FWSA conference coverage: Usin' and abusin' the freedom our foremothers gave us...
Cate further discusses her reaction to the FSWA's "Feminism and Pop Culture" conference...
After the first part of the conference, I was feeling a bit defensive. And I'm sad to say, I only became more jaded after witnessing the most awkward and blatant disapproval of younger feminists (and perhaps any feminist that wasn't an academic or a scholar) from the first keynote speaker: Pamela Church Gibson. Apparently I should "have undoubtedly heard of or read her" but because I'm not a real feminist, I had no idea who she was.
I quickly learned that she is an incredibly dynamic, articulate woman, with a half thousand credentials, but who is also completely frightening. She spoke with such conviction, that it was easy to just listen to her voice or her her witty jokes, and ignore the true context of what she was saying. Aside from using distracting clips from Mean Girls and Bring it On, this quote from her stuck out in my mind the most:
"In Oxford, you know, where I live, I look out my window at night, and see these drunk young girls out in the streets, getting arrested. And I can't help thinking to myself, is this what I marched to Take Back The Night for? No. It's not."
While her statement wasn't meant to be harmful, I think that it fully summed up her sentiments regarding younger women, and younger feminists. She might as well have said, "Look what you're doing with this freedom I gave you, you ungrateful cow!" Apparently marching for freedom so women could walk freely at night without fear of rape means that we're only allowed to behave as those before us would have wished. Not that drinking until you get arrested is a great idea, but not all women do that. I drink quite a bit, and have yet to be arrested. I'm guessing the same goes for most women reading this.
Granted, she did follow her statement up with, "Well, I'm not saying that you can't drink." But clearly, we're only supposed to drink as much as they say is okay. Was there a big, international feminist meeting where our foremothers handed out codes of dress and conduct booklets? Did I miss that?
Yet, even more disheartening, was the treatment of the FWSA member who introduced Pamela. She was was young, blond, and conservatively dressed. Despite being well covered up, you could still notice she was quite busty - and let's face it, when you're over a B cup, it's sort of difficult to hide your breasts, and really, why should you have to? For some reason, the prestigious Pamela thought it was okay to comment on the presenter's breast size. When the young woman brought up the topic of plastic surgery, Pamela pshawed, and laughingly said, "Oh honey, you don't need it. Trust me." Not that the woman was saying she did need surgery, she was simply just talking about it. Isn't that the sort of comment that if a man made in the same context, we'd burn him at the stake?
What I found amazing, was despite hearing a woman who we're apparently all supposed to look up to, say something like that, a woman had the nerve to speak up quite angrily announce, "Actually, I don't know why we're so keen on blaming that, a lady at the back of the room still women, and making women accountable. We should be holding The Men accountable."
Yes. Because clearly, women are treating themselves and each other so well. Golly, I guess it is all The Men's fault!
Stop by again soon for Part Three of Cate's trip to Newcastle University for the FWSA's "Feminism and Pop Culture" conference...
Cate Sevilla is the Editor of Dollymix.
[image via Lou Reed, NYT]
