Monday, February 6, 2012
The Reality of Regina, Karen and Gretchen - Mean Girls is a Documentary
We discussed in class this week the exclusions in the feminist movement, which I found to be a direct reflection on our exclusions of each other in every day life. Exclusion is both directional and intentional; that is to say that one cannot "accidentally" excludea person, race or gender. Bell discusses this concept further in her chapter on sisterhood, inferring that we must appreciate and acknowledge the differences without resenting them or allowing them to separate us. We must all be willing to be a member, not just a leader. To stand next to, not just in front of. To support, not just to be supported. To be the echo, not just the voice. We have become enemies within a group, foes posing as friends. We rest in the complacency of our solitude, with a unified facade. When will we care? When will we acknowledge the beauty that lies in the difference of skin, class, and experience? No one is forcing us to pretend, no one is encouraging this slap-with-a-smile way of life, and no one is leading us who is not one of us. We have a common bond and a common enemy, we are sisters and we are fighters. What we do not realize, however, is that the greatest evil we fight is not that of another gender, or an already shifting society. There is a "common enemy" in this war, but we so often fail to see is that the enemy is within.
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Although I agree with much of your response to hooks, I disagree with a small point; although exclusion IS directional, it is not always intentional. I think this is illustrated quite well in hooks's own writing; while she acknowledges men as "comrades in struggle," she does not allow them into the core body of feminism; she formulates a "we" of sisterhood, a "we" alongside which men can fight but a "we" in which men cannot be included. She creates a community with the reader, but it is (unintentionally) exclusive: she only begins to use "we" once she begins talking about women of color, and although this may seem like an overly-formal linguistic critique, her writing is political (and therefore performative) and while she argues for the institution of a society not based on gendered division, she reinforces this group divisiveness with her own diction.
ReplyDelete*overly formal linguistic critique of hooks
DeleteI think it's really interesting that Pat brings up the performative here--especially since we're about to get in to the Judith Butler reading. To Butler, pretty much everything everyone does is somehow performative. The way we act on a daily basis was somehow scripted by how we were socialized. Our gender and our actions are not who we are, but rather just what we do. I haven't been able to read too much of Butler yet, but I'm curious about how she defines who we 'are'?
ReplyDeleteI think in addition to exclusion, we have to recognize and amend the tendency we have within the sisterhood to tear each other down within the community, which very much connects to the Mean Girls mentality. So often women end up attempting to "correct" other women on how to be properly feminine or are just catty toward them without purpose, and in doing so we just end up being further aid to the whole system of patriarchy that we claim we fight against. Just because other women may want to dress or look in a way that appears "unfeminine" (such as Janis in Mean Girls) or do something that is seen as unusual does not mean we get to reinforce society's biased opinion and force it upon them. We should be able to be sisters without sibling rivalry.
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