Girling

Maybe I do Oppenheimer next, just to complete the pair.

I saw the Barbie movie the other day and honestly, I walked away feeling kind of sad. Is that weird? 

For those of you who haven’t seen it, the movie is about Barbie and Ken taking an adventure to the Real World and discovering the Patriarchy. I thought it was very fun and campy and a lot of its feminist messaging was tongue-in-cheek. But despite this, I think the movie made me sad because it still felt like there was this choice that had to be made between men and women. It felt like there was this competition between which was the dominant gender. 

It made me wonder how quickly we would notice the Patriarchy

Now, I know that it is a movie and that the ethos of Barbie is women’s empowerment and the idea that girls can grow to be anything, but the crux of the film was the power imbalance between Barbie and Ken in Barbieland. This, of course, only comes to light when Baribe and Ken see how starkly contrasted Barbieland is with the Real World. It made me wonder how quickly we would notice the deeply permeated ick of the Patriarchy within our society if we hadn’t been steeped in it since birth. 

In an interesting connection, I also happen to be reading The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan right now. For those who aren’t familiar, The Feminine Mystique is a seminal book in the Women’s Rights movement. Written in the 1960s, it outlines what Friedan calls the feminine mystique, or the unspoken rules that women were expected to follow to safeguard their femininity, fulfill their biological duty, effectively raise children, be a good wife, keep society from collapsing, the works. Of course, this led to a lot of depression in women who abandoned their ambitions to be housewives and were thus forced to live vicariously through their husbands and children (what Friedan refers to as “the problem with no name” due to the lack of attention it received at the time). 

As I’ve gotten deeper and deeper into the book, a disconcerting trend of an illusion of competition has become apparent. Friedan discusses the resentment housewives felt toward their working husbands and the simultaneous resentment husbands felt toward their dependent wives. Part of the feminine mystique is the notion that not only is having women in the workplace bad for the family, but it creates competition with men, who are biologically destined to be the sole breadwinners. 

The illusion of competition gives the impression of an all-or-nothing gendered state

Like the Barbie movie, the illusion of competition conjured by the feminine mystique gives the impression of an all-or-nothing gendered state. It is a matriarchy OR a patriarchy. You are a housewife and a mother OR a career woman. You either support your partner OR you’re competing against them.

It’s almost akin to the fallacy of having to put others down in order to succeed yourself (more on that here). 

But this uncompromising view of gender relations and successful autonomy is just that- a fallacy. We live in a big big world, one with more opportunities than I could name. Ignoring the systemic factors that engender inequity, there is no real limitation on who can succeed. Therefore there should be no perceived competition. There is no reason we need to “choose” which binary gender is dominant. 

Limited views of gender roles lead to a limited form of Feminism

I think both the Barbie movie and The Feminine Mystique have important messages. I think they both contribute greatly to society and the conversation around gender equity. But, I also think that limited views of gender roles lead to a limited form of Feminism, to which I do not subscribe. By inflicting limits on ourselves and others, we create a world in which there are “normal” ways to act and anyone who subverts this normal poses a threat to those who adhere to it. Thus inventing a competitive, limiting, all-or-nothing reality. 

Maybe I expected too much of the Barbie movie. It was deeply satisfying and very entertaining, but I think to some degree it perpetuates the stereotype of domineering women who want to see the downfall of men, the stereotype that we are all in competition. And, when considering the holistic and intersectional feminism that has become the norm in the circles of folks who discuss and study this stuff, the movie left me feeling disappointed. And yes, sad. 

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