It is the petite bourgeoisie, wich, because of its position in the social space, is particularly exposed to all the effects of anxiety about the social gaze, that women reach the extreme form of symbolic alienation.
More generally, access to power of any kind places women in a "double bind": if they behave like men, they risk losing the obligatory attributes of "femininity" and call into question the natural right of men to the positions of power; if they behave like women, they appear incapable and unfit for the job. These contradictory expectations simply take over from those to which they are structurally exposed as objects offered on the market in symbolic goods, simultaneously invited to use all means to please and charm and expected to repel the seductive manoeuvres that this kind of submission in advance to the verdict of the male gaze may seem to have provoked. This contradictory combination of openness and closedness, restraint and seduction, is all the more difficult to achieve because it is subject to the appreciation of men, who may make unconscious or self-interested errors of interpretation. Thus, as one female infonnant pointed out, faced with men's sexual jokes, women often have no other choice than to exclude themselves or participate, at least passively, in order to try to integrate themselves, but then running the risk of no longer being able to protest if they are victims of sexism or sexual harassment.
Pierre Bourdieu
1930 - 2002