different parts of myself every day and it's not easy to find answers. I have a hard time relating to girls in general but I feel that I have to stand up, even if that means alone for now.