The Post-Shopping Rant or: How Shops Have Got It All Wrong

[janestarz]

Not only do shops believe that every girl wants to wear pink or beige or ecru, but they also think we enjoy being skinny-ass skinny. As in: excuuuuse me miss, this size 32 is still too large haventya got anything smaller?
I'm not skimpy. I'm healthy - if you ignore the coughing - and I refuse to be mistaken for a skeleton (though that would do wonders at larps considering the type-casting often occurring there). It has taken me two years to acknowledge the fact that I am not a size 36 and never will be one. It has then taken me six years to accept this fact, wishing I was slimmer, or as I used to call it "less fat".
I did buy a nice cotton sweater and gouache though. And oversized sleeves must re-enter the fashion world because then I can find myself a coat with sleeves long enough for me. *sigh*

Every time I go out shopping I see windows with dolls. Pretty dolls you can dress up, just like we used to do when we were little girls. Maybe I was wrong in thinking that having dolls is not to prepare you to be a mother, but it is meant to prepare you for the fact that society wills you to be a doll, dress up and be purty.
I am happy I live in society's backalleys and -if you will- gutters, where one is not so much judged on what they wear and how they look, but more on whether you feeeeeeeeel goooooood. {Remember that, it's an important factor to life}

Secondly I'd like to point out that we are nearing December and they expect us girls to wear tanktops, single layers of cotton, and leave our bellies bare. Now I know why all those window-dolls have hard nipples. THEY'RE FUCKING FREEZING!

Comments

[coen.livejournal.com]

Have you read the Beauty Myth bij Naomi Wolf?
Very intresting stuff.
The thing is, we can complain about it, but there is little we can do about it. The myth that all women should look like dolls is not invented by one evil mastermind, but has evolved from within our culture. It is not only the fashion shops who keep the myth alive, it is also all the customers who keep on spending money in fashion shops that treat them like fashion dolls.
And it's not only the media that present girls who weigh less then 50 kg as normal women, but it's also all the people who watch/read/surf those media. It's us.
And it's not only men who prefer women to look like barbie dolls, it's women too. Women are just as judgmental about each other's appearance as men are about women.
So the beauty myth is kept alive by us all. And that is why it is so hard to change it.

Just remember that in my eyes you are far more attractive than any photomodel or skinny fashionable nitwit. And you sure are much more fun talking to.

[janestarz.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

[silverseabear.livejournal.com]

You are brilliant.

But I reckon Coen is mistaken. There's plenty we can do about it, starting with acknowledging it openly. Why is discriminatory behavior towards fat (or simply bigger than the stick people the media portrays) people still OK? We can also ask ourselves and each other openly why we continue to starve ourselves as women, why as men we demand that from our women(modern, westernized foot binding?), why we fight with ourselves(men *and* women have body image issues, yanno), for instance...

OK, thanks for the soapbox...

[coen.livejournal.com]

You reckon I am mistaken. Maybe I am. I hope I am.
I am all pro accepting and respecting people as individuals. Men and women. So if we can change that for the better, I am all for it.

I hope you're right. I do hope humankind (that's us) is smart enought to critisize our own way of thinking and judging people (and ourselves). But I am not too optimistic about it.

[janestarz.livejournal.com]

Don't just hope...act.
If we don't start to resist, then who will?

[bammerangcreep.livejournal.com]

there you have your rant. i'm glad you haven't lost your touch ;) and of course, you're right about fashion and hard-nippled dolls. have a few thoughts on that ...
i never played with dolls, though.

[elektron.livejournal.com]

The year 12 I have a crush on wears jeans and huge t-shirts (I wear huge t-shirts too, but not jeans). She's a cutie ^.^

[paysdoc.livejournal.com]

There's actually little that I can add, save that I completely agree with you.

I really hope that you'll start feeling good again bvery soon!