Whose Body Is It, Anyway?

Oprah Winfrey, that icon of women’s power and success, wears shoes so torturously constructed with narrow toe boxes and four-inch heels, that she can barely stand up in them. She laughs about how uncomfortable they are and jokes that they are “her sitting shoes.” She puts them on at the beginning of her show, and then remains seated for as long as possible. Her clothing, while expensive and attractive, looks remarkably uncomfortable. She’s tightly packed in and pushed up, her bountiful breasts presented to the camera like an offering. I can imagine her wiggling out of her girdle the minute she walks off stage.

Like so many women, I’ve loved Oprah for years. I’ve looked to her for entertainment and inspiration. Yet, even Oprah, who is attempting to lead our nation to “enlightenment” through her online courses with Eckhart Tolle and other spiritual leaders, has a need to reshape her body into some perceived ideal. This is the best example I can think of to illustrate the schizophrenic nature of women’s relationships to our bodies.

Perhaps it is Oprah’s insecurity with her body image that I identify with most. Why is it important to Oprah that her legs appear to be longer than they are? Why did I wear high heels until one of my feet was so damaged I had to stop? One day, Oprah is exhorting us to be our authentic selves, and the next, she’s snatching a woman off the street, dying her graying hair, chastising her for not wearing makeup and jacking her boobs up with obscenely expensive brassieres that make taking a deep breath nearly impossible. Breasts should appear youthful and perky, she says.

Of course, we all want to be attractive, but why would Oprah sacrifice comfort in order to appear younger, sexier, taller or thinner than she actually is? Why would she deliberately hobble herself with uncomfortable shoes? She’s Oprah, or just “O,” for heaven’s sake, a woman so powerful and rich that her endorsement of an author, a talk-show shrink or even a presidential candidate can catapult their careers into the stratosphere.

When I was a child, I resisted wearing all clothing until I could no longer get away with it. Around the age of eight, my Aunt Hazel, with a look of exasperation on her face, told me I had to start wearing shirts. I looked down at my chest and saw what she was talking about. Boobs were sprouting. I didn’t think they were such a big deal, but I went along with it. Shortly after that came the first bra. I hated it! It felt like a harness, and I found all kinds of opportunities for “losing” it at sleepovers or at the rec center pool. Eventually, I accepted that I had to wear one.

When I was in the eighth grade, girls were not allowed to wear trousers to school, even on the coldest days. Proper attire was a dress or skirt hemmed a demure two inches below the knees, sheer stockings held up by an awkward and unforgiving contraption called a garter belt, or even worse, a girdle, and low-heeled dress shoes. Recess and gym were no longer offered as part of our curriculum, since our bodies had become too womanly for such activity.

Only a few years later, in the early ’70s, many of my generation had discarded our bras and girdles and were marching in blue jeans, halter tops and mini-skirts to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment for women. (Originally proposed in 1923, it has yet to be passed.) Our dress code had changed radically, along with our politics.

My boss at the time tried to convince me that I was not the type of woman who should go braless. “It’s too obvious,” he said. “I know you’re a nice girl but when you go braless, it makes the men in the office think you’re loose.”

Well, I was finally loose and happy to be that way! His statement infuriated me. I wrote him a poem that ended something like, “It’s my body, as familiar to me as yours is to you. I know every freckle and mole. Who is this God of yours that judges some part of me as evil?” Something like that.

Now looking back all those years ago, I know he was trying to protect me, but I still don’t get it. If I don’t own my body, what do I own? Are my clothing choices important only as a vehicle for displaying my body? It’s as if women are trapped into a perpetual striptease. We’re locked and loaded. What to reveal? A shoulder, an outline of a breast, our navel, a glimpse of leg? To whom should we reveal which parts? Which parts are appropriate for polite company, and which should be reserved for more raucous occasions? Why is it perfectly acceptable for men to go shirtless in public, while women would be arrested for the same behavior? I know the female body is arousing to men, but should that be the most important criteria for determining how we dress?

Girls today have much more freedom to dress as they please. They wear jeans, shorts and sneakers to school. They dress in beautiful, sophisticated prom gowns that my generation would have drooled over. I’m not opposed to dressing up. Dressing up can be fantastic fun. We get to pretend that we’re princesses for an evening and make a choice of style over comfort. But when we feel compelled to dress in clothes and shoes that are torturously uncomfortable in our everyday lives, what does that say about our inner world? I often see young women squeezed miserably into clothes that are too small, teetering along on heels that would render them powerless against an attacker – their need to please poignantly written on their young faces.

Confined, refined, deformed and remade into someone’s fantasy by our choice of clothing, we become caricatures of ourselves. The question is: Can we be comfortable in our clothes and at the same time, feel attractive and happy with the way we look? If a woman as powerful as Oprah cannot stand on her own two ample feet, in comfort, what hope is there for the rest of us?

Janna Zonder is a freelance writer living in Asheville, NC. She has recently completed her fi rst novel, a woman-centered mystery, called One More Crazy Thing. She can be reached at zonders@charter.net.

~Janna Zonder