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Great resource I wanna dive into: I've been thinking about the "Athena" picture since last night, thinking through all the ways in which American necessitates linking perceived white female identity with specific Greco-Roman goddesses in this country... https://twitter.com/thinglygrammar/status/1285447874696949760
I was doing a little digging to see if I could find more context around the photo other than folx fawning, and I saw this comment from the photographer's thread: https://twitter.com/altcarebear/status/1285454743129608196?s=20
We have many layers here, but the one that I want to impress upon is that Athena is a figure that often blots out all other forms of feminine expression. She is prime patriarchal female of the Greek pantheon, and her association in some ways strangely reminds me...
...of the Pristine White Woman trope in popular culture. She is definitely the proto-Cool Girl. And because of that association--the reality of this woman's protest is obscured.
This is a sex worker in Portland, the city with the most strip clubs in this country.
This is a sex worker in Portland, the city with the most strip clubs in this country.
The sex workers in Portland have been striking in solidarity with their Black dancers and that's been spreading across the nation: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/stripper-strike-portland-oregon-black-lives-matter-haymarket-pole-collective-1021922/
The use of Athena in this photo I find quite unsurprising as a scholar of racialized myth reception in America--Athena is a figure usually used to whitewash and sanitize female behavior and bring it back under a patriarchal narrative.
Like one of her most famous myths: her weaving contest with Arachne--she's pissed bc Arachne refuses to show her respect as a weaver (and since weaving is the one female realm that Athena has control over, having a woman reject her in this way is very insulting).
Arachne challenges her to a competition: Athena weaves a tapestry of her triumph over Poseidon to be the patron god of Athens--one of the bigger "Girl Power!" moments in myth.
Arachne's response however is the tapestry of sexual violence done by Athena's male counterparts.
Arachne's response however is the tapestry of sexual violence done by Athena's male counterparts.
Because what use is Boss Girls succeeding when the only reason that you get to succeed is because the male gods respect your virginity because your father said so (who is featured prominently in his violations, sometimes with his other daughters)?
So Athena, unable to find a flaw, tears up Arachne's work and beats her with her shuttle until Arachne angrily hangs herself in vengeance (according to Ovid) but Athena can't let her rest and turns her into a spider so she has to weave perpetually.
This protester, if the purpose was to actually compare them to a goddess, had a whole host of other goddesses (and so many who patron sex workers!) from antiquity to choose from--going with Athena speaks to a larger tread in the sanitizing power of myth in patriarchies.
