I typed up a post to this effect in the other gender stereotypes thread but I deleted it in the end.
I will admit that it’s complicated. I think that a lot of girls shy away from being associated with girly stereotypes because such things are treated with a lot of contempt by men, and in many areas of work you have to get along with the guys if you want to survive in the workplace. And by contempt I don’t mean that the guys are hostile or mean about it. Perhaps “genial condescension” is a better way to put it, a kind of “oh look isn’t that just like a woman” attitude, which in some ways is more annoying than outright contempt.
Hazel–interesting. I’ve honestly never really encountered many non underwire bras. It seems like every time I’m in a bra shop or given a bra by my mum, it’s just underwire. I have tank tops with built in bras, but if I want to wear something that’s not a tank top or that can’t go over a tank top, I go with an underwire brassiere. And woe betide the man who criticizes me for it.
I’ve noticed that, too. In the bagborroworsteal thread, a female doper was doing just that. It was…odd. She actually said that women who care that much about fashion are insane (and she’d taken an abnormal psych class, too!). Just the fact that someone really needed to denigrate other people’s interests kind of annoyed me. Yes, I’m sure there are SOME women who would rather pay for a bag than say, their kids’ dinners, just as there are selfish men buying cars frivolously. We’re just here to talk about stuff we like.
I do think that to a degree, the whole “Fashion=frivolity” mentality is starting to dissipate in the rest of the world as fashion becomes more…I dunno, available? to the “masses.” Think of all the fashion reality shows. And some of them are quite good–Project Runway’s pretty good. (Well, it used to be even more so.)
I admit that as a kid who thought clothes and such were dumb, I found myself thinking of it as silly and ridiculous. Like, “Just silly girls like that–who cares about looks/makeup.” To a degree I think I even felt threatened by it because it felt so inaccessible. Not to project too much but maybe that’s why some people go out of their way to put it down? Because they don’t understand it and feel they’d be in over their head if they tried accessorizing or putting together and outfit and therefore they have to dismiss it with a bit of an eyeroll?
I don’t find an interest in fashion, clothes, shoes, shopping, etc. to be particularly or inherently “girlie”. Like many things, the idea that it is “feminine” or “masculine” is something that changes across time and cultures, so there’s no point dismissing or mocking those who enjoy such activities. I find myself rolling my eyes every time a guy says that he’ll have to turn in his man card for admitting he enjoys certain things. Imo, almost everything that is associated with being a “male trait” or “male interest” is perceived as more legitimate or having a higher value than anything associated with a female trait or interest… and that goes for on the Dope as well as outside of it.
Having moved to Tokyo, I’ve found that the males of my generation here are just as likely to take an interest to fashion, grooming, accessorizing, and recreational shopping (and dropping big bucks for it) as the females. It doesn’t have that “girlie” designation like it does in the United States. In general, I find the assignment of activities as being “feminine” or “masculine” rather tiresome and silly, so I (try to) ignore it. I don’t feel a particular need to validate anything by rejecting an activity that one culture at one point in time suddenly deemed to be decidedly “feminine” (and thus frivolous, a waste of money/time, or whatever), if I so happen to like it - I used to train extensively in ballet, which is considered a flamingly feminine pursuit. And likewise, I don’t automatically embrace anything and everything that’s typically conceived of as being masculine just because it’s considered, well, masculine (and all the associations that come along with it).
As for conversational topics, since a few posters have mentioned them - when I talk with my friends, I think what’s more obvious from our conversational topics, far from my gender, is my age and at times my status as an Asian American - we swap stories about our experiences being thrust into the real world following college and the confusion we experience when our aspirations are incongruous with reality, our hopes and dreams for the future that usually entail finding a career that will take us around the globe, our sufferings with identity crisis resulting from navigating a country where we are never American enough because of our outside appearance and yet not Asian enough on the inside to fit in the everyday life at our parents/grandparents’ country of birth, etc. Since I’m currently living in a place where I’m considered a foreigner, I frequently compare and contrast the new country with “back home” in conversations with the expats I meet. In general, I don’t think people’s conversational topics are decidedly feminine or masculine - there are other standpoints that get mixed in there as well, like class, age, region, race, etc.
Or women who feel they can’t live up to the beauty standard or resent feeling like they have to live up to it at all? Much easier to simply ignore the standard if you can dismiss it as being silly, useless, and not worthy of attention in the first place.
This is a really good summary. I am genuinely interested in talking about DNA and pharmaceuticals, and hockey and baseball, but I also realize that my non-girly interests increase my credibility in the eyes of men. It’s helped me a lot in terms of building rapport with male colleagues in grad school and in the workplace that I can always play on the coed softball team and I play surprisingly well for a girl. :rolleyes:
It seems fine to me to avoid talking about purses or Sex and the City or Jodi Picoult in a professional setting, where maintaining credibility in the eyes of male peers is essential to professional success. It just seems kind of sad to me that the same kind of self-editing or self-deprecation goes on here, where Doper women could be taking the opportunity to embrace our girly interests (:p) along with the other facets of ourselves.
I have to have bras with underwire, mainly for support - if not, they need to have lots of elastic and industrial-size straps. And no, it’s not to attract men - otherwise I would be out on a date instead of sitting in front of my computer right now.
As far as girly stuff, I used to have contempt for it when I was younger - I was part of a mostly male crowd that considered me “one of the guys,” and I did everything to keep it that way. It was partly that, and partly the influence of the feminist literature I read, which tended to disparage traditional feminine pursuits*. I wore little make-up, refused to wear heels, and only talked about cooking because one of my friends was roommates with a guy who was studying to be a chef, so the guys would occasionally make stuff when we visited - that guy taught me how to make chicken cordon bleu. I never gave up wearing perfume, though, and my torn jeans and flannel were always ironed. Some habits die hard.
Now that I’m older, I still dislike some girly things, but have embraced others. I do tend to get snobbish and sarcastic about it sometimes, I have to admit, but I tend to do that about a lot of things. For example, I would rather watch Discovery Channel than Lifetime (or the Domestic Violence Channel, as I sometimes call it. See, now I’m being snarky again.) I do enjoy “What Not to Wear,” though. I still don’t like to wear much make-up, and have forced myself to wear moisturizer with sunscreen on a daily basis due to my advancing age and fear of skin cancer. Also, after a 24-year hiatus, I have once again taken up cross-stitching, but prefer not to make cute bunnies or samplers with biblical verses on them. Right now I am working on a design from “Subversive Cross Stitch” by Julie Jackson, which consists of the words “Love Stinks” and a red heart with stink lines coming off it. When It’s done, I’m planning to start on something from Helen McCarthy’s “Manga Cross-Stitch” but I’m not sure what.
*This is not to cast aspersions on feminism. I continue to be a feminist, but some of the opinions I once held seem somewhat extreme to me now. But that’s a discussion for another thread.
I am an extremely girly girl – but also a nerdy one. Growing up, I had a huge collection of Barbies and a whole boxful of dress-up clothes that came from relatives and family friends (mostly old nightgowns, shoes, cast-off bridesmaids dresses, etc, hats, scarves, jewelry, etc). However, I still liked to run around in my yard, play on the swings, ride my bike, horse around with my cousins, etc. But I’ve always been a girly-girl at heart.
And I still adore clothes – love them. (Although what’s in style now isn’t really my cup of tea, I hate to say) I love jewelry – mostly old-fashioned, vintage styles.
Hell, I wear make-up when I’m just sitting around the house! (I just wish my nails wouldn’t break so easily, dammit!)
And I don’t wear heels all that much though, just because I don’t have much of an opportunity to wear them and thus, I’m really clumsy in them. :() I’m better with wedges.
Likewise, Sidney Evgeni Jordan, since you’re a Penguins fan, do you ever have to explain to people that you’re NOT into hockey because “Oh my god, Sidney Crosby is sooooo hot!!!” (Not that I’d kick the guy out of bed, mind you. ;)) And I don’t get that from men – I get that attitude from female hockey fans. It’s annoying. I like watching hockey (at least, when the Pens are playing, because they’re MY team), because it’s fun to watch. Ditto watching the Steelers.
(I did think the “rent-a-bag” thing was weird, though. It was what, $300 to rent? I’d just as soon buy a good quality bag for that price.)
I can’t speak to the dynamics on the Dope because I haven’t been here very long.
I really dislike it when women put other women down, especially for things that are explicitly feminine (ie wearing makeup, having breast implants, consuming/enjoying media geared towards women) and I see it constantly on the sites I frequent, since most of them have a lot women posters and are of a nerdy or feminist bent.
I consider myself a ‘tomboy’ and most people I know IRL would probably agree with this assessment, but I like plenty of stereotypically feminine things. And I’m really tired of being judged, and assumptions being made about my sexual partners, because I shave off my pubic hair…
Jewelry, or rocks? Because, while this board is definitely anti-rocks, it’s not that we say “I hate bling”, more along the lines of “I’m not going to buy bling just because deBeers are good at marketing… ooooh, a new iSomething, shiny!!!”
Re. the OP, some of the items are circularly defined. “Chick anything” is “stereotypically girlie” by definition, isn’t it? But the fact that something has been branded “for girls” doesn’t mean that it is, or that every girl in the world has to like it. I like dolls, but, uhm… well, Dora has fans of both genders… are Yoda (plush) and Wolvie (mighty muggs) girlie?
I don’t remember the exact bent of the thread (I didn’t post in it because I knew I would be ridiculed for my opinion), but it was something along the lines of: “My wife (girlfriend/SO) wants me to buy this piece of jewelry because she saw a commercial for it and thinks it’s really pretty, but I don’t wanna spend that kind of money on something frivolous and shallow.”
I’m not sure exactly what you mean here. The OP does ask whether you believe that there’s such a thing as stereotypically girly things or interests, so feel free to discuss that assumption or the examples if you want to. I called those items so-called-chick-lit and so-called-chick-flicks because I didn’t make up those categories, it’s debatable what they mean, and the names themselves might be offensive to some women.
I agree. No one is saying that women should like all things that are girly, or even some things that are girly. I’m more interested in why some women seem to scorn things that are stereotypically branded for girls, or might even go so far as to change their opinion of women who do like those things.
I have to say that I’ve experienced a bit of that from time to time. It’s happened on a few occasions that after I tell a man that I’m a baseball fan, he’s surprised to know that I actually know about things like hit-and-run, suicide squeeze or LOB. It’s even worse for hockey because the sport isn’t as universally known by Americans, so I’ve met people who seem to be surprised that I understand icing and offsides. :rolleyes: Perhaps my name here is a bit misleading; I am far more interested in the Penguins having Signey, Evgeni and Jordan locked up in long term contracts as they come into their prime playing years. I’ve noticed that they’re hot, but that isn’t why I pay for the NHL center ice cable package. And I pretty much hate those pink versions of professional team jerseys, because I’m pretty sensitive about women fans not being stereotyped as groupies who are in love with the players but don’t care about what’s going on in the game.
I am not sure I have much to add, or should - this appears to be mostly Doper women comparing notes - I appreciate the insight however.
I found **Pyper’s **post to be interesting - I was going to come in and ask if you all found that the “Girly Police” who take shots at girly stuff were more likely to be women or men - but she called it: more likely women in her experience. As a guy, I have learned not to go there much myself…
The Dope tends to favor strong, trivia-minded, hyper-verbal personalities who can hold their position - not sure how that applies to discussing girly stuff…
Especially make-up threads, at least lately. You can’t have a make-up thread withoutgetting into a “less girly than thou” hijack at some point.
Even the women with “girly interests” often qualify their statements in the girly threads with “I’m not really girly BUT I like make-up/purses/etc”.
You wouldn’t see that in say, a sports thread. No guy is going to say, “I’m not really a macho-he-man, but I love hockey!”
I like shoes, clothes and make-up, and I find it sad that so many people feel they have to apologize for liking those things, or even turn it into a competition about who likes these things the least. Liking these things doesn’t mean you have to talk about them constantly, or that you’re a shallow person (maybe if these are ONLY things that matter to you, but how many people here are like that?).
As a man, of course I feel contempt for stereotypical “girlie” interests. If you define girlie stuff as the stuff my girlie girlfriend watches on Bravo network or Sex And The City type shows. Things like shoes, shopping, fashion, gossiping, playing “working girl” at some inane PR or fashion job. These things seem hopelessly vain, tedious and childish to me.
Yeah, I mean even I fall into this trap sometimes. I felt the need to qualify my ‘‘I like pretty jewelry’’ with an explanation that I also like more respectable things, like martial arts.
What if all I did in my spare time was browse fashion magazines, go shopping, read romance novels, etc? So what? Does that make me a superficial person? I think there’s a general social consensus that it does. But perhaps we all ought to challenge that assumption. I don’t see how playing Final Fantasy or watching sports or whatever is inherently deeper and more respectable. It’s just different.
Oh, bollocks. You’re an urban professional with a decent job, which means you probably spend as much time picking out suits and ties as most women spend buying shoes and dresses.
When It’s done, I’m planning to start on something from Helen McCarthy’s “Manga Cross-Stitch” but I’m not sure what.