Quote:
Originally Posted by girl_dee
I have noticed that when there are butch looking women on TV they seem to glam them out sooner or later. Queen Latifah comes to mind. i adore her don't get me wrong, but i loved her appearance more when she was young, tough and butch. Then one day she was glammed out. i miss the old Latifah, but it's really not about me.
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Once upon a time I had a conversation very similar to the above comment with my at that time butch partner. She was hot under the collar about a certain news personality (clue Maddow) and she assumed and assured me that Maddow had been forced to be less butch to be successful.
My retort was that while it may be true that she had to be less butch to be successful in mainstream media.... (I've never read an article about that or researched it so I don't know) who are we to assume that it wasn't her choice. I feel the same way about Queen Latifah.
It's a particularly queer kind of arrogance (no offense Dee I'm using your comment as a jumping point) that we assume when someones gender/presentation evolves from butch to femme, or trans to femme or femme to butch etc. and so forth that they are either being forced to by society or they are being a traitor to their gender/identification.
In NO WAY am I saying society hasn't and doesn't pressured people to present themselves in a specific way to be successful, but I think we do need to be careful not to lay judgements and assumptions on especially successful women.
Another similar example that was just pointed out to me is about one of my favorite authors (who is also a personal friend of my beloved butch). I complained before reading more works that I wish her work was more overtly queer. Upon further inspection and thought if her work was overtly queer chances are she wouldn't be one of the souths most successful authors as well as a New York Times best selling author. I really needed to step back and examine that being a queer author isn't a must because she has same sex relationships. It's her right as a woman/human to choose to put being an author ahead or being an activist.
We put so much pressure on those who are successful and who are representatives of our queer culture. At what point are they allowed to just make a choice without inspection. By default they are spokes peeps and representatives, but it's not by obligation.
Feminism in it's most simple form to me is choice. Having the knowledge and education (doesn't have to be formal) to choose to be an astronaut or a stay at home mom. Feminism to me is also choosing not to judge informed decisions by women. Women queer or straight face enough adversity and judgement without me adding to it.
Your mileage may vary - mine isn't perfect.