"He controls the whole fashion industry, from cosmetics to underwear. The West, I realized, was the only part of the world where women's fashion is a man's business." (Mernissi,54)
Size 6 written by Fatema Mernissi addresses a very important concept of women's oppression in the Western Culture: size. Mernissi herself is not native to the Western Civilization but is from the Eastern Culture where she lives in Morocco. In her culture men use the veil and space to oppress women which she uses to compare to the oppression in the Western Civilization where time and size are the oppressors used for women. The veil is an article of clothing that is forced upon all women by the police and by space she means that women are kept from the public arena. They do not have a say in anything political. What she means by time in the Western Culture is how only young women are considered beautiful. Women are most beautiful at a younger age, teens through twenties, which causes older mature women to look and dress like the many years younger. Besides freezing time to look young, being thin is also considered a "norm". Size 4 and 6 are the "norms" in America which is where the title Size 6 originates from. In her country there are no sizes. "I come from a country where there is no size for women's clothes....Actually, I don't know what my size is, to tell you the truth."(Mernissi, 53) In a country where everyone and their sister knows their size, where that single number comes up in daily life, a number that everyone is fixated on, could you imagine nobody knowing their size? Not being able to compare to each other to make sure you are just as "thin"? Mernissi walked into a store and in one glance the store clerk knew that her size was not in the store, and she had no problem telling her this. Mernissi felt ugly and lost her self confidence, which is a feeling many American women feel daily. "..beauty in the West can hurt and humiliate a woman as much as the veil does when enforced by the state police in extremist nations such as Iran, Afghanistan, or Saudi Arabia." (Mernissi, 51)
Some may argue yeah but the veil is enforced by police, and in the Western Culture the police do not enforce size. But the thing is "size 6" is enforced, not by police but the media, which so happens to be soley controlled by men. Men control what is publicly seen as "beautiful". They control the images of the flawless skinned, size 6 women that we see everyday and eveywhere. "..the saleslady suddenly gave me an anxious look. 'The norm is everywhere, my dear,' she said. 'It's all over, in the magazines, on television, in the ads. You can't escape it. . . .'" (Mernissi, 52) Creating something that no women can escape sounds just as powerful if not more than the police. The media is something women are exposed to everywhere constantly haunting them. Whether it is a magazine in your bedroom, or a commercial on TV, all the women portrayed in these media devices are not what all women look like, in fact they only represent a small portion of what women look like. Some are not even real, but digitally altered. And these are the women America focuses on as beautiful. This constant reminder that you have to be young and thin in order to be beautiful has the same intention as the veil in the Eastern Culture. They are both tools used against women. "By putting the spotlight on the prepubescent female, the Western man veils the older, more mature woman, wrapping her in shrouds of ugliness. This idea gives me the chills because it tattoos the invisible harem directly onto a woman's skin." (Mernissi, 53)
* I did a mini experiment and typed in beautiful women into google search and this is what I found:
Most all of the images were similar to these three women above. All thin, blonde, and flawless skin. This just proves to show how our society strongly thinks this is what beauty is. Now go to a local public event and tell me how many women you see there that look like this. Not very many. But go into a store and you will find hair dyes, skin creams, and anything you could ask for that will help you look like these women on display. This just goes to show you how the media and our "beauty" products are all focused around the false concept of beauty that objectifies women. The pressure to look like this is everywhere, and if you ask Fatema Mernissi, she is thankful that her culture does not make size 6 a "norm"as the veil currently is.
"I am so happy that the conservative male elite does not know about it. Imagine the fundamentalists switching from the veil to forcing women to fit size 6." (Mernissisi, 56)
Questions: I wonder what it would be like to live in the culture where there was no such thing as size? What would the media look like if women's bodies weren't viewed as objects, and all bodies types big and small, old and young were viewed the same?
I can envision a store with colorful clothing throughout the whole store displayed on mannequins that range in sizes and skin colors. Where you wouldn't walk into a room and see miniature white mannequins sporting the same shirts that only flatter thin people. You would walk into stores that showed variety. Variety in color, size, shape. And if you ask me, everything the same is boring. Variety is where fun happens.
In Size 6 the lady in the store said how size 4 and 6 were the "norm" and how you cannot escape it. In the film Missrepresentation the women who spoke picked apart the media to show how deeply embedded objectifying women's bodies is in our culture. From women politicians to women newscasters there is an evident difference in the way the media portrays and views them. In the film it says how Katie Couric's love intrests are written about in the media. Do you see them writing about any male newscaster's love interest? Didn't think so. The film also shows pictures during campaigns that were taken through Sarah Palin's legs. Did you see any pictures taken through Obama's legs? Didn't think so. The film constantly made its audience think about the differences of how men and women are portrayed in the media as well as how each looked. All ages of men are seen everywhere, but it is mainly only young women that are seen in the media. This is also something Mernissi writes about in Size 6. After getting a closer look to the lady working in the store she realizes they are about the same age, both older women. However the lady in the store made herself appear like a young girl. This shows how strong the media affects how we choose to dress ourselves and Missrepresentation showed exactly how strong the media influences are. They are as strong as the veils being enforced in the Eastern Harem by the police, possibly even worse, Fatema Mernissi would say.
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