A fashion-loving feminist?

In a world that is getting gradually more feminist and more beauty-obsessed at the same time, can a woman identify as a feminist while still caring about the way she looks? And, more importantly, could she ever not care at all?
 
The sad truth is that we live in a world built by and primarily for men. It is therefore unavoidable for women to be shaped by patriarchal ideas of beauty and style, and while it has been significantly easier for us to find our worth outside of marriage or motherhood, it is our mentality as well as our experiences that are still moulded by the patriarchal society in which we grow up. The pressure of beauty is heavy and omnipresent: we are taught to be preoccupied about the way we look from the moment we are able to walk. Dressed in pink skirts and shoes with glitter, encouraged to love princesses and plan our dream wedding as soon as we vaguely understand the concept of marriage, the way little girls are brought up today is very similar to their upbringing in the past, when marriage and motherhood were the only two milestones attainable by women. The world has changed, or at least it is in the process of doing so.
 
As we are growing up, many of us encounter feminism. Some of us don’t care about it, a few of us are scared of its potential threats, but many of us believe in its values and the movement as a whole. After all, this movement was founded to liberate us, to open the kitchen door and let us out, to shine its light on the inequalities we’ve been facing for centuries, to tell us that we are more than our clothes and our bodies, that we needn’t cover our faces in makeup and add to our hands nails so long they can barely open a water bottle. A hundred years ago women were throwing away corsets to be able to move freely at last, today we are throwing away the restricted nature of patriarchally shaped womanhood that corsets once embodied. And yet, we live in the age of social media and Instagram models, of ubiquitous, extensive plastic surgery and filters that can completely change your face with the click of a button, of fast fashion and eating disorders, now fuelled by the ideal of the women on the catwalk.
 
How then are we supposed to navigate this appearance-obsessed world? How do we find ourselves outside of our beauty and our style, if that is among the few things we’ve always been taught to cherish? How do you identify as a feminist and see yourself outside of the patriarchal lens, how do you erase the years of remarks about the ups and downs of your appearance? How do you, and can you ever, see yourself outside of the context of traditional womanhood if we are still living within it? 
 
All of these questions have been following me around for a few years now, encouraging me to seek answers in feminist literature, enlighten myself, and break the cycle that seems impossible to leave. And while I have been doing my research and figuring out how to be a woman today with all its perks and all its struggles, the answers I have found have only complicated and confused me even more. Some feminists believe in the healing power of clothes and makeup if these are the things that bring you joy. Others refuse these notions, pointing out that nurturing one’s appearance is joyful only because we are taught to associate it with male approval and appreciation, which have historically been the only tools available to women to survive and thrive. 
 
While I have never been good enough at makeup in order for it to become a source of enjoyment for me, I am a woman who simply loves clothes. To tell the truth, I’ve been a fashion enthusiast ever since I can remember. Before I understood the power of style and identity, I dressed up as princesses, ballet dancers and most importantly, Hannah Montana. As I was growing up, I started to see fashion in its true potential - a tool for self-expression, a way through which you introduce yourself to the world, your signature and your ally in a society that wasn’t designed for you. Years ago I found liberation in my fashion sense and I keep finding it today, not because it might make me more attractive, but because it makes me me. The truth is, we will never be able to find out what our lives would be like had they been shaped differently, had we not been told that our beauty determines our happiness and our success. We will never know what it would feel like not to worry about our weight or pimples, the thigh gap or the perfect lipstick simply because we grew up in a society that brought us up this way. 
 
We can let these notions go, but we can never erase them from our past. Yes, we would be different without them, probably happier, but the truth is they are a part of who we are now, and we might as well use them to our advantage. While we can never forget them, we can learn to see and to realise that none of these ideals is set in stone, that they were created by humans and can therefore be changed by them. I propose we accept them - the limits of the patriarchal world - because that is the only thing that can bring change in the long run. Yes, we might have digested some toxic ideals, but it is our awareness of this fact that has the power to change the world so that one day our daughters get to grow up without them. 
 
I’ve always seen feminism as a movement designed to give women the choices they lacked for the majority of history. So let’s see it that way. Let’s not have it prescribed to us how we should look or dress, neither by the patriarchy nor by its dissenters, who likewise deny us the enjoyment that can come hand in hand with a beautiful dress or a new mascara. Bear in mind that while many feminists praise the gender-fluid fashion decisions of male celebrities today, none deny men the choice to dress according to traditional views of masculinity, despite the fact that men wearing suits are just as much a construction of the patriarchy as long-haired women wearing skirts and makeup. 
 
Let’s look, dress and behave the way we want because ultimately that is where our power lies. Maybe my love for fashion originates in the patriarchy, in a world where a woman is nothing more than her appearance, but it is my awareness that makes my choice of clothing empowering and liberating, as well as my knowledge that there is more to me, and to all women, than the way we look.