Feminism vs. Femininity

"Ah, the joys of spring!" As I looked up from my book, I soon realized the guys sitting near me on Low steps were not referring to flowers or sunshine but a girl in a miniskirt and midriff-baring cami. I felt the wind blow on my own bare legs and blushed. In the cooler months, my sweaters and slacks had fit right in with the stereotypical "rah rah women" crowd. But when April showers bring minis along with mayflowers, it's hard not to feel like a fall-weather feminist.

As Laura Kipnis writes in The Female Thing, today's women "are caught between two incompatible positions ... Feminism ('Don't call me dickhead') and femininity ('I just found the world's best push-up bra!)" As Kipnis points out through the push-up bra, a woman's desire to be sexy inevitably makes her become a sex object since the purpose of revealing clothing is to put our goodies on display. But Kipnis' solution for today's women-button up or beat it-is not only restricting but also anachronistic, as her thinking does not differ much from the second-wave ideology.

In the '70s, feminists thought that in order to get what men had, they needed to distance themselves from traditional views of femininity. Throwing on a pair of slacks and a loose-fitting tee, they strove instead to look like men, or at least, androgynous. But as Maureen Dowd writes in Are Men Necessary?: When Genders Collide, "I hated the dirty, unisex jeans and no makeup look and drugs that zoned you out, and I couldn't understand the appeal of dances that didn't involve touching your partner." Essentially, the second-wave feminists thought that to be a feminist was to not be feminine.

But femininity, then and now, can be empowering when it celebrates a woman's features. Take the early screen actresses like Jean Harlow and Audrey Hepburn. They were brainy and witty at the same time that they were sexy and stylish. As Marilyn Monroe famously quipped, "I don't mind making jokes, but I don't want to look like one." Or what about the pioneers of feminism? When Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, the Grimke sisters, and Susan B. Anthony handed in their heavy petticoats for bloomers-a pair of ankle-length pantaloons with an overskirt that came to the knees-they made a political statement that a woman had the right to wear comfortable clothes. Similarly, when ladies cut loose from long dresses in the 1920s and shimmied in short skirts that revealed their legs, they fought for the right to be sexual. And even the foremothers of the second-wave movement were not stereotypical she-trolls but, as a news source of the time commented, "preponderantly attractive young women wearing miniskirts and boots."

There is a flipside to femininity, though, that assumes the woman is inadequate and therefore must undergo various beauty regimens to make herself more complete to the opposite sex. Footbinding in China, wearing corsets laced tight enough to suffocate, and taking arsenic (for a paler complexion) in Europe and America are just a few examples of women's wacky (and painful) history of modifying themselves to be more suitable for men. Even now, from Botox, boob jobs, and bikini waxing to vaginoplasty, spray tans, and starvation, women are undergoing some serious reconstruction.

But clothing can't easily be thrown into this mix. Nowadays, when a woman wears a risqué ensemble, she doesn't just do so to make herself desirable to the opposite sex; she may want to look good for herself or for other women. Though feminist Susan Brownmiller argues that "the transformation of women's legs from a bodily part that was mostly hidden in modesty to a glamorous appendage that was whistled at and admired may not have been a remarkable gain," returning to the days of modest dress would be a step backwards in women's rights. Surely Brownmiller, a fierce opponent of headscarves and tzniut, the modesty laws of Jewish Orthodoxy, can understand this.

I'm not advocating for women to walk into the workplace wearing short-shorts, since doing so would not only be uncomfortable but also inappropriate for both sexes (just think of seeing a male lawyer in a muscle tee). But when she goes out, the woman in the miniskirt and stilettos should feel like no less of a representation of an empowered woman than the one wearing flannel and Birkenstocks. Actually, it takes a lot of strength and stamina to strut in a pair of Manolos. If we try to put a face on feminism, we'll not only constrain women but will also make feminists susceptible to stereotypes.