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thinky thoughts
Dec. 5th, 2007 09:56 pmVenus of Willendorf: sex symbol...or cruel caricature of an enemy's wife?
Why am I thinking about this? Eh...one of things I think about when I'm washing myself. It ranks right up there with whether or not there's an evolutionary reason for my boobs to be different sizes.
I keep hearing the phrase "real women have curves". I don't like that phrase, and not just because I wasn't overly wild about the movie. It's become a cliche, and frankly it's rather irritating. Sure, real women have curves. They also have angles, and lumps, and folds, and some of them have ribs and collarbones that stick out, and some have all sorts of muscle definition. All shapes and sizes and body types and dammit, that includes everyone from the skinny to the morbidly obese.
So why do we define womanhood by a particular body type? This seems more insulting than saying "true beauty is a perfect 36-24-36", because now you're not just unattractive without curves, you're not even a woman. What the fuck? It's like the fact that some plus-size clothing lines advertise as "clothes for real women". Thanks for the push towards my self-confidence, but I was just as much a woman in my thinner years as I am now.
I'm not "curvy" because I'm a woman, I'm "curvy" because of the way my body stores the fat that gets deposited when the calories I consume don't get burned off. Some women burn it off faster, some burn it off slower, some don't even try and are still skinny, some don't try and they're not skinny. Big fucking deal. I'm a woman because I say I am, not because I wear a size 16-and I look nothing like Marilyn Monroe. Not because I have boobs and an ass, because some women don't have those either. Hell, some women pay to have tits as big as mine. That said, apparently size doesn't mean a whole lot.
What is a real woman? Someone who defines themselves as a real woman. I'm a woman because I say I am. I was born with a double-X chromosome. For me, that'll suffice. Not everyone who identifies as a woman was born female. If it works for them, great.
Why am I thinking about this? Eh...one of things I think about when I'm washing myself. It ranks right up there with whether or not there's an evolutionary reason for my boobs to be different sizes.
I keep hearing the phrase "real women have curves". I don't like that phrase, and not just because I wasn't overly wild about the movie. It's become a cliche, and frankly it's rather irritating. Sure, real women have curves. They also have angles, and lumps, and folds, and some of them have ribs and collarbones that stick out, and some have all sorts of muscle definition. All shapes and sizes and body types and dammit, that includes everyone from the skinny to the morbidly obese.
So why do we define womanhood by a particular body type? This seems more insulting than saying "true beauty is a perfect 36-24-36", because now you're not just unattractive without curves, you're not even a woman. What the fuck? It's like the fact that some plus-size clothing lines advertise as "clothes for real women". Thanks for the push towards my self-confidence, but I was just as much a woman in my thinner years as I am now.
I'm not "curvy" because I'm a woman, I'm "curvy" because of the way my body stores the fat that gets deposited when the calories I consume don't get burned off. Some women burn it off faster, some burn it off slower, some don't even try and are still skinny, some don't try and they're not skinny. Big fucking deal. I'm a woman because I say I am, not because I wear a size 16-and I look nothing like Marilyn Monroe. Not because I have boobs and an ass, because some women don't have those either. Hell, some women pay to have tits as big as mine. That said, apparently size doesn't mean a whole lot.
What is a real woman? Someone who defines themselves as a real woman. I'm a woman because I say I am. I was born with a double-X chromosome. For me, that'll suffice. Not everyone who identifies as a woman was born female. If it works for them, great.
