The Modern Woman

A couple months ago I was rereading Gone With The Wind when I got the lyrics to Anaconda by Nicki Minaj stuck in my head. The combination was such an odd one that I had to stop and think about it and this is what I came up with.
For those of you who have had the grave misfortune of not reading all 1400 pages of Gone With The Wind multiple times, or watching the three hour movie, I will give you an extremely brief summary. The story is set in the last dying days of the Old South. The Civil War is displayed from the view point of a spoiled and opinionated Southern Belle, Scarlett O'Hara. Scarlett, like the other Southern women around her, struggles to cope with the world she was raised in and knows, disintegrate around her. The women can do no more than watch helplessly from the sidelines. That was the Southern woman. She was helpless. She was ornamental. She was not expected to have ideas of her own. Scarlett is all but cast out from decent society when she becomes a career woman and takes charge of her own life. The women though, while ornamental, were the backbone of society. They were the neck of the household; anything they wanted, they could obtain, though it had to be manipulated through the head of the man. Women were highly respected and required the protection of a man. The young men were not allowed to call the young women by their first names without preceding it with "Miss" and even that act was one worked towards for months and could only take place after the express permission of the female. Marriage proposals were not accepted the first time, or even the second, but the third. Women were protected and men were expected to know how to protect them and treat the women like the fragile delicate creatures they were.
Contrast this with Nicki Minaj's recent Anaconda music video. The most known line of the song is "My anaconda don't-My anaconda don't-My anaconda don't want none unless you've got buns hon." Obviously you can work out the sexual innuendo in this line for yourself. Nicki expresses that women have been empowered. They do not need a man to complete them. They are free to have ideas, to have their own goals, to do what they want, to sleep with whom ever they please. Men have accepted that women can think for themselves and are not, in fact, fragile helpless creatures.
But at what cost?
Objectifying a women in the Old South was done in secret. The "bad woman" in Gone With The Wind is not a part of society. Men of dignity do not enter her house or even entertain notions of doing such a thing. The "bad woman" made a choice not accepted in polite society and she embraces it, even though the rest of society can hardly stand to talk about her. Objectifying women was a hidden process in the Old South. Meanwhile, we have a famous pop singer objectifying herself for reasons known alone to her and the objectification of women is so commonplace that she's barely scandalous. However, no one can deny that what Minaj did worked. I know who Nicki Minaji is. I have watched some of her music videos, even if I lost interest half way through. She's built career for herself, like thousands of other women today, and probably made more money in a couple years than I will ever make in my lifetime. She's a career woman and I give her my respect for having the guts to put herself out there and make something of herself.
Women have gained a lot in the world of business since 1864. Unfortunately, I believe we may have lost on the home front. People's eyes bug out when I tell them I want a lot of kids and stay at home with them. Marriage is a suggestion rather than a social norm. Motherhood is prolonged until almost the last possible instant. Michelle Duggar is an oddity for welcoming as many children as she is able to have.
All in all, a woman's mind is far more respected today than it was 150 years ago, but I don't believe the same can be said for her body. We have given up respect for our bodies for respect of our minds. Now the problem is; how do we attain respect for both?
Scroll down for respect!
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