Waiting for the Next First Lady

Editor's Note: This meme moved me to action. I have been writing this piece since before the election. I had been seeing people on my Facebook feed shame Melania for her life choices - to use her beauty, specifically her beautiful body, to make a living. I wrote this piece and held it. I wrote this piece and rewrote it. I rewrote it again and again. I had people read it and they insisted that I needed NEEDED to post it. And yet, I waited.

When I saw this meme the other day, though, I thought I could stay silent no longer. Yes, there is a lot more at play here than just two women in equal societal standing being judged for embracing the whole of who they are, including the ownership of their own bodies. But what I would love is if we could just be in a space in America where women were allowed to own their whole selves, including their sexuality, without being shamed for it. Our physical beauty, our desire, our ability to conceive, carry and birth children is a part of us no matter how we decide to use or not use that ability.

I'm a giant fan of Michelle Obama. I watch her poise and her grace and I am genuinely moved. I see the face she presents to the world as a pulled-together woman in control of her own world. She has, seemingly, the perfect blend of power and vulnerability. I watch how she seems with her children and am moved to take some lesson with into my own life to be more peaceful in my approach. And I watch the love she has with Barack and I dream of that kind of partnership for myself.

There is an urban legend. I have no idea if it is true. It goes like this. Michelle and Barack are at a diner in Chicago. Turns out that she dated the chef when she was younger.

Barack says to her, "Imagine, if you had stayed with him, you would be a chef's wife."

"No, he would be the president of the United States," she replies.

It is that kind of surity of self that makes me admire Michelle.

When I originally wrote this piece, Melania Trump was in the running to become the First Lady of the United States. Back then, we knew only a little about her, most of which had initially been seen as negative. We don't know a lot more now than we did then, so much of what I say next is me assuming by context.

Melania, like Michelle, is, to me, a dedicated mom. The youngest Trump child, who may or may not be on the Autism spectrum, is staying in New York with his mother for his good. It must take a lot of strength for a mom to speak out, potentially against an entire nation, and insist on what is good for her child.

We also know that when she was younger, she was a model. And in at least one photo that had been circulating the Internet, this fact became a reason that people did not think Melania was fit to be FLOTUS.

I take serious issue with this.

For those of us who were so angry about Trump’s comments about grabbing a woman by the pussy - that he took a woman’s body, her sexuality as something he had control over, that he said he would grab a woman without her consent - shouldn't the fact that Melania had autonomy over her body and how she used it be in the win column?

Let’s assume for the sake of argument here that Melania Trump chose to pose for that photo shoot. She was a successful model and the assumption is likely. She was not coerced or forced or talked into it by anyone. Then she had complete control and autonomy of her own body.

So why are we so angry?

Because here in America, a woman can do anything - even run for president of the United States - but she cannot choose to do what she wants with her own body. She cannot pose nude for the sake of art. She cannot openly express her own sexuality.

Why do we feel the need to slut shame Melania Trump?

According to a story in the New York Post, the photos, which include a fully nude shot of her and another female model in an embrace and a fully clothed one in which the other model in holding a whip and Trump seems to be backing away, were shot in 1995. The photographer, Alé de Basse­ville, who shot them is quoted in the Post article as saying,

“This is beauty and not porn. I am always shocked by the porn industry because they are destroying the emotion and essence of purity and simplicity.”

Americans do not know what to do with nudity or sexuality. And worse yet, we see no line between the two.

While I am a giant fan of Michelle Obama for the grace and poise she exhibited while first lady, why do we assume that a woman who was a model in her youth cannot do the same because she has exposed her own skin. And why do we only openly embrace certain archetypes of women. Why are the mother archetypes ok (well, unless they are breastfeeding) and the demure, quiet ones are fine. But loud, or proud of our own sexuality gets shamed into submission?

Women on Facebook get banned over and over again for breastfeeding their babies. Why? Because we cannot imagine that looking at a woman’s breast has anything to do with anything other than sex.

This is the place where this meme makes me not be able to hold my silence any longer.

"...has pictures in the public domain that violate Facebook's community standards on nudity..." And?...who decided that Facebook was the morality police? Who decided we needed a morality police?

When I was pregnant with my first child, I had a nude drawing done by a college friend of mine. Like many other women I know, I was fascinated with the life growing inside of me. I wanted to capture the change. I was lucky that no one around me tried to tell me what to do with that drawing. It was hanging in my bedroom for a long time. It is a beautiful work of art.

I have posed nude for photographs before too. I am comfortable in my own body. While I don't think it's perfect, I do find it beautiful in its own right and the scars and stretch marks I have I earned by doing things like carrying and ushering life into this world. I've done the work to see beauty when I look in the mirror. I chose to pose for photos or a drawing and I have the right to do so.

But, I suspect if I put a photo of my naked body out in public, I suddenly would be not qualified to teach. Because being comfortable enough in my own skin to share art I posed in makes me somehow a sexual deviant.

We don't know how to have healthy discussions about sexuality in the United States either.

We legislate the hell out of sex. We allow politicians to decide which sex acts are legally acceptable. It was not until 2013 that sodomy laws were repealed and those laws attempted to control not only what happened in the bedrooms of single people, but married couples as well.

We enact laws, but we cannot talk about it.

.All of this leads to the culture of women being assumed responsible for being attacked here in the United States. What was she wearing? Where was she walking? Was she alone? Was she drunk? Was she sending a mixed message? Are we supposed to now add that she shares photos in the public domain that violate social media nudity standards?

Rape culture exists in the United States in part because we are terrified to talk about sex. We are too afraid to explain to our young boys and girls what enthusiastic consent is because it will require an open and honest discussion of what two people would be consenting to doing.

Melania Trump was a model with a beautiful body who chose to have that body photographed and those photographs printed. That does not make her a slut, and that does not make her incapable of being the First Lady of the United States.

So, while I already immensely miss Michelle Obama for the entirety of who she is, I can look forward to seeing what Melania will become while she is in the White House. I look forward to hearing her views of life in America while she herself was not born here, but instead chose to become a naturalized citizen. I am looking forward to us maybe shifting our own opinions as Americans about what a good woman looks like. Certainly, we have accepted when she has grace and poise, but only when she fits in to the box we think she should shrink into. Nothing temptational - no naked shoulders, for example. And certainly, we have accepted when she looks like what we want a woman to be. I would love to see what happens when we just allow a woman to be herself.

#slutshaming #rapeculture #trump #Election2016