‘All truly beautiful things are a mixture of masculine and feminine.’ So said the late Susan Sontag. And she would know.
I’ve only just read a recent profile of the transexy Serbian model Andrej Pejic in The New Yorker called, with only a soupçon of hyperbole, ‘The Prettiest Boy in the World’.
Pejic, who sometimes models women’s fashion, sometimes men’s (though guess which gets more attention), is the chap memorably described by US FHM in a widely-reported hissy fit as a ‘thing’ that prompts them to ‘pass the sick bucket’ — despite his popularity with their own readers. And more recently as a ‘creature’ and ‘a fake’ and symbol of ‘abject misogyny’ by outraged female columnists citing him as the ‘final proof’ that they were right all along, that high fashion is run by an evil gay paedo conspiracy against women that wants to do away with ladies altogether and replace them with ‘young boys’.
Though perhaps the outraged feminists of both left and right should welcome Pejic with garlands since he means that women can finally opt out of the fatal gay embrace of high fashion altogether and leave the gays and their Ganymedes to it.…
Whatever Pejic does or doesn’t symbolise about the world of high fashion it seems to me that he and the scandale surrounding him definitely, dramatically personifies something that is going on in the wider culture that feminists, along with everyone else, are often far less keen to notice (though not the anti-feminist blogger Quiet Riot Girl).
The way that in the last couple of decades the male body has become ‘objectified’ in mainstream media as much as the female variety. The way that ‘beauty’ and ‘prettiness’ is no longer the sole preserve of women. The way that glossy magazines with men’s airbrushed tits on the cover have become the most popular kind — with men. (Which lends a special irony to the banning of a mag that featured a topless Pejic on the cover by Barnes & Noble — they knew Pejic is male, and don’t ban topless males, only females, but were worried the image ‘might confuse their customers’.)
And the way that colours, clothes, accessories, products, practises and desires previously thought ‘feminine’ have been greedily taken up by men – and often relabelled ‘manly’ in a way that only succeeds in unwittingly satirising the very concept of ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’, ‘man’ and ‘woman’.
The way, in other words, that gender is undressing itself. Or at least, teasing us with an elbow-length glove or two and an unhooked bra-strap.
In the NYT profile ‘It’, alias Pejic says he’s largely indifferent to gender. For him, it isn’t about being a ‘woman’ or a ‘man’ it’s about being true to his own tastes, to himself. Though he seems to have few illusions about how he is being used and possibly exploited by the fashion industry:
“It’s not like, ‘Okay, today I want to look like a man, or today I want to look like a woman,’ ” he says. “I want to look like me. It just so happens that some of the things I like are feminine.”
“I know people want me to sort of defend myself, to sit here and be like, ‘I’m a boy, but I wear makeup sometimes.’ But, you know, to me, it doesn’t really matter. I don’t really have that sort of strong gender identity—I identify as what I am. The fact that people are using it for creative or marketing purposes, it’s just kind of like having a skill and using it to earn money.”
I identify as what I am.
How very dare he! No wonder people rush to call him ‘it’ and ‘thing’.…
Pejic has been described, usually derisively, as a ‘gender bender’. Which is interesting because, while I’ve not seen it pointed out, there does seem to be some visual and and philosophical parallels with the ‘gender bender’ of my youth, the preternaturally beautiful Brit popster Marilyn, alias Peter Robinson. Who was, for a few moments in the early 80s the prettiest boy — or girl — in the world.
Marilyn, 1980s
A Bowie fan with an obsession with a dead blonde American actress, Marilyn became the king-queen of the Blitz Set, famously describing himself as “Tarzan and Jane rolled into one” – in addition to the 1960s Hollywood starlet (dread-locked) glamour, he sported impressive shoulders which would have made it rather difficult for him to model women’s fashion, or most men’s high fashion for that matter.
Marilyn denied wanting to change sex, or being a transvestite, he just knew what he liked — and used words that sound very similar to Pejic’s today:
“I’ve never taken much notice of gender. How you can take the same bit of cloth and cut it one way and it’s ‘for men’ and another way and it’s ‘for women’? If it looks nice I’m gonna wear it!”
A favourite target of the Brit tabloids, who seemed to get sexually aroused by the phrase ‘gender bender’, using it repeatedly, his pop career was a perfect, orgasmic explosion that was over before it began — after an infamously sultry appearance on Top of The Pops in 1984, promoting his second single ‘Cry and be Free’. Giving good pouty face and flashing his muscular arms in a glittery top Madonna would have hesitated to wear, a nation gasped and the single sank without a trace.
The 1980s hastily decided it wasn’t ready for Marilyn or real gender bending, or indeed sex — Marilyn’s whole persona shouted SEX!!!! — and instead opted for the safe, Mumsy charm of his Blitz Club chum and kabuki pale imitator Boy George, who didn’t really bend gender so much as tickle its tummy a bit. And make it a nice cup of tea.
Nearly thirty years on, despite Pejic’s unpopularity with some feminists and the closet-cases who write for US FHM, 1980s Marilyn and his shameless, shining desire to be desired looks more like a glamorous prophet, preparing the way for the Metrosexy 21st Century.
POSTSCRIPT 14/09/11
Justin Bieber likes to wear women’s jeans:
“I’ve worn women’s jeans before because they fit me. It’s not a trend; it’s just, whatever works, works.”…
Bieber was responding to a question about Kanye West’s decision to wear a women’s sweater. “It wasn’t (so he’d) look like a woman in a sweater; it was just a regular sweater that happened to be a woman’s.”
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Mark,
You may be right about Dead or Alive. I loved and still love ‘You Spin Me Round’ Throwaway was too strong a word to use for that one, definitely. I was thinking about the other tracks which didn’t stack up. You are right about the impact of AIDS on culture, certainly.
I had completely forgotten about Marilyn until I read this post. Made me nostalgic for my London club days. I wonder what she’s doing now.
Thanks HH and QRG for another fascinating below-the-line discussion much more thoughtful than my original post. But I’m not going to join in, coz I’m afraid I’ll be found out.… Except to point out what should be obvious: that I described the columnists complaining about gay misogynist conspiracy in fashion as ‘female columnists’ because a) That’s who was complaining (not any male columnists that I’m aware of) and is anyway part of their job description (Platell’s rant appeared in the ‘Femail’ section of The Mail newspaper) and b) because I’m not really sure, and don’t really care, whether Platell or The Observer woman call themselves feminists or not.
Oh Tarzie: Yes, Pete Burns was another interesting case. Though there was a (Scouse docker) hardness there to his persona that wasn’t really there with Marilyn, despite those shoulders. He was more punk in his presentation (until he got going on the plastic surgery). His biggest (and last) hit by far, released in 1984, ‘You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)’ was and still is a tremendous dance track, produced by the ‘Hit Factory’ of Scott Aiken & Waterman (easily the best thing they ever did).
I think that single became such a smash almost in spite of Pete Burns’ ‘gender bender’ appearance, unfortunately. The backlash had already begun in earnest by 84–85.
And it had a lot to do with AIDS — or ‘The Gay Plague’ as the tabloids called it. The AIDS Terror really got underway in the mid-80s and rolled back most of the changes that the late 70s early 80s had ushered in. There really was a sense of ‘the gays’ have Gone Too Far. And many of their fellow travellers/camp followers ran for cover.
(note: I’m gonna use she and her for Marilyn, even because I can’t be bothered to futz)
I lived in London around the time of Marilyn and remember being sort of star struck when I saw her at Heaven (as a patron). She was a beauty. It seemed that at that time a new kind of person was emerging, since, with a body that was way more buff than most queer brits at the time, she sure wasn’t trying to look like a girl, though certainly she looked more like a girl than a guy.
I think you’re onto something about how her sexiness may have undermined her. Still, around the same time, I recall Pete Burns — before he morphed into whatever the hell you’d call him now — and I thought he was both very androgynous and very sexual. Dead or Alive had some huge hits, but they had a clubby, throwaway sound that clearly wasn’t going to last. I mean, isn’t some of this explained with matters as prosaic as song-writing and management? Was not a huge fan of Culture Club, but it seems to me there was a finesse and depth to their act that made it more durable and also more appealing to a wide audience. In this video at least, Marilyn seems to be going for the same kind of sound, and people might have just thought she was a knock-off.
I love androginy since I was a teen (long time ago…) and I had a terrible crush on David Sylvian, who happened to be as blond and delicate and beatiful as Andrej. So what’s the problem? They are beatiful (well, David not as before now, he’s an adult man near middle age and his aetherial beauty vanish with his years), I thank gods for them sharing their beauty with me.
PaulQ: Yes, Bowie’s ‘Boys Keep Swinging’ was there before Marilyn. But Maz — as his friends call him — did look better as a Hollywood icon. (I wonder whether though if there wasn’t something more Rita Hayworth about him than Marilyn.)
I like a good zinger too, HH! I also hate feminism with the zealous passion only a convert (to anti-feminism) can achieve. But sometimes the demonisation of feminism equates to the demonisation of women. And that is what I am wary of.
By the way, I have just read the introduction to Male Impersonators. I read the book without the intro and adored it.
But it did seem quite ‘feminist friendly’ as if the young Mark Simpson was not as anti-feminist as his older manifestation.
And the introduction confirms that. I won’t quote it but Mark wrote about his belief that gay men and the ‘women’s movement’ had some shared aims that should be developed and encouraged.
I was a feminist back in 1994, too. I expect being ‘anti-feminist’ in those days would have been even harder than it is now, especially if you wanted to publish a book about men.
It’s interesting though, I would love to know how Mark’s anti-feminist ‘journey’ panned out. He knows about mine, it’s scribbled all over his walls.
QRG, you’re right to pull me up on generalisations. Demonising feminism is both wrong, and not my intention.
The temptation of a good zinger overcomes me sometimes, though.
I have thought about it, a lot, HH, and I don’t think ‘gay men’ are model sexual citizens because ‘gay men’ are not a homogenous group of people, however much the gayists want them to be.
‘Gay men’ are just men who have decided to set themselves apart and make themselves special, because of their love of dick. Big wow. All men love dick.
At least bisexual and heterosexual and (some) transexual men also love women.
HH–
Mark’s writings on metrosexuality have pretty well been ignored by feminists. Either ignored or somehow bastardised and ‘watered down’ and stolen (with no credit given to him) by one or two very sly feminist women (Susan Bordo and Susan Faludi, who happen to be mates, I am looking at you, ladies).
BUT Mark’s writings on metrosexuality have also been ignored by gay men. Or, again, in one or two sly cases, bastardised and watered down and stolen (Eric Anderson I am looking at you).
The fact that Mark’s writings on metrosexuality are currently getting up the noses of both feminists and gays, is down to QRG. And both the feminists and the gays blame the messenger.
I am not prepared to single out feminists as the main group of people who can’t handle metrosexuality. I don’t think Mark does single them out either. But maybe this piece has enabled a targeting of ‘feminism’ as ‘the enemy’ when it is not that simple.
QRG, the Rabbit White article is intriguing (and so are your comments on it).
My observation: Many enlightened women despise the fashion establishment, and all that it represents. But they just can’t let go. It would be tempting to argue that there is a gender essence afoot here.
Forgive me for being a bit relaxed about gender essentialism. I’m quite willing to countenance it. To me, the true test of our humanity is in how we respond to our essence. A truly moral person who acknowledges it and overcomes it if need be, in the name of something bigger; compassion, morality, justice, the right to pleasure.
Challenging our instincts (be they biologically hard wired or culturally instilled) is what makes us human, no? Only humans, unique amongst animals, have managed to do so.
But that’s a bigger discussion, right?
“There is an intimate relationship between gay men, and women. The fact they also hate each other just makes it more intimate.”
Yes…and what a can of worms THAT is. Logically, feminism and what we quaintly used to call gay lib ought to be bedfellows. But so much gay culture is an affront to mainstream feminism.
Sexual objectification, for one.
This is where Mark’s writings on Metrosexuality really hit a feminist nerve, I notice. If sexual objectification is a tool to maintain gender inequality, then men wanting to be objectified is an outrage. And it pulls the rug out from under the argument.
One of the great things about gay men is our simultaneous ability to acknowledge that we are both flesh-and-blood human beings and sexual objects at the same time. We can admire the beauty of the buff gym bunny and get down-and-dirty with the bloke next door. Gay men have catholic tastes, if you’ll pardon the expression.
I’d like to take a gender-studies type to Bearapalooza and ask for a semiotic decode.
Men have both souls and dicks. They serve different purposes, true. But in my experience, gay men find both sexy in their own ways.
We’re model sexual citizens, when you think about it.
Actually, Miss Jay on America’s Next Top Model is a pretty classy gender bender.
If you look at TV fashion/lifestyle shows they are full of gay men:
Gok Wan
Queer Eye for the Straight Guy
Sex in the city (written by gay men with gay fashionistas in as characters)
Runway (full of gay designers)
America’s Next Top Model (G.A.Y)
There is an intimate relationship between gay men, and women. The fact they also hate each other just makes it more intimate.
As for when the feminist ‘movement’ began, it is a kind of myth that there even is a proper feminist ‘movement’. You can go as far back as you want in history and you will find gender conflict and campaigning at some level. Our sense of ‘history’ and political movements is very modern. I hope women have been kicking ass since the beginning of Time.
But yes, ‘feminism’ is riddled with class issues. So is ‘gayism’. Both ideologies are pernicious. And very much connected to each other.
‘I don’t see gay men as being anything more than facilitators.’ — ORLY?
Well I do, PaulQ. Gay men in fashion are part of Gay men’s mission to fetishise the ‘feminine’ as something they are ‘experts’ in, but something that they are also NOT.
Don’t get me started!
How many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb?
THAT’S NOT FUNNY!
Mark, a semantic point: the Feminist movement began as a fatwah against ladies. The enemy was ladies like philanthropist Brooke Astor in one of her trademark Channel suits — which she wore to a homeless shelter when she served Thanksgiving Dinner at the age of 90. “They’d wear their best clothes if they came to my house. Why shouldn’t I where mine when I come to theirs?” But then “class” has been expunged from the feminist lexicon, as well as philANTHROpy.
There was time when a lady never left the house without a hat and gloves. And gentlemen wore hats. I wish those times would return. It was as if gentility was an insult to ‘gender’.
I wonder what Mlle. Platell thinks of Marlene Dietrich in a tux?
She’s just jealous she couldn’t pull it off herself: the fashion industry exists because women dress for other women. I don’t see gay men as being anything more than facilitators. The measure is one created by women: they long to be Pejic not because he is a man but because he carries couture so well.
Before Marilyn, there was the “Boys Keep Swinging” video.
This is interesting, especially the historical stuff, on fashion and feminism, by Rachel Rabbit White.
She is feminist-identified so I think she is trying to reconcile feminism with fashion here. But I speak up for metrosexuality, Mark Simpson, Pejic and men, in the comments:
http://rachelrabbitwhite.com/is-fashion-feminist-the-dialogue-between-the-two/#comments
What I mean is — ‘masculine beauty’, aka ‘masculine feminine’ is not an oxymoron, so much as, as Mark says in this piece, a questioning of what ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ mean. Which, whether whether men or women want it to be or not, is revolutionary.
re: masculine beauty as oxymoron. Well I know what you mean, HH.
But I’d say rather that the concept of ‘beauty’ and its performance is very much tied to the ‘feminine’ in our culture. Like you say it has been established as such over centuries.
So saying ‘masculine beauty’ is a bit like saying ‘masculine feminine’.
And there we have it again. The thing that people fear about men’s desire to be desired, is that it necessitates an embracing of the ‘feminine’.
The term ‘male grooming’ pretends that men can be desirable without becoming ‘feminine’ but they can’t.
And Pejic celebrates that fact beautifully.
QRG,
I’m 100% with you when you challenge me to include “masculine” as a word whose definition and usefulness must be questioned.
I’ve still got my gender studies training wheels on, so please let me just think out loud again for a minute, QRG.
Platell’s argument seems to be that male fashionista are redefining feminine beauty to look more masculine.
And real flesh-and-blood females should resist the unreasonable demand that they must become more manly (or, at least, boyish) to be considered beautiful.
My feelings respond in many different ways to this.
First, the clothes fashionistas design for men ain’t exactly easy for those of us with a “masculine” figure to wear. High fashion is friendly to neither bust nor balls, bosom nor beer belly. Try to get a decent deltoid into a designer tux. Or to be a skinny teenage male trying to get a suit off the rack for a job interview.
When Karl Lagerfeld wanted to dress in catwalk menswear by Hedi Slimane, he famously lost 13 kilos to do it. A man in his seventies, no less.
Yes, fashion both reflects and creates the sexual politics of its day, but no more than any other cultural enterprise.
Why object to Pejic, and not, say, the androgyny of hipster chic?
Is the fashion world any more hostile to women than, say, an engineering faculty?
Why can those who fight gender discrimination attack the engineering faculty with a cool head, and not the fashion industry?
I’ll stick my neck out and venture a hypothesis. (You and Mark may have discussed such an argument, or dismissed it, in your writings already. If so, a thousand pardons.)
Is “masculine beauty” an oxymoron? Yes, and no.
“Handsome” men are admired, their good fortune coveted, and from time to time, they sexually arouse those with a taste for them.
But to be the object of desire rather than simple admiration has been the province of beauty, and thereby of femininity, for centuries.
Desire gives a certain measure of power to the desired. Tough for the beautiful to concede it to the opposite gender, one which already enjoys (putatively) an unfair measure of power.
But men, bless us, want it all. Women have shown us the joy of being beautiful, for the sheer pleasure of it. If it’s “feminine”, who cares? Let a thousand flowers bloom.
Sorry to get all Reinhold Niebuhr on yo’ ass, but everything contains its opposite, in a yin-yang sense. If beauty is feminine, then it is also masculine–how does masculine “beauty” express itself? What is a “masculine” way to be desired, rather than to do the desiring, the pursuing? (If indeed, the pursuit, the hunt, is inherently “masculine”.)
As long as the Jersey Shore boys are buffoons, then it’s OK for them to self-consciously court admiration for their bodies. But when a male makes a decent fist of it–when people gasp and say “how beautiful”–Pejic Panic breaks out. “He’s taking our job! That’s not fair!”
Like you, I raised my eyebrows at the tortuous logic of Pat Strudwick (who is just one letter off of having a very arousing name.)
Gay men only attracted to the masculine? Is it not a requirement that artists, designers and creative thinkers possess imagination? He blows it for when he rights the boat later, I think, and reminds us that designers of all sexualities design happily for both men and women.
I can’t work out whether I love or hate your term “gayist”.
The debate around Pejic has turned ugly and homophobic, perhaps less out of genuine hatred of homosexuals and more out of the participants grabbing any rhetorical stance that would get them an audience. To that extent, I agree with his gay-affirming stance.
But if by “gayist” we’re drawing a parallel with “feminist”, then let’s pause for a minute to unpack the term.
One of the irksome parts of early feminism was that it seemed, from time to time, to make the feminine morally superior to the masculine. The obvious injustice and short-sightedness of this approach has alienated many, and I notice that you among them, QRG.
But if early feminists reminded the broader population (i.e. men and non-feminist women) that denying opportunity to anyone is morally wrong, and sex roles must be more fluid for everyone to reach his or her true potential, then modern “gayists” must do the same.
Homophobia is just disguised misogyny. And to hear it from the mouths of women who (we assume) are feminists, galls me.
So then, you can call me a gayist. In a good way.
The irony is feminists use ‘female’ too to describe women in professions, to indicate how special they are: female writers, female musicians. It is the same technique used for a different effect.
HH: I can’t disagree with your eloquent analysis of what ‘fashion’ and ‘beauty’ are or aren’t — how they’re not very feel-good or friendly to anyone. That’s not what they’re for.
And also your dissection of the ‘thinking’ behind Platell’s piece. But she’s not really worth you. She’s just a hack columnist. A hack female columnist (writing for the Mail’s ‘Femail’ section) who likes to pose as a defender of her sex. Dressed in cliches.
The Observer feminist’s innovation on the other hand is to not just trot out the fashion is a conspiracy against the female body run by misogynist gay men (can I have my fee now please?) line, but to present it as some kind of accepted fact (not a third-hand opinion) and then describe turning models into pre-pubescent kids as the logical next step in the Evil Big Gay Plan.
P.s. I don’t like the term ‘female columnist’. It suggests columnists are naturally male. It is like ‘lady doctor’ or ‘female lawyer’. And it is using the biological binary. If Patell’s gender identity is significant there are other ways to indicate it.
Language when it comes to gender, as this piece shows, is crucial.
Honourable Husband:
If you are worried the feminists have been attacking the gays, never fear, everyone’s favourite Gayist journalist Patrick Strudwick turned up to save the day, and to remind us that Gay Men NEVER fancy women OR boys, because they are only attracted to manliness, which they themselves display in abundance.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/13/patrick-strudwick-feminism-gay-fashion-designers?INTCMP=SRCH
I think I have covered everything now. Oh except that when it comes to women bursting into tears over the perfect hemline, who has fetishised that and enabled it the most in recent years? Yes, none other than our other favourite Gay, Gok Wan.
I followed the Pejic Panic very closely, but I didn’t get to talk to anyone about it. When it comes to analysing the media’s representations of metrosexuality, I think I might be able to count the people who are doing that in any depth on two fingers.
Astonishing vitriol, isn’t it?
Amanda Platell’s article disturbs me greatly.
Here’s how I understand her:
Female models have long created an ideal of feminine good looks that few women can live up to. A male creating an ideal of feminine good looks which few women can live up to makes it even more impossible. Because as a male, he has a head start in the feminine good looks department, because modern femininity is defined by the (mainly gay male) fashion police.
When a man–any man–is deemed more capable of looking “feminine” than a woman is, because his Y-chromosomes allow him to come closer to the ideal woman, it’s time to question the meaning and usefulness of the word “feminine”.
Is this rant against Pejic, who as a male teenager can scarf the odd hamburger and stay skinny, another case of fat rearing its head as a feminist issue?
The most disturbing thing about Platell’s article is that she implies the curvaceous women are somehow more genuinely feminine.
Andrej Pejic is bad, and Marilyn Monroe is good? Does she not see both as equally impossible?
Clothes which are “unashamedly” for women “nip…in waists” and “celebrate…cleavage”, she says. And she wept with joy to see them.
(I don’t know about you, Mark, but it’s been a long time since I cried over boxers with a reinforced seat and extra pouch room on a stroll through High & Mighty.)
Platell was rightly taken to task. The top rated comments on her article come from less-curvaceous females, who object to the implication that one needs fulsome hips and ample breasts to be a “real” woman.
There are many reasons to critique the fashion establishment, but Pejic is far down the list
High fashion bears little relationship to wearable clothes. It’s a design exercise, where clothes are the hero and the humans who wear them just get in the way.
There’s a tendency for models of both sexes to become the thinnest, least-bodied human being possible. You should scarcely notice them.
Does this dehumanise fashion? Yes, and so what? Art is not always realistic. The obtuse, sometimes confronting aesthetics of high art push the boundaries, while mainstream art performs the functional job of bringing pleasure and reflection when it hangs on your wall.
Take cars. An unlikely analogy, but it works.
Chevrolet struts its new Corvette down the catwalk at the Detroit Auto Show in January. Do family guys get huffy because those damn car designers are creating an unrealistic picture of the ideal car?
No, we admire it. We drool over it. We say it’s beautiful and sexy. A select few put in an order. But most of us buy Malibus, because hey, it works for us. And on the whole, we’re pretty happy.
Maybe the people who hate the fact that high fashion excludes them should not take it so personally. It excludes most people.
And if dressing like a catwalk model is at the core of your self-esteem, then you’ve got a much bigger problem than squeezing your tush into a Gaultier wedding dress.
I guess with Boy George and Marilyn an obvious sign of their different approach to gender bending is how Boy George insisted on the ‘male’ signifier ‘Boy’ whereas Marilyn went for a ‘female’ name — Marilyn. There is a lot in a name. Maybe if Andrej went by a woman’s name he would not get so much hassle.
Anyway when it comes to gender I think we are all ‘pale imitators’ and ‘failed impersonators’. Or maybe that is just me, and Boy George…
p.s. you lot may all be proper queer gender benders but when I first saw Boy George on Top of The Pops in 1983 aged 12, I was physically shocked. I didn’t know if ‘it’ was a man or a woman. I have always been a bit scared of male gender benders. And in awe of them. They make me feel my own femininity is a ‘pale imitator’ of theirs.
‘Taboo’ was panto. Very cynical panto. I could have coped with self-indulgence…
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/taboo-the-venue–london-750894.html
I agree about Marilyn except that,in recent years Boy George has received such a kicking from the press, and from the Gays, eg over that incident with the rent boy and the handcuffs, that I don’t like to dismiss him as not ‘proper queer’ or ‘proper gender bender’. I don’t like the guy but he is treated as unacceptable and offensive by people I like much less.
And when I did write about the Pejic New Yorker profile, the one person to take up the piece and share it on Facebook etc, was Sarah Hoffman.
Remember, the woman who writes about her son, the ‘pink boy’?
http://www.sarahhoffmanwriter.com/sarah-hoffmans-blog/
I thought that was interesting as it shows how much this is to do with gender expression and the continued policing of boys/men. By feminists as you say, among others.
I think Pejic looks wonderful in that picture. It appeals to me not on a ‘sexual’ level but an aesthetic one: it’s Veronica Lake meets John Galliano. It’s not “tranny”. Marilyn most definitely paved the way, which is why he was helicoptered back to Harpenden straight after his appearance on Top of the Pops. And leaving Boy George to “panto”…
I always felt uncomfortable about the way Boy George and his hangers-on were hailed as the great prophets of the new gender revolution when they talked constantly about image, shock, etc, whilst Marilyn seemed to be doing it for real. This feeling only increased when I went to see Boy George’s musical ‘Taboo’, which was sickeningly self-indulgent and seemed to leave no room for authentically queer people who didn’t fit into some conveniently marketable narrative. Of course one never wants to get into the nonsensical (and very boring) ‘queerer than thou’ argument, but it still strikes me that Marilyn, alone out of that set, was doing something truly revolutionary just by being himself. Arguably, it’s the act of being oneself, regardless of the gendered context of that act, that is the most socially powerful and disruptive.