Be a Good Girl

Men want to infantilize us. Evidently men, who do and are whatever they damned well please want to mate with little girls.

We are told from birth to act dumber than boys, to be good, to take orders, to not get dirty playing in the mud, to not eat too much.

As we get a bit older, we are told to dress right, not slutty, but sexy because we must please boys.  We must not do very well in school because that makes boys feel inferior. But we must wear short skirts or shorts because boys like that. 

We must wear make up because we certainly don’t look good enough without it for men to want to look at us.

Soon we must start shaving our armpits and our legs because men like that. Often woman shave their entire bodies except for the hair on their heads which men love long and flowing. Go figure.

Oh and women wear high heeled shoes because it supposedly makes their legs look better. Their feet are ruined, but they look like men want them to.

The younger women look, the more men want to be seen with them. If it were up to men, all women would look like ten year old girls in  high heels and make up. Oh, and have boobs. Can’t forget boobs because women will undergo surgery to make them bigger. Men love boobs almost more than hairless and vapid women. Boobs on a stick would be ideal for them.

No fat please.  Remember, you can’t eat much. Be thin or be shamed and alone. Fat women are judged on their appearance daily.  Being fat is one of the first things they are shamed for. The tinier women are the better men like it.  Remember the ten year old girl look. 

And there is the age thing.  You won’t see a 60 yo man marry a 80 yo woman, but they marry 20 yo women. Especially ones that are shaved bare everywhere and have big boobs.

Sadly, this ‘ideal woman’ image is reinforced by women. We are taught that by our mothers who were taught it by their mothers.  It’s reinforced in schools, churches, the media, even Girl Scouts. Girls must be good girls first, then must constantly force themselves to fit into that perfect idea of what women should look like.

When will we become people in our own right? Maybe when we reclaim our bodies, stop accepting laws that take away our rights as humans. Old white men make these laws and we blindly accept them, often inculcate them because institutions tell us we must in order to be part of the tribe we want to be a part of.

I started women’s consciousness raising groups back in the 60’s.  We were doing great, demanding equal rights and equal pay. Talking about being a person in our own right, not merely being an extension of some man.  But I still hear, “I have to ask my husband.”  “My husband doesn’t want me to work.” “My husband doesn’t want me to cut my hair.” 

All those changes were happening. But now we are regressing. 

What on earth is happening?