femininity

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Kuva | | Henna Timanttimetsä

How a face moves

| Henna Timanttimetsä

Case of Britney Spears is an excellent example of female oppression. It is obsession for hyper-sexual child-women who seemingly do not decide for themselves what is their image but they talk of control.

| Henna Timanttimetsä

Interest in how women are seen sellable objects is a curious one. First how much are we things to possess, material to be moulded and what is the purpose? How women are merchandise and for what reason? Is slave 4 u the answer? Merchandised as ever so often women themselves allow this to happen. They make the initiative and show the will to be that object. It is a wanted she-goddess, divine. To be a sex object is seen sexy as such, a deed, a statement to be had in any form possible, as long as there is picture of her it sells. Are women in control as many pop stars claim to be, active but playing passive? Have control you can have over your weight, a discipline, a routine, a way of life. How voluntary and aware of abuse of sexuality should we be and think actively about changing the repetition of gendered clichés? They seem to be effective in making millions. Isn’t it weakness to be unable to do otherwise, unable to have any other message with the whole of one’s being that one is supposed to control? It can be a powerful calculated strategy to use this tradition of stars and ultimately be able to do as one pleases in the end. To be super-rich and look beautiful in photos is one dream for many people regardless of gender. It is an idea of manipulating a mass of people by creating an idol. Are ways to get there different for men and women, more limited for women what comes to creating personal career path in entertainment?

Britney does sing about the culture of oppression around her, involving her, sheer tormenting of her by paparazzi portrayed in her song Piece of me. Is it oppression in the true sense of the word one might wonder. Imprisonment policed by what is said is nothing new. Will she be abandoned when she rebels? She is ridiculed which works well for the press. Shaming works for the tabloids, continuation of oppressive ways women are kept in their place as what is news concerning women’s lives, what kinds of things make headlines concerning women and how they choose to live their lives. Role of a nice girl she is not permitted to change and be more serious. Girliness is not serious shit? To develop further as an artist means to experiment with what one is expected to do and be and what could be escaped from to something unknown. Role that does not evolve beyond boundaries there are is very much the one for women, safety and known areas are given from early on. Outside are dangers which boys go after and test more freely. What are the dangers inside could not be more clear. Yes one can go crazy. Division to safety and to danger is artificial, essential things remain unnoticed.

Repetitious ways to act out are the ones we must speak out about, oppose. To live by what is known and acceptable stand the one barrier to climb over, to not just play the part given is basic rebellion for the young. That is the hard way to figure out what to do, how to find a way out. Ways for Britney to rebel have been to get fat, look ’ugly’ not smiling to the camera, hit paparazzi with an umbrella, scream, quit the nice girl all-pleasing act which does not take much of effort to break. For women it is a glasshouse where any misconduct shows and is scrutinized. I wonder as she does not analyze it herself to the core the problematic nature of the business towards women in particular and her in it escaping photographers but she gives us clues to feel for her still as it is clear to feel for her is not the deal. She wants to be treated like a human being while working in the business that is not empathetic of failure and weakness, looking other than pitch perfect is not an option. Punk allows women to be ugly and behave as they see fit. It would have been interesting to see Britney change genre.

Song Piece of me which is a much needed critical point of view on her life as celebrity. The song is a picture of a person living hunted which she has felt is against her human rights, rightly so. Celebrities may seem kind of super humans who should be pleased for every publicity they get. That is what they are there for. They are livelihood for many not only for themselves. As they have what many want, they themselves should give all of themselves. Where goes the limit and what stands as interesting journalism, valuable for society? Social media has given us the option of revealing all and we are watching what happens next. It is a whirlwind. That makes a mess itself, a movement of what we see social today. Superstars pose interest to the public in their wealth, position as constantly looked at beings. Question often is why are we interested? What is it we pay attention to and why criticism does not change as much as it is legal to practice this business of vulture?

There could not be more perfect example of contemporary female oppression than Britney in the sense that violence against her is totally accepted by the media and public. It is not seen as violence or oppression, or if it is, it is not important as she is just a pop singer, doing something light-headed and stupid. How could something light be hurtful? She is very privileged and lucky to be where she is which for many equals happiness and perfection and justification. In this picture women are still sold as body parts, shrunken dolls who say what they are let to say, to play the part which is thought to be sexy, desirable and alluring as much as repetition can be. Look the look and get slapped either way. This role of perfection is not what women should want, but they must want it. Does it sound tricky and contradictory? When women go and break the role-play like feminists have done, maybe they have gone crazy and are in of need help since hell has broken loose for what they have done.

When women themselves break the machine, crack down the perfect engine, it is Hysteria, it is a scandal. It is meltdown, it is out of order, a sickness. Women in need of a doctor, in need of cure to set themselves in the right order where nothing is wrong or the matter is nothing special. Correcting themselves not to make the mistake of saying and doing other than what is planned and expected of them. Britney is seen only as someone who went nuts in front of us, got teary, which is documented and ridiculed, which is headlines. Popstar who is recovering from bad behavior and mending up her career, making a comeback, watching carefully out what she says, how she stands. It is tragic the way how she is treated as someone who had a meltdown, crying in front of us, being vulnerable and hurt.  There were 43 000 people in 2014 who committed suicide in the USA alone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_in_the_United_States

Tragedy is the complete blindness and indifference towards mental illness, shame and ridicule around  lunacy, mental issues altogether. Ways women are monitored and policed is neurotic and making women and all of society ill. The insanity of celebrity culture itself is something to be treated. Not to mention what goes on in the world as a whole. To laugh may help but it is not a comedy show. It is still her who is crazy, recovering from her condition. Something to be hidden and be embarrassed about. To talk about mental illness is to talk of those others who are ashamed of being ill and are not like the rest who are well in the head. It is a matter of how we look at things, isn’t it?

To play a part for money is slavery, as is constant need for gossip, growing need, or would we be needing the info of the rich and famous to copy them. Gossip is there nevertheless. The much hated and somewhat controversial artist of our time as Britney is especially via gossip journalism and music she makes, journalism which more or less laughs at her and her problematic relationships and  relationship with the industry she feeds from. When she makes a new album she is making a comeback. Does she evolve as a musician and is that the topic? She is making distance to her turmoil, to her problems of which she does not want to talk about in public. Problems are still hers not problems of those who watch. All she does is well, a kind of survival, behaving perfectly, playing her part. She has a part to play in this show and she is still present, acute, making money and interesting as she works, and as the journalists say, grows up, matures. Her age does not show that much, does it. She is interesting in a way how she is portrayed, how she presents herself. Is that her, are we supposed to know that? She is color of her hair, her dance moves, her unchangeable something in her.
 
Why I think of oppression when I think of a wealthy pop princess who has a history of strange public appearances and caused emotional trauma? Her conflicting with the image she is to keep up is interesting. Conflicting with the press she is to please with what she says and what she looks like and to be all about how she does all that floating like a feather, keeping up her appearance, her look. How she makes comeback again and has become fit again and gorgeous again. This all is about what is expected of women, to keep it together not lamenting. It is about how women are kept in tight leash and punished when they do differently, don’t obey and how that can be scandalous and something changes drastically. It is all about oppression wrapped around in a glittering image, perfected in a way there is no breath so she almost does not age, unable to breath, holding her breath. It is all very clear still she is the one who was deemed having mental problems when she shaved her hair off in public, she was hostile and showed her feelings towards the system that she was created for. All her ’terrible’ outbursts and in some opinion strange choices do seem strange only in the context of pop, especially in context of American mainstream music aimed at young girls, which itself is more or less perverted and gives twisted ideas about how to be a girl and a woman. What is desirable, what to look like to be desirable and valuable, worthy of attention, what are good things for girls to be interested in and what is the relationship between girls and boys about, how this ideal and illusion evolves or if it does not. Why such ideals exist in the first place and what do they represent?
 
Stating the obvious, I guess, still I wonder why there is so much trashing of a princess who loves to dance and sing? How hungry are we for gossip is very telling of mental state of our culture. What is it all about, the need to get there in to the infantile mind, to slaughter and rip apart people who do something exceptional, are in the spotlight, put there for a reason which is to make money. Pop princess is a money making machine when she does well, so any outbursts of punk-ish manner totally seem crazy, even though when she herself sings she is going crazy. Not in real life you are not meant to go crazy, it is just a song. Mental illness is for the losers and that is scary shit.

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Kuva | | Henna Timanttimetsä

Give mama a good push

Kuva | | Henna Timanttimetsä

To be a woman of action does it still mean denying femininity?

| Henna Timanttimetsä

As it happens women who pursue work that requires/means physical stress measured as getting dirty, sweaty, working with your hands wearing overalls, mask and gloves, lifting things, moving and making something that needs one to work with whole of body adding problem solving to work are thought to lose something of their femininity. Rationality and innovation with capable hands is for some reason not something women have. Idea of what women are and can be still lives in the 20th century dragging behind infuriating. Women who are doing something that is not traditionally their area to work at, to be expert at without question is seen obscure like an absurdity in every day. Strangely work for women which is to be for some reason clean, neat, ’easy’ and allow cute clothes is really an invention of the modern times and place that used to belong to upper class women who at best did nothing but things that were strictly theirs for some reason by nature, by their gender and by their class, so a privilege. Nowadays to me privilege is to be able to do work that one desires to do and most people want to work. To be absolutely idle to which we in our easy living fantasy dream about, is hopefully just a dream and an impossibility. Those unemployed rarely are happy about their idle existence.

Nature is regularly referred to when talking about women. Women are physically weaker than men and division is made clear what are chores for women. Strength and power are male characteristics physically and mentally which as such is an appalling stereotype and false. Men feel attacked and put down when women enter work that traditionally is labelled for men. This I have experienced many times myself. My work effort as my capabilities are diminished and questioned over and over. Here applies again the strange truth how people do not believe other than their bias and what they think is true. That unchangeable solid truth of theirs is so unwavering it can be changed only by huge amount of proving, maybe not even then. How slowly our world changes even though our technological advancement is rapid. Even those who have high degrees in science to my surprise are very biased what comes to women in science and art. That slowly movable wall strikes as what the fuck is it there for. Such highly educated people who hold dear the world order of theirs where just to have a Ph.D. is enough to tell how knowledgeable, refined, correct and justifiable they are and see their points of views unchangeable and undeniable. Offence is to follow, no doubt, when questioned.

What is hip and cool and why do we pay attention to the at the moment hip and cool phenomenons and trends knowing they do change all the time and the most hip and cool are those who do their thing disregarding the fashion of hip and cool? Do you know what I mean? For example making applications for the sake of making applications is a now-thing, but it is probably over quite soon, because who actually needs them. More important would be to ask why be hip and cool when you can be thoughtful, innovative, active maker, do many things in your life disregarding do they make you a fortune, things that have other kinds of meanings than what they appear outside and not do because it is your place which is decided by others but because you want to.

To my surprise younger generations to me are very often not taught to do basic chores at home at all. If it is so that parents do every day nuisance such dishes and cleaning for their kinds, boys and girls, how does it change our world of work? Will we have maids to do those inconvenient things that are dirty and low, unappreciated work chores? Robots?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/soraya-chemaly/what-exactly-does-its-a-mans-world-mean_b_7454660.html?utm_hp_ref=tw ”It’s a shame our society generally fails to teach girls to have higher expectations and boys not to feel threatened by their realization. The worst part about people’s responses to the suggestion that we find ways to address women’s needs in public spaces was the reality of many women’s low expectations and desire not to offend anxious and angry men.”

Anyone who embraces one’s femininity is brave because being feminine in every day is seen dangerous and inviting.

| Henna Timanttimetsä
Dear diary: This is my experience on the matter of being feminine which I am without much effort and which I sadly have felt i have had to hide because it attracts attention I do not want and to be feminine is of course inconvenient when doing art especially sculpting, which is funny. It is an imitation, camouflage and forgetting one’s outer self to find the correct way of being and doing art. I stopped using mini skirts and heels when I went into art, dove into the world of macho art and the doing art as work. Appearance comes second when one does work that is all consuming, but as I have learned it has a significant meaning. That is why I resent that my appearance is more important. I place my work first. I wish others would do the same. My gender and appearance are issues at work always and always.

Therefore I have decided to embrace my femininity again and bring it on. What does it even mean to be feminine? Or to have too much feminine look? Is all about the look?

http://www.salon.com/2015/06/08/memo_to_crotchety_feminists_caitlyn_jenner_is_a_woman_and_we_must_embrace_her_its_whats_feminist_and_whats_right/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
”Sometimes it seems that we have learned nothing about inclusion from our troubled past. In 1969, NOW president Betty Friedan called lesbians “the lavender menace.”  She believed that including lesbians in feminist activism would undermine popular opinion of the women’s movement. In response, Gloria Steinem rightfully said, ”Feminism isn’t a PR campaign, it’s a revolution.” Numerous groups and factions rose up to challenge the women’s movement’s exclusion of and hostility toward lesbians.  Current feminist response to trans and gender non-conforming people carries with it horrifying echoes of those old wounds.”
http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/isiss-sexual-barbarity-not-exception-rule-war-1006868986 ”In the midst of slaughter the only choice is often between hate and lust. Human beings become objects, objects to extinguish or to provide carnal gratification. The widespread casual and frenetic sex in wartime often crosses the line into perversion and violence. It exposes the vast moral void.”

Beauty of female

| Henna Timanttimetsä

Beauty of being female is to experience femininity, to learn to know it as your own. Is it undisturbed and protected? Hardly. Even the most strict attempts to preserve femininity unharmed is harmful. What would there be to protect, what is the harm and against who? For some reason femininity is the disturbed, harassed, mistreated, undervalued, feared and therefore powerful. How to experience femininity can be a challenge for it is under pressure to imitate male existence to hold and obtain power to equal male authority. Subtle and fragile nature of female is what is expected of the other sex, the receiver waiting to be loved, taken as bride, accepted and wanted as obedient and kind, loving and caring. Strength of female is to question her status, to be able to either blend in denying herself and wishes of hers or be complete as a woman and stand against, say against the norms. Her strength is that she can choose. She is allowed to choose. Complete woman is a complete person who does what she expects her to do not what others expect of her. Religion, politics, people, society, only what she expects of her to be and want. That as such can be also her weakness. The all that there is to want.

To experience femininity is to be prepared to be looked at, stared at, talked about, where is the exact place of femininity, calculated, is a strange thought because it is everywhere, on level of hormones and cells, biology, undeniable there to be faced and looked at. Why does femininity have a place of particular and a set like theater, like something ready and determined from above without this plan to have a chance to be altered and turned over? Why is gender something stiff, to be scared of, panicked over screaming in need of help, childlike, unaware, difficult and therefore controlled?

 

 
 
 
 
 

Thrills of being a woman

| Henna Timanttimetsä
I think that the fact I was born a girl was a provocation itself. I have felt my doings and all by being that is always first a female, not first a human or a person, but a woman and a body, is mere provocation and I have began to like it as that. That provocation is so easy and tormenting that it is joyous, because for me I am first a person, a human being. My gender I am not sure what it is for. That my body began to change into woman’s body was a shock also for me, because it meant I could not hide anymore and do boyish things and that I felt growing up was shameful because my body changed into woman’s body that is firstly sexual. To keep reminding me by staring and talking was like torture. I thought how bad am I if my sexuality is the only reason for my existing.

I provoke with my femininity for existing as I am, for looking the certain way, without me underlining my gender, without the need to seduce with my feminine qualities, possibilities of looking more feminine, assets to seduce are there, sure. Those parts of me are the thought of sex and means of sex. I am a sexual being as is a woman through and through. There comes a very puzzling and intriguing thing: desire and what do I want as that overly sexual being that I am. What does a woman want, what is she for, what is her purpose, what is her. There are disturbing stereotypes that repeat and cause alarm rightly so. Provocation starts there to have its effect. The one role for women that is to be for others is taken for granted and of course it is a good role. One can easily forget one’s own needs in being there for others.

Women who are vulnerable hold onto someone else, must seek refuge with someone and other women, because alone we are nothing. They forget themselves. That is the scare, to be nothing, to be left behind with nothing. We can be powerful with each other keeping womanhood as it is suffering, dirty, unholy, pleasing, not able to get away from being chained and under a looking eye that judges us, if that is what power is. There are punishments for those who do not fit roles of women and we need women to understand that to make democracy happen women need to stand out and speak up.