[ SECRET POST #4132 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4132 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



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02.
[Jay and Silent Bob]


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03.
[Louisa May Alcott, An Old Fashioned Girl]


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04.
[The Maze Runner, Thomas/Minho]


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05.


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06.
[First Wave (Scifi Channel)]


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07. [SPOILERS for Black Panther]



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08. [WARNING for sexual abuse]

[The Fall Part 2: Unbound]









Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #591.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

NAYRT - I think it was more of a "Ladies, quit pressuring each other to injure yourselves to keep up with the latest fashion" thing. The Rational Dress Movement was mostly focused on tight-lacing and high heels. But, I imagine if you're already upset with society's expectations that girls and women have to physically modify the shapes of their bodies to be successful at femininity, the fashion of punching holes in one's head from which to hang decorations would be one more straw on the camel's back.

[(Anonymous)]

It's sort of that, yes. That's why I said I thought Alcott wasn't wrong. Tight lacing and impractically tight clothing is neither comfortable nor practical. The earring scene, though... you can't really argue that it's injurious to one's health, if done properly and kept clean. The objections Alcott has are that she feels they're silly and vain, and Rose is shamed and ridiculed for choosing to have them done.

“What! what! what!” cried the boys in a chorus, dropping their shovels and knives to gather round Rose, for a guilty clutching at her ears betrayed her, and with a feeble cry of “Ariadne made me!” she hid her head among the pillows like an absurd little ostrich.

“Now she'll go prancing round with bird cages and baskets and carts and pigs, for all I know, in her ears, as the other girls do, and won't she look like a goose?” asked one tormentor, tweaking a curl that strayed out from the cushions.

“I didn't think she'd be so silly,” said Mac, in a tone of disappointment that told Rose she had sunk in the esteem of her wise cousin.

“That Blish girl is a nuisance, and ought not to be allowed to come here with her nonsensical notions,” said the Prince, feeling a strong desire to shake that young person as an angry dog might shake a mischievous kitten.

“How do you like it, uncle?” asked Archie, who, being the head of a family himself, believed in preserving discipline at all costs.

“I am very much surprised; but I see she is a girl, after all, and must have her vanities like all the rest of them,” answered Dr. Alec, with a sigh, as if he had expected to find Rose a sort of angel, above all earthly temptations.

“What shall you do about it, sir?” inquired Geordie, wondering what punishment would be inflicted on a feminine culprit.

“As she is fond of ornaments, perhaps we had better give her a nose-ring also. I have one somewhere that a Fiji belle once wore; I'll look it up,” and, leaving Pokey to Jamie's care, Dr. Alec rose as if to carry out his suggestion in earnest.

“Good! good! We'll do it right away! Here's a gimlet, so you hold her, boys, while I get her dear little nose all ready,” cried Charlie, whisking away the pillow as the other boys danced about the sofa in true Fiji style.

It was a dreadful moment, for Rose could not run away she could only grasp her precious nose with one hand and extend the other, crying distractedly,

“O uncle, save me, save me!”

Of course he saved her; and when she was securely barricaded by his strong arm, she confessed her folly in such humiliation of spirit, that the lads, after a good laugh at her, decided to forgive her and lay all the blame on the tempter, Ariadne. Even Dr. Alec relented so far as to propose two gold rings for the ears instead of one copper one for the nose; a proceeding which proved that if Rose had all the weakness of her sex for jewellery, he had all the inconsistency of his in giving a pretty penitent exactly what she wanted, spite of his better judgment.


Alcott's attitude about earrings comes off as fairly sexist by modern standards. It isn't Rose choosing to wear a piece of jewelry because she thinks it's pretty, it's Rose giving into the inherent weakness of her sex.

[(Anonymous)]

Sure, it's sexist to assume that Rose's feminine weakness led to her decision to get her ears pierced. It's also sexist to tell women that they have to bore holes in their heads and hang baubles from them in order to be fashionable and pretty. Alcott's brand of sexism has fallen out of favor, but the sexist attitude she was responding to is still prevalent today.