This is perfect and correct - "managerial class feminism underpins the system and is deeply embedded in the female psyche'.
We cant defeat woke in the short term, when the entire system of the past 50 years has been built around feminism, exactly as you describe. And I feel for so many women who have been demoralized as a result. And people wonder why the fertility rate in Canada is in the toilet.
This was amazing. The curious thing about women (as I've already written elsewhere) is their indirectness. They won't ever SAY that they're bullying another person because of status... but they do it. They won't ever ADMIT that beliefs give them emotional validation, or that victimhood is social currency-although these are both indisputable.
It's a vast ideological hall of mirrors, where everyone is talking and emoting, but no one is saying what they mean and all of their emotions are actually weapons.
Well done Radha! I am glad young women like you are speaking truth to orthodoxy of feminism. I had to call myself "feminist in the Indian tradition" for a long time simply to say I reject the regressive sexism of India, which is where I grew up. But the feminists there too have lost it by uncritically embracing the insanity of the western left. Somewhat analogous to how Marxist class warriors (albeit also misguided) feel betrayed by the insane progressive left. As an aside, I'm coming to believe the new left is more about mental health and rage than it is about any ideology and the grifters are fully taking advantage of it...
I’m so interested to know what you mean by Indian tradition and how it’s paradigmatically different. I know it is because I did at least a moderate amount of study on it through my study of Hindu philosophy and practice, but I don’t know enough to articulate it. Do you mean it is a material feminism? Or is it feminism at all in the sense that I think of it? E.g. from some of my academic reading I understand that there can for example be an evocation of Shakti in her various forms as justification for why women should be more respected than they are. If it’s feasible in this space I’m curious if you can parse that for me a bit, but if it’s not totally get it
Radha -- What I meant by "Indian tradition" is rather simple, which is what we fought for when I was growing up, of seeing women as political and social equals of(not identical to) men, owners of our lives and hence destinies (like Hindu goddesses in that sense) vs. what I observe in the new feminism, which is a weird mix of victimhood-chic and pretend-agency. Victory was when a woman claimed agency and was freed to live her life as chosen. The new feminism seems to be about demanding everyone also make us "feel" good, while we ravage our lives with rage, self-obsession and demands for special treatment as fragile, tantrum throwing creatures...
Thank you for the response, very interesting. Perhaps this is meant for a longer conversation but I do see what you mean. I've never lived in India, but in my own family I've seen the corrosive effects of women favoring boys in the family. But, I don't blame men for that but rather women who chose consciously to give their daughters and granddaughters less love (as my maternal grandmother did). As for the goddesses, as I've gone deeper into those stories and philosophy in general, I realized my understanding of Shakti was very westernized in that I saw her as a feminist type, instead of being symbolic of women's actual power. And because we have actual power, we ought to be aware of it and be disciplined in its exercise, while also controlling our emotions. In the story of Sati I see the perils of lack of emotional discipline and being too concerned about others' approval and in Kali I see the perils of unchecked anger and power without discipline. I, too, am against the levels of fragility and sapping of agency that feminism appears to be responsible for as a psychology.
Yes! Not to mention our role and formative power as mothers. We abdicate our duty and potential for positive influence when/if we can’t be responsible with our agency and power— perhaps for another time. I love your analysis of Indian goddesses and would love to see a longer piece on Indian goddesses, mythology and the implications. Keep writing!
Why was Vale offended by the failure to do pronouns/what was meant to be the purpose of doing them? I mean from the perspective of Vale. Is it just so that people don’t refer to someone as ‘she’ when that person prefers ‘they’?
She was upset that the space wasn't made safe for people's different gender identities and that gender identity was being taken lightly. It's not that anyone was in the room that Greg specifically offended; the whole thing was about a hypothetical person who may have been offended who used they/them or some other pronoun not matching their sex. It's that the room was unsafe due to the lack of pronoun ritual and there wasn't sufficient deference to trans or gender nonconforming people, even though no one in the room uses they/them
In the early days of Christianity, a controversy erupted over whether Christians were required to keep Kosher law as the Jews did (since the first followers of Jesus were Jews), or if that was optional. In the letters of the apostle Paul, this is referred to as "eating meat sacrificed to idols." He wrote that idols aren't real (reflecting his monotheistic views), so breaking Kosher law by eating food from a Roman temple wouldn't be a sin -- but only if the person eating that food has faith that it's not a sin.
Thus, one could eat temple food, but one should not do so in front of a fellow Christian who believes that it's a sin to do so -- not because one will be judged, but because it will put doubt in that person's heart and might lead him to do something that he believes is sinful. For the sake of "a weaker brother" don't do it in public. This idea of "causing a brother to stumble" has been applied to many moral standards of various fundamentalist churches (e.g. playing cards, rock music, TV) to the point that my pastor father used to joke about people who are "professional weaker brothers" -- that is, people who become tireless scolds because "Even if it's not a SIN, it might cause someone else to stumble!"
These gender identity enforcers are professional weaker siblings.
So even Vale is a she/her? I had assumed Vale identified as a they/them and that was the basis of their grievance.
To be honest, either way I would find this kind of situation exhausting to deal with and I can’t imagine myself maintaining civility for very long. I respect that you spoke up in the way you did.
This is similar to groups who provide visual descriptions even when no visually impaired people are present or do land acknowledgments even though no indigenous people are present and everyone knows that the land they are meeting on was once associated with a different ethnic group. In other words, par for the course in North American progressivism.
Sorry. I would have stood up, announced that they were all on the crazy train and then leave. I would NEVER return to that! I'd rather have a conversation with an actual snake than to listen to that bunk. But that's just me, because I'm fine with who I am as a person....warts and all.
I have faced similar struggles to those you mentioned in this article. In particular, not being able to crack the Girl Code, to find a comfortable place in most social circles. All this even though I am a good, loyal friend, polite, and I think pretty interesting and funny. Maybe there are pheromones or antennae or something else innate to most women that enables them to pick up each other’s unspoken agreements.
I’m analytical and often find it easier to converse with, and work with, men.
All this to say that I think I have some sense of where you are coming from and I wish you every success in your search for personal growth. And I would rather be staked to an anthill than try group therapy in today’s woke environment.
I'm totally with you on finding it easier to work with men, but I also want to carve out an exception for analytical women. They and I have never had issues because we understand each other. I found a male psychologist rather than a female LCSW (I tried that for ten years) and I've found that I'm making progress on my connection issues.
I am so glad to have found your writing thanks to Andrew Weiss. You put into words what I haven’t been able to. I have been questioning wokeness for the last 18 months and this gives me new language so thank you. I loved the part about how the forcible use of pronouns is authoritarianism. I have started to tell my left friends that I am no longer “woke” because of its extremism and righteousness. I totally got sucked up in that all during the pandemic. And then I began to see the hatred within the wokeness from revered authors who are bringing people along like sheep into self hatred.
There is so much self righteousness in people today that it falls into greedy self centeredness that I simply can’t deal with today. The system is set up for victims and oppressors and it’s so self combusting and 3D. I’m not saying all this to sound self righteous myself but I want so much more for ALL of humanity because this system clearly isn’t working. We are limitless here and now.
Thank you so much Shelley, that means a lot. I can imagine what you're going through in your social circles as you try to relate to people you no longer agree with; I've found it far more difficult to converse with liberals these days than conservatives because the self-righteousness is so intolerable to me. I'm so curious by the way about your relationship to Shakti given your middle name. I've been working on a piece about how Indic goddesses have become embedded in modern feminism and witchcraft/occult communities without people necessarily even noticing.
I’d love to have that multi layered conversation with you. It’s a long story of my connection to Bhakti by way of Westerners who went to India in the 70s and brought the traditions here. I feel a deep connection to the Divine Feminine through these practices. My guru gave me the name when I was going through a life altering time. I’m still learning.
In what world does Indian family law favour men? Examples please.
My comment was about social control however. Indian families are ruled by the elderly for the most part as age gives you status. I know this personally. I've also had a male colleague (a senior lead in an IT firm) who was forced into marriage by his elders. There are cultures in India in which the eldest woman of the family controls all money and property.
As far as legal rights are concerned, Indian men do not have any legal protections from rape, sexual assault, and domestic violence. We don't have a right to privacy, or bodily autonomy. We are routinely discriminated against in relation to divorce, child custody, and alimony. We don't even have the constitutional right to equality - it's legal for the government to discriminate against men.
"I am a former feminist who found the ideology to be psychologically harmful and rejected it so I could seize my mental health. Philosophy is the most excellent antidote to ideology."
Maybe you could try introducing some philosophy in your group therapy session.
Phenomenology is foundational to psychology, and is a great starting point for self-knowledge and intersubjectivity.
William James was a pioneering thinker on these topics. Here's a relevant excerpt from his "Consciousness of Self" chapter of the Principles of Psychology:
"Properly speaking, a man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him and carry an image of him in their mind. To wound any one of these his images is to wound him.[2] But as the individuals who carry the images fall naturally into classes, we may practically say that he has as many different social selves as there are distinct groups of persons about whose opinion he cares. He generally shows a different side of himself to each of these different groups."
I think it will work on one level or another. James was not only a brave and good man, but a pretty good writer as well -- he's good at bringing clarity to concepts.
I'm a big fan of his friend and philosophical mentor Charles Sanders Peirce, but I'm not sure it would be a good idea to bring mathematical logic and neo-Pythagorean mysticism into group therapy.
I want you to know that I got a voice note from my coach who read this and he referred to your comment when encouraging me to show up empowered in the therapy room. I’m going to go back because, ironically, the facilitator later told me I model for the group what many of them need to work on, which is dealing with conflict. I’m endlessly amused by this; my putting myself in a position of discomfort isn’t only affecting me and them, but I’m almost having to sacrifice my own sense of psychological safety for them. But my coach also said I can choose to show up secure in my own thoughts and just state what I think without fear. If they’re as open minded as they claim then they can deal with what that brings up for them. I guarantee none have seen a woman of color disagree with the catechism.
I have no experience with group therapy, but I've been in many rooms of people trying to work through something. To crack the nut, so to speak. Mostly in business. The board meeting itself is Theater. The heavy work is done before and after, but the theater still matters. Business is inherently collective.
But in non-business group situations, I'm trying to ask better questions and to avoid statements. Often with family, I hear the same tiresome collectivist messages about the marginalized and victimhood and our doom, and so I voice disagreement and contrary data and my impatience comes through like a heretical shock. It often goes poorly.
This is my issue to solve: “ask good questions - I'm not here to win an argument or to convince anyone of anything.”
Your post got me thinking about the allure of mystification versus the search for clarity. I've thought about it before. I think this conflict is core to wisdom. Mystification is a form of intentional distortion, and we often fall prey to those who excel at it.
In graduate school, after a 10-year hiatus from the cloistered University scene, I ran face first into Critical Theory and the citadel of mystification. It smelled rotten at the time, and it smells even worse now.
Asking questions to gain clarity about truth is an art. I see most people trying to mystify concepts before arguing about them to muddy the waters (not sure if you're talking about that or something else. I am driven by the search for clarity and first principles thinking. Most people I meet aren't interested in the root cause but the symptoms. I will try to approach group again tomorrow by asking questions.
Are you sure you're not really a feminist? You're not Third Wave, for sure. I like English comedian Caitlin Moran's definition: Do you have a vagina? Do you believe you should be in complete control of it? Congratulations, you're a feminist!
My mother NEVER considered herself a 'feminist' and used to rail about those 'damned women's libbers' in the '70s. Yet she was one of the most feminist women I've ever known. She's the one who taught me that getting abused is a *choice*, because YOU decide how others are allowed to treat you. That the first time he hits you should be his last, you're out the door, no second chances. That if he hits you once he'll hit you again, and never, *ever*, be a doormat and let him wipe his feet on you (like her friend Marisa).
She was also antiracist long before it was cool. I don't know where a woman born in the 1930s got all this stuff, but she got it somewhere and she passed it on to me and my brother.
A major part of why I like you so much is BECAUSE you are a kickass feminist! You don't take no shit from anybody. I do get the desire to separate from Those People - you don't want to be associated with those woke, weak-ass, whiny little bitches who think white penises ruined the world. For 25 years, starting in probably the early '90s, I started calling myself an egalitarian rather than a feminist, because I believed in equal rights for all, not being a weak-ass little permavictim. Only in the last five years have I started using the F word again. In fact, I want to reclaim it from the fauxminists, especially those who value men's (trans) rights over women's rights and have never learned how to say No to anything.
So I respect your right not to call yourself a feminist, Anu, but know that in my head, every time you say that, just like when my mom did, I'm rolling my eyes inside my head :)
You know you have gotten me thinking. Where I struggle is that I don't think the current iteration of feminism accommodates how I think. It encourages self infantilization where I am like your mother - getting abused is a choice; being passive is still a choice. I am reminded of Aziz Ansari and how his accuser could have left several times but chose not to; she exercised her agency, but at the time I wasn't allowed to ask why she couldn't just leave. It wasn't an approved question by the women at the top of the women's only group in which I wanted to ask it. Curious what you think about the disempowerment encouraged by modern feminism. Can there be a different version of it that we fight for? I don't know.
Not true (your first comment). Radha and I were talking about it the other day. Feminists come in many different flavours and she and I are of the variety that don't blame men for everything and almost always use 'patriarchy' ironically. But I get where you and Radha are coming from because Third Wave feminism is just a bloody mess. Radha and I may be writing about a new iteration of feminism in the future...and perhaps more dude-friendly...you just never know!
I disavow that Democrats are feminists. I think they're more anti-feminist than the right. At least Donald Trump is trying to protect women's spaces and sports teams, unlike the Democrats and 'progressives'.
Democrats state right on their website democrats.org/who-we-are/who-we-serve that they serve women, but not men, and every racial ethnic group except for White people.
If feminism was really dude-friendly, it could no longer be called feminism.
That’s just one slice of feminism. Most folks are used to what passes for it today and don’t realize there are others who don’t think like that. I suppose if feminism was really dude-friendly, and dudes were less hostile to feminists or just women who want equal rights, we’d have….egalitarianism. Which is what I called myself for 25 years before I decided to return to the feminist label.
With conservative women speaking out more, do you think intersectional feminists will retreat at all? … It feels like they’re losing influence and credibility every day, but not sure if the stronghold can be broken
It kind of bothers me but doesn’t entirely surprise that many of the most direct women writing about these things logically are conservatives. I can’t see intersectional feminists retreating because it’s a system of self and social discipline rather than an intellectual paradigm
That’s true, and there is an element of self-denial and self-flagellation that would likely be difficult for them to undo… they really have turned it into a kind of religion
Giving up a belief that's closely tied with one's self-image is the most difficult of all. There were Nazis who lived out their final breaths in a South American jungle somewhere, swearing to their dying breath they did the right thing. While today's feminists can hardly be compared to Nazis, there are *many* people who'd rather die wrong than admit it.
Nancy Mace is Nancy Mace, no one outside of SC has any idea how she was elected. She’s one of those political theater politicians I can’t believe is actually a real person. No clue how to explain her, or her behavior
“Feminism is a system of rigid social discipline.” It does have this aspect, but I respectfully dissent, in that there is a deeper reality. Feminism is the collective manifestation of gender narcissism amongst women and society. The traits you describe are narcissistic in nature; feminists are champions at projecting shame.
Speaking of which, if a sufficient cadre of women were unconsciously ashamed of their feminine biology and any natural social ordering that might arise as a result of gender difference (to the point of narcissistic pathology), what would these women look like, and how would they behave?
Gerald Schoenewolf’s essay “Gender narcissism and its manifestations” is a good starting point (perhaps think covert/vulnerable-sensitive). Feminism is thus a gender subset of the general narcissistic cultural decay discussed by Christopher Lasch in 1979. One cannot reason with narcissism.
Insightful. The healthy expression of femininity is such a beautiful thing, too. And, yes, it is the narcissistic corruption of masculinity that feminists express in denial of femininity.
You are correct, because being a woman is interwoven with shame about one’s femininity; Butler was correct about that sentiment. But while being ashamed, they seize the worst aspects of masculinity to latch onto as a performance contra the femininity that disgusts. I did that too.
Aaron Russo reported that David R.'s family sponsored feminism, as feminism was consistent with their goals: get women into the workforce to collect income taxes from them, get their children into daycare, where they can be indoctrinated by the State, and bring about the New World Order.
This is perfect and correct - "managerial class feminism underpins the system and is deeply embedded in the female psyche'.
We cant defeat woke in the short term, when the entire system of the past 50 years has been built around feminism, exactly as you describe. And I feel for so many women who have been demoralized as a result. And people wonder why the fertility rate in Canada is in the toilet.
This was amazing. The curious thing about women (as I've already written elsewhere) is their indirectness. They won't ever SAY that they're bullying another person because of status... but they do it. They won't ever ADMIT that beliefs give them emotional validation, or that victimhood is social currency-although these are both indisputable.
It's a vast ideological hall of mirrors, where everyone is talking and emoting, but no one is saying what they mean and all of their emotions are actually weapons.
I'll stick to Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Thanks.
Well done Radha! I am glad young women like you are speaking truth to orthodoxy of feminism. I had to call myself "feminist in the Indian tradition" for a long time simply to say I reject the regressive sexism of India, which is where I grew up. But the feminists there too have lost it by uncritically embracing the insanity of the western left. Somewhat analogous to how Marxist class warriors (albeit also misguided) feel betrayed by the insane progressive left. As an aside, I'm coming to believe the new left is more about mental health and rage than it is about any ideology and the grifters are fully taking advantage of it...
I’m so interested to know what you mean by Indian tradition and how it’s paradigmatically different. I know it is because I did at least a moderate amount of study on it through my study of Hindu philosophy and practice, but I don’t know enough to articulate it. Do you mean it is a material feminism? Or is it feminism at all in the sense that I think of it? E.g. from some of my academic reading I understand that there can for example be an evocation of Shakti in her various forms as justification for why women should be more respected than they are. If it’s feasible in this space I’m curious if you can parse that for me a bit, but if it’s not totally get it
Radha -- What I meant by "Indian tradition" is rather simple, which is what we fought for when I was growing up, of seeing women as political and social equals of(not identical to) men, owners of our lives and hence destinies (like Hindu goddesses in that sense) vs. what I observe in the new feminism, which is a weird mix of victimhood-chic and pretend-agency. Victory was when a woman claimed agency and was freed to live her life as chosen. The new feminism seems to be about demanding everyone also make us "feel" good, while we ravage our lives with rage, self-obsession and demands for special treatment as fragile, tantrum throwing creatures...
That was the encouragement I needed for that one :)
Yes! Please do. I am a big fan of your work, and will look for it.
Means much Reena.
Thank you for the response, very interesting. Perhaps this is meant for a longer conversation but I do see what you mean. I've never lived in India, but in my own family I've seen the corrosive effects of women favoring boys in the family. But, I don't blame men for that but rather women who chose consciously to give their daughters and granddaughters less love (as my maternal grandmother did). As for the goddesses, as I've gone deeper into those stories and philosophy in general, I realized my understanding of Shakti was very westernized in that I saw her as a feminist type, instead of being symbolic of women's actual power. And because we have actual power, we ought to be aware of it and be disciplined in its exercise, while also controlling our emotions. In the story of Sati I see the perils of lack of emotional discipline and being too concerned about others' approval and in Kali I see the perils of unchecked anger and power without discipline. I, too, am against the levels of fragility and sapping of agency that feminism appears to be responsible for as a psychology.
Yes! Not to mention our role and formative power as mothers. We abdicate our duty and potential for positive influence when/if we can’t be responsible with our agency and power— perhaps for another time. I love your analysis of Indian goddesses and would love to see a longer piece on Indian goddesses, mythology and the implications. Keep writing!
Why was Vale offended by the failure to do pronouns/what was meant to be the purpose of doing them? I mean from the perspective of Vale. Is it just so that people don’t refer to someone as ‘she’ when that person prefers ‘they’?
She was upset that the space wasn't made safe for people's different gender identities and that gender identity was being taken lightly. It's not that anyone was in the room that Greg specifically offended; the whole thing was about a hypothetical person who may have been offended who used they/them or some other pronoun not matching their sex. It's that the room was unsafe due to the lack of pronoun ritual and there wasn't sufficient deference to trans or gender nonconforming people, even though no one in the room uses they/them
In the early days of Christianity, a controversy erupted over whether Christians were required to keep Kosher law as the Jews did (since the first followers of Jesus were Jews), or if that was optional. In the letters of the apostle Paul, this is referred to as "eating meat sacrificed to idols." He wrote that idols aren't real (reflecting his monotheistic views), so breaking Kosher law by eating food from a Roman temple wouldn't be a sin -- but only if the person eating that food has faith that it's not a sin.
Thus, one could eat temple food, but one should not do so in front of a fellow Christian who believes that it's a sin to do so -- not because one will be judged, but because it will put doubt in that person's heart and might lead him to do something that he believes is sinful. For the sake of "a weaker brother" don't do it in public. This idea of "causing a brother to stumble" has been applied to many moral standards of various fundamentalist churches (e.g. playing cards, rock music, TV) to the point that my pastor father used to joke about people who are "professional weaker brothers" -- that is, people who become tireless scolds because "Even if it's not a SIN, it might cause someone else to stumble!"
These gender identity enforcers are professional weaker siblings.
My Goddess, these people had serious, hardcore, First World problems.
Thanks for the explanation.
Honestly I needed to explain it to myself lol
So even Vale is a she/her? I had assumed Vale identified as a they/them and that was the basis of their grievance.
To be honest, either way I would find this kind of situation exhausting to deal with and I can’t imagine myself maintaining civility for very long. I respect that you spoke up in the way you did.
This is similar to groups who provide visual descriptions even when no visually impaired people are present or do land acknowledgments even though no indigenous people are present and everyone knows that the land they are meeting on was once associated with a different ethnic group. In other words, par for the course in North American progressivism.
No the crazy thing is Vale confirmed that she uses she/her
Absolutely right: that second paragraph nails it.
Sorry. I would have stood up, announced that they were all on the crazy train and then leave. I would NEVER return to that! I'd rather have a conversation with an actual snake than to listen to that bunk. But that's just me, because I'm fine with who I am as a person....warts and all.
I'm going to go back because I want to test myself, but yes I wanted to cut and run many times.
I have faced similar struggles to those you mentioned in this article. In particular, not being able to crack the Girl Code, to find a comfortable place in most social circles. All this even though I am a good, loyal friend, polite, and I think pretty interesting and funny. Maybe there are pheromones or antennae or something else innate to most women that enables them to pick up each other’s unspoken agreements.
I’m analytical and often find it easier to converse with, and work with, men.
All this to say that I think I have some sense of where you are coming from and I wish you every success in your search for personal growth. And I would rather be staked to an anthill than try group therapy in today’s woke environment.
Wise lady. Therapy has been utterly infested and infected with wokeness and it makes one's existing problems worse, not better.
I'm totally with you on finding it easier to work with men, but I also want to carve out an exception for analytical women. They and I have never had issues because we understand each other. I found a male psychologist rather than a female LCSW (I tried that for ten years) and I've found that I'm making progress on my connection issues.
There's an idea....
I am so glad to have found your writing thanks to Andrew Weiss. You put into words what I haven’t been able to. I have been questioning wokeness for the last 18 months and this gives me new language so thank you. I loved the part about how the forcible use of pronouns is authoritarianism. I have started to tell my left friends that I am no longer “woke” because of its extremism and righteousness. I totally got sucked up in that all during the pandemic. And then I began to see the hatred within the wokeness from revered authors who are bringing people along like sheep into self hatred.
There is so much self righteousness in people today that it falls into greedy self centeredness that I simply can’t deal with today. The system is set up for victims and oppressors and it’s so self combusting and 3D. I’m not saying all this to sound self righteous myself but I want so much more for ALL of humanity because this system clearly isn’t working. We are limitless here and now.
Thank you so much Shelley, that means a lot. I can imagine what you're going through in your social circles as you try to relate to people you no longer agree with; I've found it far more difficult to converse with liberals these days than conservatives because the self-righteousness is so intolerable to me. I'm so curious by the way about your relationship to Shakti given your middle name. I've been working on a piece about how Indic goddesses have become embedded in modern feminism and witchcraft/occult communities without people necessarily even noticing.
I’d love to have that multi layered conversation with you. It’s a long story of my connection to Bhakti by way of Westerners who went to India in the 70s and brought the traditions here. I feel a deep connection to the Divine Feminine through these practices. My guru gave me the name when I was going through a life altering time. I’m still learning.
That's intriguing. Who were they?
Ram Dass, Krishna Das, and others who traveled to Vrindavan to sit with Neem Karoli Baba.
Indian social control is a gerontocracy, not a patriarchy.
Tell me more, how is it not a patriarchy? Family law still favors men as far as I know
In what world does Indian family law favour men? Examples please.
My comment was about social control however. Indian families are ruled by the elderly for the most part as age gives you status. I know this personally. I've also had a male colleague (a senior lead in an IT firm) who was forced into marriage by his elders. There are cultures in India in which the eldest woman of the family controls all money and property.
As far as legal rights are concerned, Indian men do not have any legal protections from rape, sexual assault, and domestic violence. We don't have a right to privacy, or bodily autonomy. We are routinely discriminated against in relation to divorce, child custody, and alimony. We don't even have the constitutional right to equality - it's legal for the government to discriminate against men.
"I am a former feminist who found the ideology to be psychologically harmful and rejected it so I could seize my mental health. Philosophy is the most excellent antidote to ideology."
Maybe you could try introducing some philosophy in your group therapy session.
Phenomenology is foundational to psychology, and is a great starting point for self-knowledge and intersubjectivity.
William James was a pioneering thinker on these topics. Here's a relevant excerpt from his "Consciousness of Self" chapter of the Principles of Psychology:
"Properly speaking, a man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him and carry an image of him in their mind. To wound any one of these his images is to wound him.[2] But as the individuals who carry the images fall naturally into classes, we may practically say that he has as many different social selves as there are distinct groups of persons about whose opinion he cares. He generally shows a different side of himself to each of these different groups."
https://psychclassics.yorku.ca/James/Principles/prin10.htm
I haven’t read James, but I appreciate you pointing me there. I certainly will try introducing this concept…I don’t usually have luck.
Well, your blog is billed as "radically pragmatic," so I thought you might enjoy the work of the original pragmatists. 😉
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pragmatism/#HistDev
I think it will work on one level or another. James was not only a brave and good man, but a pretty good writer as well -- he's good at bringing clarity to concepts.
I'm a big fan of his friend and philosophical mentor Charles Sanders Peirce, but I'm not sure it would be a good idea to bring mathematical logic and neo-Pythagorean mysticism into group therapy.
1. You are caught in a maze of Critical Theory that isn't real - the world is not a text
2. To connect with people, you have surrounded yourself with people who cannot connect - why? They are in the maze.
3. You want to get out of this maze but you're not ready - not quite yet - what holds you?
4. There's power in the tool bag of Critical Theory and it's hard to let it go. It's alluring, but it's a trick.
5. This kind of power critiques power In order to cultivate power (secretly). That is the maze. Step back. It's right in front of you.
I want you to know that I got a voice note from my coach who read this and he referred to your comment when encouraging me to show up empowered in the therapy room. I’m going to go back because, ironically, the facilitator later told me I model for the group what many of them need to work on, which is dealing with conflict. I’m endlessly amused by this; my putting myself in a position of discomfort isn’t only affecting me and them, but I’m almost having to sacrifice my own sense of psychological safety for them. But my coach also said I can choose to show up secure in my own thoughts and just state what I think without fear. If they’re as open minded as they claim then they can deal with what that brings up for them. I guarantee none have seen a woman of color disagree with the catechism.
To "state what I think without fear."
That's a good place to be.
I have no experience with group therapy, but I've been in many rooms of people trying to work through something. To crack the nut, so to speak. Mostly in business. The board meeting itself is Theater. The heavy work is done before and after, but the theater still matters. Business is inherently collective.
But in non-business group situations, I'm trying to ask better questions and to avoid statements. Often with family, I hear the same tiresome collectivist messages about the marginalized and victimhood and our doom, and so I voice disagreement and contrary data and my impatience comes through like a heretical shock. It often goes poorly.
This is my issue to solve: “ask good questions - I'm not here to win an argument or to convince anyone of anything.”
Your post got me thinking about the allure of mystification versus the search for clarity. I've thought about it before. I think this conflict is core to wisdom. Mystification is a form of intentional distortion, and we often fall prey to those who excel at it.
In graduate school, after a 10-year hiatus from the cloistered University scene, I ran face first into Critical Theory and the citadel of mystification. It smelled rotten at the time, and it smells even worse now.
Asking questions to gain clarity about truth is an art. I see most people trying to mystify concepts before arguing about them to muddy the waters (not sure if you're talking about that or something else. I am driven by the search for clarity and first principles thinking. Most people I meet aren't interested in the root cause but the symptoms. I will try to approach group again tomorrow by asking questions.
Here's where your post took me: https://open.substack.com/pub/demianentrekin/p/the-table-is-not-a-table?r=dw8le&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true
Are you sure you're not really a feminist? You're not Third Wave, for sure. I like English comedian Caitlin Moran's definition: Do you have a vagina? Do you believe you should be in complete control of it? Congratulations, you're a feminist!
My mother NEVER considered herself a 'feminist' and used to rail about those 'damned women's libbers' in the '70s. Yet she was one of the most feminist women I've ever known. She's the one who taught me that getting abused is a *choice*, because YOU decide how others are allowed to treat you. That the first time he hits you should be his last, you're out the door, no second chances. That if he hits you once he'll hit you again, and never, *ever*, be a doormat and let him wipe his feet on you (like her friend Marisa).
She was also antiracist long before it was cool. I don't know where a woman born in the 1930s got all this stuff, but she got it somewhere and she passed it on to me and my brother.
A major part of why I like you so much is BECAUSE you are a kickass feminist! You don't take no shit from anybody. I do get the desire to separate from Those People - you don't want to be associated with those woke, weak-ass, whiny little bitches who think white penises ruined the world. For 25 years, starting in probably the early '90s, I started calling myself an egalitarian rather than a feminist, because I believed in equal rights for all, not being a weak-ass little permavictim. Only in the last five years have I started using the F word again. In fact, I want to reclaim it from the fauxminists, especially those who value men's (trans) rights over women's rights and have never learned how to say No to anything.
So I respect your right not to call yourself a feminist, Anu, but know that in my head, every time you say that, just like when my mom did, I'm rolling my eyes inside my head :)
You know you have gotten me thinking. Where I struggle is that I don't think the current iteration of feminism accommodates how I think. It encourages self infantilization where I am like your mother - getting abused is a choice; being passive is still a choice. I am reminded of Aziz Ansari and how his accuser could have left several times but chose not to; she exercised her agency, but at the time I wasn't allowed to ask why she couldn't just leave. It wasn't an approved question by the women at the top of the women's only group in which I wanted to ask it. Curious what you think about the disempowerment encouraged by modern feminism. Can there be a different version of it that we fight for? I don't know.
Real women value and respect men. Feminists do not. It's that simple.
The Democrats state on their website that they serve women, but not men. They are feminists.
Not true (your first comment). Radha and I were talking about it the other day. Feminists come in many different flavours and she and I are of the variety that don't blame men for everything and almost always use 'patriarchy' ironically. But I get where you and Radha are coming from because Third Wave feminism is just a bloody mess. Radha and I may be writing about a new iteration of feminism in the future...and perhaps more dude-friendly...you just never know!
I disavow that Democrats are feminists. I think they're more anti-feminist than the right. At least Donald Trump is trying to protect women's spaces and sports teams, unlike the Democrats and 'progressives'.
Democrats state right on their website democrats.org/who-we-are/who-we-serve that they serve women, but not men, and every racial ethnic group except for White people.
If feminism was really dude-friendly, it could no longer be called feminism.
That’s just one slice of feminism. Most folks are used to what passes for it today and don’t realize there are others who don’t think like that. I suppose if feminism was really dude-friendly, and dudes were less hostile to feminists or just women who want equal rights, we’d have….egalitarianism. Which is what I called myself for 25 years before I decided to return to the feminist label.
With conservative women speaking out more, do you think intersectional feminists will retreat at all? … It feels like they’re losing influence and credibility every day, but not sure if the stronghold can be broken
It kind of bothers me but doesn’t entirely surprise that many of the most direct women writing about these things logically are conservatives. I can’t see intersectional feminists retreating because it’s a system of self and social discipline rather than an intellectual paradigm
That’s true, and there is an element of self-denial and self-flagellation that would likely be difficult for them to undo… they really have turned it into a kind of religion
Giving up a belief that's closely tied with one's self-image is the most difficult of all. There were Nazis who lived out their final breaths in a South American jungle somewhere, swearing to their dying breath they did the right thing. While today's feminists can hardly be compared to Nazis, there are *many* people who'd rather die wrong than admit it.
Some conservative women are just as misandric as liberal women. Nancy Mace comes to mind,
Nancy Mace is Nancy Mace, no one outside of SC has any idea how she was elected. She’s one of those political theater politicians I can’t believe is actually a real person. No clue how to explain her, or her behavior
“Feminism is a system of rigid social discipline.” It does have this aspect, but I respectfully dissent, in that there is a deeper reality. Feminism is the collective manifestation of gender narcissism amongst women and society. The traits you describe are narcissistic in nature; feminists are champions at projecting shame.
Speaking of which, if a sufficient cadre of women were unconsciously ashamed of their feminine biology and any natural social ordering that might arise as a result of gender difference (to the point of narcissistic pathology), what would these women look like, and how would they behave?
Gerald Schoenewolf’s essay “Gender narcissism and its manifestations” is a good starting point (perhaps think covert/vulnerable-sensitive). Feminism is thus a gender subset of the general narcissistic cultural decay discussed by Christopher Lasch in 1979. One cannot reason with narcissism.
Insightful. The healthy expression of femininity is such a beautiful thing, too. And, yes, it is the narcissistic corruption of masculinity that feminists express in denial of femininity.
Thankfully, you escaped.
Agree on the complimentary nature 👍
But the only rational explanation as to the “why” of feminism and feminist behaviour that I’ve encountered is the gender narcissism thesis
You are correct, because being a woman is interwoven with shame about one’s femininity; Butler was correct about that sentiment. But while being ashamed, they seize the worst aspects of masculinity to latch onto as a performance contra the femininity that disgusts. I did that too.
I suppose where I struggle is that I don’t see how we meaningfully diverge. Ours seem like complementary takes.
The accuracy here is...well...accurate.
Also sickening.
One white man they can blame is David Rockefeller. He was a big proponent of the ERA.
Aaron Russo reported that David R.'s family sponsored feminism, as feminism was consistent with their goals: get women into the workforce to collect income taxes from them, get their children into daycare, where they can be indoctrinated by the State, and bring about the New World Order.
Also adding women doubled the workforce, cutting labor costs in half.
Exactly. That was part of the globalist plan, that began in the late 1950s