The way we live now - women's attitudes about clothes

Women's Quarterly, Spring, 2003 by Meghan Cox Gurdon, Midge Decter

The Real Skinny on Why We Feel Fat

Meghan Cox Gurdon says it's not the models who make us feel fat. It's the clothes.

MODERN WOMANHOOD is caught in a trap of its own making we are hoist by our own petard. It is female emancipation that has put us on diets and treadmills. Before you throw this magazine down in disgust, consider that the more economic and political power women have acquired, the fewer clothes we have worn; the fewer clothes, the less friendly concealment. That is why our bodies, themselves, have come to be of such supreme--and exasperating--importance.

Say what you will about corsets, they at least gave every woman a waist and made a pleasing contrast with zaftig hips. In olden days, the contours of one's calves, let alone one's thighs, mattered nor at all, for they were veiled in sumptuous layers of skirting. Rich or poor, chunky or sylphlike, all women used to wear garb which conveyed femininity whilst concealing womanhood's more problematic hip-thigh-buttock zone. Not only were women's pillowy backsides hidden from male eyes, they were also hidden from those of their owners. And if you can't see your thighs, why would you worry about them? My guess is that most women of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries passed their whole lives without once scrutinizing their cellulite. (Our great-grandmothers didn't even have a name for it; according to Webster's, "cellulite" only entered the language in 1974.).

Today women make more money, and are courted more assiduously than ever in history by politicians (though less assiduously by men). Women govern, run companies, adjudicate lawsuits, and, in Britain, operate their own special taxpayer-funded unit. So why is it that from dressing rooms across the English-speaking world comes the querulous cry: "Do these pants make me look fat?"

Summer 2000

You're On Your Own, Baby

Midge Decter argues that the woman problem arises not from lack of freedom but because of it.

NO ONE, I REPEAT, has ever led a life with so many private options in it as the modern enlightened woman. It is nor surprising that she is often confused and restless and vulnerable to a lot of abstract notions about what she should be doing. It is not surprising that the family appears, for the moment, to be a highly unstable institution. The family will not in the end, I think, remain unstable for long. The nuclear family is the most useful invention of the human spirit, a means by which men and women and their children can negotiate a tolerable settlement of their respective, very different needs.

But how are we to get along in the meantime? We need desperately to understand what is truly going on with us and to be as honest about it as possible. A proper feminism would result in a movement that spoke to women not about their grievances but about their new condition of freedom. It would be saying to them not, "You are entitled to complain" but rather, "Your difficulty is also your opportunity. Be of high heart. You are going to make it."

Winter 1996

False Courage Awards

TWQ has always hated hypocrisy--we're also amused by it. Here is a selection from our False Courage Awards.

Just a "Housewife" Award

PROVING THAT an ordinary soccer mom can take on the all-powerful gun lobby, Donna Dees-Thomases, a self-described housewife, became the driving force behind last spring's Million Mom March, an antigun protest in Washington. Bobbsey Twins Hillary and Tipper attended. The courageous New Jersey mom frankly admits that she has "never been politically active"--although, presumably, she has shaken the hands of a few bigwigs through sister-in-law and Hillary confidante Susan Thomases, and in her own capacity as spokesman for the Late Show with David Letterman, and before that, assistant press secretary to two Democratic senators.

Courage under Fire Award

GUNS SEEM to bring out the courage in all sorts of moms. Another participant in the Million Mom March was rotund talk show hostess Rosie O'Donnell. Previously, she had ambushed NRA poster boy Tom Selleck when he appeared on her show. When it was subsequently learned that Rosie's own bodyguard had applied for a permit to carry a concealed weapon, Rosie explained--between mouthfuls of Drakes Cakes--that she did not "personally" own a gun. Her spokesman helpfully added that the gun was for protection, not homicide.

The Susan Sarandon Golden Hacksaw Award

STANLEY "TOOKIE" WILLIAMS says his life has "changed totally" since he entered San Quentin. A founder of Los Angeles' notorious Crips gang, Tookie joined with journalist Barbara Becnel to produce several books designed to teach kids about the evils of gangs. Tookie's newest book, Life in Prison, has received kudos from the American Library Association. When Tookie, who has entertained Winnie Mandela and other celebrity admirers, was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, Becnel described her protege as "wide-eyed like a child and really excited." Unable to see how much Tookie has "grown," prosecutors snipe that articles about him often fail to mention that he murdered four people, allegedly schemed to kill a prison guard, and appears to be in firm control of the Blue Note Crips, the L.A. gang's San Quentin arm.