Sex Art Work, concise statement on a big project

The more I let myself give up control of the text and express ideas through dance, movements of the body and explicit use of my own body as site of experimentation onstage, the more deeply I understand that my body (all of our gendered bodies) will and always have been the literal flesh and “stage” of feminist theory. My body is thus where I must continue to live out theory as praxis; as a sexual, sexualized, and sexualizing force in real life and in life performed.

More on Body Image Discussions

This is becoming so tiresome, this discussion of women’s body images. Not only from the standpoint of a machista misogynist voice, but even from a libratory feminist voice. If we are to stop concentrating on women’s image, what they look like, what they wear, how fat or not fat they are, then we must stop talking about it, simply put. We have to stop judging it, keep it from being a topic of interest. How many times have I heard this idea of the women on the front of magazines being “rail thin” and “waifish” … isn’t this critique boring us yet? Aren’t we ready for a critique with more meat on its bones? These words are so overused as to become cliché and indistinguishable from any other buzz word. They lack meaning. I no longer even know, somehow, what these critiques are about. I don’t know what they mean. I do not know the realities of these women. The problem is, women need to be encountered and known. Feminism is about empowerment of each other as women (and men). Feminism is about empowerment of each other despite the disempowered positions we come at each other with as a result of our gender.

Empowerment of each other comes through knowledge of each other. We do not know why a woman, who we see walking down the street, wears a veil unless we ask her. We do not know the extent of love, or lack of love, contained in her life or her relationship with the men in her life, just by seeing her. We cannot say that this woman has experienced a life absent of respect by men or even lack of self-esteem. We cannot even say that she does not consider herself a feminist. As feminists begin to understand their varied experiences and culturally specific contexts for feminisms, we see even more clearly that there is no way for white academic feminism to come into places where they have little or less cultural knowledge and talk about what “should” or “should not” be and what “is” or “is not” libratory.

I can apply this idea beyond that white feminist debate about how to frame the “issue” of the “veiled woman.” This idea extends to how we consider any image of any woman. When we see a “fat” woman walking down the street we cannot assume that she is unloved and mistreated, or that she feels bad about her body. Nor can we assume that she necessarily feels good. We cannot also say that she is or is not treating her body well. Just because she “has curves” does also not mean that she is a “feminist” or that she is being respectful to her body or treating it healthily. Equally, when we see an especially thin woman, we cannot assume that she loves or hates her body, that she treats it well. We cannot assume that she spends all of her time trying to maintain it, or that her body weight is or is not right for her level of physical activity and normal diet. When a picture of an actress is on the front of a magazine, are we to assume that automatically this woman is unhappy with herself and not a true feminist or flat out not someone to admire simply because she happens to be skinny? Are we such a superficial society as to actually believe this? What about liking or disliking women based on what they seem to do? And even more potentially liberating and radical, what about liking or disliking women based on what we actually know of them? How many women do we actually know, wish to know, attempt to get to know? And why not more?

Self Exploitation Argument

Have I isolated myself even from Bitch Magazine? I refuse to believe that, but the self-exploitation argument mentioned three times in the love/shove section is really getting old. See “A Total Sham” … “self-exploitation;” “The Wages of Spin” … “some women fetishize their own devaluation,” and “The Pussycat Dolls Present” … “the freedom for women to exploit themselves.”

I know that the Love/Shove pieces are supposed to be short and snappy, but if Houton were really trying to save space in her critique of the Pussycat Dolls, she might as well have been all-out bitchy and just left it at, “She thinks she sexy but she ain’t!”

That would have been more honest. Sure, the Pussycat Dolls aren’t that great. But what about pop culture is? And is it fair to claim to understand how the women in the Pussycat Dolls really feel about themselves or their profession? Is it fair of Breshears (A Total Sham) to claim that a pillowfight using iconic characters is necessarily an exploitative experience for its participants?

What these critiques lack is the depth (and respect) that would acknowledge and probe further the agency, individuality and no doubt fears and contradictions inherent in the minds of the women participants.

I’m a dancer, a stripper, a burlesque performer and a spoken word artist. I do a variety of performance using my body, sexuality and eroticism that challenges gender roles. Yet no doubt, I’ve made performances that “reinforce” a stereotypically feminine archetype. Some of my choices are financially motivated because I want to be able to live solely off performance. Sometimes I say “yes” to a gig just to get more experience. No, not every performance I’ve ever made has felt “empowering,” even if it is for a queer hipster audience in Copenhagen.

Women’s choices are complex and our stories are not always so easily interpreted. Nor is exploitation so easily predicted. I’ve felt more disrespected by supposedly well-meaning professors than some crowds of horny men in a strip club. That’s why it’s so important to spend our time inviting the voices of various women to the table instead of assuming how they feel about themselves.

Perhaps what I’d really like to hear are a few possible answers instead of critiques. Within mainstream media, what kind of expression of female sexuality is “okay”? What does a pop-cultural feminist expression of female (hetero)sexuality look like? Can it involve pillow fights? Can it involve fake breasts? Makeup? Fishnets? I think so.