Like Nora Ephron, I was always very masculine growing up. Unlike me, Nora grew up in the 50s, where masculinity could only be expressed through physical strength, athleticism, ambition, and domineering presence. These extremely standardized ideas of masculinity have now been re-established (rebranded, even by PRs who know their Paglia) as toxic masculinity. By the definition created in the early aughts, I was considered to be masculine. Masculinity of the 2000s had been reimagined by nebbish Hollywood writers who wanted to feel “like men” but was picked last in gym class and wanted to connect to young boys of the same cloth. This new version of masculinity and myself was nervous, wordy, smart, sly, funny, wry, interested in science and math, but still had a passion for the humanities. As weird as it is to admit, I “skipped my latency period” and was overly sexual and interested in sex from a young age. I liked sports and I thought “girl stuff” was stupid, but still, like Ephron describes, I knew I was a girl and I wanted to just be a girl easily defined, despite girls not typically being defined as having any of the qualities I had.
What was I? Would my femininity, and thus my “girlness” be suddenly up for question due to a combination of my flat chestedness and my interest in books and stand-up? By the mid-2000s, femininity had evolved from its 50s prototype of being submissive to being kind of airheaded and ditzy. In the fifties, women were supposed to be soft, in the 2000s, extremely waifish. In the fifties, women were supposed to be maternal, in the 2000s, wild partiers. In the fifties, women were supposed to be chaste, in the 2000s, women were supposed to be eager and proudly promiscuous; I couldn’t comfortably sit in any of these categories.
Once, near the year’s end, a guy in my class was talking to his friends about who would take who to the 6th grade dance (the social event of the season. You had to be there.) He had validated my insecurities over a 6th grade version of poker game talk! To this day, I picture him, 11 years old, standing 5’1”, smoking a cigar and pointing out to his chums on a slideshow my harsh jaw and how I was always donning a ponytail!
In desperation to silence him and as a final checkmate move, I wore a bra two cup sizes too big for me the following week. He might have won the battle, but I would win the war by developing an impossible 15 pounds of breast tissue in 72 hours. How my parents allowed me to leave the house looking like this, I have no clue.
My plan turned out to be somewhat flawed. I looked uncomfortable, my only association with breasts being in a sexual context so I, a girl of 11, was suddenly a sexual being to at least myself, and for a performative reason. And still, nobody asked me to the dance!
Growing up, breasts were the solidified trait of womanhood and attractiveness; the bigger the better. Boobs were sexy. Sex was boobs. There was nothing south of the navel that could compare to the breast and the nipple in all her glory! I didn’t know why that was or why there was such focus on them, but I had to have them; this was my ticket to femininity. Through boobs, I could be as I was before: smart, funny, witty, wry, and still be a woman.
Zuckerberg’s Frankenstein
I had probably 8-12 Facebook friends – all in my bloodline. I was the youngest child, the one most advanced with the ability to use the internet to connect. In middle school, everyone had it and it was my new pad to make friends and further my connections with people around me. Though I would post the funniest captions and make conversation with everyone, the photo aspect of the site made me uneasy. I couldn’t bear to even take a glimpse at pictures of me – why do I look cool and normal in the mirror but insane and hirsute in the photos? Who is this girl? Surely, that cannot be me? On top of that, I had no idea what to post. Everyone would go on cool vacations and my parents responded to pleas for travel with, “a beach in Mexico is identical to Toronto’s beach!” A pathetic and evil lie. Looking at my new friends pictures, I was suddenly trapped. All of their pictures were demonstrating their alluring and cool boobs, plus their hips and waist! What the hell? Why have they all betrayed me?! Maybe they’re all lying and they’re just wearing a cool La Senza bra with extra padding. Do girls stuff their bras? I have no idea how to even do that. When I put tissue in my bra, it looks like I just have wrinkled boobs. Why am I the only girl here who has no boobs!?
Thank God it is 2008 and I have the internet to ease my troubles. “Why don’t I have boobs?” I demand to the wise owl, Google. To my luck, Google didn’t know the answers and the hypotheses that Yahoo came up with were either something I couldn’t help or were too complicated. “Boob growth” was the following search which offered me thousand-dollar creams that promised a fantastic and beautiful bust. I couldn’t approach my parents and ask for this, so the final search was “when do boobs stop growing,” wanting to know when hope was totally lost. To my coaxing, the majority of answers were in the mid-to-late teens. I had time.
The time never came and I would go through massive anxieties over the years, Googling various remedies, acquainting myself with the fenugreek seed, toying with birth control, looking up the various hormones I could take, massages, oils, what genetics came into play. Most people online came up with the tiresome and moronic, “it’s your genetics!” Well then, why on God’s green Earth was my sister of above average boob size and I sat mimicking the Saskatchewan fields? WHY?
It seemed simultaneously of utmost importance and of such triviality.
Thus spoke Instagram
Among other insecurities that Instagram directly fed me, I was suddenly exposed to an array of girls who were infinitely more confident in their bodies and busts than myself and loved to demonstrate how great they looked. Some even had the same relative size that I had! So, how come in photos their bust looked so cute and delicate and I was stuck in this body and mind that was perpetually against being dainty and feminine? I was still SO loud and boisterous, I wanted so much attention. I was funny and wry, I would speak too passionately and fight with everyone over the smallest things. Their small breasts beautifully complimented an athletic frame and they were so effortlessly feminine both in body and in behaviour, despite having a flatter chest. They had picture after picture of them against the backdrop of an enjoyed adolescence, casually embracing their development – that was the word I used in the heat of envy, “developed” – bodies.
Beyond being more developed, everyone else was also a better sport, infinitely cooler about their bodies than I ever was about mine. A casual shirt was placed as an afterthought and still complimented them in every picture. They knew exactly which clothes flattered them, what colours suited their skin tone, and which fits hugged their new-found curves the best. Vacationing, at school, attending a dance, doing extracurriculars, whatever the occasion- the bodies of my female “competitors” (that’s how I saw it at the time) were at the very least sitting on a cushion of confidence. Mine was sloppy, too soft, never built by sport, and undeveloped. I wore anything, I couldn’t find it within myself to care about my appearance enough to research what would flatter my figure, but I simultaneously longed to suddenly wake up at least a C.
I couldn’t possibly sound whinier, more petulant, could I? At the end of the day, who are these women? I hardly know them. Be happy for them, love yourself! I would repeat these words to myself and began to learn more and more about feminism on social media sites.
Delete the app! I urged myself. Onward and upward!
Instagram culture becomes a haven for women to post “thirst traps”
As the years go on, it comes to my, and everyone else’s realization that Instagram is a great platform to publish enticing and scantily-clad photos for the sake of selling a product, gaining validation, attention, proclaiming confidence, getting back at the ex, your ‘what-have-yous’, your ‘you-name-its’. Instagram broadcasted, “bring us you’re tired, you’re poor, your hungry, you’re horny,” and we unanimously answered. The hotspot of influence that my friends and family, celebrities in magazines, T.V and film, and advertisements, used to have on me is eclipsed by social media influencers – who are girls (who at the very least want me to think they are) just like me. They’re my age, my height, have my interests, but are much cooler and more digestible.
Though in the back of my mind, my self-aware self is harping at me for looking at these pictures, I can’t stop, they look so good and it’s easy to look at. I have to know what X model does for fitness; I have to have Y’s clothes! I have to try Z’s makeup! I feel like a massive moron for buying into this since my father taught me from the crib that strangers just want to sell me garbage, and here I am, drinking it up by the gallon. The punishment for eating a massive cake is a stomach-ache and the feeling of sloth and gluttony, and the punishment for eating a diet solely of thirst traps is a heartache iced in envy and pride.
The era of the butt is in full swing and smaller breasts (with the accompaniment of a microscopic waist and a massive hip) are in, but I’m still uncomfortable with my chest. Why does every influencer seem so comfortable with their bodies and wear things (you know what I mean by “things!” Stuff! Doo-dads! Everything! Scarves, even! What the hell!) so easily all the time? Why even when I have the reassurance of women who look like myself being seen as beautiful, do I still feel like my body conjures up images of the Flat Stanley book series? Has the big-breasted obsessed media of the early aughts plagued my brain so intensely that I have a massive psychological obstacle in simply looking at myself and just thinking I’m fine? Or at least not negative? Are the hang-ups that I have about my body something that is fundamental to my being, a foundation, and as integral to myself as my wit, my humour, and my skill on the court? What frustrates me the most is that this does seem to be the answer, that it’s not an issue of lacking self-love. I love myself and how I look, but I don’t like it. I love that I have the ability to move, and breathe, and drink, and eat, and in due time when I have children (God-willing), I’ll be able to (God-willing) breastfeed; that’s not the issue. I have what seems like an inherent pish-poshing voice in my head that comes down particularly hard on my breasts, and the idea that they will never be enough.
The problem has transcended social media, “the IG Disease” – as Offset would say. I would still feel insecure about my chest. If there came a day when we all uniformly grew bored of socials and stopped posting photos of our bodies but, in the hokiest way imaginable, posted our thoughts (reflections of our minds have more substance than reflections of our bodies, no?), I would still look at my breasts with chronic dissatisfaction. Beyond social media, the advertisements and movies that blow people up 50x their natural height have an undeniable effect on the viewer’s mind. We are watching them, we are inherently viewing them as a leader, a superior to ourselves. Even on our phone screens, though they’re not so big, we still are looking at them and in that capacity, they have some kind of psychological superiority over us, we the plebeian viewer, and they the master creator. We, the 5’5” film goer, they, the 50’ tall advertisement/movie star – we must, on some psychological level, view them as Gods to be idolized, Gods with fantastic and perfect breasts.
Even if social media were to disappear, I have the presence of advertisements and media in my life which inherently have put me in the position of idolizing the subject’s beauty. Even if I looked exactly like an admired creator, down to the cup size, I would feel insecure because then I’d want to be more and better. There is no “enough.” Over the last few years, self-love has been a massive developing trend with loving the skin you’re in, but do we ever truly feel enough, or do we project that because we believe that feeling enough is what confidence is? – Rather than being comfortable with what you have, but then facing the fact that you will always want more?
I’ve considered the body positivity movement’s perspective, that someone will feel enough once they truly love themselves and view themselves as worthy. Some have relayed to me the concept of apathy – not caring about my body, but realistically how is that possible? It is attached to me, I have to look at them every day, how can I not form an opinion on something of this much attention and this close to me? Regardless, I think they are all full of it.