Our old pro-feminist comrade Hugo Schwyzer linked recently to this post by Sugarbutch, in which she talks about how gender role playacting, and the performance of chivalry, are an important part of her particular butch-femme lesbian relationship. She writes:
Chivalry is deeply feminist to me. When in femmes, I expect femininity to be deliberate, done with the whole knowledge of the compulsory heteronormative restrictions which dictate that women must be and do certain things, particular that we must wear high heels, delicate cloth, restrictive clothing.
Femininity is not made for comfort or movement, it is made to accentuate the sexualization of a woman’s body – and that’s why things like holding her doors open (so she doesn’t dirty her white gloves or expensive manicure), pulling her chair out (so she doesn’t have to awkwardly move a bulky piece of furniture, and risk getting it caught on her skirt or stockings and ripping something) or holding her coat (so she doesn’t have to reach around and risk ripping the tight seams in her shoulders or upper back) are necessary to me, as an acknowledgement of how restrictive femininity can be, and of how difficult it is to walk around the world in these clothes, as a celebration of the beauty of femininity on the body, and with deep respect for the courage to costume and perform femme to begin with.
Putting aside for the moment the debate about the feminist virtues (or lack thereof) of performing femininity and chivalry, I find that I have a powerful desire to just call bullshit.
(Bullshit!)
I mean, really, I’m all for Sugarbutch and her partner playing around with chivalry and femininity. It sounds like fun. More power to them as they epater le bourgeois and enjoy each other’s company in whatever way works for them in the unique context of their relationship. But I buy the political virtue of it only so far (not very far), and then it starts to sound like someone who’s just having a hard time squaring her taste in women with her feminist politics (constrictive femininity is bad + I find chicks in white gloves really hot = cognitive dissonance), or someone who’s trying to find a high-falutin’ justification for playacting because she’s afraid that she and her femme look a bit silly (I mean, who wears white gloves anymore? It sounds very ren faire Not that I’m against it, mind you. I’m all for ren faires, I just think they should be valued on their own terms.)
I don’t mean to knock Sugarbutch too much, because she’s really just floundering (if I’m even right about what’s going on) on the horns of a dilemma that most of us flounder around on sometimes, which is what to do when our political values or philosophical principles don’t square with our tastes or desires or preferences.
I think it can get particularly messy when you get into the arena of gender politics because we have these incredibly entrenched ideas of what roles men and women are supposed to play in a relationship, and then we have these principles about how every role or responsibility or virtue or character should be equally available to every gender, and then we have these actual people (i.e. all of us), none of whom conforms perfectly to either the traditional gender roles or the newfangled non-gender roles. Some women are butch. Some men are femme. Some women who earn way more money than their husbands and are better at negotiating with used car dealers can’t fix things and tend to be emotionally flighty, while their low-earning, poor-negotiating husbands are incredibly handy and rock solid emotionally.
When they’re used wisely, feminist ideas about the inherent performativity of gender can help us liberate ourselves from constrictive gender roles, but when used un-wisely, to justify behavior that either doesn’t need justifying at all (who cares if your girlfriend wears white gloves and high heels; go to it, girlfriend!) or shouldn’t be justified at all, or to try to render simple and orderly the unsimplifiable and disorderly nuances of two people trying to be with each other, then they can be dangerous.
