How do you all feel about Blaire White?

submitted by Kai_Decadence from self.GenderCritical

sorted by:
top
newinsightfulfun
you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]TalkToTheVoid 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

Sorry for replying again, but I realized I mentally fixated on Blair White when I first read your post, but you've also mentioned Rose of Dawn. I haven't seen a lot of Rose of Dawn, only a couple of videos and then her appearance on that morning show where she defended JKR. My impression of Rose of Dawn was that they're a male person who likes wearing dresses, makeup, and growing their hair long, and has dysphoria, but that's about it really. I didn't see her aesthetic as the same as Blair White who seems to want to look like a Kardashian. So to me Rose of Dawn seems pretty sensible in that sense, and not someone who's trying to ape some barbiegirl idea of "feminine". Am I missing something?

Also, I read some of your other comments about there not being enough men who choose a more feminine aesthetic without denying their maleness, and I agree with you, that it would be wonderful if there was more of that in the world. That's what I thought Alok Menon was to begin with, but I realized I was wrong. I did remember Billy Porter though. What do you think about him? I also remembered reading about Will Smith's son and Harry Styles as men who've expressed nothing about not being men, but whose aesthetics include feminine elements. I haven't seen enough, but reading about them made me feel hopeful.

[–]MarkTwainiac 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Just FYI: Rose has has gone to the extreme of having major "facial feminization surgery," surgery to lower his hairline and apparently other surgeries to shave down his Adam's apple and "feminize" his body in other ways too. But Rose is also a very large person with shoulders, hands, feet, height and girth that are unmistakably blokey.

I don't think affecting the sort of look Blaire W has was ever in the ream of possibility for Rose. But if you look at the cartoon imagery Rose uses to represent Rose's self, it seems that the Blaire aesthetic is what Rose would like to emulate and be able to pull off.

[–]TalkToTheVoid 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I didn't know about Rose of Dawn's surgeries. I thought she was mostly just dressing as a woman and maybe taking hormones. I still feel a bit conflicted about it though... I know she experiences dysphoria. I can't relate but I feel sympathy I guess? She wants to alleviate it by changing her body to be as close to female as she can manage. That's what dysphoria does to people who experience it right? None of the surgeries she's undertaken seem like they're about becoming an over-sexualized doll, so to me it feels like whatever she's done is driven by a desire to feel better, not really to be a stereotype.

I couldn't find cartoon imagery other than at the start of her videos. Did you mean that? Or something else? Based on just that, I agree with you that using a Jessica Rabbit sort of image to represent herself does make it seem like that's her ideal for herself.

I still feel inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt though. We've all come up in a world where we're constantly bombarded by images of what an ideal woman is supposed to look like. All of us have to fight that feeling of unworthiness for not having that stupid ideal body. Rose has fallen victim to that messaging too, in that when she imagines how she wishes her body was, she imagines the ideal we're all sold. It does feel odd that she's used that image for herself, but I don't know, I still feel she's not really driven by sexist stereotypes in her aesthetics.