A RECIPE FOR MISOGYNY

Here is a recipe for misogyny: 

(1) Believe that engaging in lustful thoughts is a grievous soul-endangering sin.

(2) Believe that women have a moral responsibility to prevent men fron engaging in lustful thoughts about them. 

This recipe for misogyny happens to be the theoretical basis for the modern Christian "modesty" movement.  This kind of attitude is liable to cause downright  hatred of women because  young (and not-so-young) heterosexual men are, by nature, going to be "tormented" by lustful thoughts about women all the time and they are naturally going to turn their frustration at this state of affairs upon the women who inspire this lust. 

We see the seeds of this kind of misogyny in the comments of some young men who hold the beliefs described above:

Kevin:
“Each and every day is a battle—a battle against my sin, a battle against temptation, a battle against my depraved mind. Every morning I have to cry out for mercy, strength, and a renewed conviction to flee youthful lusts. The Spirit is faithful to bring me the renewal I need to prepare me to do war against my sin, yet the temptation still exists.

Sometimes, when I see a girl provocatively dressed, I’ll say to myself, ‘She probably doesn’t know that a hundred and one guys are going to devour her in their minds today. But then again, maybe she does.’ To be honest, I don’t know the truth—the truth of why she chooses to dress the way she does. All I know is that the way she presents herself to the world is bait for my sinful mind to latch onto and I need to avoid it at all costs.

For the most part, the church serves as a sanctuary from the continual barrage of temptation towards sin. However, the church’s members are not free from sin yet, and there are girls both ignorant and knowledgeable of men’s sinful tendencies. I must confess that even church can have several mines scattered about.”

Jack:
“The one place where I might think I wouldn’t have to face as much temptation is at church, but this is not always the case. When ladies whom I’m friends with dress immodestly, it definitely has a negative effect on our friendship. When a woman dresses immodestly it makes it difficult to see her as a sister in Christ. There is a constant battle going on as I’m talking with her. Communication becomes more difficult as I’m trying to listen to her, because I’m trying to fight temptation.”

(Emphasis Added).

This is pretty much the same attitude early church father Tertullian expressed when he said, "Dear sisters, you are the devil's gateway...you are she who persuaded him whom the devil did not dare attack. Do you know that every one of you is an Eve?"

Frankly, if evil thoughts are in and of themselves damaging as Christians believe, or if they are likely a prelude to evil actions, then I would ten times rather have a man say to himself, "Hey, a roll in the hay with Happy might be kind of fun," than to think, "Happy is such a dirty little whore, she's the devil's gateway."

I have nothing against modest dress at all. In fact, I tend towards modest dress myself.  But I view it as a matter of good etiquette rather than a moral imperative, and more importantly, I think the men around me hold the same view. It's not polite to show a lot of thigh in the workplace or at church because it draws needless attention to attirbutes that are irrelevant to the mission of one's office or one's place of worship.  The beach or a nightclub, however, are a different matter, but by all means, cover up even at those places if you are not comfortable showing a lot of skin. The problem however comes from viewing modesty in women as a moral imperative and placing responsibility on women for reining in men's lust.

The other pernicious aspect of this modern Christian modesty movement is -- where does one draw the line?  Randy young men are inclined to feel lust at even the slightest "provocation."  Even if I am covered in loose material from neck to ankle, a sexually imaginative young man (and trust me, they're pretty much all sexually imaginative) is still going to have a pretty good idea of my general build.  Even the sight of a finely turned ankle, a pretty face, or some luxuriant hair is likely to inspire a good amount of l-u-s-t. 

Chances are, if you are female and not some kind of hideous swamp creature, you are at some point or another going to inspire some sexual thoughts in the men around you despite your best efforts.  There's nothing you can do to prevent it.  Even if you wear a burka, men are going to think about what is underneath the burka.  Groups like the Taliban understand this and thus not only imposed the burka on women but also restricted women's ability to leave the house -- or even to talk or laugh in the presence of men.   These inhumane restrictions on women were inspired by precisely the same reasoning as that outlined above. 

The bottom line is that women cause lust just by BEING.  Anti-lust attitudes -- or certainly attitudes that place responsibility on women for causing lust -- are thus inherently anti-woman, and a very dangerous strain in our culture. 

Comments

[Chalicechick]

"A feminist response to dressing sexy in the workplace" deserves a post of its own, IMHO.

There's a woman superior to me in my office who dresses VERY sexily. When she bends over you can see her thong and her top almost always shows the tops of her breasts.

As a happily married woman, I still have trouble not looking. I mean, she's going to so much trouble to show off, is it impolite not to look?

Other than the occiasional, whispered "Oh my God, shorts and pedal pushers?" no one in the office ever comments on her attire.

So I do my best to ignore it, but goodness, the men must find it difficult.

CC

[Chipmunk]

I think these guys just need to get laid.

As to the office chick who dresses scantily all the time, guys in the office get used to it. You see it every day. You might be reminded of the sight once in a while, but it gets boring. It loses its effect. The Fed Ex delivery boy might enjoy his daily visit to get a glimpse, but he's not there all of the time.

We often forget that modest dress can be sexy in the right setting. Also, what it is viewed as modest in an earlier time would have been viewed as scandalous. Our standards change over time. When bikinis first came out, they were shocking even though they actually covered a lot of skin. Now, many women were the equivalent of a g-string on the beach.

As for the boys mentioned in Happy's post, they want to place the responsibility for their guilt on others rather than take responsibility for their own feelings/urges/behavior.

thought:
[hmmmm, Happy is such a dirty little whore, a roll in the hay with Happy might be kind of fun]

[will]

"I mean, she's going to so much trouble to show off, is it impolite not to look?"

Happy told me not to look at her "that" way no matter how much skin she shows.

[evil_fizz]

Chipmunk: I know that thought was meant to be funny, but it's not. If you're going to make such jokes, stick to comments about power suits or something, please.

[The Happy Feminist]

Thank you for the support Evil Fizz but I kind of "provoked" this thought (ha ha) by bringing it up in my post.

[Joel Monka]

Speaking just as one 50 year old man, I can say Happy got one thing wrong: even a female swampthing will produce at minimum idle erotic curiosity. And Chipmunk got one thing wrong: a guy never does get used to it- ten years later he'd still be looking. And you know what? That's not a bad thing. It's not a temptation from Satan, it's a perfectly innocent pleasure any reasonable man would just enjoy and not worry about. Why, of all matters of the flesh, is this one different? If I walk past a bakery and luxuriate in the smell of fresh baked bread, nobody blames the bakery even though gluttony is a "mortal sin". Nobody says the smell of bread was sent by Satan. Why shouldn't a woman enjoy looking nice if she wants, and why shouldn't a man who has enough self control and maturity to still behave like a gentleman look?

One other point: I have heard some women worry that be perceived as sexy will make it impossible for a man to take them seriously. I can assure you that it is not a problem for a man emotionally older than 14. I've always wondered if the woman saying that had problems taking a sexy man seriously.

[will]

"I've always wondered if the woman saying that had problems taking a sexy man seriously."

You can get your answer just by looking at how HappyF treats me!

[Richard]

First, I'm skeptical after reading the link that either "Kevin" or "Jack" ever really said what's attributed to them. Somehow I get the feeling the quotes where made up by the writer himself and reflect his believes only.

Second, men with viewpoints like the writer probably comprise something less than 2% of the nation's male population. Kevin and Jack are clearly freak stereotypes often promoted by the Left to color men with the aura of Neanderthal characteristics. The other 98% of men would roll their eyes and walk away from any guy who started spouting the idiocy of a Kevin or Jack. So yes, people like them probably do exist in the crevices of society, but I don’t believe they hold much sway with most men, and are almost not worthy of our consideration. (I say almost because every now and then it’s handy to put such people up to the light to remind us how far we’ve come from the 13th Century. ). However, women have far bigger fish to fry when it comes to misogynist characters.

Aside: I limit my comments to western culture men. In the Arab culture, for instance, I would reverse the numbers. 2% are probably modern thinkers, with 98% being crevice thinkers. “Honor killings” are just the tip of the iceberg in those impaired civilizations.

[The Happy Feminist]

Oh if only you were right, Richard! But unfortunately, I think we pooh-pooh this kind of thing at our peril. (After all, weren't we all pooh-poohing those who believe in "intelligent design" until they actually started to persuade vast swathes of people and came close to successfully implementing that curriculum in our school system?)

I can tell you that I have heard very similar message to that above touted in "Focus on the Family" radio broadcasts. These broadcasts allegedly reach approximately 28 million people per week (http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/dobson.htm) The Focus on the Family organization (which, as I discussed in a prior post, also apparently touts the belief that women ideally shouldn't own their own homes) is an extremely wealthy and influential organization, able to mobilize throngs of people for letter-writing campaigns and whose leader (James Dobson) has the ear of the President.

I would love to dismiss these Neanderthal attitudes as the rantings of a random group of crackpots, but I don't feel we necessarily have that luxury. These ideas need to be exposed and critiqued or we'll be caught by surprise the way we were when we suddenly realized that an enormous percentage of the electorate believes in Intelligent Design and votes on "values" issues like homosexuality.

[Shawna Bound]

First off: Joel, thank you! I agree with everything you said.

As a former evangelical, I grew up with all this nonesense. The thing that gets me about this is the implications that only boys lust. Girls just lust different: give me a man in a suit, and oh baby! But we lust all the same. And as far as lust in church goes--back when I was a teenager in the Bible belt, it was still normal for men and boys to wear suits. So the two immature peons in the post just need to shut up their whining and deal with it.

Lust is going to happen both ways--when it needs to stop is when the appreciation for the opposite sex turns into making a member of the opposite sex into an object.

[evil_fizz]

HF: I know it's from the post, but it's still a little weird to see it in the comments like that, that's all.

[Richard]

HF-- Okay, maybe I'm out-of-touch with who's actually "out there." But I don't live a sheltered life and know people from all sorts of faiths, beliefs, backgrounds, etc. I just don't run into men like Kevin and Jack. And just because Focus on the Family broadcasts their sort of drivel doesn't mean its listeners embrace it. (Remember too that Catholics are not suppose to use birth control or have abortions. So much for strict adherence to matters of faith, huh?) I have a "born again" friend who listens to Focus, but would never agree with Kevin and Jack. Just as you like to say about feminists, Right wingers are not a monolith either. (Case in point is me. I've never in my life voted for anyone other than a Republican for president, and yet I'm pro-choice, anti-Intelligent design, encourage my sisters to have careers traditionally reserved for men, and think Kevin and Jack are screwballs.)

I'm pretty optimistic that such Kevin/Jack backward thinking is doomed to eventual failure with the broader society, just as Intelligent Design is pretty much getting hammered wherever its proponents try to introduce it into school curriculum.

[Tamakazura]

My alias is from the Tale of Genji, written at a time when a man wasn't supposed to talk to a woman unless there was a screen between them (in polite society, anyway). There are cases where a mere glance of a woman - even by the light of fireflies through the screen - drives a man mad with desire. Somehow, this barrier of morality didn't stop everyone from having all sorts of sexual affairs...

[The Happy Feminist]

OK, I just started a new thread (see next post) on the topic of complimenting a woman's appearance. The comments on this topic don't seem quite on point with the topic of the post, so I am in the process of moving all comments regarding compliments, wolf-whistles etc. to the next post!

If you want to talk about old-fashioned religious views regarding modesty, stay here. If you want to talk about compliments, go to the next post.

[The Happy Feminist]

Tamakazura,

I split your comment in two and put the first half under the next post. Hope that's ok!

[Tamakazura]

Thanks for moving it. I read both posts in a row and I think they just sorta ran together in my mind!

[Mandolin]

Richard,

I wonder if maybe when you see this behavior expressed in other kinds of ways, it doesn't feel like the same kind of behavior?

For instance, I was working at a local high school for a few summers in college as the perennial school uniform debates were going on. Girls were being instructed that they couldn't wear anything sleeveless -- or actually, I think they were going "without a collar" -- without wearing a sweater too.

When I asked someone why, inevitably the response I got was, "Because the boys get distracted."

Aren't the boys responsible for themselves?

As a corrolary, if a teenage girl claimed she couldn't focus on her work because of 'all the provocative guys'" can you imagine anyone taking her seriously? They'd laugh and tell her to stop being silly.

[beth]

Thanks for this post, Happy. (And for the comments, everyone else.) I consider myself very firmly feminist, and also very firmly Christian. This is one of those places where I go back and forth on what *my* place in this debate should be and how to reconcile any number of ideas about community, body, pornography, and feminism.

I think I may link to this post from my own blog and see what my readers (mostly serious Christians and politically moderate to liberal) have to say about it. Again, thanks for the thoughts.

[Lauren]

As a pentecostal woman I have had much exposure to the modesty movement. My In laws grew up in the UPCI and adheared to the standards. They left when my mother in law realized that the girls were being just as sexy with the close cuts and big hair dues as the girls who wore short skirts ever where.

As far as modesty in general- I do not believe it gives women any sort of power to dress sexily. All it does is degrade them and make them into some sort of sexpot for men to lust over and use. Women should be proud of who they are and not feel the need to flaunt their bodies. I know many disagree with me on this issue, but I honestly think it is far more powerful for a woman to dress modestly and behave accordingly than for her to be out in a miniskirt and tank top jutting around.

I believe it is far more degrading for a woman to be put out as a sexual image than for her to retain her dignaty. In this time of "sexual revolution" I believe we have lost sight of the fact that not every moral cast aside is helpful to feminist causes.

[Ann]

Among the Mormons, it has become part and parcel of the Old Guys Speeches to conflate pornography with immodesty. Blaming young women for young men's lusts because the young women expose their shoulders or thighs is just another way this proudly patriarchal religion strives to keep women in their place. I can almost not think about it without swearing, which is also not a good Mormon thing to do.

[The Happy Feminist]

Thank you Beth!

Lauren, I don't disagree with you. I think that the "modesty" movement and the sexual objectification of women are flip sides of the same phenomenon -- seeing women as primarily sexual objects, either as sexual objects to be covered up or sexual objects to be flaunted. Ideally I would like to see a world where women are seen as fully human and valued just as much regardless of how much or how little they cover up.

I don't want to be blamed for the sexual feelings men may have, but I also don't want to be valued solely or primarily for causing such feelings.

I should also point out that two posts up I have apologized for clarified some of the other thoughts I have expressed in this thread.

[Richard]

Mandolin-- Off hand, I can't recall any time I witnessed a "because the boys get distracted" moment. If I had, I would have laughed out loud at the hypocrisy of it. And again, most of the men I know would have seen the hypocrisy too. I often feel that Leftists and/or feminists are working from some cartoon character image they have in their minds of how “most” or “many” men think and are extrapolating from that image. Yes, there are a few fruitcakes in the crowd, but I wish men generally would be given a bit more credit.

[Jay]

Richard,

I don't think Happy or other leftists or feminists are failing to give men credit for common sense, they are just calling into question the common sense of a particular group of men, namely fundamentalist Christians. I grew up in a Four-Square Gospel(a batshit crazy offshoot of the Pentacostals founded by a raving lunatic named Sister Aimee) church and remember our youth pastor warning the girls not to tempt us to sinful thoughts with revealing clothes. We boys were expected to wage war with lust and the girls were to refrain from doing anything that might cause us to falter. Girls who dressed immodestly were shamed both for their inherent sluttiness and their role in tempting good Christian boys to go astray.

In my experience, Libertarian-leaning Republicans like you tend to underestimate just how strongly a lot of fundamentalists believe insane shit like women are to blame for male lust. I remained a conservative Republican throughout college, years after I had left my church and become an atheist, and I was always surprised at how little other self-styled conservative intellectuals (especially the more libertarian ones) knew about the hardcore religious right. There really are a lot of people who blame women for male sexual urges, who think God sent AIDS to punish gays and drug users, and who think that the devil planted dinosaur bones and other fossils in order to trick people into doubting the Bible.

[Left Right Out]

This is omething I really struggle with. I am a Christian and I really enjoy other people finding me attractive. On the other hand I do not want to cause my brothers (or sisters) to stumble.

In my struggles with this I realise that I am still trying to define modesty and immodesty. Is immodesty drawing attention to yourself as a sexual being outside a relationship? Is it deliberately trying to turn people on via your looks? So far my tentative conclusion is that most of the time, attitude is key. Modesty is not just about how you dress, it is about your attitude towards other people. Two women can wear the exact same outfit and have one be immodest and one modest just by how they speak and the way they move.

But with attitude, don't people (men and women) often project their judgement on women? I by no means want to give credence to the sort of people who say "That slut! She smiled at him and look at the way she's dressed -- that means she wants sex!" As HF points out, you can be considered immodest in a burqa depending on who's doing the looking. Two people can look at the exact same woman and draw totally different conclusions about her modesty.

I do think im/modesty is a cultural, time, and place thing as well. I think it's more immodest to wear a bikini on a nudist beach than it is to go naked. In certain cultures the breast is not considered a sexual body part and I wouldn't think twice about women going topless. Laura Ingalls Wilder's mom was sent home in disgrace from school because she let her ears show. In previous times the flash of an ankle was provacative.

The misogyny issue really gets to me because it's very true. I sort of operate on parallel tracks here -- I do absolutely believe that people are responsible for controlling their own feelings and actions. However as a "meat before idols" thing I also believe that I personally have a responsibility to try and live my own sexual ethics -- which are founded on the idea that sex should be within marriage. So I'm still groping my way towards answers and (as I said) this is a big issues with which I struggle. For right now I'm sort of incorporating my beliefs with a time/space ethic. I wear clothes that make me feel attractive but do not "display" my breasts or bum -- I'm covered collar-bone to knee, arms excluded. I can't control other people's judgements of me but I feel this is wear God wants me to be right now.

I don't feel like I got my feelings across in this post very well, but work calls. I want to sum up: People are responsible for their own feelings, but there are ways other people can affect those feelings and we should be aware of that.

[The Happy Feminist]

Wow. What a thoughtful analysis, Left Right Out. (And thank you for gently pointing out the heteronormativity of my post.)

I don't mind at all the idea of showing consideration for others by the way we dress (and that goes for both sexes), but one has to remember that "provocation" is in the eye of the beholder and one is ultimately responsible for one's own reaction.

It is absolutely culturally relative too. When living abroad, I had little old men chuck stones at me and call me a "whore" for wearing clothes that would have been perfectly acceptable in any conservative American circles.