Life is a Game That Women Are Losing

Losing 40 pounds is what made me realize what it meant to be a woman, before that I was just ‘Ashley.’ Naive and innocent, I never completely understood the chokehold of womanhood until I reaped the benefits of it. Looking back, I had been what people feared, in not having the benefits of conventionally attractive features, I had been treated as a human, but only was I respected and treated as an equal, once I could be sexualized.

After crossing over into the world of women, I realized how polarizing the two genders were. Before I stood in the center, a girl, but not a woman, but now I wasn’t just Ashley. I became Ashley the woman. Once I became what I had been striving to achieve my whole life I realized that womanhood is simply a cruel game. The ever-changing concept of “women” was designed by men for men. Men created the world of womanhood by perpetuating the male gaze, forcing naive girls to sacrifice themselves to play a cyclical game. A game where women are cycled through the constantly changing rules and expectations, which men designed to benefit them, in order to rig the game so that women always lose.

That summer, I lost a lot more than just my ‘baby fat,’ I lost a piece of my innocence. Losing that weight opened up a whole new world. Food wasn’t fuel, it was not three meals a day, rather it became an evergoing mathematical equation, one that I would be reminded of on every nutrition label, and in every mirror. Once I saw my body change to become more desirable, there was no reason to believe it would not continue to do so. Little did I realize that I had fallen victim to exactly what the patriarchy wanted. The patriarchy wants women to be at war with their bodies so that they can profit off women’s insecurities, insecurities that men designed. Diet culture and the modeling industry utilize women’s constant dissatisfaction with themselves and turn it into a game. Women will continue to play the games set up by men, holding onto the hope that they can emulate the male gaze.

I held onto that sense of hope that summer. My insecurities fueled my pursuit to become an ideal girl. My sister was an ideal girl and my mom was always proud of my sister Amanda. My sister was skinny and I was a “solid tuna,” my childhood nickname. My mother always bought my clothes two sizes too big to hide what she feared others would see. My body. Because my body was not what a woman’s body was supposed to be. As my mother indirectly reminded me, my body was not beautiful.

But beauty is just subjective to men’s current mood. It’s a changing concept perpetuated by the media. Mass media ideals shape the standards toward which young women believe they must strive for in their struggle for “true” beauty (DeBraganza and Hausenblas). My struggle with my body image is one all too common among women. One size does not fit all but unfortunately, the ideal woman is only sold in one, ironically a size one. Women who live up to this ideal body type are treated noticeably differently than women who do not. An unrealistic ideal of thinness, while maintaining so-called “feminine” features is one of the impossible ideals women battle on a daily basis.

Take Kim Kardashian, a model woman girls strive to emulate in their appearance in contemporary society. Somehow Kim Kardashian has been both fat-shamed and skinny-shamed as the patriarchy changes its mind about the ideal body a woman should have. Women can never satisfy what men want us to be. Because the male gaze isn’t just one lens, its thousands of conflicting lenses. One day men decide that women should have a small waist, and the next curvy women are in. Men decide what’s pretty and what’s not and women must follow these rules in order to be seen as worthy. This shows women that they are disposable and that once they no longer live up to the mass’s notion of femininity, they are no longer valuable in society. Women need to be careful how they play the game because once they mess up they’ll be booted off the game board, locked away from the world of womanhood.

Beauty may have been the key I needed to enter the world of womanhood, but once inside, I found myself entirely lost in what felt like an alternate reality. Finding my place as a woman in this complex world has transformed my self-perception. Rather than looking into women world as an outsider, I now lived in it. As a young girl, all I wanted was to be a part of the world of womanhood. I used to admire my favorite Disney princesses growing up, hoping I could be just like them. But now, knowing what its like to live inside the world of womanhood, I can not help but empathize with them, for they too are a part of the women’s world.

Disney princesses model to young girls the correct way to behave and look as reflected by the patriarchy. They are pretty, kind, submissive, small, and often waiting around for a man to solve their problems. This is exactly how men want women to be and exactly how I wanted to be when I dressed up as my favorite princess when I was younger. I used to play with barbie dolls because my mother bought them for me. But looking back, I never actually wanted them. I wanted them because I wanted to be like every other girl. My mom wanted me to want them because little girls are supposed to like barbie dolls, only I did not. Now being an adult I understand why my mom bought me barbies. Because Michelle wanted a daughter, a girl who would live up to what a woman was supposed to be. Women are supposed to play the game and mothers raise girls to be good players.

Mothers are supposed to raise ideal women. By playing with barbies, I made Michelle proud. I was living up to what an ideal woman should be even when I was just a little girl. Women are always being told by men what they are supposed to be. We’ve been playing a game stacked against us just trying to please men.

But Michelle isn’t the one who instilled these ideas within me. The patriarchy has set up rules and expectations on what a model woman is supposed to be. Men created this world and women continue to perpetuate it because that is what they were told to do and they don’t know any better. It comes from the idea of the perfect American nuclear family in which the mom takes care of the family and is feminine and pretty (Sarkisian and Gerstel). Moms want the best for their daughters, as mine did for me, and the best for their daughters is to be pretty, which leaves women chasing this notion of beauty. My mom created this ideal because she was raised in the same world as I was, but an older version of pre-widespread femininity. Being pretty meant that I would find a man to validate my appearance and I would be successful. Because the only way to survive is to be an ideal girl, which is ingrained in women’s minds throughout generations.

A woman’s value has been equated with her appearance throughout history. A woman’s worth is determined by whether or not she is meeting men’s expectations, causing “women to compare themselves to those who have been deemed ‘socially acceptable’ to those represented in the media” (Richins). Men control how women are displayed in the media so women can consume this media and embody these expectations. Women are constantly in a state of comparison to both themselves and to other women. I always compared myself to my sister when I saw that she was allowed dessert after dinner and could wear bikinis. I’d watch the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show wondering why I didn’t look like the women on TV. I’d compare myself to magazines too far into this toxic cycle of comparison to realize the false realities of the media. I found myself not only constantly sexualized by men but surrounded by girls who were living reminders of my insecurities.

The game of womanhood is cruel. It’s set up so that women play against other women. Every woman stands alone in women world. The patriarchy thrives by pinning women against each other. If women are too busy trying to be better than other women, they are continuing to perpetuate exactly what the patriarchy wants. Men profit off of women’s insecurities and women are a vehicle to spread their own insecurities to other women. It’s human nature to compare ourselves to others, and the patriarchy exploits this nature by forcing women to compete with each other. It’s an endless cycle and in the end, women will always lose this game.

But women will continue to play this game because although the patriarchy has created this world, women preserve it. Allan Johnson, an American author specializing in gender studies discusses the patriarchal legacy. Johnson believes that “The patriarchy is driven by a powerful and self-perpetuating dynamic between control and fear” (Johnson). By controlling women through other women, the patriarchy is able to maintain its power. The patriarchy scares women by telling them when they’ll expire and no longer be of value. I’m terrified that as I get older I’ll only be less desirable to men. When will the time come when I’m shut out of women world? I may be one girl, but my experiences are not only my own, but experiences many women find all too familiar.

Judith Butler, a renowned author on gender and sexuality touches on this notion of femininity. “If you are a woman, you are expected to dress, behave and talk in a certain way, perform certain duties while keeping yourself miles away from what is considered to be a masculine domain. But, is it possible that the gendered roles have nothing to do with our biology but our internalized ideas of male dominance? “ (Butler). Butler highlights this idea that men dominate society and decide how women should behave. These ideals are projected onto wome,n just as my mother projected them onto me. My mother wanted me to be successful and the only way she was taught to be successful was by seeking the validation of men. Being feminine is to be successful, which evolved from the changing ideas of beauty. The prettier you are, the more attention you get.

Its simple pretty women are successful at the game and women who aren’t seen as pretty by some arbitrary standards created by men, don’t even get to play the game. I wasn’t pretty until I had my first kiss, my first taste of what it meant to be a woman. I finally understood why my mother wanted this for me. I felt worthy even if it was just for a second. Being a girl was great or so I thought. My first kiss validated my femininity because for once, I was made to feel feminine. It was the first time I felt like I was enough and my mother’s voice echoed in my head with praise for once instead of dissatisfaction. My first kiss was a gateway drug, one to which I became addicted. I needed this sense of validation so I continued to look for it.

The more people I kissed, the more feminine I felt. Each kiss was proving to my mom or myself, look what I can do. Because through kissing I proved to myself that I too could be feminine. After getting this sense of validation I only craved it more. Before I entered this era, I was invisible to the male gaze, but now that I’m in it I can’t undo the association of my own beauty with the male gaze because they both entered my life at the same time. Women associate their beauty with validation from men. Once I felt what femininity was I felt empowered by it, as long as I stayed feminine under the rule of the patriarchy.

I chased a corrupted ideal of femininity, designed by men. Rather than seeing it as something internal, something innate, I saw it as something external that I got from others rather than myself. The patriarchy is set up so that women can enter the world of womanhood and be the ‘perfect’ second-class citizen. Once in this world, women became trapped under the control of the male gaze. The male gaze is a term coined by Laura Mulvey, a British film theorist who opened the discussion on how women in a male-dominated society are plagued by this idea of the male gaze. “The male gaze is this idea that is always in the back of women’s minds how they are being perceived by men” (Mulvey). It’s this constant feeling of judgment and pressure to always look good, to be something of desire. Men make the decisions, and women follow, ensuring that women will almost always be unhappy with their appearance so that they can prey on this vulnerability. By forcing women to internalize these unrealistic standards from a young age, the patriarchy maintains control over women, forcing them to look the way they want them to.

But men dictate so much more than a woman’s appearance. They also control women’s behaviors. As a woman in STEM, I have had to deal with balancing the equilibrium between being too masculine and being too feminine in a male-dominated field. “For women, the workplace is a different, sometimes more hostile environment than the one their male coworkers experience” (Cary). Being constantly surrounded by what society deems as a masculine career has shifted how I behave in the workplace. I can’t be too girly or feminine or I won’t be taken seriously. But I can’t be too smart or it’s a turnoff for men and I’m seen as overbearing. If I’m too assertive then I am an emotional woman, but if I do not stand up for myself then I’m a pushover. Women will always lose to the patriarchy. Not only do we have to work harder to be taken seriously, but we will always be a woman first. Women will always carry with them their female identity and be unable to escape all the implications that come with it. Women can never escape the male gaze. They are forced to sacrifice parts of themselves in order to fit into this mold that has been designed for them. There’s no escape. If women don’t fit into the mold then they are left exiled and unwanted.

Fearing losing this game the patriarchy has set up, I like many women will keep trying to fit into what men want us to be. No matter how much a woman sacrifices, she’ll never be enough. Because if she is enough then the game is over and the patriarchy loses its power. If we stop, then all the work will have been for nothing. All the emotional turmoil and pain trying to be what an ideal woman should be will be for nothing. I can’t just go back to being this little girl, innocent, naive, and unaware of the reality of womanhood, even if I wanted to. But despite how painful it can be to be a woman, at least I know what it was like to be pretty. For that reason alone, I don’t know if I would ever want to give up that feeling. What’s the lesser of two evils? The little girl, known as “Solid Tuna” wanted what I now possess, but now that I have it, I’m dependent on the validation of men. Being in the women’s world has shown me that women can never win. We’ve been playing a rigged game from the beginning. Women are put through endless cycles of trying to live up to constantly changing rules and expectations and are always manipulated by the strings attached to our sense of self, strings which have always been held by the patriarchy.

Citations

DeBraganza, Ninoska, Hausenblas, Heather. Media Exposure of the Ideal Physique on Women’s Body Dissatisfaction https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021934708317723.

Funk, Cary. “Women and Men in STEM Often at Odds over Workplace Equity.” Pew Research Center’s Social & Demographic Trends Project, Pew Research Center, 21 Aug. 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2018/01/09/women-and-men-in-stem-often-at-odds-over-workplace-equity/.

Jagger, Gill. Judith Butler: Sexual Politics, Social Change and the Power of the Performative. Routledge, 2008.

Johnson, Allan G. The Gender Knot: Unraveling Our Patriarchal Legacy. Temple Univ. Press, 2014.

Marsha L. Richins, Social Comparison and the Idealized Images of Advertising, Journal of Consumer Research, Volume 18, Issue 1, June 1991, Pages 71–83, https://doi.org/10.1086/209242

Mulvey, Laura. Afterimages: On Cinema, Women and Changing Times. Reaktion Books, Limited, 2020.

Sarkisian, Natalia, and Naomi Gerstel. Nuclear Family Values, Extended Family Lives the Power of Race, Class, and Gender. Taylor & Francis, 2012.