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| I did not make these to destroy feminism. |
Duck readers, I have a confession. I bake cupcakes. Thousands of them. I love doing it, I love icing them, I love decorating them and I really like eating them.
This is not something that I would typically share with a blog on international politics. Normally I write about things that blow up or try to calmly argue that twitter is not going to stop a war lord. But you see I am compelled. I am compelled to write in defence of cupcakes for International Women’s day.
Apparently some people think my love of cupcakes makes me a bad feminist: real feminists hate cupcakes:
Cupcakes are just so twee-ly, coyly, ‘ooh no I really shouldn’t’-ly, pink and fluffily, everything that I think feminism is not. It’s feminism-lite, feminism as consumption and ‘me time’ (grr), rather than feminism as power and politics and equal pay.
You see, this “Bun fetish deals a blow to feminism”:
Because these cupcakes – mark my words, feminists – these trendy little cupcakes are the thin end of the wedge. It will start with cupcakes and it will end in vaginoplasty.
And so – maybe you thought the ideological battle was between men and women. Or even liberal feminists and radical feminists. You’re wrong. The real debate has moved to Cupcake Feminism.
This move is not deliberate – probably not even conscious. But the pop-culture image of feminism today – as perpetuated at Ladyfests, in BUST magazine and its Craftaculars, on so-called ‘ladyblogs’ and at freshers’ fairs – is ostensibly the direct opposite of the Hairy Dyke. For simplicity’s sake, we’ll call her the cupcake feminist….
Twee and retro have been seeping into feminism for a couple decades now, gaining potency. It’s all about cute dresses, felten rosettes from Etsy, knitting, kittens, vintage lamps shaped like owls, Lesley Gore. And yes – a lot of cupcakes.
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Another problem with this trend towards the high-femme is that we inadvertently court the enemy. We inadvertently justify the vilification of the Hairy Dyke image, as if we were ashamed of it all along. Why are ‘fat’, ‘ugly’, ‘gay’ or ‘never-been-fucked’ still the first insults sent whistling towards the trench? What is their supposed import? To cry ‘We’re not all like that!’ only lends power. Some of us are fat/ugly/gay, some of us aren’t. So? Really, though, so what?
Mainstream society only finds cupcake feminism more palatable because it can lick off the icing and toss the rest.
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| These chickies want equal rights, darn it! |
Look, I take these points seriously. Feminists who fought for the right to have equal pay, birth control and the idea that I could basically become whatever I wanted are uncomfortable with women “cooing” over pink fluffy things.
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| Tend to your cupcake lady-garden! |
But I’ve never seen a woman “coo” over a cupcake. (Seriously? Who does this? Who are these anti-cupcake feminists hanging out with?! Get better friends!) I’ve seen an entire Department of Politics and International Relations devour 30 of them in under an hour. But I’ve never seen a woman making an intelligent point suddenly suffer a cupcake-lobotomy because of some buttercream.
In fact, the very reason I like baking cupcakes is that they are cheap, easy as hell and don’t take very long to make. I can make an entire batch in under an hour. It’s a fantastic way for me to be creative and then write about targeted killing. Or mark essays. Or reference letters for many of my excellent female (and male) students applying to do masters programs in their chosen fields.
Surely, the worst kind of feminism is the one that tells feminists what to do in uncompromising terms. Or the kind that perpetuates a “Hairy Dyke” vs “Cupcake Feminist” false dichotomy. Cupcakes, cupcake bakers and cupcake aficionados are not secretly trying to make feminism more palatable. To see cupcakes this way is to unthinkingly buy into the gendering of an activity – or wholeheartedly buying into a male-created stereotype without thinking about how the humble cupcake might be an act of liberation for those who partake in the cake.
I don’t consider myself to be a “Cupcake Feminist” – I’m just a feminist who likes cupcakes. I believe in questioning gender barriers AND unnecessary carbohydrates. But most importantly, I’m tired of individuals explaining to me what I am, who I am and what I can or can’t do on baseless, dated logic – whether they are feminist cupcake haters or Rick Santorum.
So I am asking you, Duck readers, this International Women’s Day – please consider ways we can rethink the gerontocratic patriarchy – and have a cupcake. These activities are not mutually exclusive. Plus I spent, like, an hour on these things.
EDIT: And for the love of cupcakes, read this excellent post by Sarah Duff at Tangerine and Cinnamon
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| Come to the Feminist Side! |
Thank you, for opening my eyes to the evil that lurks in the heart of…cupcakes. I enjoy cupcakes, which, apparently makes me an anti-feminist misogynistic buttercream loving pig. Brilliant.
I love cupcakes too! The point of my blog was that we shouldn’t confuse baking or eating a cake, which is a truly lovely thing and should be done very often, with a political act. Cake is cake and feminism is feminism. What annoys me is when people think that eating said cake is the same as arguing for equal pay. Because it’s not.
Can you point me to an an actual argument where someone has claimed that eating a cupcake is the same as arguing for equal pay?
I always hoped that feminism would be about women having the institutional apparatus available to make what they want of their selves and the cognitive apparatus to figure out what that is (and that’s a hope I’m happy to generalize beyond that particular chromosomal configuration), so feminists disciplining each other is always disturbing. You’ve been a woman all your life, and you’re the only one who’s ever been you, so who’s to tell you how to do that best? Indeed, feminism is about nipping such attempts to define others in the bud, n’est-ce pas?
Full-cream ahead! Praise Gaia and pass the sprinkles!
(Just one Guy’s opinion)
No one’s saying real feminists hate cupcakes or that you shouldn’t bake. Global Dashboard is complaining about “cupcake themed international women’s day events”. Heawood is complanining about the fetishization of cupcakes and the paragraph you quote is tongue-in-cheek. When you say “apparently some people think my love of cupcakes makes me a bad feminist” you are creating a strawman and inviting your readership to tell you that of course it’s ok that you bake cupcakes and gosh those feminists are just so wrong and you are so much better. Do you really need to hear that? There is overwhelming cultural agreement that women baking is good. There are three blog posts on the Internet arguing not that women shouldn’t bake but that cupcakes aren’t feminism (or in the Heawood case, something completely unrelated).
Congratulations for completely missing the point of this post! You may collect your cupcake as a prize by the door!
The people you haven’t responded to snarkily are the men telling you that of course it’s ok that you bake cupcakes and gosh those feminists are just so wrong and you are so much better. That kinda makes it seem like that was the reaction you were going for, so what part did I miss? Would you also like to have your opinions validated on such subjects as “it’s ok for women to get married” and “I clean because I really like cleaning and I think that’s just fine”? I bet you can find a few ladies on the Internet who have some mean things to say about those, too, and plenty of men who will be happy to tell you that you’re right (along with sharing with you their own special interpretation of what the point of feminism was.)
Oh. Did you not get a cupcake? Well I see you have PLENTY of hateraid. I’m sure that will get you through.
Agreed fully. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – there’s nothing inherently gendered about deliciousness. I’m a guy, and I like baking and love baked goods. And besides, the whole point of feminism is that women ought to be able to do what they want, so if you want to make tasty dessert food, go for it.
Ok so I am a month late in posting a response to this – but only just saw this blog…
(a) cupcakes are not that nice and so I am happy to join the ranks of the cupcake haters (I think Charlie Brooker has effectively dealt with this particular issue herehttps://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jan/08/charlie-brooker-new-year) . (b) (and bear with me here…) my mother has an apron that she was forced to make in a 1950s home economics class – she has kept that apron because, to her it represents all that was wrong with the 1950s. In the 1960s she found feminism and in the 1970s she finally got to learn woodwork (and built an impressive multi story garage for her daughters). Now, this apron is cute and yellow and frilly with a print of poodles all over it – these days it would be considered funky and retro and vintage — but it isn’t is it!! It is symptomatic of the way in which women’s lives and educational opportunities in the 50s were so systematically constrained by pernicious gender stereotypes. Now you could say -‘ but its only an apron and aren’t the poodles cute and oh haven’t times changed etc” – but then I see pictures of my highly educated stay-at-home mum friend posing in facebook pictures of her and her daughter in matching frilly aprons, probably about to start making cupcakes and it makes me rather depressed. Maybe I am missing the point and need to eat more cupcakes, but I’d like to state for the record that this vintage retro bullshit with its ironic embrace of early C20th ‘vintage’ gender ideologies (i.e. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Donts-Wives-Blanche-Ebbutt/dp/0713687908/ref=pd_sim_b_1)f*cking depresses the hell out of me.
You need to learn to be depressed about more important things.