The Law According to Lidia Poët: a feminist analysis

The Law According to Lidia Poët is an Italian-language Netflix series based on the life of Lidia Poët, Italy’s first female lawyer. Despite having earned her law degree in 1881, working in a law practice for two years, and passing the Order of Advocates of Turin examination, Poët was prevented from practicing law because she was a woman until 1920. Described as a mature version of Enola Holmes, the combination of strong female character, period drama, and murder mystery is irresistible to me so I had to check it out.

Lidia is a sharp, gutsy, tenacious young woman who doesn’t waste time explaining why she isn’t what society says she is. She just gets on with her work, catching things her arrogant male peers don’t and quickly seizing upon opportunities to find clues. One episode features a lesbian relationship and though Lidia is heterosexual, she’s not interested in marriage or children. She creates opportunities for her niece, who seems to be legitimately in love, to spend time alone with her boyfriend. We also see in Lidia’s sister-in-law a woman who is resigned to patriarchy and grooms her daughter for a life of obedience and male servitude. She doesn’t approve of Lidia’s feminism but has no choice but to tolerate her as Lidia is living in her home and has somehow managed to twist her brother’s arm into allowing her to work for him behind the scenes. Matilda de Angelis offers an energetic and engaging portrayal of the feminist heroine.

Unfortunately, the series falls back on tired pseudo-feminist elements, wasting a lot of time doing so. My first critique is that independent female characters are never made all that independent and The Law According to Lidia Poët is no exception. Lidia insists the guy she’s sleeping with isn’t her boyfriend and true enough, she doesn’t pine. One gets the sense that she genuinely likes or may even love him but maintains her focus on her career and cases. A question few seem to ask is why female characters have to have romantic relationships with men in the first place. Over and over again, we get the message that women can be capable, autonomous beings, but there always has to be some man – or men – inserted into the story who is more than a friend or could become more. The imperative of romance is ever-present.

Viewers may appreciate that far from being chaste, Lidia is sexually active and unashamed. Still, we’re presented with that false dichotomy: belong to a man or have casual romps. How feminist can a woman be if she sleeps with men who use prostituted women? Surely this isn’t something the real Lidia would have done. The subliminal message to women is that men must be in the picture.

My second critique is the predictable female objectification. There’s an unwritten rule that the bodies of strong female characters must be exposed. The camera must capture carefully angled shots of her naked, hairless body, and erect nipples. Male viewers are rewarded with female nudity while female viewers – the intended audience – are reminded that women are ultimately never full human beings. There are a couple of quick pans of man bum. In one scene a man stands in the blurred background with his tackle out (one wonders if it’s prosthetic or CGI). Anyway, it doesn’t compare to the amount of gratuitous bare breasts on display. Another scene has Lidia investigating a wealthy murder suspect; naturally, on that very night he’s hosting a sex party. What does any of this have to do with a woman who fought to include her sex class in the legal profession? These decisions are deliberate.

Now for the third critique, related to the second: saucy fantasies and period dramas aren’t cool unless they include some depiction of prostitution. A boring plot gimmick that provides more opportunities and excuses to show tits and ass, brothels feature in tons of fantasy and period dramas, including Game of Thrones, The Witcher (including Blood Origin), Carnival Row, and Black Sails. The sex trade is often represented in an uncritical light or simply an inevitable fact of life. The oldest profession, don’t you know? In The Law According to Lidia Poët, Lidia visits an opium den to further her investigation. Naturally, there are high, sex-starved women draped everywhere and a half-naked temptress saunters over, advertizing her wares to a male patron. The theme of prostitution is sprinkled throughout, and though Lidia notes at one point that it’s hardly a good life, it comes off as opportunistic.

My fourth and final critique is that strong female characters are always portrayed by women who are conventionally (and exceptionally) attractive. Even if the historical person being portrayed isn’t particularly beautiful, only a dazzling actress is selected to play her. Matilda de Angelis is indeed gorgeous and does a commendable job, but these choices perpetuate sexist beauty standards, reminding women that we’re never good enough. Apparently it’s not enough for Poët to be an average-looking or even plain woman with an above-average intellect. Unless you’re a man, looks matter even if you’re a genius. A Review Geek article says of de Angelis (note that the writer is male):

Everything about her – hair and makeup, costumes – is compellingly crafted to embellish Poet’s appeal.

Arnav Srivastava for Review Geek

Her appeal to whom? If the principle audience is women, why should it matter to us whether the actors are beautiful? Surely this is more alienating than anything to the average woman. Why should we care about hair, costumes, and makeup, except to assess whether they’re well executed and historically accurate? This is the obligatory injection of femininity. It seems the assumption is that without the glossy femininity, romance, and sex, women wouldn’t enjoy a murder mystery series about Italy’s first female lawyer. Apparently one cannot make a modern production that’s exciting and provocative without these ingredients. Apart from perpetuating liberal sexism, it’s unoriginal and tiresome. With only six episodes to tell Lidia’s story, instead of focusing on what must have been a fascinating and groundbreaking development in women’s rights, the producers reduced the show to a smutty bastardization of Lidia Poët’s life. It wasn’t until the final episode that we see any depiction of feminist organizing. There are women demonstrating on behalf of her legal appeal, shouting from the back of the courtroom. She doesn’t even look at them. Somehow she has no idea women are gathered outside her home in a candlelight vigil to her honour her fight; she only finds out because she has to walk past them and even then, she doesn’t engage with them. Imagine what they could have done with the source material!

It’s unknown whether the show will return for a second season and the ending of the first deviates drastically from what we know about the course Poët’s life took. The Law According to Lidia Poët is clearly intended as liberal feminist, sex-positive entertainment so if you’re looking for an honest biography that engages with Lidia’s circumstances and the struggle for women’s rights, I’m sorry to say you’ll be disappointed. At the very least, the series may inspire people to learn about the real Lidia Poët, a brilliant feminist whose astounding accomplishments benefitted not only herself but women as a class.

Reclaiming the feminist legacy: language and defiance

If being a feminist means recognizing that women and girls face unique challenges because we’re female and men as a class exert power over us, why do some women, especially some who campaign for women’s rights, reject the label?

One reason proferred is that the words ‘feminism’ and ‘feminist’ supposedly don’t mean anything anymore because the movement has been astroturfed and is dominated by women who are male-centred. These are the “sex positive” cool girls who go on slut walks and denounce you as a SWERF if you criticize the sex trade’s disproportionate impact on women and girls. They say that talking about this creates the stigma around “sex work,” which then inspires men who purchase sex to assault and kill women. The fact that men who target desperate and underprivileged women to purchase their consent are violent misogynists driven by their hatred of women is not only ignored but unspeakable. These same so-called feminists are also happy to allow male sex offenders into women’s prisons and for men to steal medals from female athletes, represent women in politics, and erase women as the female sex class in law and language. Obviously, they’re the opposite of feminist.

The problem with this stated reason for not identifying as feminist, however, is it’s rife with contradiction. The word ‘woman’ arguably doesn’t mean anything anymore either because trans activists have succeeded in bullying a huge tranche of the population into saying “trans women are women” and defining ‘woman’ as anyone who identifies as one. Should we then abandon the word ‘woman’ because it’s been pretty much mangled beyond recognition, most recently by the Cambridge Dictionary? Of course not. It’s nonsensical for women who oppose male appropriation of womanhood to reclaim the meaning of ‘woman’ but not the meaning of ‘feminist.’

For this reason, I’m suspicious that the real motivation might be a desire to remain in feminist spaces while protecting one’s likeability. Particularly if one has broadened one’s content to non-feminist audiences and makes a living off podcasting and writing. Why else would someone who founded a feminist platform and has published so much clear, uncompromising feminist writing suddenly become sympathetic to the ridiculous claim that incels are misunderstood victims? Women who date men have to make many uncomfortable choices, often between their feminism and their relationships with or appeal to men. They should nevertheless be honest about their motivations.

Another explanation a women’s rights campaigner has given for not identifying as a feminist is she believes some feminists really are man-haters and have gone too far. Standard MRA rhetoric of the “feminism is cancer” variety. Ironically, this person also acknowledges that some women sell other women out. I’ve heard one podcaster, a lesbian who vehemently opposes gender identity, say the word patriarchy is overused. How can it be that naming a system that degrades, brutalizes, and murders girls and women is considered excessive, rather than the system itself? Should we resort to sanitized language to describe our oppression, the same way liberation has been replaced by equality? Notably, the individuals who say these sorts of things frequently criticize liberal feminism, usually on the basis that it’s fake feminism, which is exactly what they’re engaging in when they eschew class analysis and refuse to name the problem. And anyway, why be offended by fake feminists when you don’t want to be a feminist yourself?

We use certain words constantly in feminist circles because the whole point is to talk about feminist concepts. If you get tired hearing about it, do the decent thing and bow out graciously and leave women to do the work. Don’t go whining to men and any woman who will tolerate it that women won’t shut up about our oppression. Outside of those spaces, people aren’t talking about patriarchy enough. Just because men bristle at the mention of male violence, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t talk about it.

Some arguments between feminists and not-really-feminists turn on the way in which mothers shield their boys from scrutiny. No mother wants to believe her son hates her and other females on some level. She’s inclined to believe she’s done a good job and may have even tried to avoid pushing masculinity on her son(s). But I suspect a mother who doesn’t want to call herself a feminist and parrots MRA talking points isn’t well prepared to raise a boy/man who supports the feminist struggle and treats women and girls with respect. If boys themselves weren’t a threat, many of us girls wouldn’t have experienced all manner of violence, including sexual violence, at the hands of boys. And yet we have.

There’s also the claim that feminism is the province of middle class educated women: “I’m working class and we don’t do academic feminism (paraphrasing).” A lot of radical feminists are working class and have never taken a women’s or gender studies course. I certainly haven’t and I certainly don’t come from a middle class family. Those of us who don’t fit this characterization are able to understand that naming the class of people who oppress us is critical to our liberation from them even if we believe the oppressive behaviour is learned and not biological. It doesn’t require a degree.

And what’s up with this business of identifying as a feminist, anyway? What does that even mean? Given the nonsense around identifying as a woman, or black, or disabled, we should be clear that some things are objective; words have meaning. Mere utterance doesn’t make something true, e.g. a man who says he’s a woman or non-binary is a man no matter what he says. If you satisfy the definition of feminist (what it actually means, not the bullshit version patriarchy has cooked up), then aren’t you a feminist?

You may not want to stain yourself with the title but you are what you are. You may resist in order to avoid some measure of punishment, just as some women and girls try to identify out of femaleness. The logical parallel should be evident to anyone who rejects gender identity. So if some women don’t want to call themselves feminists for whatever reason, they’re probably more male-centred than they’d like to admit. One might argue that what really matters is the work they do – tireless, brilliant, amazing work which benefits all women. That’s fair. We should give credit where credit is due.

But women aren’t fragile creatures immune to critique. Our predecessors defiantly marched behind the feminist banner. Our rights are once again under attack: our bodies, our spaces, our language. Now is the time to proudly reclaim the legacy of feminism. We don’t need another word to describe who we are. We already have one. It was taken from us. Whichever new one you try to use, they’ll try to take it from you too. Feminism, female, woman, vagina, mother, breastfeeding, menstruation, intersectionality, homosexuality, oppression, biological sex, patriarchy…

I say we stand our ground and say, “No, fuck off, you can’t have it, it’s ours.”

What Hillary Clinton means for feminism

Feminist Current has published a fantastic article by Marie Crosswell entitled Hillary Clinton is the embodiment of liberalism, not feminism. I urge you to read it. Everything from the title to the well-argued points are exactly what feminism needs right now. I wanted to add a few points of my own to bolster the great case that Crosswell has made and to put another much-needed article of dissent out there. Nothing I’m saying is original. This started out as a comment posted on the site in response to liberals but I decided it needed its own space.

 

“Why extremists always focus on women remains a mystery to me. But they all seem to. It doesn’t matter what country they’re in or what religion they claim. They want to control women.” – Hillary Clinton [source]

Scott Eisen/Getty Images

It’s the job of feminists to critique and analyze every supposed representative of our movement. Women haven’t died and made incalculable sacrifices so that modern feminists could make excuses and settle for half-assed solutions to the domination of our species by males. We need to carry these women’s work on our shoulders and prove that it wasn’t all in vain. Feminists are having to learn this lesson over and over and over again because the movement coddles people who can’t think beyond their knee-jerk denial.

The question simmering beneath the debate is simply this: Who are you here to defend; one woman or all women?

Patriarchy runs down to the core of this rotten society. It requires a radical solution. At what point do we realize we’re decorating a tree that needs to be taken down? We know the system has many tentacles that women often only have the time or energy to focus on individually. Hillary Clinton is not one of those people. She’s white, rich, and powerful. She’s smart. She could be a formidable force but she has chosen to mold her politics to a template that does not work, and I doubt very much that she doesn’t know that. She could have decided to extricate herself from a party that recently decided, extending the DOJ well beyond its legal mandate, that sex-based protections under Title IX mean nothing because some men have confused the stereotype of femininity with the material reality of womanhood itself. Whoever can’t see how damaging this is – that it is the erasure of females as a distinct class of people whose needs should be protected – needs to call whatever it is they’re doing something other than feminism.

The question of just how feminist Hillary Clinton is has been articulately laid out by many feminists, but some people don’t think they need to internalize that info because Clinton supports abortion. How many feminist-identified politicians are against it? When you’re done counting to zero, ask yourself whether you want to keep running on this hamster wheel. Liberals are never willing to face the ugly truth and stand up for real change – and that’s dangerous.

You might have good reasons for voting for Clinton and we can certainly appreciate the good things she’s said and done. I for one will be celebrating when (I hope) she kicks Trump’s ass and outshines her own philandering husband. But none of these things make her worthy of being the face of feminism. Can we finally admit Clinton’s limitations and instead set our focus on doing the work that we know only we are willing to do?

The world has seen a number of female leaders. Thatcher broke that glass ceiling a long time ago in the U.K. How much of a difference did that make for women? She wasn’t a feminist by any means, so it’s not an apt comparison on that level. But she was a neoliberal – a capitalist individualist – whose policies weren’t so different from those endorsed by Clinton all these years. A leader’s support for women shows not only in the comments they make explicitly about women but also in their policy, particularly as it concerns education and the economy, since these areas are key drivers of sex-based inequality under the current system. Being the most exposed and least valued, women are the first to suffer, forced into work that even the poorest men can avoid, along with the risk of unwanted pregnancy and their role (voluntary or not) as the primary carers of children and other family members.

Stopping at reproductive rights leaves a huge gap that fails to address the cause of sexual violence (masculinity) or the ways in which women who are further marginalized because of their ethnic backgrounds, disability, civic status, etc. are coerced into making impossible ‘choices’. As quoted above, she’s said that she doesn’t even understand why all of this is happening. I too want to believe her heart is in the right place but the depth of her ignorance is disappointing and her contradictions form a clear pattern.

An impressive list of countries including India, Guyana, Mali, Sri Lanka, Nicaragua, Argentina, Indonesia, Liberia, Philippines, Malawi, and Brazil have elected female heads of state. I think it’s important to ask how the lives of women and girls have changed as a result. For instance, what has Angela Merkel in Germany done for female victims of violence, not only at the hands of immigrant gangs but also at the hands of white German men who prey on poor women who are often trafficked from economically depressed regions, in mega brothels? One of the fascinating bits of history revealed in the Ascent of Woman BBC series is that women have taken power many times throughout human history, some of whom used that power to help their sisters while others didn’t or couldn’t. Worse yet, neither Canada nor the U.S. have managed to elect a woman as prime minister or president. So I absolutely want to see that happen.

Ultimately, it’s a trademark liberal strategy to fool the optimistic ranks into believing that a token woman in a powerful position is a sign of fundamental change. Does it make anything more than a little dent in patriarchy? It sure does enrage MRAs to think of a woman representing a state that they believe should be protecting their own privileges. And it gives many women and girls hope. Leaving aside the question of the degree to which a U.S. president is a true leader rather than a figurehead, having a woman in that role means something. The problem is that the liberal elite are very good at exploiting this something, blowing it out of proportion, and hoping that women will be content with it because they didn’t get stuck with an openly fascist president whose hatred of women is part of his appeal.

Women can’t afford to fall for the spectacle. The good news is that feminism is not one woman, and it remains up to all of us, as it always has, to overcome male power.