It’s absurd
how political a playground can be. Hierarchical social groups and cliques. Leaders
and followers. Nerds, geeks, jocks, loners, bitches, troublemakers, ditzes, gossips.
The labels that are assigned by adults and children, alike, which are then
perpetuated and regurgitated thoughtlessly, and endlessly for all time.
The
basketball courts for one group, the kickball diamond another. The swings, the
see-saw. They were all reserved turfs. They would shift from time to time, but
they always remained reserved. You needed to belong to a group to achieve access.
In my
younger years, I was a bit of a loner. It wasn't that I didn't desire to have
friends, but I found them inconstant, and prone to participation in the
societal dance for acceptance and approval, a cotillion for which I had never
catered to, nor been invited to participate.
I was an
attractive, pale, skinny blonde girl with light hazel eyes, rocking a pair of
pink plastic glasses. I have a lovely singing voice. I was the kid you sit next
to during quizzes or exams. Physically, I developed early—around the sixth
grade.
I was picked on and bullied consistently.
People I’d never met
perpetuated rumors about me. People I’d rarely interacted with created them.
It wasn't
always so bad, but I found one has to develop a thick shell. It backfires on
occasion. That thick shell gets heavy, and you can come to resent it from time
to time. That you would be required to wear it in the first place. Why should
you have to shoulder the arrogance of confidence as a protective shield?
But then you
develop actual confidence. And then you’re derided for that, too.
When I was
younger, I was considered too pale. I was asked on a weekly, sometimes daily
basis if I was albino. Often by people who knew better, but were trying to get
a laugh. Albinism is a genetic disorder in which a person has partial or
complete loss of pigmentation (coloring) of the skin, eyes and hair. I do not happen
to be albino.
As an aside,
people who are born with albinism often face ostracism, and occasionally,
violence, from their community. I can’t say I've dealt with even a fraction of the
issues someone who lives with such a disorder faces. But I wasn't left
untouched.
I was told
constantly that I needed to get out in the sun. Go get a healthy tan. You’re
too pale, don’t you ever go outside?
This was
during the first waves of the tanning bed craze. The early nineties, when
people were overcooking in beds. Turning your skin orange was fashionable.
(There seems to have been a recent resurgence in popularity).
And for a
minute, I tried in vain to tan. My sisters have the right skin for it. They could achieve
a ‘healthy’ tan. I turn lobster red. Insanity would have been repeating the
same process and expecting different results. I learned my lesson. I burn. I
gave up on the hopes of ever achieving a so-called ‘healthy glow.’
People have never
shut the hell up about it.
For ‘white’
people, I’m just too white.
When you’re ‘too’
anything in our culture, it gets brought up constantly.
As a child,
I was frequently apprised of being:
Too pale
Too white
Too ghostly
Too smart
Too
intelligent
Too
opinionated
Too insubordinate
to elders (I’m from Indiana. Some of my fellow hicks deserve a healthy dose of
irreverence for the insane things that they say).
Too loud
Too precocious
Too
political
Too
outspoken
Too
talkative
Too vulgar
Too literal
Too subversive
Too plain
Too pretty (?!)
Too self-aware
Too stupid
to know I was supposed to be attracting boys (a specific confrontation with a
bitch named Jessica in the sixth(!) grade in regard to my haphazard ponytail…
how I wish I’d had made a comeback then to such absurdity)..
Too confident
Too active
Too reckless
Too much of
a show off (for enjoying singing, and being quite good at it)
Too much of
a know it all
Too direct
Too honest
Too
assertive
Too stuck in
my own imagination
Too happy
Too
energetic
Too enthusiastic
Too
comfortable with my own body
Aren't most
of the things above, good things?
Is it people’s
insecurities that make them so at the ready to stifle others?
The last on the list triggered this current rant.
I am
comfortable with my body.
I like it. Whether I'm 85 kg or 65 kg, I’m an attractive and shapely woman.
I don’t
really work out, and since I was once a dancer for a decade and a half, my
body still keeps a decent shape. (It doesn't hurt I walk several kilometres a
day through deep sand, though).
I’ll admit
my shoulders are a little broad, but, they help me heft things during stints of
manual labor, so I really can’t complain too much.
All in all, I like me. And I don’t feel an apology is in order for not being self-conscious
about the way I look.
I have average sized breasts. Not big, not little. They’re just there.
I do not
wear, and have never regularly worn, brassieres.
Since I
started to develop at age 11, I rarely felt the need to wear a bra.
In athletics,
and while dancing.. Sure. Wrap ‘em up and strap ‘em down.
But daily
life? I never saw the point.
To me, brassieres feel uncomfortable (yes, even when sized correctly) and I just didn't
understand why, for so many people, my breasts were a major concern for them..
My father asserted on multiple occasions that my lack of bra was indecent.
My camp
counselor complained, and tried garner support from other counselors to institute
an underwear dress code policy (she was an idiot, and didn't realize she was
flirting with a lawsuit, quite obviously).
Other
females in my peer group would call me variations of slut, whore, and
prostitute.
Strangers (usually
women) would come up to me, berate me, and ask me why I wasn't wearing a bra.
This was all
before I was 14 years old.
People consistently
tried to make me feel uncomfortable about my own body, and my choice to not
wear a miniature strait-jacket to reshape and artificially lift my breasts.
I've always
wondered why it’s such a hot topic.
And why people think they have the right to discuss my breasts outright in conversation, as if they don't belong to me at all.
What is
wrong with the natural shape of my breasts?
Who deemed
it a requirement to hold them up in uniform half circle cups, just so?
There aren't
any adverse medical side effects from not wearing one...
And in fact,
a
study completed within the past decade highlights that constant artificial
support can actually make the muscles fibrous, and cause the sagging effect
that so many women seem to fear.
Boobs.
Boobies. Tits. Teats. Breasts. Jugs. Cans. Racks.
They’re just
sacs of fat hanging around in the event I choose to have kids and decide to
offer them up for feeding.
Breasts are
constantly sexualized, and they’re something of which heterosexual males are so
fond… Sure, they’re soft and squishy,
and nice to get a handful of, but while breasts can be an erogenous zone… So is
the inside of my elbow, my wrist, my neck. Skin in general—an organ—not a
sexual organ, but certainly relevant in the general enjoyments of sex. We want to
be touched. Enjoying sex
does not make you a slut. And whether a woman is wearing a bra or not is not a
litmus test as to how soon she’ll be primed for mating.
Women who do
not wear bras simply do not wear bras.
I live, now,
in southern Africa.
Many, many,
women here do not bother with a bra. Its just another layer of clothing in this absurd
heat. Female PCVs often
talk about how they're adjusting to Namibian women being so comfortable
with their bodies. Males bring it up too, but not in the same way. They've been
introduced to un-self-conscious breast-feeding, which doesn't happen often in ‘Western’
culture.
Because I’m
an American, and therefore one of ‘them’ I get a lot of flack in regard to my unbound
breasts. A lot of skeptical and suspicious questioning, or comments—by women
particularly..
The origin of this particular tirade is this:
We trade
slights more readily in our culture than we trade compliments.
And the
compliments we seem to muster are so often offered wholesale and speciously.
The other
day I met a lovely woman in our Peace Corps lounge.
She had just
transferred to our group, and we got onto the topic of age, and shared ours in
a round. She has fantastic skin, and I mentioned it.
Before she
could even process the compliment, or reply, I was derided outright, by another
woman, for offering an honest compliment. As if my mentioning that this woman has great skin was, in fact, an insult if one factored in her age..
What was inappropriate about this earnest compliment?
Was this other
woman offended I didn't compliment her, instead? If so, why?
It seemed a
gross overreaction.
Later at
dinner, the group reconvened.
Four women
who had known each other for a year’s time, and our new addition.
At one point
in the dinner, a remark was directed toward me, that it was “surprising that [I] wasn't a fan
of Halloween, because I must really love those slutty costumes, because [I] don’t
wear a bra.”
I must be
honest, it left me reeling. Because I don’t wear bras, I should enjoy overtly
sexualized and demeaning Halloween costumes? Forget that my current state of dress—baggy cotton pants and an oversized sweater—covering me from ankle to wrist was antithetical to the rude implication of the comment... I tried to shake off how offensive
this absurd and thoughtless remark was, and move on… So I got around
to ordering..
I asked the
waiter for the bar menu and he brought me back the wine list.
I ordered
wine.
It wasn't in
stock. I figured I’d check out the list and make another selection.
When I
realized he’d brought only a wine list and not the bar menu, he’d already moved
over to the next table. It was a full house and a busy night.
I figured I’d
ask again on his next pass. No rush.
He comes
back. I ask for the bar menu. He says he doesn't think there is one. I ask if
he’s sure, and which beers do they have? He tells me there are only three
beers, not enough for a list. (But fails to tell me their prices or options).
Although I
have ordered from the bar menu a half dozen times, and was surprised, I didn't pursue it, because it
seemed silly to argue the point. I’d just settle with wine. He’d told us at the
start of the meal that he was new, and I figure he’ll find out about the half-size
menus stored at the bar at some point.
I ordered another
bottle of wine instead.
No big deal.
This second exchange
took about thirty seconds, tops.
He left the
table, and the three women I knew well jumped all over me for being rude.
For asking
someone for a bar menu?
Wouldn't it
have been rude to argue the point, go get the menu from the bar two rooms away
and wave it in his face? Did I do anything remotely close to that? I didn't
think so.
I was taken
aback.
How is it that
these women who were wholly nonchalant when another suggested that I must like
to dress ‘slutty’ because I don’t wear bras, are so wholly offended on behalf
of a stranger being asked a standard question in the course of his job?
Who else am
I supposed to ask for a menu or drink prices?
The
gardener?
And why is
the perceived offense more important than the insult you've just dealt to a person
you’re dining with? Was it because he is Namibian? Does that automatically make
him someone to protect? And isn't that protectionism more than a little insulting?
I’ll admit,
this soured my mood for the rest of the evening. I felt ganged up on, and then
was told I was making people uncomfortable by my mentioning that I was offended
by the belittling comment made toward me. What?! What is it I’m allowed to say or talk about?
Should I talk
about the music and the size of the room? The number of couples?
Peoples from
so-called 'Western societies' have the strangest sense of entitlements.
This occurs
to me often in the arrogant way that Americans, in particular, feel that they
have the ability to embark upon any topic, without having any expertise or
first-hand information, versus the trivia they've accumulated second and third-hand.
Masters of bull-shit, we are..
There are
also the times, too, when someone will point out cultural, or personal choices
that break from social norms with derision and ignorance. Dismissive of difference.
As if people should just get used to ‘the way it is’ for the greater good. Don’t
disrupt the flow.
Plus we can
be loud, brash, and often thoughtlessly cruel in the manner in which we speak.
Why am I
considered rude for telling someone honestly and earnestly, without aggression
or viciousness, that they've said something I know to be disrespectful or
untrue? Why should I be treated like a caricature of myself, simply because some
people find me to be ‘different?' I am not impervious to insults or slights.
They hurt, and they piss me off. I have no problem asserting my right not to be
taken down a few pegs simply because someone dislikes me or my choices—especially
in things that affect them in no way, whatsoever…
It's too bad that it might make you less uncomfortable if I were uglier, had acne, a darker skin
tone, and less long blonde hair. Or if you’d like it more if I were stupid,
unintelligible, or depressed. Or for any resentment you may have for my possession
of a body type that I had nothing to do with, apart from acquiring my parent’s
particular combination of DNA.
I feel no
need to apologize for things outside my control.
Furthermore,
these are things about myself I have no desire to change.
Work on yourself.
I’m doing just fine.
I once
had an ex-boyfriend (in my mid-twenties) tell me that I should put on a bra because
if it turned cold that night, ‘people would
be able to see that I have nipples’…
See that I have nipples?
Doesn't
everyone have nipples?
Why might
someone knowing I possess them set off a frenzy?
Some people
are just hopeless...
The above digital art illustration, 'Boobs' by UK designer Tiago Caetano, can be found here.
