One of my cousins, though I love him, is a sweet-talking, womanizing charmer who really has a way of bringing out the outspoken feminist in me. He has a nasty Facebook habit of sharing pictures of women and submitting his opinion on them, subsequently opening them up to the unfiltered opinions of the digitally verbose. Recently, one such social share of his was a photo of an obese young woman, previously shared by her brother who was extolling her beauty, with her formal floor-length dress and happy smile. The conversation that ensued in the comments, however, tossed around taglines ranging from “Western standards of beauty” to “unhealthy,” with perfect strangers commenting on the appearance of someone whose story was wholly unknown to them. This happens to women far too often.
I tried to explain to my cousin, when he offered to me that men too get their share of criticism that, while that may be true, the criticisms heaped on women extend far beyond the boundaries of "fair." Throughout much of our history, men have judged women on their appearance and on how well they conform to physical expectations, to the point that sometimes we do not even realize the degree we subscribe to this oppressive regime. “You never wore corsets,” I tried to explain, “never bound your feet until they broke, and rarely ever sold your body for money or were valued on the marriage market by your looks alone. In politics, nobody’s wasting time asking about what you’re wearing. Nobody’s talking about how fast you get your body back post-pregnancy. Yeah, men get their fair share of criticisms. But only a man could equate the criticism of the male sex with that of women.”
I was a little hard on him. But was I, really? The problem is we need to stop placing women under an unsolicited microscope and calling it a limelight, because it’s often more patronizing than bolstering, and it can often even be dangerous in more ways than one. It can be very difficult to feel comfortable in your own skin as a woman in Western society, very intimidating to face the world as you are and to feel free to make your own decisions in the shadow of the male gaze. This prevalent male gaze too often reduces women to spectacles and places expectations on them that are often unfair to say the least, and simply unrealistic at their worse. And these are expectations that strangers have no right to level, even as they keep cropping up in both professional and social settings.
One new play, recently put on by Mildred’s Umbrella Theatre Company, explored the mechanics of a darker side of this societal male gaze, which I found fascinating (though beware: I may spoil it by article’s end). “Dollface” by playwright Kathrine Sherman takes modern societal pressures placed on women and modern rape culture and weaves these concepts into a dramatic retelling of the Greek tale of Medusa. This Medusa begins as a pretty young woman living on an island with her two sisters but ends as a transformed, monstrous woman who has covered the marks and memories of sexual assault with scales and cynicism. Throughout the course of the play, innocent but skeptical Medusa is courted by a suitor we never see; she is pampered, complemented, and then lured to a party, possibly drugged, and, finally, used, cast out, and shamed. In its telling, the play skilfully illustrates a tenuous relationship between a young woman with a pretty face given persistent attentions she’s not sure she wants and the pursuant man willing to take advantage of any vulnerability. Afterward, as is often the plight of victims of sexual assault, her shame is bottomless, illustrated in this play by the offstage actresses rolling message bottle after message bottle of hate mail to the shore of the island or pulling strings tied with scores of clanking bottles into view. Her shame has been forced upon her. By strangers who don’t even know her story.
There is a point in the play where Medusa, sleepless and dejected, visits a goddess to seek reprieve. The goddess, however, acts as the voice of society as a whole, speaking in platitudes that strikes against her as a woman and as a victim. The goddess interrogates her, asks if she knew this man previously, if she even tried to fight him off, if Medusa was showing too much skin and if she ever reciprocated his advances; the goddess is probing for any indication of Medusa’s active participation that may disqualify her from claiming the title of victim, exemplifying the skepticism that too often answers women’s claims of rape and assault. Once it’s established that Medusa had done nothing to solicit these attentions, the goddess assesses her physically. “You’re pretty,” she says. “That’s a strike.”
It’s quite a sobering play. Of course, our male representative Perseus makes an appearance, entering armed and ready to kill Medusa only to be confronted with the frustrating story of her abuses. And here’s where I spoil the end to make a point: At play’s end, this “monstrous” Medusa places a mirror before him that has the potential to turn him to stone — not because of her gaze or her looks or her warped body, but because of the ugliness that might exist inside of him, something ugly enough to freeze him in stone forever, as she herself was frozen and unable to fight off her attacker. Medusa bids him look into the mirror and answer truthfully whether, when faced with a beautiful, unconscious woman like she was, he would not have taken advantage, too. She asks if his respect for women would truly be pure and upstanding when he has the power to take what he wants. In doing so, she poses a question that is all too relevant in today’s Man’s World: What can be gained from taking advantage of this woman in this situation — whether it’s her looks ripe for commentary on social media or her talent in the workplace — what can tearing her down do for me. Medusa's question to Perseus is a challenge to this social structure of date rape, of male hypercriticism, of shaming, of parading, and of offering up a total stranger to the scrutiny of others.
Most recently, my cousin, God help him, posted a picture of this woman, Dolly Castro, again posted merely for public comment; hers had fewer, and much kinder, comments. The difference between the comments for the first woman, which more than bordered on body shaming, and these comments for this lighter, taller, curvier woman are evidences of the pervading male gaze in our societal filter. She is watched, she is talked about, and she is desired. Meanwhile, Woman No. 1 is shamed. It’s shameful and it’s subjugating.
And, as long as it persists, we will need shows like “Dollface” to hold a mirror to our own overcriticism and call it unjust.
