The earrings Say it all!

This is an old story from years back but for those of you who have attended women conferences and workshops it might trigger a few memories.  For those of you haven't let me introduce you to this hidden world.  You might never feel the same again, be warned!

 

The Earrings Say It All

It is an odd thing that when you get into women’s organisations and conferences, certain unspoken laws become apparent. For instance, as a woman becomes really involved in women’s issues certain things are almost sure to happen. First she will cut her hair and wear less or no make-up. Secondly the high heels will certainly go, as will most of her dresses except long dark coloured tassel-ended skirts. So usually the flat-shoed, shorthaired, trousered female will be the order of the day. This one might think is reasonable. Given the genuine push for equality, is it not perhaps a powerful statement of that principle to visually appear like men. In my experience there is one subtle difference. Although the clothes are darker (bright colours are thought too frivolous) and the look androgynous, there is one article of adornment which perversely grows to immense and ornate structures in these circles: it is the earrings. While every other aspect is low key and understated, this earring phenomenon is blatant in its length, colour and design. I have noticed it through the length and breadth of Ireland and have long contemplated a sociological study of the importance of earrings, perhaps entitled ‘Earrings in the women’s movement’.

The earring phenomena is much too much of a generalisation of course, just as is the cry ‘I am not a feminist’. What on earth is so wrong with being a feminist? Please, please would all those who keep saying they are not one, look up the word in a dictionary and then ask themselves the question, ‘how could they not be one’. Some words have become fashion articles, pasted on when thinking is much too tiring to contemplate.

At a women’s conference in Dublin two years ago, in a workshop of around twenty women, things became quite heated. The discussion had got round to development groups set up by women in under-privileged areas of Dublin city. One of the organisers of the project, a tough looking tattooed lady with a crew-cut hairstyle, was speaking about the progress of her particular group. She said that the development project had caused a lot of unhappiness in the estate. A group of women had been put on a personal self-development course and had enjoyed it immensely. The only drawback had been that at the close of the course they had gone back to the same depressing economic and social environment they had always faced. The feelings of self-worth that had been engendered were demanding change and the environment was just the same as it had always been. These women had been given hope and then sent back into a hopeless situation. She ended her report by commenting that in some ways perhaps they had been wrong to start. The number of women whose marriages were wrecked, who were on sedatives, etc, as a result seemed to highlight major problems in such projects. The well-dressed lady beside me who was representing a Women’s Institute group spoke up ‘But what can one do for these poor women?’ The tattooed lady was on her feet in an instant shouting across the room in an angry voice ‘Who are you calling poor?’ At once the atmosphere in the room became tense and the young facilitator with huge dangling earrings struggled vainly to distract the two women from each other. She tried desperately to convince both women that really it was men who were to blame for everything and how by uniting against them we could ‘find ourselves’. A picture of huge armies of women with flat shoes and huge dangling earrings marching Gestapo-like in their thousands came to my mind. Then into the chaos spoke Vivien. She was a slight woman with short hair died a deep plum crimson. Her voice when she spoke was shaking with emotion. ‘I’ve left my husband and my children and I’ve started a whole new wonderful life. The only person I care about now is me and I’m happy for the first time in my life’. She then collapsed sobbing in a dreadful way onto her chair. The young social worker facilitator was now pulling frantically at her earrings and urging everyone to be ‘positive’, ‘forward looking’ and ‘supportive’ while inwardly probably screaming ‘bloody women’. As her earrings shook in agitation I remembered as a child coming across a picture in a book of an African woman with loads of metal rings around her neck. The note under the picture pointed out that the neck muscles of these women had been stretched so much that if the rings were now removed the women would no longer be able to support the weight of their heads. It seemed so tragic that they should be doomed to wear these wretched metal rings around their necks. Following fast on my awareness of foot binding in some earlier traditions, I was horrified. I asked my dad why they wore these rings around their necks. He looked up from his newspaper and commented that in that particular culture long necks were considered beautiful. A mental connection was made immediately. In China small feet were considered beautiful so people hideously mutilated their girl’s feet. In parts of Africa long necks were considered a thing of beauty so women tortuously stretched their necks. So for the sake of cultural preferences the world over women would gladly mutilate themselves. At that relatively young age, I immediately resolved that whatever the culture or fashion pressures around me I would never put holes in any part of my anatomy, or allow any form of mutilation of my body. That included earrings I’m afraid. As the social worker tried to unite our diverse bunch I suddenly wondered, what forms of emotional and mental mutilation have gone on unnoticed through the centuries? Now that could explain a lot.

On the train back to Belfast from Dublin I shared my compartment with a bunch of male football supporters. That short journey convinced me that whatever has been done to the male of our species is so absolutely dreadful it is beyond analysis.