Feminine and Other Isms
Written 11/5/05...slightly edited today.
[You should probably finish your thoughts
before posting... -ed.]
I’m reading
The Feminine
Mystique. I should have read it awhile ago, but
I was busy, and that Phyllis Schlafly bit in the New Yorker last week outraged
me sufficiently to make me run to the bookstore and begin reading.
I’ve a lot to say, but to start, I
wanted to point out this little snippet from Chapter 1, because it’s
something I’ve seen surfacing in recent years in cultural critiques about
our Millennial Generation and the quality of contemporary life; it reverberates
in a very eerie way.
“On the contrary, new neuroses are
being seen among women--and problems as yet unnamed as neuroses--which Freud and
his followers did not predict, with physical symptoms, anxieties, and defense
mechanisms equal to those caused by sexual repression. And strange new problems
are being reported in the growing generations of children whose mothers were
always there, driving them around, helping them with their homework--an
inability to endure pain or discipline or pursue any self-sustained goal of any
sort, a devastating boredom with life. Educators are increasingly uneasy about
the dependence, the lack of self-reliance, of the boys and girls who are
entering college today. "We fight a continual battle to make our students assume
manhood," said a Columbia dean.
A
White House conference was held on the physical and muscular deterioration of
American children: were they being over-nurtured? Sociologists noted the
astounding organization of suburban children's lives: the lessons, parties,
entertainments, play and study groups organized for them. A suburban housewife
in Portland, Oregon, wondered why the children "need" Brownies and Boy Scouts
out here. "This is not the slums. The kids out here have the great outdoors. I
think people are so bored. they organize the children, and then try to hook
ever' one else on it. And the poor kids have no time left just to lie on their
beds and
daydream."
[Friedan's
arguments about feminism -- and my concurrence with her -- led me to think about
this, next: - the editor.]
This seems intrinsically related to my
belief in affirmative action; the idea that you can only get ahead and make
money as a black man by pursuing athletics or a rap career or drug dealer; well,
if everyone was given the same access and opportunities from the get go, if
everyone was nurtured and encouraged and were allowed to discover themselves and
for themselves what they believed in and were passionate about, and could exist
in a community that supported and reinforced such self-knowledge; then society
as a whole would benefit. Women were told that they weren’t interested in
anything outside the home; this mystique became a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Black men today (although, happily, I think things are changing –
increasingly I’ve been seeing much more media coverage depicting a strong
upper-middle class of college-educated black men; note movies Guess Who?, Beauty
Shop, the success of Everybody Hates Chris (which, as Nancy Franklin pointed out
the other week, ""Chris” is seen as a potential crossover
hit—meaning that it would be UPN’s first black-oriented show to draw
a significant number of white viewers.”), and numerous TV commercials
(always a good sign that the times are changing, because ad agencies have some
pretty sophisticated market analysis at their disposal – they
wouldn’t run ads for a fictional market share; and hasn’t this been
rapped about, as well?) are told the only way to make a buck is through
athletics…
Anyway, back to the
point, sort of...
Elle Woods as post
modernist third waver? Gwen Stefani?
I
think all this media has always been self-perpetuating, in a way –
MoDo’s new book cites statistics which reflect this, that despite all
evidence to the contrary, women are still perceived to be aggressors,
etc.
This will never change, in any
culture, in any time. There will always be something in these fundamental views,
be they liberal, conservative, “Man Show” or
“Femme-nazi” that appeals to certain types or groups of people. It
is in direct relation to people’s upbringing, emotional experience, their
nurture and their nature.
If you
think about it, humans only experience life in three positions, with some slight
variation (including yoga); thus, the choices will continue to be sit, lay down,
or stand up.
The triumvirate of the
modern experience, ne c’est
pas?
I would have finished this if I hadn't had to go to
dinner...and now I'm too tired to get back into that train of thought. Someday,
someday....
Posted: Friday - November 11, 2005 at 01:42 PM
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