Gender101@Bowdoin

Face it, you’re a tease.

I’m NOT a tease.

Sure you are. Sex is your weapon. You said it yourself. You use it to get respect.

Perception of Teases

The scene from The Breakfast Club shows the three labels from which a woman is categorized when stating her status as a virgin or non-virgin: the slut, the prude, or, worst, a tease. The prude is the woman that cuts herself off from sex and sexuality expression. The slut is the woman that sleeps around (in Claire’s opinion this showcases her lack of self-respect). The tease, though, is the woman that flouts sexual expression but then withholds sex. This disconnect makes her the worst label, because she uses sex as something other then its physical act, as a means of power and control. 

For Monday’s class, we read several articles that discussed perceptions of women’s sexual activity and inactivity as well as the use of the female body as a sexualized object. It is arguable whether the labels of prudes and sluts are more dependent on one’s sexual activity, sexual expression, or both, but the definition of teases inherently combines both aspects. The tease acknowledges her sexuality, inducing arousal in others, but then doesn’t deliver that arousal in an actual sexual act. For this post, I would like to explore the perception of teases in our culture and ask whether the notion of a tease carries the same meaning today as in The Breakfast Club (1985).

Claire (the redhead) in The Breakfast Club is by definition a tease. She is “sexy, but not sexual” (Levy, 2006, p. 30). She is popular at the school, and, no doubt, her position as a tease adds to her social status. It would seem that the tease is the valued role for a woman.

Valenti (2009) and Levy (2006) support this idea that a tease is a position of power and respect. They both utilize Jessica Simpson as an example of the female role model in American society. She is a “shiny, waxy [blonde]” (Levy, 2006, p. 30) that ”adheres to the social structures that tell women that they exist purely for men: as a virgin, as a sex symbol, or in Simpson’s case, as both” (Valenti, 2009, p. 27). Jessica Simpson is a tease, and, according to Valenti (2009) and Levy (2006), she is what society wants girls to emulate. The focus is on presenting a picture to society that is in contrast to her actual sex life. Claire achieves popularity by conforming to this model (despite having red hair).

Claire, as a tease, should therefore be given the highest amount of respect and power, but, as seen in clip, the men don’t respect her. It seems this frustration derives from their knowledge that she uses arousal as a weapon of power. She manipulates others with sexual fantasy to have others like her and look up to her, and the boys don’t think that is commendable.  

My overall question then is whether the current perception of the tease matches more with Claire’s perception or the boys’ perception. Is being a tease given high value by society or does it cause others to lose respect for the person? Interesting, both Valenti (2009) and Levy (2006) discuss celebrities, but celebrity culture, in my opinion, has changed dramatically. Sex tapes and naked pictures of both male and female celebrities quickly spread around the internet, and it seems every day we hear about another celebrity’s nude scandal. Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian are prime examples of women that flaunted their sexuality and sexual activity as means to achieve status in our culture. This shift in the achievement of celebrity would seem to give power to a woman that expresses sexuality and engages in sex.

This shift gives power to these women, but does it give them respect? For example, Lamm (1999) earns money by performing a sexy dance in front of people in a drag show that includes “straddling,” a revealing outfit, and “thrusting” (Lamm, 1999, p. 152). Her show promises arousal and delivers on it. Although Lamm (1999) appears to feel empowered by her show, she also labels herself as a “freak,” “like the kind of person people gawk at and feel sorry for” (153). She isn’t a tease, but she doesn’t express the greatest amount of self-respect. Therefore, respect is something still not available to sexually expressive women, regardless of their actual sexual activity. The woman is still just a prude, a slut, or a tease.    

Questions

1) Is the tease still a highly valued commodity in modern American culture? Has a new bar been raised where women that express sexuality must express sexual activity as well?

2) Does being a tease empower or disempower a woman? Are power and respect mutually exclusive for sexually expressive women?

3) Does a single, non-married woman always have to fall into one of these three labels: the prude, the slut, or the tease? If no, then how does this non-labeled woman dress, engage in sexual activity, and express her sexuality?