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Oct 4, 2003 As you might know, the term sin didnt start out as a biblical reference to damning behavior, but as a term from archery meaning to fall short of the mark or in other words to miss the target. Feminism is the latter, more secular kind of sin, because women who become feminists typically fall short of the mark, their individual potential as human beings, when compared with their feminine sisters. Until sixth grade, I was a feminist. I didnt really understand what feminism meant, I just knew that I liked being myself and was far more interested in math, music, photography, and politics than in Barbie dolls and make-up. In grade school it doesnt matter much that no one but the school principal and the music coach find you especially likable. I started out with a good future as a violinist. Not a great famous violinist, but the sort of competent and inspired musician who could have easily ended up in a city symphony orchestra. In sixth grade I found myself touring with a quartet of other promising little girls who were violinists. I dearly loved playing, but in seventh grade, I walked away. What I had learned in my short experience with touring is that females were objects of beauty first and anything else second. Something about this bothered me and when I tried to discuss it with peers they generally failed to see what I meant. Adults more often talked over my head. It seemed no one was equipped to deal with my questions, and I was basically given free reign over something I didnt understand. My response, which ultimately doesnt seem to have been that healthy, was to just drop out of the social side of life. Over the next 30 years, I would walk away from many things I wanted to do in the name of feminism. I am a competent back up singer and walked away from a prestigious college choral group rather than wear a costume that seemed demeaning based on its design to portray feminine beauty. The same thing happened with acting, social work, quality control, politics, computer science, and several other careers. It even happened with writing, with a brand new degree and a portfolio of excellent work, at a time when jobs were going unfilled, I found myself unemployed. I wasnt a salable writer because I lacked a salable image. I ended up doing work as a temporary that I was less skilled in and very mediocre at, because I didnt have the appearance or the comfort with female gender roles that I needed to successfully market myself. It is now common knowledge due to substantial media coverage, that girls, in one way or another, lose their motivation as they hit puberty. Many will simply turn from their ambitions and settle into traditional roles, whether theyre happy in them or not. The womens movement seems to have caused some change in this fatalism at adolescence; women are becoming successes as everything from politicians to prisoners of war to top level careers in every profession. What is notable about the successful women, regardless of their chosen field or their level, is that except in fields of severe staffing shortage, the women who succeed are able to do their jobs as well or better than male counterparts, and they are usually quite attractive and adhere strongly to the prevailing idea of female gender roles in their social behavior. Observing this as a professed feminist until my middle 30s, I eventually realized that feminism didnt actually work. Countless media stories showing unattractive women being left to manage dropped packages and flat tires, and eventually scientific studies that showed how all people, not just men, but also women and the youngest of children, consistently reacted well to women who met the standards of attractiveness and behavior and badly to those who did not. As I would later find out women who were unattractive or overweight or both would be brushed aside by a majority of physicians as well. My career floundered because of my feminism, my personal relationships suffered, and eventually, by my mid 40s the most blatant prejudice, also widely documented in media, my health problems were disregarded by a bevy of doctors, in spite of increasing and substantial clinical evidence of serious medical problems. Until a problem was blatantly connected with a clearly observable physical cause, it was dismissed as being the result of my weight or my demeanor or my appearance. Having a rare disorder that would lead to substantial suffering and eventual death by complications over a period of perhaps another 10 to 35 years of increasing debilitation, I vowed to do whatever it took to beat my rare disease. It was at this point that the importance of rejecting feminism and embracing femininity really sunk in. Women had to compete for medical care just as they had to compete for everything else, and attractiveness and adhering to traditional gender roles were as crucial in obtaining health care as they were any place else in life. While I initially resented these changes, I soon realized that there were other benefits to these changes in behavior and ideology. A general feeling of self loathing, perhaps caused by a reduction in contention with other people, or perhaps from a more surprising source, a better feeling of self esteem and a lesser feeling of doing something wrong resulted in an improved mood, regardless of the sort of reactions from other people. I found within a few months that despite pain that is sometimes nearly intractable, increasing debilitation, a significant reduction in my overall standard of living, and a long future of difficult and painful medical treatment, a feeling of depression that had haunted me since junior high school finally began to lift as I began following traditional mores about appearance and behavior. I even began to suspect that while I was clearly genetically predisposed to my medical condition, to some extent; it seemed that my attitude and behavior might have kicked the chain of events leading my development of my disorder into gear. My column will explore the feminism, coping with rare disorders, recovery, and various other topics that reflect personal passions of the author. ------------ About the author: Alias Jaye Zero is obviously a pen name. In an era of fewer jobs and a health care crisis of gargantuan proportions, as well as an increased expectation that females who are not both attractive and sexy disappear in exile, Jaye finds she is dealing with a rare disorder that is both disfiguring and debilitating. Her history of militantly feminist behavior has made her real name synonymous with mud, so an alias is better. The rare disorders community online has taken issue with people using their diseases to make money, and few disease sites that feature commercial ventures are well received. As a result Jaye is also developing a website. Email your comments and suggestions for future columns to: aliasjayezero@yahoo.com Comment on this column in the forum. Tell a friend about this site! ------------ |
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