Can Women Share Femininity?

By Shauneez Rigney
@_shauneez_
watermelaninmag.com

​In October of this year Always Ultra, the feminine hygiene brand, made the decision to remove the Venus symbol from their FEMALE products in an attempt to be more inclusive because, well, not only females menstruate now but so do some transgender men. Full disclosure, this article does not aim to be homophobic or transphobic, but it does attempt to dissect and navigate the dark hole that is the reinvention of gender constructs that we have seemed to invent out of thin air. In the midst of all these new gender concepts it always seems like femininity is put under the microscope and forced to be reinvented and more inclusive because, everyone wants to be a woman, and everyone seems to know how to be a woman better than women themselves. So, can women share femininity or perhaps masculinity that needs to be reinvented?

​Let me create a montage for you; confident gay men in drag, or gay men in general, straight men who over compensate and claim to be against toxic masculinity but in reality, they’re nothing but a bunch of misogynists. Transgender women who are desperately seeking to be one of the girls by making femininity their own, which is cool (but…), fashion brands creating more inclusive lines with feminine pieces for men- que Dior’s summer20 men’s collection. Why is society so obsessed with femininity, people either want to be more feminine, redefine it or make it more inclusive. Personally I just feel women have endured so much more over time, to get to where we are now in society to have what makes us uniquely women suddenly be for everyone. I mean, we thought our ovaries made us women, and once a month we don’t even like our ovaries, but we held onto them and with the simple removal of a tiny feminine symbol, we can’t even count on our ovaries anymore. The process of redefining femininity should be to empower women BY women. This means to redefine the roles women have, how we choose to own our bodies, how we choose to navigate motherhood and our overall freedom in society. I have trouble accepting that simply feeling feminine gives some transgender women and gay men the right to dictate what it means to be a women after not living a full physical feminine life. Have you lived in a female body long enough to feel insecure and endured the frustration and confusion of navigating inconsistent clothing sizes from store to store? Have you felt the disappointment and heartbreak of always giving to men who don’t deserve you? Do you know what it feels like to have an entire war happen in your uterus once a month and have to shrug it off with comments like “it can’t be that bad”? Have you ever worked twice as hard for the same job as your male colleagues and have to smile through the inequality and a lower pay check? If not then I don’t think you’ve been a woman long enough to get to redefine femininity.
 
The notion of redefining masculinity needs to be normalised. Masculinity is crumbling because for decades women have worked hard to redefine themselves and suddenly men are growing increasingly insecure as they attempt to figure out what they mean to the modern day, liberal and independent woman. Accepting that a woman does not need you but would simply just like to have you is the first step. We no longer need a man to take care of us because we have learned that our bodies can be our protection. We don’t need a man to be the bread winner because more and more women are now surpassing men in corporate, creative and medical fields (despite the gender wage gap) and we don’t even need a man to validate us anymore because we have learned that everything we need is already within us. More so, redefining masculinity means that when gay men adopt a more feminine persona it shouldn’t be claimed that they’re being more feminine but rather exploring the fact that masculinity can have a softer side in its own way. Why does society think that masculinity as a concept is untouchable and not problematic? In order to figure out what men bring to the table these days means masculinity needs to be redefined by accepting that the role men used to play is no longer necessary in some cases. Just like women’s roles have changed, men need to figure out their new roles.
 
Dissolving gender roles and the confusion that comes with it leads to gender fluidity where everyone abandons the gender ship and swims in the sea of no labels and baggy, monochromatic clothing. It’s great but also farfetched that society thinks we can live completely free and labeless because some things need to be kept in place, not as rules but as guidelines. We’ve grown accustomed to thinking that rules are the reason for exclusion and attached so many negative connotations around rules. How about we think of it as guidelines for a point of reference to figure out our gender and sexuality preferences and then choose what we want to be. Labelling has become such an offensive thing to do, if anything, a society who thrives on individuality needs labels. We are obsessed with not being categorized and labelled but at the same time we’re pedantic about how we are categorized and labelled. In other words, don’t label us but label us correctly with our choice of pronouns.
 
 
Becoming transgender is the individual’s choice. Being a trans-man, you’re supposed to adapt to the life of a man because that is what you wanted and chose. It is unfair to expect the world to accommodate you to that extent, no one prohibited you from using female products in the first place. Just like the world doesn’t prohibit normal men from using female products, so why can’t they just remain female products? Requesting the removal of a feminine logo on a feminine product then means you are not a man if you want female products to accommodate you. It’s as though as soon as you slap some masculinity on something or someone, entitlement automatically comes along with it. So, take the feminine sign off female products since it’s for everyone now but then pay for it too. Maybe now that “new” trans-men have become in touch with their masculinity entitlement, society can make having a period a little less painful by cutting the prices on these products, because no one has been listening to women about it.
 
We’ve found ourselves in a pool of new terms with everything floating around and nothing is grounded anymore and the meaning behind everything is slipping away but it shouldn’t be that way. What it means to be a man and a woman doesn’t have to disappear, believe it or not, there are people out there who are plain old men and women. It’s as though we hate old values so much we’d rather have everything mean nothing. How about we stop sweeping all our preferences under the gender-neutral rug. My conclusion is simple, if people don’t like being placed in boxes then stop forcing them into old boxes, leave those old boxes alone and create new boxes with fresh new gender terms and characteristics and be proud of them. Don’t take the meaning away from older concepts who can serve as a point of reference. That is how you create a free society, not by completely changing old values and notions but by creating an entirely new space for brand new values but still allowing old ones to exist. 

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Author

Shauneez Rigney, journalism and English literature graduate. I aim to write as raw as possible. I draw inspiration from different types of music, observing human interaction and through my own journey in trying to discover who I am as a contemporary brown girl, exploring my individuality. 
I understand that sometimes the topics I choose to write about may support the unpopular opinion. My only intention is to spark constructive conversations between these opposing opinions and through that we will increase each other’s knowledge about certain topics in society.