Augmentation and Feminist Cognitive Dissonance

If you look a few posts down, you will see a song by Bikini Kill called "Alien She" which I absolutely adore, and I think speaks to the issue I am about to blog about: Feminist Cognitive Dissonance.

I had a conversation with a friend a few days ago about females augmenting their bodies. He asked "Really, augmentation, from a feminist?" and my answer to that was YES "because while wearing makeup and tight pants and trying to fit into the beauty ideal can be oppressive, it can also be empowering sometimes because we live in a messy world. So yes. Augmentation from a feminist." (That was a summary. My answer was long winded as most of my answers in life are)

This is a satisfactory answer. It's ok. But I have been toying with this idea ever since this conversation. WHY? Why does wearing makeup and tight pants make me feel empowered sometimes and oppressed at other times? I think that is why I appreciated Bikini Kill's song "Alien She." Let's look at the lyrics:

"I want to kill her
But I'm afraid it might kill me
Feminist
Dyke, whore
I'm so pretty. Alien
She wants me to go to the mall
She wants me to put the pretty, pretty red lipstick on
She wants me to be like her"

To me, Kathleen Hanna is singing about what I feel daily. The struggle to feel like a strong, powerful, independent woman, but also feeling an overwhelming urge to be "pretty" and "girly" and "sexy." It's funny because these things are not mutually exclusive.... I can be strong and powerful and pretty. BUT it can be so damn hard because "powerful" often times feels like a rejection of any and all "normal" conventions of beauty, and "pretty" often feels like an embrace of ALL "normal" conventions of beauty and a passive acceptance of being objectified. SIGH. That makes me exhausted! I sometimes feel like there is no room to breathe!

Like I said earlier, I have been toying with this idea of the nature of augmentation, and whether it is empowering, oppressive or both. I felt solidarity with the Bikini Kill song, and have discovered that my quest to be powerful and pretty has left me exhausted. I am extremely long winded by nature (as you can see ^^^) and then I read ONE sentence that summed it up. (Coming from this article, btw)

"Lately, I’ve written a bit on how feminist women are forced to engage in some cognitive dissonance in order to satisfy two conflicting parts of ourselves: The part that wants to dismantle the patriarchy, and the part that must live in it."

THANK YOU article. Thank you. I wish I could write so eloquently. I participate in feminist cognitive dissonance.  (Quick definition of CD:  an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously.)

And THAT is why I find makeup and tight pants empowering sometimes, and oppressive at others. Because my feminism tries to dismantle patriarchy and the beauty ideal, but my reality forces me to live within it.


BLAM. Just figured out some stuff in my head. I don't know what to do about it.... haha, but I feel better understanding why my thoughts are so messy.