via GIPHY

HERE WE GO…

So, here’s the thing, I’ve prattled on and on about patriarchy and men.  Including all the nuances of patriarchy. I’ve decided to switch it up. Today I’m coming for all the women. You, me, her and all of our embarrassing toxic little traits. If there’s toxic masculinity then I’m pretty sure toxic femininity is very real too.

We’ve all been victims of toxic femininity and or perpetuators of toxic femininity. Toxic femininity is a form of internalised misogyny which involves restricting yourself to stereotypically “feminine” behaviours in order to appeal to men. If that isn’t awful enough, we also happen to project these stereotypes on other women.

Damned if you do and damned if you don’t. Wear a mini skirt? Well then society calls you a HARLOT. Wear a suit and they scream that you aren’t feminine enough and that you want to be a man. Because as a woman, why are you choosing to express yourself in a way that pleases either one of societies intense extremes which are ultra-femininity or traditionally masculine tropes? It gets so frustrating that you’re like oh boo hoo hoo cry me a river Stephanie.

Femininity isn’t inherently bad. The pressure to conform to a rigid definition is what is toxic. And then going on to shove it down other women’s throats makes it more icky.

WHAT TOXIC FEMININITY LOOKS LIKE…

I’d say shaming women is hot-wired in all women. I can safely say even from a young age we already had reservations, including our own perceptions of what a proper female should act like.

I was a toxic girl. I could blame it on the lack of knowledge, empathy and my young age. I’ll throw in the society I grew up in as another important reason as to why I was walking around in my size 2 ballet flats shaming other girls for not being girly. Growing up, I’d always adored Barbie, Winx Club, Pop-Pixie, Monster High, Bratz and basically every other cute show with pretty women that had a bad-ass taste in fashion. I would buy exercise books, as well as magazines that featured pictures of my favourite feminist icon Barbie and stick her pictures in my exercise books. I was (and recently am) obsessed with the colour pink. I didn’t hide my girly side and I didn’t try to until I ran into a very interesting human being (I’m being very polite here). Let’s call her Beatrice.

Now Beatrice was more of a tomboy. She was friends with most of the cool boys in our class (well, as cool as you could be at the age of 10, 11 and 12 that is). Beatrice made it a point to make my life a living hell. She would go on and on about how disgusting my love for Barbie and pink was. She told me that I had to wear sneakers and boy clothes because that was cool and being a girly-girl was weird and silly. I know I should have probably head butted her and there’s no excuse for not going through with it but in my defence I was small and I had many girls nodding in unison with her. Imagine how terrified little me was, clutching so desperately at her homemade Barbie magazine.

I became the butt of jokes. Why in the world did I like pink so much? My peers would ask me.  It’s so gross, they said. Civvies days didn’t help my case either because I would most likely be wearing a very pink article of clothing somewhere in my early 2000’s core outfit. I thought I looked cool so I wondered why other girls shamed me. When I got to school on civvies, every girl was wearing jeans, sneakers and dull coloured jackets. It was like a skater boy fest. The moment I walked in, the laughter started.

I realised that I might have committed social suicide at that moment. However, I soldiered on. I decided that every other girl was sick in the head because princes in movies always married the girl with the biggest and prettiest ball-gown. Then little me had an epiphany, I wasn’t the problem but Beatrice and her goons were. Yikes, I was a spiteful little thing huh?

Here’s the real kicker ladies and gentleman, whilst Beatrice and I were polar opposites, we had one thing in common. Everything we did was to impress snot-nosed primary school boys. Beatrice dressed like a skater girl because all the boys thought she was cool, chill and cute and that made her happy. Some boys told me my dresses were pretty and that made me happy. We were shaming each other to appeal to BOYS and that, my dear readers was toxic femininity. In this case, I was the ultra-feminine girl who shamed the masculine presenting girls and Beatrice was the masculine presenting girl who shamed me for being ultra-feminine. I know, it’s a real doozy. We were quite the cliché really.

Growing up, I was perpetuating toxic femininity by looking down on women who refused to recognise feminism. I trashed women who aspired to have children and cook and clean for their husbands. I was just a mean little thing. I’m so glad I was slapped in the face by knowledge. Because phew…I was extremely mistaken on so many, many things.

EVERYDAY TOXIC FEMININITY IS LIKE THE HUNGER GAMES

Toxic femininity is constantly criticising your appearance based on unrealistic beauty standards.

Toxic femininity is trad wives screaming at other women that they should aspire for the picket fence lifestyle.

Toxic femininity is shaming a woman who chooses not to shave. Because what if this woman you shame has PCOS and shaving is taxing if not impossible?

Toxic femininity is when you’re shaming other women for wearing baggy jeans instead of cottage-core dresses and vice versa.

Toxic femininity is when we demonise and vilify women who identify as feminists because feminism has played an influential role in their lives.

Toxic femininity is when we shame women for aspiring to marry and have children.

Toxic femininity is when we shame women for desiring for to be housewives.

Toxic femininity is demonising women for being both a homemaker and a ‘boss-babe’. Do some women know you can be both? You can raise a family and go to work. The two sides aren’t mutually exclusive so why should we demonise each other for any of those choices?

Toxic femininity is telling another woman not to speak up because she shouldn’t emasculate a man. Hold uppppp….huh? Why did women get an education then? To keep quiet? Oh, the audacity Stephanie!

Toxic femininity is telling other women how to live their lives even if they didn’t ask you. Make it make sense lady.

Toxic femininity is shaming other women for not desiring to depend on their husbands financially and in other ways as well. I don’t know if you have ever noticed that those dependency relationships don’t usually end well.

Toxic femininity is screaming at other women claiming that they aren’t supposed to work long hours. That they should be at home nurturing or something like that. Here’s the funny thing though, no human man or woman is biologically designed to spend 8 hours typing away at and staring at a screen that is most likely hurting their eyes, only to be summoned to some useless meeting then sit down and have to do it all over again but I digress.

Do you see the problem? Toxic femininity is women judging other women for their choices. That’s just about the crux of it.

INTERNALISED MISOGYNY AND HOW IT CONTRIBUTES TO TOXIC FEMININITY

It’s funny how society tends to scream that women are each other’s worst enemies. I find that there’s an element of truth in this. However, women’s toxicity to each other and other men is as a result of internalised misogyny. Internalised misogyny is when women subconsciously project sexist ideas onto other women and even onto themselves. And what is misogyny? Well can we please get a drumroll because here’s the accurate and true definition of misogyny according to Britannica: Misogyny, hatred or prejudice against women, typically exhibited by men. It is generally accepted that misogyny is a consequence of patriarchy (male-dominated society), and the term may be applied to certain individuals as well as larger systems, societies, or cultures. Funny how men are involved.

Here’s the real kicker, there’s also something known as misogynoir. Dictionary.com defines misogynoir as the specific hatred, dislike, distrust, and prejudice directed toward Black women (often used attributively). Get this, women deal with misogyny then there’s black women who deal with both. The nuances of misogynoir can be linked to the plight of blackcellence. (See my previous blogpost…I swear this isn’t cheap advertising, not at allllll).

Thanks to a society that is strongly tied to the patriarchy, everyone has preconceived notions of what a woman should be, that is how they talk, act, walk and dress amongst a slew of other things. If you don’t fall in an acceptable standard then you may as well jump off of a very high bridge and if you don’t die then I don’t know, maybe get a shark to finish you off. Since the beginning of time, women were expected to act in accordance with a specific standard or a popular standard set by men. This standard is what is deemed as a traditional and necessary behaviour of women so society can continue to flourish or evolve or some other cow du-du like that.

A woman’s station in life is to achieve societally accepted beauty according to toxic femininity. A woman should direct all her efforts to ensuring that she’s the belle of the ball. Her wig should be human hair without a trace of lace peeking on her scalp, her lip combo should be completed by a shiny lip gloss and let’s not forget about her body hair. A woman covered in hair is unattractive. Society is disgusted by hair under your armpits, on your arms and let’s not forget the shame other women throw at you when your most intimate parts remain unshaved. Granted, some women just want their fellow friends to look their best then there’s the other female population that SHAMES other females for their choices.

The traditional standard involves ultra feminine women, decked in pretty and dainty frocks, with pretty hair on their HEADS not body. Just their heads, ladies and gentlemen. So, society is basically saying that it’s either you are a woman or sasquatch. There’s no in between. Let’s not forget about the modesty. I’m sure we’re all well aware of the stress inducing rules upheld by headmistresses in some schools, such as don’t wear pants because it entices men beyond measure. Think of Carrie’s mum in the movie Carrie, granted she was a nutter but she was the personification of a toxic female. Apparently we are to wear skirts and dresses that cover our knees and shoulders because the male species happens to have a weird attraction to shoulders and knees and that’s somehow a woman’s fault? Sigh.

However, I digress. When you want a picture-perfect depiction of an acceptable woman in society think of a Caucasian woman from the fifties. The pretty, prim and proper stay at home types. Now, you might be wondering Nonkosi, do you have a problem with women who have traditional standards? Um no, I don’t actually. I only mind when those traditional standards set for women become absolutely a tool used to shame other women who choose to deviate from them as they are seen as the norm. I’m pretty simple-minded, I just happen to have an aversion to cow du-du constructs.

It’s no secret that men have shoved these traditional standards down our throats for the longest time, but I’m not writing about that today. It’s about other women who help perpetuate these occasionally harmful narratives on other women.

TOXIC FEMININITY SAYS SOME WOMEN DON’T NEED FEMINSIM SO ALL WOMEN SHOULDN’T NEED IT…(weird).

First of all, I call bollocks. I’ll never understand why people hate feminism. I always surmise that it’s hated because most people lack comprehensive knowledge of what it is. Feminism has been commercialised and commodified to the point where people believe it’s a farce. We live in the age of information where ignorance is a choice and it’s startling to see how well-educated people genuinely think feminism is somehow society’s biggest problem.

Toxic femininity also happens to be when some women shame other women for making informed decisions to be feminists. Women pull each other down because of how much feminism has been demonised. Apparently being feminist means you hate traditional feminine values and standards, what a silly perception. The whole traditional housewives versus feminist dichotomy is used to demonise feminists and that within itself is toxic femininity.

Other women will look down on other women for straying from traditional feminine norms. In Zimbabwe you’re deemed an abomination because how dare you decide to say go to the gym, build muscle and not have children by the age of 24? Now whilst this might be the inherent definition of toxic femininity, the opposite is also true. I firmly believe that whilst toxic femininity truly means shaming other women for deviating from traditional feminine roles in order to please men, I would like to believe that shaming and demonising other women for other choices is also toxic femininity. There is a faction of women who dub themselves feminists. They look down on women who choose to stay on the path of traditional feminine values. Their questions become: how dare you dress up like Elle Woods from Legally Blonde and vie for the attention of men? I guess wanting to be a housewife who cooks and cleans is outlandish or something. How strange.

There are two ends of the spectrum but it is suffice to say that the former is more intentional and somewhat more cruel about their judgement of women who don’t want to have the big house and picket fence dream. Corporate girlies are demonised for chasing after their careers because a woman’s traditional station in life is to sacrifice her own joy to serve her family. Women who adore traditionally masculine activities are vilified as well. Just pick any social media platform and read comments under posts of stunning women who are extremely ripped and determined to get muscular. Other women are constantly telling them that women are not supposed to look that way. The feminine women who like pretty frilly things, pink stuff and kids are always being teased by other women that they have had a lobotomy at some point.

It’s funny how no woman can ever win. You could choose A or B or B or A and never win. Women will find ways to tear each other down just to gain the approval of a system that men set up centuries ago. It’s an endless cycle of doom.

What aggravates me is that a key component to dismantling the systematic cycle of toxic femininity is the ever-vilified concept of feminism. Feminism is about ensuring that women have choices. Feminism is about freedom for women. Understanding that women are entitled to make choices that don’t hurt themselves or anyone can assist in the mission to dismantle toxic femininity and it’s less than très chic manicured grip it has on all of us. It’s one thing to not adhere to feminism. Fair and fine, I am big believer of choice and free will. However, to completely and utterly disregard feminism and the important milestones it has helped women achieve is a form of toxic femininity. Vilifying women who have truly progressed in patriarchal societies thanks to feminism is a form of toxic femininity. There’s no two ways about it.

I absolutely detest the fact that women were given these unrealistic standards to live by thanks to the patriarchy and women have taken those standards and made them ammunition that they use against each other. We’ve taken all these unrealistic standards and even gone as far as making sure they adapt to current societal trends. In the early 2000’s women shamed other women for not being skinny and in 2014 women shamed each other for not having a Kim Kardashian butt. Gross, ladies.

FREEING ONESELF:

Emancipating oneself from toxic femininity starts with figuring out where these beliefs and notions stem from. Are they from your family? Your parents? Social media? Society? If you can find the origin you can start the process of destroying the entire construct or pandemic.

Read a book you silly woman. I’m not joking, read something.  Read an article, an autobiography or a newspaper. Free yourselves from the mental slavery of toxic femininity. Watch as many commentaries or documentaries as you can and learn to form opinions of femininity outside of what the patriarchy has spent centuries drilling into your head.

Exercise compassion and empathy. God condemns people from judging each other in Luke Chapter 6 verse 37, so um listen to God. People do all sorts of things for reasons that are unbeknownst to us. If said things seem harmful to their health and well-being then approach the situation with compassion. Address it whilst exercising empathy. Don’t just jump into judging Luba because she doesn’t shave her armpits or her legs. Don’t jump into verbally assaulting Miranda because she loves her boyfriend and wants to become a housewife. Don’t yell at Linda because she wants to look like She-hulk. Let’s stop slaughtering each other for sport.

“Women are often socialized and conditioned to minimize their experiences and discount their feelings to make men feel comfortable,” says Vermani. So, make it a point to validate yourself. You might, for instance, reach for daily positive affirmations like, “It’s natural to feel this way,” “It’s OK to feel angry,” “I tried my best, and that’s enough,” or “My feelings matter.” Don’t water yourself down so you can be digestible. Feel what you feel and say what you need to say. Validate yourself always.

Women are so dynamic, so nuanced and so capable. There’s a diversity in the way we think or present ourselves and we need to be in a position to celebrate all of this without shaming each other. We need to be in a position to stop tearing each other down by saying “it’s what women do” or “it’s what women should do”. How about we stop looking foolish as we destroy ourselves all in a bid to pine over another gender. It’s certainly not iconic or cute of you for that matter. And we want to be iconic, yes?

-The Weird Brown Girl.

SOURCES

https://www.britannica.com/topic/misogyny

https://biblehub.com/luke/6-37.htm

https://info.umkc.edu/womenc/2018/11/16/internalized-misogyny-what-does-it-look-like-how-do-you-stop-it/

https://www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/toxic-femininity#what-to-do-about-it