On Transforming Guilty Pleasures
By Anna Kim, ASW
One theme I hear coming up in my work with womxn is guilt. They feel guilty for taking up too much space, guilty for having needs, guilty for asking for help, guilty for work they could have done, guilty for not doing more. They often say they feel selfish when asking for their needs to be met, and feel guilty about that, too.
As a female-identifying person, I resonate with these sentiments. I have likewise been exposed to the guilt that is interwoven into our cultural narratives about femininity, and all the tasks womxn need to accomplish with no complaint or struggle. I still feel pulled to make myself smaller, to listen more than I speak, to apologize at the first sign of offense.
In fact, I think that this kind of guilt is so pervasive that it’s invaded womxns’ joyful spaces, too. Take “guilty pleasures.” What is a guilty pleasure, really? What is it guilty of?
“ They’re all the things we’re not supposed to want because they don’t fit within the ideal version of “womxnness” and “femininity.” But we do want them because they feel good!”
Whether it’s watching television or eating a comforting food, what makes something a guilty pleasure is an underlying assumption that it is embarrassing, frivolous, bad, or that we somehow don’t deserve it. There is guilt in liking it even though one “shouldn’t,” and guilt in fearing judgment. But who decides what is and isn’t pleasurable? What makes someone’s pleasure a guilty one?
In my experience as a therapist and as a womxn, womxn hold guilty pleasures far more often than their male-identifying counterparts. Whether it’s related to diet culture, sexuality, work, relationships, or raising families, societal narratives instill guilt in womxn from an early age. I think it’s worth locating where that guilt comes from.
I think for many womxn, guilty pleasures are just pleasures seen through the oppressive prism of sexism, heteropatriarchy, and white supremacy culture. They’re all the things we’re not supposed to want because they don’t fit within the ideal version of “womxnness” and “femininity.” But we do want them because they feel good!
Here’s an example—I love peanut M&Ms. I recently bought a two-pound, family size bag of them. I think peanut M&Ms are delicious (but you can replace them in this example with any food you find delicious and comforting!), and they bring me joy. But I remember a time, not so long ago, when they were my guilty pleasure. With each small, single-serve bag I’d consume, I felt overcome with a sense of shame. A whole serving of candy! Candy! I rued my lack of self-control and worried about gaining weight and rotting my teeth. But that guilt does not come from my actual experience. That guilt, and any such guilt associated with comfort foods, is pleasure viewed through the lens of heteronormative, patriarchal ideas about the “feminine ideal,” diet culture, and thinness.
“But if you remove the prism, delicious foods and TV shows are just pleasures! And everyone deserves pleasure and deserves to experience it without needing to justify it to others.”
Another example is television. Womxn feel guilty when they watch TV instead of being productive in the ways society tells them they should be—i.e. cooking, cleaning, mothering, caretaking, etc. But TV is entertaining! It can be relaxing, comforting, enriching! What makes TV-watching a guilty pleasure is the prism of patriarchal norms about the domestic duties of womxn, and capitalist notions of productivity and worth.
But if you remove the prism, delicious foods and TV shows are just pleasures! And everyone deserves pleasure and deserves to experience it without needing to justify it to others. To eat something you love or watch a show that relaxes you unapologetically, and without guilt, is not just self-care, it is a form of resistance against these systems of oppression.
I encourage you to, as Adrienne Marie Brown writes in her book, Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good, “center joy and pleasure as resistance.” By doing so, you inherently de-center heteronormative, patriarchal, and capitalist systems.
There is much to suss out here for each person, and separating guilt from pleasure can be very challenging and complicated, as we are still always inundated with patriarchal gender norms and expectations. But there is pleasure separate from guilt, and womxn deserve to experience it, too.
Anna Kim is an Associate Clinical Social Worker, a writer, and an adventurer. Anna works with individuals, intimate relationships, families, and groups to support growth and change. She is especially interested in grief & loss, identity & authenticity, and attachment, but appreciates all the infinite, complicated parts of being alive.
Anna can also be contacted directly at anna@kindman.co