Vera Boguslavskaya
Sasha Sobol: What are your definitions of "man" and "woman?"
Vera Boguslavskaya: Never thought about it this way. Yeah, just a person with some gender specific parts. It works for most people and I believe if a person insists to belong to the other gender it's ok.
SS: Are there any gender roles that you think should be there and are there any that you wish did not exist?
VB: I think that on one hand with all the progress we have in contraception and baby care and everything, gender roles should be eliminated and on the other hand [as long as] women are still responsible for giving birth to kids, they should be protected in some way. I think that traditional stereotypes don't improve life nor for men neither for women. So men are under bigger pressure, have more stressful lives because they kind of have to achieve something; otherwise they don't "count" as men. And women are still treated as a second sort of people, unfortunately. I think that getting rid of those strict roles will help people to get more flexibility, more freedom and live better lives because they would have more choices. It doesn't mean that it's wrong for a woman to just stay at home with kids. It's ok if she really wants it. It doesn't mean that it's bad for a man to be ambitious and build his career. It just means that both [options] should be available for everybody.
SS: Do you conform to the society's gender expectations?
VB: Not always.
SS: Can you give some examples of when you do not conform?
VB: Well, for example in Russia it's not general that a woman drives and a man doesn't and it happened in our family. And I frequently found myself talking to my man friends as just fellow friends and then at some point they looked really surprised that they talked to a woman and not a man.
SS: For the times you do conform, is it more because society expects you to or because you--
VB: Because I feel comfortable to do this way. I don't really care about society in terms of what people would think about me.
SS: The next question is about two different situations and what you think about them. So the first one is that a lot of the time when it's socially acceptable for a man to expose his chest, a woman has to cover hers and in some places there are laws that prohibit women from exposing their nipples and the other situation was that when women are allowed to show their legs, arms, and cleavage, as in with dresses and formal situations, men have to wear suits and can't really show a lot of skin.
VB: I don't know what should be in general, but just from my perspective, I never really wanted to be naked on my top unless it's a really hot place like the beach or whatever. At the beach, first of all there are beaches where you [are] allowed to be topless and second, it's not very good cancer-wise to expose your breasts to the sun, so maybe it's not that bad for women. I think I most struggle from observing some not-so-nice looking too fat guys than from inability to be topless myself.
SS: Do you think women should be allowed to be topless if they wanted to?
VB: I don't really see any place beside a beach or a pool where it would seem to be appropriate for me or maybe I don't know... No, on a street -- not really. And maybe on the street it's not nice to see topless men as well. So, on a beach yes they should be allowed. Maybe there should be some kind of separate places for people who maybe don't want to expose their kids to the view of naked women. Or men.
SS: Naked as in topless?
VB: Or maybe completely naked. Because, you know, it's really cool to swim naked. Yeah, but if you have bright sun you have to cover yourself anyway.
SS: Some people don't burn.
VB: But ultraviolet still causes skin cancer even if you don't burn.
SS: What about the second situation?
VB: The second situation. I really feel sorry for men who can't be as creative as women for their formal dresses. And I feel really privileged as a woman that I can dress up different ways. And I don't really feel like showing your legs or cleavage is inappropriate for anybody. It may be inappropriate when you're in a church or people are supposed to be covered or in some religious place. But overal, come on. We all have legs, it's not something to hide. Oh yeah, and I really like men in kilts.
SS: Do you think it's kind of ironic that in different situations men and women are expected to cover more or less of their bodies?
VB: Never thought about it... No, it's not ironic because I think both situations kind of derived from objectivization of women's body. Because they are not supposed to be too attractive so they have to cover their nipples in all situations otherwise those "poor men" can unexpectedly be overexcited. And in formal situaitons, men look like "serious person" and their formal suits look pretty similar so nothing will distract them from their business. And women look like tropical birds to please those serious guys.
SS: So the next question is about the value of masculinity and femininity and how women are sometimes encouraged to embrace their masculine side while feminine men are kind of looked down upon by society. And the question is why do you think that is and why do you think femininity is valued as less than masculinity?
VB: It's complicated because you should first define how exactly you understand femininity and masculinity. And it's hard for me to answer this question because English is not my native language. But in Russian, there are a lot of words connecting with females or femininity that [are] kind of [degrading] and a lot of other words that are connected to masculinity that could be formally as rude as the first ones, but actually they are positive adjectives. And I think it's all kind of outcomes from the patriarchy system when men were real people and real humans and women were just some creatures to make babies and maybe please these real people. And yes, there are differences that depend on hormones because on average having more testosterone, men are stronger, more aggressive, and more competitive. Not because they're are better or women are better. It's just some hormonal thing. That's why young men drivers pay high insurances. Insurance rate depends on statistics, not some gender speculations and young men drivers do get into more accidents than young women drivers. But on the other hand, you cannot just assign some abilities to just one gender. Having more instances of some characteristics in one gender doesn't mean the other gender doesn't have them.
SS: Kind of building off of the patriarchy and the idea that femininity is valued as less than masculinity, how does that relate to discrimination in the workplace?
VB: I don't know the answer to how it relate, but I do know that discrimination still exists. And even people who will answer the straight question "Do you think men can do this job better than women?" they will say "Oh, no, we should consider the abilities of the candidate before hiring him or her and we don't care" but in reality there were a couple studies where different scientist, so it's not like underprivileged people, or uneducated people, but scientists [of both genders], they were presented some applications, the very same applications, and they should kind of read it and either accept or deny it and whatever. And so the very same application was submitted under a definitely feminine name and a definitely masculine name and the very same application got higher grades with [a] masculine name than it got with [a] feminine name. And the weird thing is that not only [did] men scientists [grade the work under a male name better], but [women graded men higher too]. [referring to this study: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/09/21/study-offers-new-evidence-scientists-are-biased-against-women ]
SS: Do you think it's important to make the world a more accepting place to gender nonconforming people and if so, how can this be done?
VB: I think that in long perspective it would be done and it is necessary to work on it, but it can't be done in just one click. It should be done through some educational work because not many people know just how many gender nonconforming people there are around and sometimes they think that they're some weird freaks and just don't understand. We have example of women who fight for their rights and in the last hundred years they achieved a lot. And we see homosexual people who in the last 20 years achieved a lot. So, yeah the modern world is kind of ready for different changes but you do need to educate people to convince them to change their perception.
SS: I think that is about it. Is there anything else you would like to add?
VB: It was interesting to talk to you. Thank you.
SS: Thank you.
Note: This is my mom. I had a lot of fun talking to her.
This interview was done in person.
This interview was done in person.