6/27/2021 0 Comments June 27th, 2021I have a mutual on Twitter named Shari Smith (Her Twitter: https://twitter.com/faithandcoffeee?s=09) and she has started this weekend to attempt take over a hashtag, #ModestIsHottest. The reason for this is a song and video (the video has since been taken down) by Matthew West who wrote a song titled "Modest is Hottest." Personally, I haven't been able to submit myself to that kind of torture that would be listening to that song. I listen to enough shitty Christian pop as it is (I'm still recovering from the crime against humanity that is MercyMe's newest album. It was so bad I haven't been able to bring myself to listen to any music at all in the last few weeks since listening). That said, I have seen and heard enough to get the gist of the song. It's toxic. Basically, it promotes the old misogynistic trope that women must cover up to protect boys from themselves. But, because Matthew West is a woke misogynist he frames it as covering yourself up completely and showing no skin is actually a lot hotter than, God forbid, showing a little cleavage or a shoulder. I can't even how much trouble it must be for some guy to keep it in his pants if he sees a female knee or upper leg. Will someone think of the poor boys? Obviously, I'm being extremely sarcastic at the moment. So, let me move beyond my trademark mockery and sarcasm and attempt to behave myself more than I do on my podcast and actually be serious (shameless plug, I know: https://anchor.fm/trans-ramblings). So, for a very brief background if you have no idea who the hell I am, I, Anna Hudak (pronounced "Who-Doc" not "Who-Dak" like most people pronounce it) am a trans woman. I was assigned male at birth and started transitioning to female 15 months ago. I grew up in a very fundamentalist church. The church I grew up in, girls and women wore long dresses and skirts every Sunday and boys and men wore, at the minimum, button-down shirts if not suits and ties (I hated ties with every fiber of my being so I never wore them unless I was forced to). Male modesty, of course, was never talked about. When it came to guys, the only things we were ever talked to about was how girls were a walking and talking sexual temptation for us and it was our duty to keep it in our pants until we married one right out of high school then we could fuck our brains out, and do it on demand because women are sub-servient to men. We also learned in indirect ways that rape happened because women dressed too inappropriately, so if a rape happened, it was a woman's fault. Because of all this, I remember when I was little, my sisters and mom always wore dresses or skirts while out in public. NEVER pants. It was considered scandalous and we would look down in judgement upon all the women wearing pants in public. I even remember when we would go swimming my sisters in addition to their bathing suits had to also wear shirts and skirts over the suit, to, you know, make sure they weren't tempting any boys. Meanwhile, as someone assigned male, I could go out merely in swimming shorts and no shirt, heck, I was expected to (which I rarely did before puberty and never did during puberty thanks to gender dysphoria, and therefore always covered up, heck, I tried to convince my parents to let me wear pants into the pool because of how dysphoric my legs made me). I remember being looked down upon for wearing a shirt while swimming, because apparently, I wasn't taking full advantage of all the privileges that being assigned male afforded me. I also remember looking up to the Duggar family. We were hooked to their TV show and idolized them for their "modesty." Our family saw them as role models. Not only for covering up but also requiring courting instead of dating in a romantic relationship (another toxic fundamentalist belief pushed on me, and one I admittedly, haven't deconstructed yet, mainly due to being aromatic and asexual). So, these are the things I remember growing up. The purity culture lessons I learned. As I got older things changed. My sisters and mom could wear pants in public. I learned that women weren't asking for rape if they went out showing some skin. Yet, purity culture prevailed. I continued to be taught that sex before marriage is one of the worst sins one could commit (the Bible isn't anti-fornication and I will die on that hill) and therefore my sisters were given purity rings. My dad called my youngest sister a slut for wearing shorts that went above her knee by about a centimeter. I watched these things as a gender dysphoric teenager going through male puberty and taking all these lessons in. I can only imagine how these lessons only made accepting myself as a woman only that much harder. Being taught that women were lesser than men and needed to cover themselves up to hide themselves from the "male gaze." So, now we're in the present. I'm transitioning and openly living as a woman, and now, all these years of purity culture is affecting me more than ever. I have been shopping for women's clothing and while I have finally mostly figured out what all the different types of clothing are and am figuring out my style, I find myself repulsed when I try something on that shows any skin, because of all the ingrained lessons. Last year, one of the very first outfits I bought was a long shirt and leggings. I thought I looked really cute in it, but, those leggings though. So immodest! Sure, they didn't show any skin and aren't completely form-fitting, but still! So immodest! No self-respecting women would ever go out wearing those! Well, I did buy them anyway, but have been terrified to wear that outfit in public. I did it once at a friend's request, but that was it. It was scary, and the thought of doing it again is scary. Doing so goes against every bit of programming I was programmed with. Then, there's a dress I bought for myself this year. It's a long dress that has no sleeves (sin #1) and is a v-neck (sin #2) that is low enough to show cleavage (sin #3), though in my case isn't an issue at all because quite simply, I don't have a cleavage at all (thanks to the HRT gods hating me and despite having taken stuff to grow breasts a year even before transition, they're still stupid small). I love the dress, but am terrified of actually wearing it in front of anybody because well, I have been informed quite simply that it's immodest. So, while I have not gotten over my purity culture programming, I'm on the road of doing so. I have started on my way, as scary and long as it is. Hopefully someday I can gain the courage to go out wearing a dress that makes me feel pretty that shows my non-existent cleavage. So, please, if you're so inclined, take a pic of yourself with an outfit showing some skin and post it with the hashtag #ModestIsHottest. Let's beat back purity culture in any way we can. Let's take over this hashtag from the fundies (and Matthew West) and get out this good message.
P.S. I was thinking about this post and re-reading it and realized I actually had a bit more to say. Purity culture is not only misogynistic but anti-queer fundamentally. Many an article and book has been written about how misogynistic purity culture is, putting the blame for men's inappropriate behavior on women, making women think lesser of themselves, and teaching men that women are nothing more than sex objects. But, it also works to work against gender variance. I genuinely believe that purity culture helped make it harder to accept myself as a woman, because, purity culture leads to one seeing women as lesser than (in addition to everything else in society). Then, once one transitions, they have all those lessons ingrained in their heads and even if you have deconstructed all those beliefs from a male point-of-view, you still never needed to do so from a female point-of-view. Now you are the one expected to live out purity culture and have to fight against it. Before, as a guy, I could learn that it was wrong and just move on with my life. Now, as a woman, someone this is pushed upon, I can't anymore. I have to unlearn these lessons from a more personal view. Before I saw it all from a macro view, now it's from a micro-view. These are the things no one prepares you for when you transition, and it's a major shock. Living as a trans woman has allowed me to experience purity culture as both a man and a woman, (aka, an observer and later as someone who it personally effects in a obvious way) and as someone who had previously gotten out of purity culture, or at least, thought I did, as a man, only to be thrown back in as a woman. I understand how harmful it is to both men and women, I have experienced it's harms for both. Almost makes me wonder if I will ever actually escape it to be honest. Anyway, back to my earlier point, it was another thing in my life teaching me that not only were women less than, but trans people are lesser than. So, if trans people are sub-human, and women are sub-human, then we are left with the notion that trans-women are the most sub-human of them all (which unfortunately, is a notion widely pushed with the narratives that trans women are predators and pedophiles. Heck, I know of Christians who actually argue that trans women are worse than pedophiles). It instills in a trans woman that not only is she bad for having such desires, but is degrading herself by living as a mere temptation. Remember, men are taught in purity culture, even sometimes explicitly that women are just walking and talking sexual temptations for men. So, by transitioning, as the logic would go, I would be reducing myself to a walking talking sexual temptation for "real" men (and even worse, because since I'm apparently "lying" about being a woman, I'm apparently trying to trick some poor man into having gay sex, which is even worse). So, anyway, I just wanted to point out just some of the ways purity culture affects trans women as gender queer voices on this discussion are pretty much unheard of. Maybe sometime I will come back after thinking about all of this more deeply, as this is something I decided upon to write about on the spur of the moment. One final note, I wonder how this affects trans men who grew up under purity culture. I can only guess, and I would love to hear from trans men who grew up under purity culture how they dealt with all these teachings. I really would love for more of a queer presence, a queer voice in these discussions as many of us have different perspectives and different interactions with purity culture due to just being queer.
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AuthorHi! I'm Anna, a currently transitioning transgender woman! I started my blog "Ramblings of a Trans Woman" as therapy for gender and identity issues and abuse from my parents and church. Hopefully, someone else out there can get something from this. If you want to talk, just get in contact with me, there's plenty of ways how and we'll discuss the best way to talk! Archives
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