Challenging myths about women
Lip Service
By Kate Fillion
Harper Collins. $16.95
Reviewed by Trish Corcoran
As the cover of Lip Service reads, it is about "the myth of female virtue in love, sex and friendship". Canadian feminist author Kate Fillion has taken on the task of debunking the myth that women are more nurturing, kind, caring and sharing than men. This myth has been adopted by a significant number of feminists as well as broader society.
Initially I was disappointed; the first two chapters have very little substance. Fortunately, I turned to the last few pages and found that it was a lot more interesting than it first appeared.
Fillion argues that myths have been used by feminists in a way that has become a block to achieving women's liberation. According to Fillion, feminists have promoted the notion that women's "nature" is morally superior to the "aggressiveness" of men. However, "in real life, men and women step outside of their assigned roles all the time". Because women are told that they are supposed to act in a certain way, taking on "masculine" characteristics only leads to self-denial and/or guilt. Fillion challenges us to discard the old myths that dictate the way we should behave.
Lip Service is very contradictory; I found myself in complete disagreement with one paragraph and then applauding Fillion the next. For example, in attempting to argue against typecasting women in particular roles, Fillion herself typecasts women. "Intimacy appears to be so easy for many female friends ... If only we could have these same sorts of relationships with men, women sometimes sigh." This made some of her arguments unconvincing.
But she also has very clear arguments against biological determinism: "When sex is understood as a purely biological act, it makes good sense to talk about women (or men) as a group because we share certain anatomical similarities. But what we do, when, where, why, with whom, and how we feel about it before, during, and after — biology has very little to do with any of this ... women are different from one another, and so are men ... Even for an individual woman who has only one partner in her lifetime, sexuality is not a fixed trait like height or eye colour."
One of the really useful things about Lip Service is that it demonstrates, on a number of different levels, how the myths are used to keep women oppressed. Fillion uses the example of Andrea Dworkin's stance for the censorship of pornography: "Dworkin's argument is frequently misrepresented in the media as 'the' feminist viewpoint on sex. This is not terribly surprising, because they affirm traditional gender stereotypes: women are weak and defenseless, men are powerful and aggressive. The right wing has enthusiastically endorsed their denunciation of pornography as intrinsically harmful to women."
Fillion goes into quite a lot of detail on the issues of sexual harassment and date rape, raising some very controversial views. While not necessarily agreeing with all of the points that she makes, the extent to which she discusses them is useful.
These issues are part of a broader analysis that Fillion is making: after the sexual revolution of the 1960s and '70s, the terrain has changed. Issues of sexuality facing young women today are very different to those of 30 years ago.
Fillion is right in saying that the sexual revolution has not completely liberated women. The "double standard" is currently not as limiting to women having sex outside of marriage. However, Fillion argues that society has adopted a new sort of double standard: female sexuality is supposedly gentle and romantic, whereas male sexuality is aggressive and genitally oriented. This "fiction" of female moral superiority, according to Fillion, "encourages women to believe they are powerless dupes who lack free will."
Fillion's research consisted of in-depth interviews with 108 North American men and women, as well as reference to many other studies and surveys. Of the 108 people she interviewed, approximately 20 people's lives and experiences were elaborated throughout the chapters.
I found disappointing the limited scope of different sections of society represented; all of the 20 were heterosexual and either university students or in high-paying jobs. There were no factory workers, unemployed or clerks. This in itself taints her understanding of the issues she is addressing.
While there are contradictory arguments and ideas in Lip Service, overall it is a very worthwhile book. Reading it helped me to think about those issues in more detail and come to my own conclusions. More feminist debate around these myths will be a very positive step.