A Cold War Fought By Women

Same woman, different outfit. Do you think differently of this woman depending on what she's wearing? 

Dear Ladies, for the love of Gahd, please read this one! Really- it's super interesting! It's called "A Cold War Fought by Women" and its by John Tierney and you can read it by clicking here and you're going to love it so just read it. My CliffsNotes on it won't do it justice, so you should really read the article. It's about women being aggressive and mean towards each other. Come on! If you love Mean Girls, you'll love this article even more, I promise!

Thirty years ago, science couldn't confirm anything about the competitive nature of women; today there are many studies done devoted entirely to the topic of female aggression. Now, science is starting to prove right ideas that those of us who have been in high school have all been hypothesizing: girls get super competitive with each other. Things that distinguish female competitiveness from that of the male variety: more subtle and indirect, less violent. Do you agree with this assertion? I think it is safe to say that I see a lot of this passive-aggressive female competition kind've often. Guys often make fun of the girls for this. They say stuff like, "Guys get in a fight, then get over it. Girls are so passive aggressive and never get over things." What do you think about this bold comment? 

 What's perhaps most interesting about this research is the finding that the pressure that young women feel to meet the standards of sexual conduct and physical appearance is due to this "intrasexual competition." As in- it is girl on girl forces that are pressuring girls to look and act certain ways.

Here's a brief overview of the experiment conducted by Tracy Vaillancourt and Aanchal Sharma at McMaster University: researchers put pairs of women into a laboratory for what they thought was a discussion about female friendships. The real experiment, however, took place when a different young woman entered the room asking where to find one of the researchers. This woman was conventionally attractive. Sometimes she wore a T-shirt and jeans and other times she'd wear a tightfitting, low-cut blouse and a short skirt. What did you think would happen? When she wore the jeans, she attracted very little attention from her fellow female peers. When she wore the other outfit, though, "virtually all the students reacted with hostility." 

They stared at her, looked her up and down, rolled their eyes and sometimes showed outright anger. One asked her in disgust, "What the [expletive] is that?"

Not surprisingly, the majority of the aggression happened after she left the room. The girls laughed about her and ridiculed her, going as far to suggest that "she dressed that way in order to have sex with the professor."  

"Women are indeed very capable of aggressing against others, especially women they perceive as rivals," said Dr. Vaillancourt. .. "The research also shows that the suppression of female sexuality is by women, not necessarily by men."

"Slut shaming" has often been blamed on men, but this evidence seems to suggest the opposite- that women are the primary aggressors of slut shaming. What do you think? (Slut shaming= stigmatizing female promiscuity) Personally, I have to say that I see slut shaming come a lot more often and naturally from other girls. But is this because they are feeling pressure from society? Is it because they feel insecure? What is the root of this issue? Women feel worse when they compare themselves to peers in their own social circles. Women tend to feel worse about themselves when they're surrounded by other women in makeup and sleek attire. What do you think of these findings? Does it resonate with you? 

 This article talks a lot about the valid evolutionary aspects that would factor into this competitiveness. However, I would like to see this issue from a more holistic perspective, from a bio-pscyo-social approach. I think it would be really interesting to look further into this. What other studies have been done? Has this study been repeated? How would you design a similar study? 

This article reminded me of the following scene from Mean Girls: 

Idealistically, I hope that we can find some way to stop this girl-on-girl madness. There must be some way.. Any ideas? Or do you not think/see it as a problem?