"BREAKING OUT OF THE 'BEAUTY & GENDER CONSTRUCTS WITHOUT BECOMING ANTI-FEMININE OR EXTREMIST"

For starters, women, beauty is individual, it is also not THE priority or what makes us valuable or is the measure of our WORTH, contrary to what many church-cultures and the world would have us believe. [see post below]

While I do not adhere to the 'fascist' types of deconstructs, I do believe, that there are many Harmful self-destructive things in 'culture' to women and for other women, not only that, they give fuel to other 'fundamentalist extremes and the misogyny that oppresses women'.

I do not go all into that whole aesthetics, I believe aesthetics can be deceiving AND Western-Religious-and most Surely Male Imperialistic, via culture, RACE especially and Gender [for male sexual desires defined by Who is in power or the subjugation of females by instilling Shame into women for beauty, etc] and I don't 'live' by them, nor conform to them. That does not mean, that I don't agree with some things like a color or a style in fashion...no, but I don't 'measure' what I think beauty is, by culture or aesthetics that are Conformist, by social pressure or by despotism [the other extremes].

To me beauty is nature--and that we should live in harmony, as much as possible, with nature. Do we need cosmetics? I like cosmetics but I did have conflicts when I learned of animal testing, so with beauty comes torture? And that wasn't the only issue I began to question, about beauty and constructs and seeing how Gender has been boxed in, our female worth judged by, our beauty...and to hell with whose backs or what blood is shed, as long as we are judged, yes, she is desirable to men.

It is there, that I began to question these constructs, and those questions would increase the more I learned about where our cotton comes from and our dyes and our cosmetics and just how much we strip/or fuel the oppression of OTHER WOMEN just so we can be told, yes you are beautiful and even then, IF we don't have the right 'cultural norms' [set by men and industry] we then go off and do all kinds of painful things to ourselves, and it was then that I saw, especially when I became older, my skin wrinkling and hair losing its life and gray coming in, just how invisible and discriminatory this world [including the church] is to women,

and the whole Beauty Myth, began to make a lot of sense to me. This would come to fruition when I hit forty, I won't forget that year or the year after, when I really had to take a look at age, beauty, the loss of, you see for Working Class women who have done 'manual labor' they tend to age sooner, especially if poor. So for me, I also saw how Beauty is tied into Economic Class. My oldest daughter is half Native American Indian, she is dark skinned, brown, and through her life I have seen and known the Reality of Racism and what it has done to Her image of herself, and how she feels internal to 'conform' to some White ideal of Beauty.

And those internalizations ARE strong...even at young ages. I will say, that I see some similar internalizations in my son, who is only ten...and its one area feminists don't talk about much, men and steroids and the pressure men feel to measure up to some Patriarchal ideal of Strength.

When doing research for a thesis I am working on [Is the Male Culture the Jesus Culture] I found a lot of material on violence, and the male physique in early cultures, Roman and Greek especially--and today, in American culture. I also find it interesting how those same 'images and ideals' are all in porn and in most, church cultures [and in the world].

All to be 'gods' and 'goddesses' and the blood is shed--when one really Looks at it, it all ties in, somehow.

On the other hand though, there is the Other EXTREME where its a hatred of feminine and beauty and sexuality and the only way I can think of, right now to describe how Unnatural that is, is this:

all over the world, we see diverse plants and flowers, yet we Don't cover them in black cloth to hide them, to tell them, they are Shameful, for being beautiful and attractive to the 'eyes', we ONLY see that, done to WOMEN.

And the Other extreme, for Beauty and Power that derives from the worship of such, those same plants and flowers are mulled over and destroyed by stripping the earth, raping and pillaging the lands and people [and mostly WOMEN] to get at those precious resources OR to mow them over with bloodshed, violence and guns/tanks and other Warfare, OR to poison them, by chemicals, and biological toxins.

Beauty that God created, we either, take it as our own and destroy others and life to Get it, to 'fit in' or to 'conform' or to be Valued [by culture constructs] OR we destroy them by hating them and by stomping on them or by keeping them for our selfish selves.

So, some areas I would like to go over, on this blog, will be ethical products that are NOT animal tested or damaging to the environment OR that are unethical in labor practices, natural remedies with good stewardship, of course, reconstructing what we Have so not to strip more from the earth AND well,

I suppose, questioning, is a lot of what we do, to Conform, really Necessary? Is there more to self-worth,

than what appeals to the 'eyes' of others.

More on this, in months to come...see post below

Jane