which equal in sheer horror and sadism the extermination o f Native Americans and Hitler’s massacre o f the Jews. Those two horrendous slaughters have found a
place, however tenuous, in the “conscience” o f “man. ”
Acts o f genocide against women have barely been noticed, and they have never evoked rage, or horror, or sorrow. That sexist hatred equals racist hatred in its
intensity, irrationality, and contempt for the sanctity
o f human life these two examples clearly demonstrate.
That women have not been exterminated, and will not
be (at least until the technology o f creating life in the
laboratory is perfected) can be attributed to our presumed ability to bear children and, more importantly 93
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no doubt, to the relative truth that men prefer to fuck
cunts who are nominally alive. I except here necrophili-
acs, those pure and unsullied princes, whose story begins where ours ends.
In addition, in any war, in any violence between
tribes or nations, a specific war crime is perpetrated
against women —that of rape. Every woman raped
during a political nation-state war is the victim of a
much larger war, planetary in its dimensions —the war,
more declared than we can bear to know, that men wage
against women. That war had its most gruesome, grotesque expression when Chinese men bound the feet of Chinese women and when British, Welsh, Irish,
Scottish, German, Dutch, French, Swiss, Italian, Spanish,
and Amerikan men had women burned at the stake in
the name of God the Father and His only Son.
F O O T B I N D I N G E V E N T
Instructions Before Reading Chapter
1. Find a piece o f cloth 10 feet long and 2 inches wide
2. Find a pair o f children’s shoes
3. Bend all toes except the big one under and into the
sole o f the foot. W rap the cloth around these toes
and then around the heel. Bring the heel and toes as
close together as possible. W rap the full length o f
the cloth as tightly as possible
4. Squeeze foot into children’s shoes
5. Walk
6. Imagine that you are 5 years old
7. Imagine being like this for the rest o f your life
C H A P T E R 6
Gynocide: Chinese Footbinding
T he origins o f Chinese footbinding, as o f Chinese
thought in general, belong to that amorphous entity
called antiquity. The 10th century marks the beginning o f the physical, intellectual, and spiritual dehumanization o f women in China through the institution o f footbinding. That institution itself, the implicit belief
in its necessity and beauty, and the rigor with which it
was practiced lasted another 10 centuries. T here were
sporadic attempts at emancipating the foot —some
artists, intellectuals, and women in positions o f power
were the proverbial drop in the bucket. Those attempts,
modest though they were, were doomed to failure:
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Woman Hating
footbinding was a political institution which reflected
and perpetuated the sociological and psychological inferiority of women; footbinding cemented women to a certain sphere, with a certain function —women were
sexual objects and breeders. Footbinding was mass
attitude, mass culture —it was the key reality in a way
of life lived by real women— 10 centuries times that
many millions o f them.
It is generally thought that footbinding originated as
an innovation among the dancers of the Imperial
harem. Sometime between the 9th and 11th centuries,
Emperor Li Yu ordered a favorite ballerina to achieve
the “pointed look. ” The fairy tale reads like this:
Li Yu had a favored palace concubine named
Lovely Maiden who was a slender-waisted beauty and
a gifted dancer. He had a six-foot high lotus constructed for her out o f gold; it was decorated lavishly with pearls and had a carmine lotus carpet in the
center. Lovely Maiden was ordered to bind her feet
with white silk cloth to make the tips look like the
points o f a moon sickle. She then danced in the center
of the lotus, whirling about like a rising cloud. 1
From this original event, the bound foot received the
euphemism “Golden Lotus, ” though it is clear that
Lovely Maiden’s feet were bound loosely— she could still
dance.
A later essayist, a true foot gourmand, described 58
varieties of the human lotus, each one graded on a 9-
point scale. For example:
T ype: Lotus petal, New moon, Harmonious bow,
Bamboo shoot, Water chestnut
Specifications: plumpness, softness, fineness
Gynocide: Chinese Footbinding
97
Rank:
Divine Quality (A-1), perfectly plump, soft and fine
Wondrous Quality (A-2), weak and slender
Immortal Quality (A-3), straight-boned, independent
Precious Article (B-1), peacocklike, too wide, dis-
proportioned
Pure Article (B-2), gooselike, too long and thin
Seductive Article (B-3), fleshy, short, wide, round
(the disadvantage of this foot was that its owner
could withstand a blowing wind)
Excessive Article (C-1), narrow but insufficiently
pointed
Ordinary Article (C-2), plump and common
False Article (C-3), monkeylike large heel (could
climb)
T he distinctions only emphasize that footbinding
was a rather hazardous operation. T o break the bones
involved or to modify the pressure o f the bindings irregularly had embarrassing consequences — no girl could bear the ridicule involved in being called a “largefooted Demon” and the shame o f being unable to marry.
Even the possessor o f an A - 1 Golden Lotus could
not rest on her laurels —she had to observe scrupulously
the taboo-ridden etiquette o f bound femininity: (1) do
not walk with toes pointed upwards; (2) do not stand
with heels seemingly suspended in midair; (3) do not
move skirt when sitting; (4) do not move feet when
lying down. T h e same essayist concludes his treatise
with this most sensible advice (directed to the gentlemen o f course):
Do not remove the bindings to look at her bare feet,
but be satisfied with its external appearance. Enjoy the
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outward impression, for if you remove the shoes and
bindings the aesthetic feeling will be destroyed forever. 2
Indeed. The real feet looked like this:
(feet: 3 to 4 inches in length)
The physical process which created this foot is
described by Howard S. Levy in Chinese Footbinding:
The History of a Curious Erotic Custom:
The success or failure of footbinding depended on
skillful application of a bandage around each foot. The
bandage, about two inches wide and ten feet long, was
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99
wrapped in the following way. One end was placed on
the inside of the instep, and from there it was carried
over the small toes so as to force the toes in and towards the sole. The large toe was left unbound. The bandage was then
wrapped around the heel so forcefully that heel and toes were drawn closer together.
The process was then repeated from the beginning
until the entire bandage had been applied. The foot of
the young child was subjected to a coercive and unremitting pressure, for the object was not merely to confine the foot but to make the toes bend under and
into the sole and bring the heel and sole as close together as physically possible. 3
A C h ris tia n m is s io n a ry o b s e rve d :
The flesh often became putrescent during the binding
and portions sloughed off from the sole; sometimes
one or more toes dropped off. 4
A n e ld e rly C h in e s e w o m a n , as late as 1934, re m e m b e re d v iv id ly h e r c h ild h o o d e x p e rie n c e : Born into an old-fashioned family at P’ing-hsi, I was
inflicted with the pain of footbinding when I was seven
years old. I was an active child who liked to jump about,
but from then on my free and optimistic nature vanished. Elder Sister endured the process from six to eight years of age [this means that it took Elder Sister two years to attain the 3-inch foot]. It was in the first lunar month of my seventh year that my ears were
pierced and fitted with gold earrings. I was told that a
girl had to suffer twice, through ear piercing and footbinding. Binding started in the second lunar month; mother consulted references in order to select an
auspicious day for it. I wept and hid in a neighbor’s
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home, but Mother found me, scolded me, and dragged
me home. She shut the bedroom door, boiled water,
and from a box withdrew binding, shoes, knife, needle,
and thread. I begged for a one-day postponement, but
Mother refused: “Today is a lucky day, ” she said. “ If
bound today, your feet will never hurt; if bound tomorrow they will. ” She washed and placed alum on my feet and cut the toenails. She then bent my toes toward
the plantar with a binding cloth ten feet long and two
inches wide, doing the right foot first and then the
left. She finished binding and ordered me to walk,
but when I did the pain proved unbearable.
That night, Mother wouldn’t let me remove the
shoes. My feet felt on fire and I couldn’t sleep; Mother
struck me for crying. On the following days, I tried
to hide but was forced to walk on my feet. Mother hit
me on my hands and feet for resisting. Beatings and
curses were my lot for covertly loosening the wrappings. The feet were washed and rebound after three or four days, with alum added. After several months,
all toes but the big one were pressed against the inner
surface. Whenever I ate f ish or freshly killed meat,
my feet would swell, and the pus would drip. Mother
criticized me for placing pressure on the heel in walking, saying that my feet would never assume a pretty shape. Mother would remove the bindings and wipe
the blood and pus which dripped from my feet. She
told me that only with the removal o f the flesh could
my feet become slender. If I mistakenly punctured a
sore, the blood gushed like a stream. My somewhat
fleshy big toes were bound with small pieces o f cloth and
forced upwards, to assume a new moon shape.
Every two weeks, I changed to new shoes. Each
new pair was one- to two-tenths o f an inch smaller than
the previous one. The shoes were unyielding, and it
took pressure to get into them. Though I wanted to
sit passively by the K’ang, Mother forced me to move
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1
around. After changing more than ten pairs of shoes,
my feet were reduced to a little over four inches. I
had been in binding for a month when my younger
sister started; when no one was around, we would
weep together. In summer, my feet smelled offensively because of pus and blood; in winter, my feet felt cold because of lack of circulation and hurt if
they got too near the K'ang and were struck by warm
air currents. Four of the toes were curled in like so
many dead caterpillars; no outsider would ever have
believed that they belonged to a human being. It took
two years to achieve the three-inch model. My toenails pressed against the flesh like thin paper. The heavily-creased plantar couldn't be scratched when it
itched or soothed when it ached. My shanks were thin,
my feet became humped, ugly, and odiferous; how I
envied the natural-footed! 5
Bound feet were crippled and excruciatingly painful. T h e woman was actually “walking” on the outside o f toes which had been bent under into the sole o f the
foot. T he heel and instep o f the foot resembled the sole
and heel o f a high-heeled boot. Hard callouses formed;
toenails grew into the skin; the feet were pus-filled and
bloody; circulation was virtually stopped. T h e foot-
bound woman hobbled along, leaning on a cane, against
a wall, against a servant. T o keep her balance she took
very short steps. She was actually falling with every
step and catching herself with the next. Walking required tremendous exertion.
Footbinding also distorted the natural lines o f the
female body. It caused the thighs and buttocks, which
were always in a state o f tension, to become somewhat swollen (which men called “voluptuous”). A cu
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rious belief developed among Chinese men that footbinding produced a most useful alteration of the vagina. A Chinese diplomat explained:
The smaller the woman’s foot, the more wondrous
become the folds o f the vagina. (There was the saying: the smaller the feet, the more intense the sex urge. ) Therefore marriages in Ta-t’ung (where binding
is most effective) often take place earlier than elsewhere. Women in other districts can produce these folds artificially, but the only way is by footbinding,
which concentrates development in this one place.
There consequendy develop layer after layer (of folds
within the vagina); those who have personally experienced this (in sexual intercourse) feel a supernatural exaltation. So the system o f footbinding was not really oppressive. 6
Medical authorities confirm that physiologically footbinding had no effect whatsoever on the vagina, although it did distort the direction of the pelvis. The belief in the wondrous folds of the vagina of footbound
woman was pure mass delusion, a projection of lust
onto the feet, buttocks, and vagina of the crippled
female. Needless to say, the diplomat’s rationale for
finding footbinding “not really oppressive” confused
his “supernatural exaltation” with her misery and
mutilation.
Bound feet, the same myth continues, “made the
buttocks more sensual, [and] concentrated life-giving
vapors on the upper part of the body, making the face
more attractive. ” 7 If, due to a breakdown in the flow
o f these “life-giving vapors, ” an ugly woman was foot-
bound and still ugly, she need not despair, for an A -1
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103
Golden Lotus could compensate for a C-3 face and
figure.
But to return to herstory, how did our Chinese
ballerina become the millions o f women stretched over
10 ce
nturies? T h e transition from palace dancer to population at large can be seen as part o f a class dynamic.
T h e emperor sets the style, the nobility copies it, and
the lower classes climbing ever upward do their best
to emulate it. T he upper class bound the feet o f their
ladies with the utmost severity. T h e Lady, unable to
walk, remained properly invisible in her boudoir, an
ornament, weak and small, a testimony to the wealth
and privilege o f the man who could afford to keep h e r—
to keep her idle. Doing no manual labor, she did not need
her feet either. Only on the rarest o f occasions was she
allowed outside o f the incarcerating walls o f her home,
and then only in a sedan chair behind heavy curtains.
T he lower a woman’s class, the less could such idleness
be supported: the larger the feet. T h e women who had
to work for the economic survival o f the family still
had bound feet, but the bindings were looser, the feet
bigger—after all, she had to be able to walk, even if
slowly and with little balance.
Footbinding was a visible brand. Footbinding did
not emphasize the differences between men and women —it
created them, and they were then perpetuated in the
name o f morality. Footbinding functioned as the C erberus o f morality and ensured female chastity in a nation o f women who literally could not “run around. ”
Fidelity, and the legitimacy o f children, could be reckoned on.
T he minds o f footbound women were as contracted
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as their feet. Daughters were taught to cook, supervise
the household, and embroider shoes for the Golden
Lotus. Intellectual and physical restriction had the usual
male justification. Women were perverse and sinful,
lewd and lascivious, if left to develop naturally. The
Chinese believed that being bom a woman was payment
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
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