Pessimistic Politics: The... Pookie Monologues

Yep, I was at a student presentation of The Vagina Monologues, dragged there by my loving girlfriend, who was herself forced to go see it for a women’s studies class. You may have heard of this play, created by Eve Ensler and performed worldwide. The play has gathered notoriety over the years for its unashamed view of the female anatomy and frankness about rape and lesbianism. If I had to summarize the intent of the play, at least what I got from it, it would be to celebrate women and their vaginas, and go against the flow of male oppression that, in many ways, exists to this day.

I was apprehensive about going at first, believing it was going to be one big rally for the National Anti-Men Group (NAG) While men were definitely downplayed in this play, it wasn’t completely anti-male, and I couldn’t help but feel like Ensler had a point. Or rather, it’s the fault of centuries of patriarchal egotism that necessitated the creation of performances like this, so you could say that men in general are getting their comeuppance.

That’s not to say that I took away anything particularly useful from the play, which reminded me that, with enough creative thought and inspiration, you can create poetry, or a reasonable imitation, about absolutely anything. The entire affair came off as one big grrl power trip, existing in a world where men are insatiable horny bastards who want nothing but sex, no matter what. This is a gross misrepresentation of men the world over. We also like beer and physical activities that are loud and/or break stuff.

What I did take away from this play is a realization that society is seriously messed up when it comes to equality between anything, particularly genders. As I pointed out in a previous article, men have been treating women as second class citizens for centuries, and now that we have this notion of equality in our heads, we tend to treat any potential PC brouhahas with no small amount of paranoia, essentially elevating women to a protected status instead of sitting them equally with men. This may seem better than the alternative, but by lifting women above men, we’re creating a lot of hostilities, which are not a good thing when male egos are involved.

We still practice double standards, even encouraging them through our personal beliefs. If you review the title and opening paragraph of this article, you’ll see a prime example. In America, we pretty much throw the male anatomy around all over the place, with penis jokes being the norm. Men are very comfortable with getting their wangs out there in public view. While phallic symbols and jokes offend people, it’s not on a deep, spiritual level, even when referencing the most brutal of events. Case in point: we’re still making Lorena Bobbitt jokes.

This isn’t so with the vagina, which has been elevated from reproductive organ (or, to be more accurate, a port) to liberating feminist symbol or extreme religious no-no. Whether it’s the hardcore womyns’ liberationist or the casual girl-got-‘tude gal, the vagina has become a distinguishing mark, separating women from everything else in the world, which, if you’ve been following, means men. Anatomically, this is true, but if you factor in our universal level of stupidity, it’ll take more than superior genitals to save us.

In the mainstream, the vagina is something that nobody talks about. The very mentioning of the word brings even the most brutish to a blush, even those who sling around the term “penis” on a regular basis. If we absolutely have to talk about vaginas, we use a variety of euphemisms, some of which are more embarrassing than the word they’re trying to cover up. I’m not exactly taken with fits of lust with the idea of being involved with something called a “fish taco.”

This brings up the point about how women are expected to treat their vaginas, and, by that extension, their sexuality. While religions have done a good job shaming sexual practices on both teams, men have been almost completely absolved from these shackles over the last few decades. Now, men are pretty much expected to check out women, buy porno, wank off in the shower, and screw around with as many women as possible. While these activities aren’t completely free of retribution, men are pretty much allowed to do whatever stupid thing they feel like, especially if they don’t get caught.

Women, however, are still told to keep a lid on their sexual urges, despite the hidden wishes of both parties involved. A woman who express sexual desire run the risk of being labeled a slut, skank, whore, or whatever term suits your fancy, even if that sexual desire pales in comparison to a man’s libido. Don’t even get me started about women taking sexual pleasure into their own hands. Despite the massive quantity of self-pleasuring devices (not that I would know personally…), the idea of a woman get herself off is considered a taboo. Who hasn’t gawked at those movies where the characters discover a dildo in a woman’s underwear drawer?

The play also brought up some points about sex that I, being a guy, could never hope to understand. For instance, some women claim that they’ve never seen their vaginas before. These are grown, adult women here. As a guy, this confuses me more than a season of Lost broadcasted in Latin. I mean, guys have their penises dangling right out their in front of them, goading them for attention. The idea that women don’t even see their genitals is impossible to believe.

But if the male population would stop thinking in terms of their wang-doodles, this statement makes some sense. If you consider the positioning, it’s not like a woman has a huge chance of catching a glimpse of themselves. She would have to manually go in for a look, and a mirror is required for a good, long gander. And if women are constantly told not to have anything to do with their vaginas, they’re probably not going to make the trip.

Another oddity of female sexuality is the number of women who have never experienced orgasm. While this is a swiftly dying breed, there are still elderly women who never had the experience. For men, this is the whole point of sex. If there isn’t an orgasm at the end of the tunnel, there’s really not much reason to go down there. However, women don’t always require them, and it’s not necessary to get pregnant, so the female orgasm is built exclusively for pleasure. In the context, the orgasm-less lifestyle seems to be more plausible, considering women have been told, and are still being told, that sexual pleasure is bad.

Even though the vagina is considered by some to be a symbol of liberation, having one doesn’t always put women in a good position, especially when people (read: men) mistreat or abuse it. There was a story about a man who would have sex with other women because his wife wouldn’t shave down there. There was another story about women during wartime being raped by evil soldiers (probably Nazis; they’re responsible for everything bad, including wood splinters and head colds), who resort to using bottles, brooms, and whatever else they could get their hands on. And you wonder why women are sensitive.

This is something men can’t understand. If (and this is a big “if,” though it does happen) a man gets raped by a woman, there’s some consolation that his organs are on the outside, so the mental symbolism isn’t so harsh (not to make light of it). Rape on women, however, carries with it not only the physical and mental scars, but an unjust reminder that socially, there is a vague sense that women are inferior, and rape hits home that point all the harder. There’s also the sense of being invaded, having something pushed into their bodies that they don’t want in there.

It might seem like I would walk away feeling sorry for women, but nothing could be further from the truth. I also don’t have respect for men who lord over women because history and religion tell them that’s the way to go. I firmly believe that every gender has its own quirks; we’re all idiots, regardless of organs.

The reason I’m not totally into women’s liberation is that it separates us as a species. This phenomenon can be seen in other “groups,” where people of different ethnical, national, and religious alliances form neat little clubs that tell everyone how great they are. The “minority” clubs (referring to power minority, even if there are a great number of members) in turn exonerate themselves from the oppression of the mainstream (white, rich, hetrosexual Christian males) and fix themselves on a pedestal. While the original goal was supposed to be equality, the way the mainstream skittishly treats the minority clubs with kid gloves makes equality impossible.

Women are no exception to the minority club principle. I wrote a recent article about domestic abuse that reflects the double-standards that women expect to be upheld, while demanding equal rights, essentially having their cake and eating it too, then throwing it in the face of the chef because it wasn’t good enough. While I’m all for individual expression, I’m not for the idea what any group is better than the other. Frankly, I think we could do away with associations and just be people, but I think I’m asking too much.

Speaking of double standards, I honestly found the emancipation and proclamation of the vagina obnoxious, to say they least. I mean, come on, it’s an organ, not a philosophical breakthrough or symbol of liberation. It’s an organ that you happen to have. Don’t treat it like a divine entity, treat it like a part of your body.

Yet The Vagina Monologues largely consists of pookie poetry that makes the vagina out to be some wonderful mystery that’s the best thing in the world, outweighing God himself (maybe that’s why Christians have been oppressing women for years). Some of this stuff is so melodramatic, especially stacked up against the subject matter, that it’s almost laughable.

Yet, as a writer, I don’t want to stifle poetic creativity, but I can’t help but think that a similar poem based on the wonders of the penis would be regarded as more idiotic than an oil tycoon in the Whitehouse. Still, I’ve decided to fill the gap and write a poem praising the majesty of the male member. And if you think it sounds ridiculous, you’ve never seen The Vagina Monologues.

Of course, men are as much to blame for the play’s existence as the author. I can’t begin to imagine at what point in human history men got it into their heads that they were better than women. Maybe it’s because men are physically stronger and go out for on the hunts, while women stay in the cave and have babies. Both seem to important roles in the game of human survival, but the men got it into their heads that they were better because they were killing mastodons with sticks, whereas the women just grew children inside their bodies, beings larger than a football, and then had to pass them out an opening the size of a garden hose. The lazy wimps.

Regardless of how it started, men still have this vague feeling of dominion over women. All too many men constantly troll bars and clubs, looking for women to take home for the night, thus asserting their dominance and spreading their seed. Women are still being paid less than men in some jobs. We’re still extremely squeamish about electing a woman as President. Good luck ever seeing a female pope.

I blame religion for this. My guess is after people started forming villages and agriculture, the manliness of men started to fall into decline, because, let’s face it, how manly do you have to be to stare down the furious gaze of a turnip? At this point, women were suddenly gaining more importance, because they were just as capable of producing food as men, and every so often, like magic, they would swell up and a child would pop out. Men never made the connection between sex and pregnancy, because they were, and in some cases, still are, completely clueless. The women probably figured it out, but weren’t willing to let on and risk destroying their mystique.

As a result, the concept of goddesses was born, beings that gave birth to the world, the sun, and TV, all out of thin air. And since women were basically doing the same thing, they must be greater than men! The men eventually figured out how the pregnancy thing worked, but by then it was too late. Women were in control.

The men, being men, didn’t like this, and they were looking for a way out of it. So they invented God. God was, despite insistence that he has no gender, a man, and He created the world, and He created the sun, and He created TV. Most of all, He created the first woman from the spare parts of the first Man. And let us not forget that it was the first woman that was stupid enough to be tempted into eating the Fruit of Wisdom and gave the fruit to the first Man, so it’s every woman in the world that is responsible for the rest of us going to Hell. Pretty sweet deal. For Men.

That’s probably why men have seen themselves as the dominant sex all this time. Even if they don’t buy into Judeo-Christian views, being on top still sounds good to them. And that’s where some of us still are, regarding women as second-class citizens who are allowed as many rights as we give them, and exist as either notches on our belts or servants.

So we either have those who wish to dominate women, and those who absolve women of all wrongdoing because they’ve been treated so poorly for millennia. Frankly, I think both sides are a crock of crap. What’s wrong with treating both sexes as (gasp!) human beings, with all of the rights, privileges, and disadvantages entitled thereto? I don’t see why this is so difficult. Sure, everyone is different, so true equality is logically impossible, but that doesn’t mean we have to think less of which other because we have a different set of organs.

That’s what I got out of my experience with The Vagina Monologues: a reminder that we still have a ways in the elusive quest for equality. While I would love to see this happen, I know it won't, but that doesn’t mean we can’t treat each other with respect. That, I think, is what counts.