The 7 Deadly Sins of Being a Woman

So, church today got me thinking about the ways that we gender things like sin, sex, shame, anger, evangelism, and emotional needs. It got me wondering--do churches split men and women into gender specific groups so we can talk about the differing sins that plague each gender? How do we tend to gender certain sins?

Lust

Sex, as we all know, is for men, and thus only men struggle with lust. Women never struggle with their sexual desires. They just want to be loved unconditionally, like that movie "The Vow" (or was it "Pretty Woman"?) No further comment needed here. Moving on.

Gluttony

I don't know about you, but I feel like Los Angeles has this weird relationship to food, eating, diet, and exercise. As a city, we're probably bulimic, anorexic, and addicted to exercise. On a good day. Now, far be it from me to look down upon healthy eating (not my fav) and exercise (not my fav either). But I feel like extreme dieting and exercising are like gluttony's prettier, skinnier cousin. In our culture, things like weight loss and being skinny are heavily geared toward women. There's a lot of shame involved. See also, envy.

Greed

Ah, the gold-digging stereotype--it lives on, it thrives even. Though I suppose now that many women are making more money than their spouses, men will start being objectified only for their good looks and hot bodies. On another level, it seems like women are constantly accused of having unreasonable expectations--of men, of marriage, of sharing housework, of having it all. It's not so much the injunction to "settle" as it is anger that women might have these kinds of expectations in the first place.

Sloth

If anything, Sloth is a guy. A guy who plays XBox all night and works at Dairy Queen. Women are really falling behind on this one. They're going to have to work super hard to even think of achieving parity.

Wrath

Recently, I read an article on Relevant Magazine entitled "When I'm Bad at Being a Woman." The article didn't seem to be about being a woman at all--but rather about anger, disappointment, getting credit for your work, and basing your value in God. As I tried to suggest in the comments, the title betrays the underlying assumption that getting angry makes you a bad woman (Hey kids! Close reading--it's not just for English majors!) I think with women and getting angry, there's always the fear of being the shrew--the B-word. But anger, man oh man is that a real emotion, and if anything, I wish I expressed it (rather than holding it in) more than I do. Because anger is so much better than resentment and bitterness.

Envy

Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Women are notorious for constantly comparing themselves to other women, favorably or unfavorably. Of course, our culture doesn't contribute to this at all. Of course, I'm being sarcastic. Here's the thing about women, especially women at church--they are the nicest, most accepting people EVER. But that envy stuff is real.

The only gender-specificity I can really see here is that men are not under the same pressure to compare their appearance to that of other men. I could be wrong.

Pride

I sometimes think that one of the worst things a woman can be is arrogant (to those that think she's arrogant). I'm not saying men get a free pass on this one, either. There's just this desire to take her down a peg or two. I should know.

I don't think having an ego is all bad--instead, women pretend that they are not competitive, ambitious, or confident in themselves and their abilities. Or women are confident, they just don't express themselves confidently, in fear it will come off as arrogance.

I worry about gender stereotypes in the context of church. Mostly, I worry that women or girls who don't fit into the dominant gender stereotypes (emotional vs. analytical, for example) will feel alienated and as if they are "bad at being a woman."

Dear 15-year-old me,

You are fat.

Just kidding. Sort of. Later on, your family and friends will tell you that you went through a "chubby" phase. Subsequently, you will get a lot of comments along the lines of, "Wow! You've lost weight!" or, "You're skinny now!" Uh...thanks?

This will come as a surprise. No biggie. I'm glad you don't think you're fat. Cause you're not. 

You are pretty. 

Don't act so shocked. Attention from guys will come later, and I know you think you're safe in that baggy black sweatshirt, but it's okay to feel attractive. Dressing in an appealing way is not a betrayal of your identity. Attention is not always a bad thing. You don't have to hide.

Homeschooling is a terrible idea.

You will never get the "normal high school experience." And let's face it, you're not disciplined enough to homeschool yourself. You are, however, extremely stubborn.

Homeschooling is an awesome idea.

Going from Beijing-->World travel-->North Carolina will be one of the toughest transitions of your life. You won't feel like you fit in. At all. You will probably always be ambivalent about NC as a whole. You will probably always feel at least a little bit like an outsider. But, the 6-month period you spend in Beijing your junior year of high school will change your life--an oasis in the desert of adolescence. You will learn how to edit. You will spend the first of many late, lonely nights cutting video. You will love it. God help us all.

You are not a burden.

I don't even know how to begin to convey this to you. You are very independent, and that can be a good thing, but that personality trait is being twisted into something else--something that's not good. You are not on your own. It may feel like that, like you need to be entirely self-sufficient now that your parents are divorced, but that's not the case. Retreating into yourself so as not to impose on anyone is not the way to go. It will only leave you isolated.

You are hurting.

I'm sorry.

You are OK. 

I could tell you all about the messed up way you relate to your family, or how you're judgmental, self-righteous, bitter, and perfectionistic--how you hurt the people you love the most in the most cutting ways possible. But you know what, they forgive you later. You even forgive you. You are OK.

And you know what--I still think "The Outsiders" is a great movie.

Stay gold, kid. 

Sincerely,

Me

Inspiration: http://jezebel.com/5951005/would-your-15+year+old-self-listen-to-you

Dear Sort of Sexist Guy,

Hey there. How's it going? It's me. Yeah. We went to college together. We work together. I think I had a crush on you back in the 8th grade.

You were the one who told me in high school that most guys think that men are better than women--they just don't say it out loud. But you--you were above that kind of cowardice. "Think about it," you said, "Why are the best chefs in the world men?" I still can't argue with your unshakeable logic.

I feel a bit bad for you, Sort of Sexist Guy--the way political correctness has driven your kind underground, for the most part. You can't even post sexy pics of underage girls on facebook anymore without getting some kind of feminist flak. I mean, where's the harm in a little objectification? The sooner girls realize that they are primarily valued for their looks, the better.

I really have to admire your panache, Sort of Sexist Guy. You could be rocking a unibrow and a beer gut, but that doesn't stop you from making condescending comments about a woman's weight or how she's "let herself go."

Of course you "loooooove women." And yeah, you're sort of an a-hole, but in a good way. Cause you're a guy. And guys are a-holes.

At least you're not like Sort of Racist Guy or Sort of Misogynistic Guy. I'm never going to catch you ranting about how feminism has ruined the American dream or how the REAL reason you're such a jerk is that this one girl broke your heart this one time in the second grade...

You're just a little bit of a chauvinist. I get that. Now that I think about it, you're not half bad, Sort of Sexist Guy. Maybe we can hang out some time and you can tell me all about how if I only lost some weight and started reading challenging books, I could really make something of myself.

Well, it's been real. I sort of gotta go do some laundry.

Yours (sort of),
MT

10 Reasons You Should Think Twice About Dating Someone Who Goes to Your Church

DISCLAIMER: Every guy I have ever dated that has gone to the same church has been a perfect gentleman. No complaints or negative experiences here. Also, there [were] only 8 reasons.

Reason #1 - The Awkward

Let's talk about the awkward, shall we? Awkward: He asks you out. You say no. He proceeds to pretend that you have fallen from the face of the earth. Awkward: Your friend dated his friend's roommate's set dresser's bartender's ex-girlfriend's cousin. Awkward: You volunteer together every other Sunday and still have to see each other at church, even if it ends...awkwardly.

Reason #2 - "That Guy"

Let's talk about that guy (there also exists "that girl," I'm sure, but all my experiences have been with that guy. Sorry.) Have you ever heard "No one wants to be that guy"? Well, revise that to "No one wants to date that guy." Harsh, but true. Why? Because he hits on every single single girl at church, which means he's: A) Desperate, B) Has very little dating experience, or C) Desperate and has very little dating experience. It might be poor personal hygiene. It might be the tendency to constantly bring up a struggle with lust during coed group discussions. It might be an inability to take "no" for an answer (At which point that guy becomes "that stalker" and you might have to get a restraining order.) Regardless, that guy will always ask you out, as a rule. Which is, as you already may have guessed, awkward.

Reason #3 - She's Just Not That Into You

This is not, strictly speaking, entirely true. It's just that, if you like them, they probably don't like you, and vice versa. When girls complain that, "No one asks me out," what they really mean is "No one cute (or that I like) has asked me out." I theorize that, realistically, there are one or two girls or guys everyone wants to date. They, in turn, have inexplicably taken a vow of celibacy and/or are holding out for Ryan Gosling. Yes, the guys too.

Reason #4 - Nice Girls Finish Last

You are too nice. If you were raised to be a good Christian guy or girl, you probably aren't completely comfortable saying "no"--just "no"--no qualifications, no "You're a really nice guy, but..." or "I'm really focusing on my acting right now, so..." These things take practice. If you're nice to a guy, he might think you're flirting with him (in fact, he will definitely think you're flirting with him if you don't want him to think you're flirting with him). Now, you're stuck somewhere between a rock and a literalist interpretation of scripture: If you're not nice, you're a bad Christian. If you're too nice, you're a good Christian, but now this guy is stuck to you like a barnacle to a whale's arse no matter how politely you tell him that you're focusing on your walk with the Lord.

Reason #5 - The Prohibition Against Drinking in Church [Communion Wine Excepted]

Just kidding. Sort of. Problem is, Christians take dating way too seriously, and at church, everyone is on their best, church-behavior. Plus, when you're screening every member of the opposite sex for desirable life partner traits, it kind of takes the fun out of dating, or most forms of social interaction for that matter.

Reason #6 - The Sisterhood of the Traveling Gossip Pants

People, they talk. And by people, I mean girls. They talk about guys at church and whether or not it would be a good idea to date them. This leaves, oh let's see, one and a half guys who are acceptable to date. All the single girls at church then hold a gladiatorial contest to determine who gets to sit next to him during Bible study. (Of course, then he goes and says something that could be construed as insensitive and we all take a vow of celibacy and/or continue to hold out for Ryan Gosling.) It's brutal.

Reason #7 - The Insta-Couple

The minute you sit with that guy or girl at church, everyone assumes you are a couple. I'm not sure why this is. Probably because when you look around at church, it's all couples or suicidal single people sitting by themselves. Or with friends. This makes so much sense. Guys I barely know have sought me out at church in order to sit next to me. I guess that's their way of staking their claim. Perhaps there's something about singing "Blessed Be Your Name" next to someone that really clinches whether you should spend the rest of your life with them. Sitting together = practically married, after all.

Reason #8 - The Insta-Wife [Add one heaping tablespoon Jesus and stir]

Church engagements are known for being criminally short. Or maybe it's just my church. Soon after becoming someone's insta-girlfriend or boyfriend you are this close to becoming someone's insta-husband or wife. It's insane. Not to mention scary. What makes it worse is that everyone will be secretly or not-so-secretly judging you for your three-minute-engagement. You dog, you.

Reason #9 - The Temple of the Holy Spirit Market

Think about it for a minute--scoping out your church for dates feels...a little bit icky. "Wow, that was a really great sermon--I really felt like God was speaking to me about---whoa, that guy in the plaid is hott!" Or worse: "She's really cute, I wonder if...OMG! WEDDING RING ALERT!" Treating church like a singles mixer pretty much always leads to feeling like the least spiritual, most shallow person on the face of the earth.

Reason #10 - The Clincher

You might meet someone and fall in love. This reason alone should be enough for you to never think of, or even CONSIDER dating someone who goes to your church. Don't say I didn't warn you.




More on church dating:

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys are All Dented Cans - Introduction
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Misogynist
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Coward
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Racist
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Myth of Persistence 
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - Entitlement

The Burden of Fear

As I walked past the seedy--yet somehow comfortingly familiar--entranceway to the local crack den on my way to church, I couldn't help but think about respect, and its importance in my life.

Yes, I was thinking about the suspect(ly) named Love and Respect Ministries and how as far as I can tell, it's mostly about women learning to respect men, not men learning to love women. As it turns out, I have a theory as to why this is:

Books, conferences, and ministries focused on making marriage better are primarily marketed toward women. And the primary marketing tool at work is fear. Fear of infidelity (his). Fear of a less-than-great marriage. Fear of not being good enough (as a wife, mother).

But the core fear, that coveted, prized, and beloved of advertisers the world over fear--is the fear of abandonment. How do I know this? 'Cause Google tells me so. One of the most persistent, recurring ads I get online warns me: "Why Men Pull Away: 10 Ugly Mistakes Women Make That Ruins [sic] Any Chances Of A Relationship."

[Then there's this Christian book, "What Your Husband Isn't Telling You" by the same author of "Why Men Hate Going to Church." This guy has got this angle on lock. I love the contradictory messages: men are simple and have basic needs (food, sex); men are a mystery, buy this book.]

Christian or secular, it doesn't matter. The fear is the same. The message is the same: If he leaves, it's because of you. You did something wrong.

This plays out on a larger scale as well. Why are men leaving the church (or why don't they attend in the first place)? Women. The feminization of Christianity. The predominance of xx chromosomes. Who's supposed to do something about this "crisis"? Women, particularly if they hope to ever get married to a Christian man.

Seems a bit backwards to me--men aren't stepping up and being men in the church! Who's to blame? Women! The most manly thing we can do is blame someone else (Eve) for our problems.

But, sadly, it seems that this kind of fear, no matter how poorly articulated, sells.

I've been writing about the burdens that women are expected to bear in our culture, and I feel like this is a key burden.

It fits so neatly with a pressing temptation women face: To take on blame for the failure of a relationship. Or I dunno, maybe it's just me.

There's something oddly comforting about taking on the burden of blame, perhaps because it's easier than anger, or perhaps because it turns into something you can control. If I change my behavior, repent, respect, submit, then he won't leave me.

There's the fear too, that men always cheat. That they can't keep it in their pants. It's in their very nature to stray. And this fear too, sells.

And as far as the feminization of church goes...color me confused. I get the part about wanting "adventure to live" and "battle to fight" and such, but I doubt that this translates into "What I really want as a Christian man is to literally go into battle and die for my family/faith/country" or "I could really use a few more disfiguring knife wounds so that everyone will know I'm a real man" or "I want nothing more than to do the back-breaking, manly labor of a lumberjack for the rest of my life" or "I wish that disemboweling scene at the end of Braveheart could happen today."

All this "Men were made for battle" stuff seems to translate into, "Get back, woman! Let the men lead." Am I wrong?

I am not a man. And far be it from me to offer here a definition of masculinity. However, I am a daughter and a sister and a friend, and I'd like to challenge this conception of what it means to be a man.

To return to this article, my favorite article, from the website Love and Respect Now, I think we need men who can honestly and non-defensively talk to their own daughters. I'm not sure what, in the name of Mel Gibson, this has to do with battle, or MMA, or adventure, or knife throwing, or rescuing wenches from dragons, but it seems important to me. And probably way, way more difficult. Is that not true strength?

You Never Marry the Right Job

My dad's a really funny guy. He also gives pretty good advice. I can remember some advice he gave me once, when I was stewing in a post-high-school-what-the-heck-am-I-gonna-do-with-my-life funk:

Just move. Choose a direction, and go in that direction. It's much easier to steer when you're moving.

It was and is still pretty good advice. And I think I'm slightly less anxiety-stricken about the whole "What am I going to be when I grow up?" conundrum.

I can remember posing this question to a handful of college professors my senior year. One of them said, "The more I live life, the more it becomes a question of 'How?' rather than 'What?'" And man, isn't that profound. Another professor said that the movie High Fidelity contained the answer to my question. I've seen the movie High Fidelity, and I still don't know what he's talking about. [If you know, please point me to chapter and verse. Thank you.]

And the more I think about, the more I think that we (naive young persons) tend to view the choice of career as we do the choice of a mate. We believe in "The One."

We believe in that one career, dream, passion that will completely and utterly fulfill us, forever and ever and ever. Find your passion. Follow your dreams. Keep pressing on and don't give up.

Have you read the article, You Never Marry the Right Person? What if you applied this same basic concept to your career?

What if your dream job was occasionally a nightmare? (All y'all filmmakers know exactly what I'm talking about.) What if it required hard work, sacrifice, and doing a bunch of crap you don't wanna do? What if, on some days you can't stand it, and on other days, it outright takes your breath away?

Maybe, just maybe, some people do have "The One"--that one thing they were created to do, that they would wither away without: Einstein and physics, Beethoven and music, Emily Dickinson and poetry...

I know that at times, writing feels less like a hobby and a whole lot more like an identity. I don't just write. I AM a writer. It seems like part of my very being, something I take for granted.

But the more I live and work and write, the less I believe in "The One"--the one job/career/calling that will bring me the fulfillment I think I deserve.

I get a little bit frustrated with people who think that their very identity is tied to a career or artistic endeavor. [You're not an actor, you're a freakin' human being! Your life and identity cannot be encompassed in the word "actor."]

Truth be told, most people are good at more than one thing and find enjoyment in doing more than one thing. For example, I really like my current job. I truly enjoy what I've been learning to do. However, when I think about it as a "career," I freak out.

Can I really see myself doing this for THE NEXT 10 YEARS?!! (They're called commitment issues. Yeah, I know.)

That's the problem with believing in "The One." It breeds panic and a sense of discontent. But there exists the possibility that I only think this way because I have yet to meet the right job/person. Maybe you never meet or find the one, you just meet or find the one that's right for you.

I think we can at least agree that it's possible to marry the WRONG person or job.

And I'm challenged, too, by the words of a friend, from back when I used to work in a warehouse everyday: "You didn't come to LA to pack books into boxes."

Yeah, I didn't. I don't think anyone does, truthfully. No one comes to LA to wait tables either. What then, did I come to LA to do?

This question brings up a mixture of guilt, fear, and avoidance. It's answering this question that asks more of me than I think I can bear.

Love in the Third Grade and How Things Never Change

We're standing, alone, in the middle of a field, just me and the boy that likes me. It's recess. Is there snow on the ground? Maybe. Maybe not. I'm in third grade. I live in Maine. There probably is snow on the ground.

"What do you think?"
"What do I think about what?"
"What do you think about me?"

I pause. What kind of question is that?

"I guess...I'm amused."
"Amused??"

But wait, it gets worse.

"Yeah, amused. Do you need to look it up in the dictionary??"

Emotional confrontations. Never my strong point.

I would say, never corner a girl in the middle of a field during recess and demand to know how she feels about you. But really, isn't that what we all want, to some extent?

Not the recess part necessarily, but the clarity--I've made my feelings clear. Now you can tell me if you feel the same way.

When I was in fourth grade, I moved to China. Do you know what fourth graders think China looks like? Little grass huts, everywhere.

In third grade, I was in the advanced reading and spelling groups. In spelling, we learned words like "vacuum" and "restaurant."

I told a boy I was "amused."

Years later, and not much has changed. What if your entire romantic future is basically laid out for you in the third grade? I don't like people easily. I'm bad at discussing feelings. I'm a bit arrogant about my large vocabulary. I say the wrong things at the wrong time, in the wrong tone of voice. Perhaps, one day, someone will find these qualities endearing.

You know what China looks like? China looks like a big city where I don't speak the language and there are too many cars and too many bicycles. I will learn the language. I will explore the city. I will write back to my fourth grade class and disabuse them of their little grass huts, everywhere. But not yet. For now, China looks like a big city where I am a foreigner and I don't speak the language.

You know what? There was definitely snow on the ground. Definitely. I'm sure of it.