for evils committed in a previous life. Footbinding was
designed to spare a woman the disaster of another such
incarnation.
Marriage and the family are the twin pillars of all
patriarchal cultures. Bound feet, in China, were the
twin pillars o f these twin pillars. Here we have the joining together of politics and morality, coupled to produce their inevitable offspring—the oppression of women based on totalitarian standards of beauty and a
rampant sexual fascism. In arranging a marriage, a
male's parents inquired first about the prospective
bride’s feet, then about her face. Those were her human, recognizable qualities. During the process of footbinding, mothers consoled their daughters by conjuring up the luscious marriage possibilities dependent on the beauty of the bound foot. Concubines for the Imperial harem were selected at tiny-foot festivals (forerunners of Miss America pageants). Rows upon rows of women sat on benches with their feet outstretched
while audience and judges went along the aisles and
commented on the size, shape, and decoration of foot
and shoes. No one, however, was ever allowed to touch
the merchandise. Women looked forward to these
festivals, since they were allowed out o f the house.
The sexual aesthetics, literally the art o f love, of
Gynocide: Chinese Footbinding
105
the bound foot was complex. T h e sexual attraction o f
the foot was based on its concealment and the mystery
surrounding its development and care. T h e bindings
were unwrapped and the feet were washed in the
woman’s boudoir, in the strictest privacy. T h e frequency o f bathing varied from once a week to once a year. Perfumes o f various fragrances and alum were
used during and after washing, and various kinds o f
surgery were performed on the callouses and nails.
T h e physical process o f washing helped restore circulation. T he mummy was unwrapped, touched up, and put back to sleep with more preservatives added. T h e rest
o f the body was never washed at the same time as the
feet, for fear that one would become a pig in the next
life. Well-bred women were supposed to die o f shame
if men observed them washing their feet. T h e foot
consisted, after all, o f smelly, rotted flesh. This was
naturally not pleasing to the intruding male, a violation o f his aesthetic sensibility.
T h e art o f the shoes was basic to the sexual aesthetics o f the bound foot. Untold hours, days, months went into the embroidery o f shoes. T here were shoes
for all occasions, shoes o f different colors, shoes to
hobble in, shoes to go to bed in, shoes for special
occasions like birthdays, marriages, funerals, shoes
which denoted age. Red was the favored color for bed
shoes because it accentuated the whiteness o f the skin
o f the calves and thighs. A marriageable daughter made
about 12 pairs o f shoes as a part o f her dowry. She
presented 2 specially made pairs to her mother-in-law
and father-in-law. When she entered her husband’s
106
Woman Haling
home for the first time, her feet were immediately
examined by the whole family, neither praise nor
sarcasm being withheld.
There was also the art of the gait, the art of sitting,
the art of standing, the art of lying down, the art of adjusting the skirt, the art of every movement which involves feet. Beauty was the way feet looked and how
they moved. Certain feet were better than other feet,
more beautiful. Perfect 3-inch form and utter uselessness were the distinguishing marks of the aristocratic foot. These concepts of beauty and status defined
women: as ornaments, as sexual playthings, as sexual
constructs. The perfect construct, even in China, was
naturally the prostitute.
The natural-footed woman generated horror and
repulsion in China. She was anathema, and all the
forces o f insult and contempt were used to obliterate
her. Men said about bound feet and natural feet:
A tiny foot is proof of feminine goodness.. . .
Women who don’t bind their feet, look like men,
for the tiny foot serves to show the differentiation.. . .
The tiny foot is soft and, when rubbed, leads to
great excitement.. . .
The graceful walk gives the beholder mixed feelings o f compassion and pity.. . .
Natural feet are heavy and ponderous as they get
into bed, but tiny feet lightly steal under the coverlets.. . .
The large-footed woman is careless about adornment, but the tiny-footed frequently wash and apply a variety o f perfumed fragrances, enchanting all who
come into their presence.. . .
Gynocide: Chinese Footbinding
107
T h e natural foot looks much less aesthetic in walk-
ing. . . .
Everyone welcomes the tiny foot, regarding its
smallness as precious.. . .
Men formerly so craved it that its possessor
achieved harmonious matrimony.. . .
Because o f its diminutiveness, it gives rise to a
variety o f sensual pleasures and love feelings.. . . 8
Thin, small, curved, soft, fragrant, weak, easily
inflamed, passive to the point o f being almost inanim ate—this was footbound woman. Her bindings created extraordinary vaginal folds; isolation in the bedroom increased her sexual desire; playing with the shriveled, crippled foot increased everyone’s desire.
Even the imagery o f the names o f various types o f foot
suggest, on the one hand, feminine passivity (lotuses,
lilies, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts) and, on the other
hand, male independence, strength, and mobility (lotus
boats, large-footed crows, monkey foot). It was unacceptable for a woman to have those male qualities denoted by large feet. This fact conjures up an earlier assertion: footbinding did not formalize existing differences between men and women —it created them.
One sex became male by virtue o f having made the
other sex some thing, something other, something
completely polar to itself, something called female.
In 1915, a satirical essay in defense o f footbinding,
written by a Chinese male, emphasized this:
T h e bound foot is the condition o f a life o f dignity
for man, o f contentment for woman. Let me make this
clear. I am a Chinese fairly typical o f my class. I pored
108
Woman Hating
too much over classic texts in my youth and dimmed
my eyes, narrowed my chest, crooked my back. My
memory is not strong, and in an old civilization there
is a vast deal to learn before you can know anything.
Accordingly among scholars I cut a poor figure. I am
timid, and my voice plays me false in gatherings of
men. But to my footbound wife, confined for life to