Sexualization and Female Power

Power. It's a neutral thing in an of itself, like money or guns.

In cultures where social control is important, there are many warnings regarding power. We are all familiar with absolute power corrupts absolutely. There are warnings against rich men getting into heaven. When we are young, we are told not to break our arm patting ourselves on the back. We are shown the necessity for humility, but very rarely are we shown the effective uses of positive ego in regard to feelings of competence and mastery.

We are shown figures like Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr. as people who were able to stand against power with passive resistance on one hand, and on the other we are shown battle heroes like General MacArthur or Alexander the Great as people who were able to use power in active resistance or conquest.

On a rare instance we are shown women wielding power in a historical framework. Most of the time one has to dig in order to come back with names other than Joan of Arc (who became a saint, but had to get there by way of being burnt at the stake for heresy when she was 19). I'm happy to see more lists of Historical Women (http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/women/notable.htm), believe me I am. But it's our everyday woman that I really want to talk about here.

There are many cautionary tales for women also concerning power. You are warned that if you are powerful or try to become so, bad things can happen (see also, Joan of Arc, or any women in a war zone currently). Unfortunately, women through history have often been kept in place through rape, sexual servitude, marriage, and pregnancy. If you are out of the stage where these items don't apply (you're in the crone phase), you are mostly in line for other torture or death. You can be branded as a witch. You can be called a heretic.

Or, if you live in safer times, you might be afraid of power because it will make you a bitch, or "unattractive," and all of this means you will end up alone and unloved.

I often like to show this to my friends, just to remind them how not very far away we are from certain stereotypes: Women, Know Your Limits!

I use the term "sexualization" of power rather than sexuality because the latter is an organic state of being in which a woman has innate sexuality, whereas sexualization in my mind is the in-organic addition of sexuality to situations where it might not be naturally appropriate in order to make a woman's power more acceptable. My test for this is would the addition of sexuality to power in a man in any specific instance be seen as "weird" or "inappropriate" where it is not seen so when added to the behavior of women?

I often find that if I am just direct and powerful, it can be seen as me trying to be intimidating or trying to usurp power (with the assumption that it isn't mine to begin with). But many people take my use of power better if it is coupled with a softening of my words and general demeanor and if I add the element of sexuality to my bearing, I am much more well received.

One might postulate that if I am sexual, I am a known element, and also available for sex/sexual interaction, and in the end, controllable. It becomes odd though when this reaction happens in regard to the response from heterosexual woman.

Why is my power more acceptable to women if I am clearly feminine, wearing makeup and clothing that is specifically feminine, and am soft in my approach? However, I can't get too sexualized, because women will assume I am slutty and only got my power from screwing my way to the top, as it were. If I am too manly, I am accused of being butch, or trying to be a man (which is less palatable to both men and woman).

What I am getting at with this is in a modern context, I must be sexual in just the right amounts and kinds for people to not be uncomfortable with my power. And it's important for me to hit that mark, because if I don't, I run the risk of being made to "pay" for my hubris by having power either stripped from me if I am in a volatile power position, or having my power undermined by those I am interacting with, even if they don't realize that is what they are doing. The answer is just, "I felt more comfortable with the other person" and that is enough...

We can always say screw the world, I am going to be sexual and powerful in the ways I want to as organically as possible. Which I think is an excellent idea. But I also know that there are penalties if how I am does not conform to the expectations of the culture at large.

I don't want to say that men do not have lines they need to walk if they seek or have power. All I'm saying is that in a general cultural and historical context, the stakes are not as grave if they should fail.

To bring this back to the personal, I struggle with some of the fear of what will happen if I am powerful. The reminder that the world needs more powerful people who fall on the "fighting for good" side of things is one of the elements which pushes me onward.

A number of women in Hollywood feel like it's a crusade to get more women in the rank and file and in higher positions in the industry. They go about it by showing how many women are not working at the tops of the profession and having special incentives for using women on projects. However, I feel this sort of thinking is sometimes counterproductive.

Because we "firmly" believe that we are being held back/down and purposefully underrepresented, we entrench that belief in the ether. We cannot underestimate the power of belief to affect things in a thousand subtle, nuanced ways.

We also may come across to males in our field as the whiny little sister who wants to play but is being told no, instead of equal adults. Or we offend the men who are our allies and like working with us because they feel like "men" are being held as responsible for something they have little control over. And we also may not be as qualified for a job as a man in our field, but we get the job in the name of equity. And some of the men really are tired of the women who do use their sex and sexuality to get jobs they aren't qualified for in the first place. These are valid complaints that we need to recognize.

I think rather than mandates or force from the outside, the change has to be organic in us first. I think we have to feel worthy of our power and our sexuality and not afraid of it or of wielding it. I think we have to focus on our excellence and then not be afraid to show it. I think we need to stop softening ourselves if that is not the way we are intrinsically. And I think we need to stop using our sexuality in ways that legitimize or make acceptable our power.

I think it is going to take us being unafraid of what might happen if we are truly powerful. We need to come to that place internally and externally. And we DO need men to help us in building a world where we have nothing to be afraid of.

It's hard when we're fighting the proof of history and culture and politics... but I can feel the way the power in me wants to rise, and I am beginning to welcome it.