Since the doorbell doesn't work anyway, I climb through the open window into the kitchen of the shared apartment and am greeted by an atmosphere that, based on the slightly burnt-smelling air in the room, could be described as heated. The used dishes are stacked next to the sink at the other end of the kitchen, which adds to the crammed, lively charm of the room. The shelf next to me is crammed from top to bottom with communal food. Every centimeter of the low walls is hung with pictures of excursions together, concerts, bike rides and bouldering. Whoever enters this apartment is entering a community.
All three roommates have come together to chat in the kitchen. Somebody let the new video by Shirin David run, in which she shows herself confident but also extremely revealing. That divides the minds within the women's flat share: “I don't like this mean-girl feminism,” explains one of the roommates who is watering some flowers next to me and inadvertently watering the neighbors' curious cat on the windowsill. Diligently avoiding the discussion, I decide to get to the bottom of the slightly burnt smell and plan the most inconspicuous route to the stove at the other end of the room.
“I don't care if you think that Shirin adapts to existing ideals of beauty in her videos with her revealing outfits and her way of dancing. If feminism is supposed to give us women the freedom to be authentic, why do we feminists keep asking each other to justify our clothes and life plans? ”She asks as I try to get under the kitchen table on my way to the oven Crawl in the middle of the room. “If all the time we do nothing but attack other women in the name of feminism, then this is not a generic term for discussions about femininity, but an exclusive club that you can only come into if you are cool enough and have the right clothes carries! ", she explains and adds after the failed attempt,to calm the freshly poured cat: “And as far as your reproach is that Shirin makes herself an object for the recipient through her aesthetics: Why is it always the woman's responsibility to behave kindly in such a way that she is not objectified? How many clothes do you have to wear at least to receive the status of the subject so generously? Humanity is inherent in all of us, this is not a trophy with which one can be temporarily rewarded for good behavior. "to receive the status of the subject so generously? Humanity is inherent in all of us, this is not a trophy with which one can be temporarily rewarded for good behavior. "to receive the status of the subject so generously? Humanity is inherent in all of us, this is not a trophy with which one can be temporarily rewarded for good behavior. "
"Keeping your mouth shut is also having an opinion!"
The second roommate sits cross-legged on her chair at the kitchen table and uses her finger to paint smileys on the crumbs on the plate in front of her.
She replies thoughtfully: “But what is always declared here as freedom of choice only perpetuates existing constraints that have existed forever and have been causing damage for just as ever.
Exactly the freedom that was so bitterly fought for by feminists is now being used by the rapper not to question established ideals of beauty, but to use them for her own benefit from the window to the stove try to camouflage myself in the shadow of the man-high refrigerator next to the kitchen door.
The roommate at the window answers: "Why do we casually ask any women to dismantle the existing ideals of beauty?" 30 o'clock, ushers in the new era of body neutrality. I just find that women who use oppressive norms to their advantage do not have to be pat on the shoulder in a feminist and benevolent manner. "
“I think you're somehow talking past each other,” the third mini-resident intervenes, who makes tea for everyone at the stove. “The way I see it, the way Shirin David presents himself is one of a thousand valid facets of femininity. And it would be important to process a lot of different designs of femininity in the media without discrediting any of them, don't you think? Femininity definitely includes women, like Shirin David. But also sporty women, women with physical disabilities, intellectual women, women who present themselves androgynous or masculine and trans women. Not to mention, of course, women who are just not white and blonde. ”In the meantime, I've reached the stove.
“You just have to show the thousand other designs and, if necessary, deal with them critically but empathically. So Shirin's way of being a woman becomes just one of a thousand valid variants, ”she says, pouring tea for her roommates while I smell the slightly burnt banana bread from the oven with delight. "And this one ideal of beauty, which we have been discussing for so long, loses its disproportionate effect among a thousand others," she concludes, suddenly pausing at my cup: "What do you think of that?" The roommate adds challengingly at the window: "Shut up is also having an opinion!" I bite into my banana bread to buy time. “It's been there for at least two weeks,” says the roommate at the kitchen table dryly.