April 16th, 2008
Adaptation: Learning to See the Chameleon
We learn to be chameleons.
When sexually receptive, we remain calm.
When we’re not ready, we sway, hiss and become aggressive.
When we sway, hiss and become aggressive, we’re ready.
Can’t you see? Can’t you see?
Study links women’s fashion sense to ovulation (The Guardian)
France to crack down on “pro-anorexia” websites (Scientific American)
“All rejection and negation indicates a deficiency in fertility:
fundamentally, if only we were good plowland we would
allow nothing to go unused, and in every thing, event,
and person we would welcome manure, rain, or sunshine.”
Quotation from Friedrich Nietzsche, Good Plowland
April 16th, 2008 at 3:17 am
What a great episode is this, Sera!
So true, so clever, so artistic!
I love the colours you’ve chosen
April 16th, 2008 at 7:13 am
Eeeeee! Flowery neko Sera!!
Exclamation points!!!!
April 16th, 2008 at 9:15 am
Brilliant!
OKay - forgive me, but I’m pasting in a newspaper piece I wrote, back when I had a syndicated column (of course you don’t have to read it…):
WHEN GOOD ENOUGH ISN’T
Have you ever watched an entertainer spin plates – with dinnerware whirring on the tips of rods, as well as on fingertips? Apparently, for many young women in North America, daily life feels like spinning plates. There is research indicating that this pressure is beginning to define a generation of girls and women.
A recent study, conducted in the U.S. and Canada by global market research firm Synovate, found that a growing number of young women today are in a constant identity struggle to be viewed as both the “hot”, desired girl, as well as the successful, independent woman. The term “Stressettes†has been coined to describe this segment of today’s female generation.
A thousand young women, aged sixteen to twenty-five were surveyed. More than half of them indicated that they feel incredible anxiety about their body image as well as what the future holds for them. Seventy percent indicated that they are not happy with their body and thirty-eight percent said that they would get cosmetic surgery if they had the money.
However, the majority said that their biggest fear is not finding a career they love. The need to be attractive through external reinforcement from peers and society is in ongoing tension with the need to feel competent and independent.
Youth doesn’t seem to hold the same appeal as it once did. The same study discovered that a high percentage of young women look forward to their thirties, believing they may achieve what they want by then. In an article on Stressettes, national columnist Leah McLaren recently wrote, “I’m sorry to report that if anything, girls, it just gets worse. For one thing, the issue of fertility — safely relegated to the back burner for most twenty-something women I know — rears its pudgy little head. Even if it’s not an issue for you, rest assured, it is for everyone else.â€
When did beauty and body image become such self-defining factors? One stunning example of the current global beauty conundrum is described in an article by Dr. Nancy Etcoff of Harvard University. Research indicates that two thirds of women around the world, from fifteen year-olds to sixty-year-olds, avoid basic activities of life because they feel badly about the way they look - activities such as meeting friends, exercising, voicing an opinion, going to school, going to work, dating or even seeking medical help.
If anyone argues that beauty is a trivial problem, this finding will put that argument to rest. It’s no wonder more girls and women are seeking cosmetic surgery. It’s as though they feel they must wear permanent masks, approximating a current narrow ideal of beauty rather than face the world as they are, in their uniqueness and diversity.
The often-repeated premise is that girls should be satisfied with who they really are – that true beauty is within and that success is about feeling confident and happy, not about material attainment. Young women living in our (mostly) affluent, secure society should feel free to pursue and enjoy whatever life course they choose. So why do we need a word like Stressette?
How do I relate to the girls and women in my life? What do I notice, value and praise in them? What reinforcements in society and in the popular media support girls and women? What messages are we giving to my daughter…and to yours?
In this column, I leave you with questions, not advice.
April 16th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
wow that is so true, you adapt to the situation. I never thought of it in that way, well stated.
April 16th, 2008 at 9:07 pm
As a guy, all i can say is; women are so confusing!
April 16th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
@rags, Well, women aren’t confusing!!
Its just that v manage to confuse men more easily
Nice post sera
April 18th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
I agree with Gary, this one is brilliant!
And I learned that it’s better to be a chameleon sometimes.