after the last week, i am learning a whole other area of feminism i have not seen

[seabeyond]

It can be fun to feel exceptional – to be the loophole woman, to have a whole power thing, to be an honorary man. But,” she warns, “if you are the exception that proves the rule, and the rule is that women are inferior, you haven’t made any progress.

*

A chorus of male voices throughout the centuries has echoed Jonathan Swift’s words, “I never knew a tolerable woman to be fond of her own sex.”.. So women disidentify with other women in order to make themselves “tolerable” to men.

*

In other words, perhaps women hate women because male culture hates women. To return to Sandra’s original examples. She remembers women in high school as playing dumb and actively conforming to beauty mandates, but she does not analyze the fact that patriarchal culture tells us that women are dumb and are only worthy as beautiful objects. Or to turn to another example, she believes women are difficult to work with because they are competitive and catty, but she does not see that our culture defines aggressive behavior in women as b*tchy, and does not note such behavior in men. In other words, she sees women through the male lens of hatred and disdain.

*

To return to the above examples, Sandra may have hated the young women at her high school because she was jealous of the attention they received from men (due to the fact that they conformed to the f’kability mandate, and performed femininity in male-approved way). Since male-derived power is one of the only ways women can receive power, Sandra may have resented these women for receiving crumbs of attention she would have preferred to parlay into power herself. Or, perhaps the women at Sandra’s work really were catty and competitive with other women because they believed that women are easier targets then men, and that if only so many women were going to be able to succeed, they’d like to be one of them. In other words, perhaps the patriarchal culture that hates women creates women-hating words and behaviors in women.

http://smashesthep.wordpress.com/

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right now i am doing a bit of exploring. i have thought about this because at younger age, i too would say.... i dont hang out with women. i dont get along with women. the last decade i have come to realize the insult to women and my doing wrong in this. i have a niece at 20 that is walking this same thing. she is doing great in empowering herself and being true, but she, too is letting go of her power in this area.

anyway, checking things out and learning, in all the new brought to us the last week.

[notadmblnd]

1. Women tend to be thier own worst enemies. And I think it is because they are more competative

Maye it is in our genes and all boils down to survival of the fittest, but it is rooted deep within us. But can you imagine if we could get beyond the competitiveness and put all that energy into helping each other- the things we could do?

[seabeyond]

2. this is the thing. about a decade ago, i pretty much came to this myself

an since i have been shedding all the patriarchy and conditioning that society created for me to live. in so doing, i have found myself becoming lighter and lighter, not having to live under the cloak of either the conditioned man or the conditioned woman. i can so recognize my own experience in these words.

it is very freeing to let this go. and i see how silly and restricted i allowed myself to be.

[Sera_Bellum]

3. +1 n/t

[planetc]

4. "The woman who most needs to be liberated ...

is the woman in every man, and the man who most needs to be liberated is the man in every woman."

--attributed to Florence Kennedy

[seabeyond]

5. which takes me to my spiritual (not religious) self of embracing the male and female

of who i am and bringing them to one, in love.

[Remember Me]

6. Those are some great excerpts

We probably all ought to keep some feminist reading material on our nightstands (or reading lists, or Kindles, or whatever). Thanks for the great quotes.

[Tumbulu]

7. so very interesting

thanks for the post.