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Thursday, June 19, 2014

Your Looks, Your Call

Susan Walsh of hookingupsmart.com dispenses the kind of crisp, common-sense matronly advice about dating and relationships that I wish I'd had access to when I was a young woman (instead of letting Helen Gurley Brown so seriously fuck with my head).  Today in a post titled "Your Looks, Your Call," she points out that women shape their own appearances to appeal to the specific men they wish to attract.

Pretty obvious, no?  Yet it's a great response to the readership of sites like Return of Kings that rail about the "unfeminine" look of many American girls: the tattoos, the short haircuts, the refusal to wear high heels or any of the other trappings of conventional "femininity."  These choices baffle and enrage young men who feel entitled to fantasy "cookie-cutter" ideals of feminine beauty they see in advertising and porn.

Walsh characterizes the deliberate tweaking of one's appearance as appealing to a "niche market."  Since my background is in anthropology, not economics, I am more inclined to see the way people adorn themselves and the artifacts they surround themselves with as tribal markings.  They signal that the bearers are only available for mating within their own tribes.  That girl with the full sleeve of tattoos and assorted facial piercings is no more aroused by a random dude's six-pack abs or Axe body spray than an African grey parrot is sexually stimulated by the flash of a blue-crowned conure's tail feathers.  SMV (sexual marketplace value) is a meaningless concept unless one recognizes that there many different markets.

This phenomenon applies to all genders, BTW.  Jezebel yesterday reported a story about a teenage boy whose drivers license picture was rejected because he was wearing eye makeup.  The women who commented on the story mostly remarked how attractive they found him.  Yes, there is a small but significant "niche market" for men who transgress conventional gendered norms too, as many young male cross-dressers bold enough to sally forth into a Capitol Hill nightclub are apt to discover. (Of course, that gender variant individual has to screw up the courage to present himself/herself in public in order to be identified by members of his/her "tribe" as a potential mate.)

The well-spring of the New Misogynists' fury stems from the fact that, on some level, they cannot fail to see that these choices in attire and body modification are deliberately made not only to attract members of the same subculture, but to explicitly repel "outsiders" (which is to say them).  It's evident that Matt Forney, for example, wants nothing more than to be recognized as an "intellectual," and part of the cool music crowd, and his obsessive hatred of "hipsters" and mainstream writers, and the girls who are part of those scenes, is a direct measure of how wretched he is to be excluded.  (The problem is, contrary to what a guy like Forney believes, it is not the deficits in his own physical appearance that are shutting him out of that specific market: it's the anger and self-loathing he wears on his own sleeve.) 

Walsh concludes by reminding her female readers, "You’re not trying to lock down all the boys on the boy tree. You only need one."  This is the best advice ever for both men and women looking for love, friendship, or even a vocation.  Figure out who you are, what you want, and tailor your image accordingly.

Of course, the challenge of adolescence and emerging adulthood is just that: to figure out, as individuals, who we are and what we want.  Indeed, some of us spend the best part of our lives endlessly experimenting in an effort to nail that critical element down!  

14 comments:

  1. Wasn't Walsh a pretty shady quasi manospherian back in the day? What happened?

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    1. Let me try that again... I don't know a lot about Susan Walsh's association with the "manosphere" except that she enjoyed some popularity with certain bloggers, probably because she was sympathetic to some of their complaints. I'm sure I wouldn't agree with everything she writes / has written; I expect I would find her perspective rather more traditional and conservative than my own. The fact is, I myself am very sympathetic to some of the issues raised by MRAs (i.e., fathers' rights), and I am becoming increasingly disturbed by some of the rhetoric spouted by some "feminists." I expect I'll be blogging more about that in future.

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    2. I have to add, having read more of Susan Walsh, that I (obviously) do not share her negative attitude toward people who embrace being single. But for young women who want to marry, her advice seems sound. See http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/living-single/201202/hooking-smart-and-nasty for a critical look at Walsh's claims.

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  3. Cinzia, I feel the same way you do- I believe very strongly in fathers' rights and also believe that male and LGBT victims of domestic violence need to be taken more seriously and provided with services. What turns me off about MRAs is that they seem to consumed with self-pity and be stuck in time- they seem to think that things are the same as they were twenty years ago. The Family Courts have definitely been awarding more fathers joint/sole custody in the last ten years. Most custody agreements are negotiated out of court now, and visitation is more strictly enforced. There are also more services for battered men. Things could still be improved, though.
    I am also disturbed by some of the rhetoric spouted by some feminists on the "radical" end of the spectrum. Just like MRAs, they seem to be stuck in time.

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    1. But to be fair, such voices are the far end of that spectrum.

      It's a pity that anyone should see men and women's rights as mutually exclusive, that somehow if less bad things happen to women more bad things will happen to men. The problem with the likes of AVFM et al, is that all their agenda is about getting their own back on female scapegoats, as opposed to genuinely helping men out. I thought it was really sad when that guy running the men's shelter killed himself when it closed for lack of funds, but I also wondered why MRA groups hadn't been raising money for him.

      I still identify as feminist and always will, but I do try to call out misandry when I hear it. Though I must say, in real life, the most anti-male sexist comments I've heard have always come from women who would not call themselves feminists. The feminists I associate with are usually at pains to not to appear sexist towards men, because thinking about sexual politics tends to make one more aware of these things.

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    2. "thinking about sexual politics tends to make one more aware of these things"

      Now that you point this out, snork, I recognize this is true to my own experience as well. The kind of casual misandry and homophobia that is pervasive in our culture is not being perpetrated by feminists as much as women who buy into traditional (patriarchal) gender roles.

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  4. "You’re not trying to lock down all the boys on the boy tree. You only need one."

    I think more than one boy is probably also fine.

    Dress to attract the people you're interested in -- this seems so obvious to me that I'm astonished some people don't get it. :)

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    1. "more than one boy is probably also fine"

      I agree. More than one boy, more than one girl, a boy and a girl... whatever floats your boat, sez I.

      For some reason this reminds me of a recent therapy session in which I complained that I didn't have enough friends. "How many do you have?" my therapist queried. I considered this carefully: "three." "So how many do you need?" she asked. "Five," I responded (no idea from where I had plucked this arbitrary figure). We concluded this did not represent an insurmountable deficit.

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  5. Thanks for the link, Cinzia! I've written about my quasi shady past affiliation with the manosphere. For a time I was a beloved "Auntie," though I felt more like Wendy taking care of the Lost Boys.

    They found me originally. Interestingly, it was because of an anti-Game, anti-Roosh post I wrote. I was sympathetic to their frustrations and concerns, and listened to many of their theories. I then proceeded to research and analyze their claims rather exhaustively. They did not stand up to scrutiny. Their red pill beliefs were as deluded as their original unsuccessful mindset. As I wrote about and "disproved" many red pill myths, I became the enemy.

    Last year I banned 78 male regulars from my blog, and have banned at least that many since. HUS is now pretty heavily moderated to keep them out.

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  6. I feel like this is something everyone does intuitively, but I like Susan Walsh's down-to-earth approach when it comes to dating advice. It is needed when we have stupid Cosmo articles telling every girl to wear red lingerie because every guy must like it. The only time Walsh weirded me out was in an article where she collectively accused feminists of rejecting women who were not openly sexual, in the name of sexual liberation. While there are some feminists who propagate that idea (such as the one she cited), I know several feminists (including, well, myself) who don't, so I was surprised that her usual level-headed approach just dumped all of us into one category of opinion. Mind you, feminists are collectively confused as to when sex is degrading and when it is empowering, so I don't blame her for being confused.

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    1. Ain't that the truth! I myself am at sea with the schism within feminist ranks between the "pro-sex" feminists who support sex work as a valid career choice, and those of us who would be saddened / horrified if our own children (male or female) grew up to commodify themselves in that way. I mean, who looks at an infant lying in its cradle and thinks, "Wow, maybe he/she will grow up to be a porn star!"

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    2. I don't get it, either! I don't think sex work is immoral, necessarily, but who would genuinely respect prostitution as a career??

      On the other hand, I have also read feminist bloggers who automatically equate any female interest in sex, boys, or make-up with sexual objectification, which I think takes the concept too far.

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