How Hollywood demonizes ultra-femininity
Brenna Twohy said “Peach pits are poisonous. This is not a mistake. Girlhood is growing fruit around cyanide. It will never be your for swallowing.”
The world cannot remember a time when beauty was not coveted. However, beauty standards have progressed or reverted over the centuries. Beauty has always been ideal. Helen of Troy had a face that launched a thousand ships with her likeness first appearing in portraits as early as 7th-century bc. She was so beautiful that Paris would give up power for her. He would give up wisdom and war on her and if history fails to portray the version where Paris actually kidnaps Helen against her will you’ll find beauty in this circumstance to be flattering maybe even a mode of popularity over our history as mankind.
Ultra femininity has often been one of the many ways to be considered beautiful. Helen’s beauty caused the Trojan War but barbie’s beauty comes with over 200 careers and a sick Malibu dream house.
Beauty in the age of barbies and brats is different from beauty in the age of ancient Greek mythology. In addition to the unobtainable body proportions and initial rollout of only white dolls, Barbie has long reigned as a relatable aspirational figure in the lives of millions of children. She’s most known for her love of the color pink, her fashion sense, and her undeniable drive and intelligence that landed her on the moon years before Neil Armstrong.
Barbie is arguably proof that ultra-feminine women who partake in quote-unquote girly activities for fun are also capable of being smart of being accomplished and of being multifaceted. Why do we need proof of that? Because ultra-feminine women in the media are often depicted in a different way.
At what point did ultra femininity morph into a lack of substance? What happened to the face that set sail a thousand ships? Or the idol who broke glass ceilings with her pink Jimmy Choose?
If you’re lucky enough to have not noticed, our society tends to depend heavily on the perceived notion that only two genders exist. Those two genders are blue truck-toting gamer boys who can work at NASA when they’re older. And pink glitter-wearing doll plain girls who will grow up to have a valley accent. Or to put it even more simply, using a quote by Shakespeare “She´s watching that Oxygen, I’m watching ESPN”.
For the majority of our history, cisgender men have been at the forefront of society. They hunt for food, they own the land, they pay the bills, they commit horrendous crimes against women and aren’t held accountable because he’s got a promising future ahead of him and this could ruin his life. Men held power that for a great deal of history women couldn’t even dream of having. Except we could and we fought for centuries to obtain equity.
The first and second waves of feminism
The first wave of feminism is thought to span across the 1860s to 1920. Though we should and do take heed of early mothers of feminism such as Mary Wollstonecraft and her publishing of a vindication of the rights of women in 1792. This wave mainly focused on advocating for woman’s right to vote.
The second wave of feminism, though, is where the whole point of this lies. The second wave spanned from the early 1960s falling in tandem with the civil rights movement and is projected to have ended around the early 1980s. This wave of feminism broadened its reach to gender roles alongside its focus on enfranchisement.
During World War II, women flooded into the workplace at numbers larger than ever before to take over for war-bound men. After the war, however, they stayed in their position for lower wages than their male counterparts. Or they worked for quote-unquote pink-collar jobs which are quoted to be care-oriented work such as secretarial or nursing positions. With society’s ideals slowly shifting back into domesticity and a strong dependence on marriage, women were also making careers out of raising a family and keeping up their homes.
The argument for second-wave feminism was that women were far more depressed in a domestic setting they needed to get out and break down the family unit if desired to be independent and have more opportunities. This wave produced an unthinkable side effect. The separation of femininity from feminism.
To be taken seriously, second-wave feminists denounce things like makeup and other girly things in favor of stereotypically masculine things. But it is not entirely their fault. They were more than likely a product of an environment where they were not looked at as people but as women. That distinction would never allow them to progress to a place of equity. even now we see the effects of femininity separated from feminism.
The Not Like Other Girls Trope
Media depictions of progressive or powerful women are often shown to be quote-unquote tomboy characters who are well versed in being one of the guys but unaware of how to perform femininity. This trope finds itself in numerous TV shows and films of our time, especially ones that depend on the infamous trope known as The Not Like Other Girls Trope.
If you were unlucky enough to have the utter privilege of internet use around the early 2010s you won’t be a stranger to the not like other girls trope. Whether it be the age-old debate about whether bubblegum pop is real music in comparison to rock or oldies. Or the infamous remarks about male singers who have naturally high singing voices. Or visuals that go against stereotypical masculinity. Our society has always had an aversion to things classified as feminine.
Some activists during the second wave of feminism called for the denouncing of stereotypical girly things because to them these things upheld patriarchal ideals. Things like makeup and revealing clothes. Even high heels were considered tools that are given to us by men for us to please them.
As a society, we’ve progressed past this notion as we all should understand by now that what a woman does with her body is her decision. And there was even such a thing as lipstick feminism sometime during the third wave as women sought to reclaim stereotypically girly things like makeup and heels.
But not like other girls trope ruined it for everyone and set us back about 540 million years. We’re all just basic unicellular bitches. Here comes not like other girls who think they’re something special because they don’t use eye shadow. But once again it’s not their fault.
Like I said earlier, our society has an aversion to things classified as stereotypically feminine. Bubblegum pop allegedly has no substance because it sometimes talks about partying or boys. Rock or alternative music talks about life and mental health so, of course, it must be superior. Artists like Nicki Minaj, Doja Cat, and Beyonce sing about the quote being sexy wearing no clothes, fucking and cheating end quote. While artists like Lana del Rey sing about the quote being embodied, feeling beautiful by being in love, etc.
This aversion to stereotypically feminine things has caused a rift in girlhood. Where girls who didn’t fall into ultra femininity were adopted as one of the boys. She plays football, she doesn’t mind getting dirty, she doesn’t worry about her hair getting wet. She’s coveted because she’s what society considers masculine.
There are exceptions of course there are numerous movies that perpetuate the ugly duckling stereotype where a quote-unquote tomboy has to be transformed into a feminine character to be accepted or loved. There are even high-maintenance ultra-feminine characters who subvert their media stereotypes by being highly intelligent like L Woods. Or as kicking badasses like the Winx Club characters.
Because society views men as mainstream and has an aversion to femininity it’s impossible to categorize women who are intelligent, down to earth, or talented as feminine. Because women apparently can’t be smart, they can’t be humble, they can’t be talented or career-oriented. Only men can do that.
So obviously women who are all these things tend to be not like other girls. And then you have the not like other girls trope that exists for relatability. Characters like Bella Swan or Katniss Everdeen are utterly incapable of performing femininity because they’re so quotably bad at it.
When this trope delves into the territory of relatability it often becomes the Mary Sue trope where the oftentimes female character is given no personality or real passions but is desired by every person with a pulse (or without one if we’re talking Twilight).
This Mary Sue, unlike other girls hybrid, allows for audiences to project their own personalities and quirks onto this blank character and imagine themselves in this new and exciting world. It’s why everyone thinks Tori Vega is bland and relatively talentless. She’s given popularity and countless opportunities despite being kind of boring. But that’s only because she’s supposed to be marketed as the average girl in a relatively wacky school. She’s there for the audience, not really for a storyline.
Influence of the 90s and early 2000s teen movies
So you may be asking yourself now “What is the outcome of all of this?”. Well, the 90s and early 2000s teen movies would like to have a word with you.
The idea of femininity being synonymous with evil feminine characters in the media is more often than not depicted the same way. They’re catty, they’re boy obsessed, they’re fashion-forward and makeup dependent. And sometimes they even become cold-blooded killers.
The movie Jawbreaker deals with the quote duality of the poppy sweetness of the girls of high school and youth. Yet it features dark commentary about the popularity of killer queens and the links people go to remain in power.
Mean Girls, which is probably more well-known and less dark, examines girlhood through the lens of Cady Heron, who is the embodiment of the not like other girls until she transforms into Plastics. In doing so complete with a full makeover, Cady becomes evil it isn’t until she denounces the bubblegum world of Plastics settling into her own calmer version of her popular self that she’s once again viewed as a good person.
When it comes to these sorts of movies, the idea is that feminine short skirts, colorful wardrobes, and an emphasis on hair and makeup make a girl evil. Everyone wanted to be Regina George, but everyone also feared her more often than not; queen persona characters are always shown to be powerful but in a catty, abrasive way.
In the Netflix adaptation of the Winx club, Stella and her mother are perfect examples of what Hollywood thinks of quote-unquote, high-maintenance women. Time and time again the other characters throw words that are intended to be insulted at Stella like princess and barbie. You can tell from her superficial portrayal that the show itself teeters on wanting to and is going to extend to treating her like a bimbo.
These tropes reflect our society’s hatred yet strange fascination with ultra femininity. It reinforces the idea that women who aren’t allowed to be pretty aren’t allowed to take an interest in their appearance and aren’t allowed to be charismatic or a lover of pastels without it being an indicator of their evilness or vapidity.
Tomboys have to be one of the guys instead of being viewed as women who simply have different interests in their girly peers. And ultra-feminine girls have to be rude or dense or transform to be viewed as worthy of audience respect.
Hollywood has a bone to pick with girlhood, with its ultra-feminine and, quite honestly, with most tropes that are afforded to female characters. Unsurprisingly, it all boils down to the usual culprit misogyny. I want a character who’s ultra-feminine and ultra smart at the same time. I want people to stop viewing ultra-feminine outfits as unrealistic or high maintenance. I want girls to be able to be assertive to know what they want and how they want it without them being portrayed as a diva or villain. I want girls to be multifaceted in the media just like they are in real life. I want more and there’s nothing wrong with that no matter what Hollywood would leave you to believe.
