Blecch. This article did two things for me: (1) renewed my appreciation of and commitment to my wife and our relationship, as we are both the antithesis of the stereotypes Dowd presents, and (2) made me sad if this view actually represents conventional wisdom and the typical state of affairs.
Which, I suppose, is a pretty good setup to increase the impact of the “warning” found in the conclusion.
Please don’t hurt me. 
I do believe that it is undeniable that we as a society (well, us women-folk) have regressed to 1950s standards of womanhood, even if it isn’t completely. In the 50s, the standard was the flawless housewife who was trying her best to emulate the big, Hollywood sirens. Big boobs, tiny waist, doe-like eyes, big, curled, bouncy hair, and red lips were the ideal.
The 60s brought an era where women were more “natural” (for the most part, of course).
Since then we’ve come full circle, back to the “Playboy” ideal".
Although I think it is horrible for young girls to grow up wanting to be objects of sex (they should want to be strong, intelligent, doctors, lawyers, or whatever else they want to be- including a housewife*), I think it is also important for women to realize that there is some power in being a female.
Now, don’t get me wrong: I, like every other logical being, enjoy voting, equal pay, and getting to drive a car ;). At the same time, I recognize that there are plenty of “good ol boys” out there who, even if I cure cancer and make peace in the middle east tomorrow, will never see me as anything more than a pretty young girl. Not everyone is like this, but I think it would be fair to say that we have a pretty decently sized grouping of people (and it isn’t just men, there are plenty of women that hold this true as well) that feel this way.
So what do you do? Well, I think a smart person plays to it.
I like to think of myself as one of the stronger, more independent, intelligent people I know (don’t we all :p), but part of that intelligence is knowing people. When I stop at the corner store (not the best example, but it comes to mind) to get directions from the old man in a cowboy hat behind the counter, I bat my eyes and smile sweetly, I maybe even turn up the southern accent a bit. Why? I know this guy would be threatened by, well, a strong female.
There is a power that females have and yes, it mostly is related to sex. But that is just another tool in the shed, so to speak. Why not use it? Don’t get me wrong, it would be horrible to rely only on sex and being “feminine”, but what is wrong with using it as part of your arsenal?
Oh and I like having men open doors for me, carry my stuff, pay for my dinner, or walk on the outside part of the street while we are walking. I like this stuff not because of a power thing, but because it makes me feel protected and cared for. Because I like getting the door opened for me does not mean I should get my voting rights stripped** 
.
Great article, though. For what it’s worth: my husband better like having a wife who has a real job, is smart, and out spoken- or we’re screwed.
*I have a few friends who, when asked what they want to do after college, say they want to be housewives. Whenever they say this, the are attacked as being “bad women” for not trying to bring down the man. Sigh.
**At school, a man opened the door for me and some lady snatched my arm. She proceeded to tell me that I was personally setting the women’s movement back years by allowing that “pig” to open the door for me. I simply pointed out that men aren’t the only ones who can be sexist and walked away.
Just wait. When you’re around forty-five or so, you’ll become entirely invisible.
Guy here. Just read Dowd’s piece and would like to chime in.
I think women (and men too) got what they thought they wanted: simple roles for the sexes. The problem is, they’re too simple, and they limit us (especially women, but men, too) as people.
Cultural conservatives have had great success with a philosophy called essentialism. It says that biology, in some ways, makes us different from those of the opposite sex and the same as others of our sex. This may have some validity, sometimes, but most often it’s used as a force for making people less resistant to conformity – usually in hopes of selling them something to make them more feminine or more masculine.
I’m not going to sing the old antifeminist song about how women really have it so much easier than men, because I don’t believe that. But I’m not sure men have it all that easy under current conditions. Women may have to juggle being themselves with their identity as a woman that men approve of and will love. But men are answerable both to women and to other men for our identity as men, with ourselves as individuals running a poor third place.
It’s not only not the best example, but it’s really kind of the very worst example I can think of. You need to trust me, that you can be ugly, and mean, and a complete idiot, and random old men will still probably give you accurate directions without harming you. If ever there was an occasion when you don’t need to suck up to someone, that would be a prime one.
I wrote something in the ballpark of the article’s topic a few years ago and this is as good a place to share it with you as any,
(Sorry, didn’t register to read the article).
Well, I don’t think men have it easy at all - but what makes you think that women aren’t answerable to other women’s approval as well as men’s approval? There’s always women out there who want to tell you that you’re not feminine enough, or not feminist enough, or just not enough like them.
Men and women face that same problem together - there’s always some idiot (or marketing guru) who wants to tell you how to be.
People used to have simple roles for the sexes. Then women decided they wanted choices, which complicated things, and some women are now finding it too hard to make those decisions and long for a simpler time.
But I’d rather make the difficult choices, and hope that the men in my life will take advantage of having more choices too, to free themselves from the stupid stereotypes that ask for conformity in our relationships rather than honesty.
I’m in another seemingly bizarre, paradoxical status: a femme (i.e. “lipstick lesbian”) feminist. When I have to defend my right to be femme, I’m a femme-inist. (You heard it here first.) I’m in favor of freeing all people from predetermined gender roles and allowing each person to find her own level freely. It just so happens that my personal preference is way over at the femme end of the scale. Just because I like a style that has been associated with inequality for women, doesn’t mean I would stand it for one New York second if I saw women’s equality being degraded.
American social reformers, going back over 3 centuries, have a history of holding themselves dour and grim, as if it’s more righteous to never have any fun. It’s a legacy of 17th-century New England Puritanism. Geez, guys, I don’t know about that, I’m Italian, I think elegant style is every woman’s right, I was raised as one of those heathen Catholics, and now I’m a Pagan for real. A queer Pagan. I like to have fun with gender roles—it’s a subject I study and I imagine entomologists have some seriously buggy parties around Samhain–they advise you to write what you know, well, people party what they know too.
The Marquis de Sade said something like there won’t be true revolution until people are fucking in the streets. In other words, if we’re going to liberate ourselves, let’s exercise our liberty by enjoying ourselves. Pleasure is sacred to the Goddess. “All acts of love and pleasure are my ritual.”
For a man, substitute a butch dyke romancing me as a fun idea and not at all in confict with my feminist principles. I made friends with a butch who did in fact romance me this way, just for fun. She held the door for me, she led me in ballroom dancing, she recited luxurious Urdu love poetry to me (she’s Pakistani) because she knows I know Urdu. She was a perfect gentleman to me. I loved it: we were playing with stereotyped gender roles, but being able to play and not take ourselves too seriously may be the surest way to subvert the gender-privilege system that locks people into these roles.
Boneyard Blessings of Sombrous Samhain,
Johanna D’ark
An angry Slate author follows up
Is Maureen Dowd Necessary? By Katie Roiphe - The Times op-ed columnist adds nothing to the debate between the sexes.
FTR, I think The Rules is wack on crack.
Now Salon has risen to Maureen Dowd’s defense, http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2005/11/08/dowd/ saying the article in the New York Times Magazine gave a poor idea of what Dowd’s new book really says.
I wonder how good the book is. The title is, Are Men Necessary? When Sexes Collide. My impression of the Magazine article: it was an excuse to flash her gorgeous gams. (Sorry, by now the article has gone to the archives, so the picture of Dowd posing on a barstool in sheer patterned black stockings is no longer online.) I’ve been wondering if maybe “Maureen Dowd” is a cleverly constructed pseudonym meant to suggest “More Endowed.”
Thanks for the link. It indicates to me that the bulk of the Times article really was a setup for the ending. Good promotion, that.
It sounds as if 150 years ago, she would have been one of Les Grandes Horizontales.
I posted the link in a hurry as soon as I saw the article. I should have read through it first. You know what that rhymes-with-twitch Rebecca Traister had the almighty nerve to write? Lesbianism is an “ailment.” :mad: Since when does Salon feel comfortable publishing open homophobia? If you ask me, homophobia is the fricking ailment.
Also, is that the lamest old stereotype of successful women or what? If she’s powerful enough to reach the top of her career and isn’t hitched with a man, she must be a lesbian. Way to go to stigmatize strong, independent women.
It just so happens that a lot of strong, independent women have been lesbians. The secret history of dykes in America tells of many achievements, it’s something to be proud of, not stigmatized by.
Main thought: This woman does not speak for the state of all women.
The impression that I got from the article is that she is thoroughly entrenched in upper-crust Manhattan society. And as hard as it may be for her to believe, the majority of America is not. Further, so many of her examples are pulled from magazines, movies, television: popular media, Hollywood. We know how true a representation of life is through that filter, where “movie ugly” is a common term that would be “very pretty” anywhere else, where there are makeup artists, professional costume designers, and directors or photographers plying their skills toward a false ideal that nobody can really say actually IS the ideal. And in both cases, the examples are largely 18-30 years old.
So between Manhattan and Hollywood, in adolescense and past 30, there is, y’know, the rest of America with minivans and mortgages and children. And sure, some of them buy into wanting the glamor, some midwest soccer moms will botox 'til the cows come home, Williams Sonoma and the Gap will open in yet another mall. But Walmarts will continue to be built at least as quickly, and Budweiser commercials will air that appeal to both men and women (thinking now of that horrible glurge “Budweiser is American” commercial that they won’t stop playing).
Is the problem bitching about how feminism has wafted away on the breeze and renewed objectification has taken its place? No. The problem is what is causing young women to fall back upon these gender stereotypes: discouragement from the hard sciences, (as Dowd herself stated) the lack of interest that a moderate female Supreme Court justice will most likely be replaced by a true conservative male at a time that women’s and civil rights will come before the Court, and the greater disinterest in real news in favor of quick camera cut editorializing and celebrity gossip posing as news. Solve some of those problems, and gender equality will fall in line, and do so for more than just Manhattan and Hollywood.