In Favor of Feminism: Share Your Views

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  • wrenn
    wrenn Member Posts: 2,707
    edited November 2021

    LOL Minus two. I assumed too. oops

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  • MinusTwo
    MinusTwo Member Posts: 16,634
    edited November 2021

    Introspective day. Interesting to stop & peruse our own thoughts!!!

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  • DivineMrsM
    DivineMrsM Member Posts: 9,620
    edited November 2021

    image

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  • Nkb
    Nkb Member Posts: 1,436
    edited November 2021

    Devine- this is so true- I do think that men are so used to only competing with men (mostly white) and are shocked when women who create more than 1/2 the pie of life want ANY of it. It is maddening and I get it that if you are privileged you have to give something up when you have to share-

    not sure how it is going to look moving forward- but, men seem to need to suppress women all over the world- they are very threatened by women and men of color. I read a book recently (Sapiens?) where he tried to figure out what makes men like this and rules out all sorts of theories and the only think he can come up with is testosterone.

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  • MinusTwo
    MinusTwo Member Posts: 16,634
    edited November 2021

    Sorry to say I think most women are 'enablers'. I have one friend who can be washing the floor on her hands & knees and if her DH says he wants to go out to lunch now, she jumps up & grabs her purse. She doesn't even tell him she'll be through in 15 minutes. Many others who work a full day, then after coming home & making dinner, race to the fridge if their DH says he's out of of iced tea.

    We were raised by generations of Mothers that women have the responsibility to make everything right for everyone all the time. It is a role that is exhausting and guilt producing - and very hard to change. My Mother told me I could be & do anything I wanted if I worked hard enough, but I was still supposed to see men as superior.

    Granted - there are some men who actually do "help", but not many who would notice or take equal responsibility for whether there is any milk in the fridge.

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  • illimae
    illimae Member Posts: 5,710
    edited November 2021

    Minus, I agree and I too am an enabler. It wasn’t intentional but I’m naturally more organized and DH worked away from home most of the year, so I handed everything. Unfortunately, it resulted in DH not having many household responsibilities and becoming more dependent. Cancer has changed that now and I’ve taken big steps back. He’ll miss me when I’m gone but he won’t be completely lost. I feel no guilt, never have but the need for control and desire to be helpful landed me in a situation less balanced that it should be.

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  • MinusTwo
    MinusTwo Member Posts: 16,634
    edited November 2021

    I think that's how most of us get caught Mae. We want to see things under control in our daily lives and we want to be helpful - especially to people we love.Fortunately I don't have guilt either, but I have lots of friends who seem to wallow in it.

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  • DivineMrsM
    DivineMrsM Member Posts: 9,620
    edited November 2021

    MinusTwo, I've always joked that I never know how much milk is in the fridge because it's something dh always makes sure we don't run out of, so I don't worry about it.

    I could not imagine having the kind of marriage where my husband expected me to wait on him hand and foot. My marriage is always a work in progress, tho, and the last several years I've really learned to advocate for myself. Dh is very domestic and helps with cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, does his own laundry, packs his own lunch and more. But after I became aware of the patriarchy, I noticed how conditioned I was to allowing dh to minimize the work I did, sometimes even taking credit for it or not acknowledging it or even seeing it. I refuse to take a back seat any longer and learned to place much more value on all I bring to the table and I speak up a lot more to make it visible. I call dh out now whenever he tries to claim credit for something good that was my doing.

    Another big turning point for me was when we moved dh's elderly mother into a house across the street from us about six years ago and dh started treating her and his sister (who chipped in to help with their mother) as more important than me. I knocked myself out for decades being the wonderful wife and then they waltzed in to become his priority? I wasn't having it. I was indignant and insulted to be treated that way. Change had to come from within me, which meant standing up for myself over and over and over. My mother in law eventually moved in with her daughter, but I was never going back to my old ways of making dh a bigger priority than me. I'm learning to check in much more often with myself about how I'm feeling and what is it I want to do and not just go along to get along. I only wish I'd advocated for myself a whole lot sooner.


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  • SF-Cakes
    SF-Cakes Member Posts: 316
    edited November 2021

    I haven't checked into this thread in a while, the "foundation recommendations" aka We Riot at Midnight, had me laughing out loud! Thank you, Divine, for sharing that!

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  • wrenn
    wrenn Member Posts: 2,707
    edited November 2021

    Just got an email from a cousin and she shares her email address with her husband. I hate this. I have another friend who does it as well and many things I would like to say to her I would not say to both of them but this address means they are both in on the conversation.

    Reminds me of the old salutations "William and Mrs. Smith" like she doesn't deserve her own identity.

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  • magiclight
    magiclight Member Posts: 8,690
    edited November 2021

    wren...agree wholeheartedly re: shared emails. When I call my SIL her husband (my brother) often talks over her and wants to be part of the conversation which is another of his control features.

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  • DivineMrsM
    DivineMrsM Member Posts: 9,620
    edited November 2021

    I get what you're saying about joint emails, but I know a few couples who have a joint email and even social media account and due to some of their history, I surmise it is a case of the wife not trusting the husband to stay on the up and up. Sometimes joint access is a way the wife can keep track of the husband's interactions.

    In more recent years I realized how often dh would take over many of the conversations I started with others. For him, it wasn't about control, it's about wanting to be the center of attention. He has an insecurity where he won't make the first move to put himself out there but instead lets me get the ball rolling and then he steps in as if it were my job to set the stage for his entrance. I used to think so little of myself I didn't see this. I was so conditioned to acquiesce. Now I'm more mindful and do things to try to prevent it from happening.

    I also go to another room when I'm on the phone.

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  • wrenn
    wrenn Member Posts: 2,707
    edited November 2021

    Divine, that's funny. My niece just said that she assumes one of them had cheated when she sees a joint email.


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  • AliceBastable
    AliceBastable Member Posts: 3,461
    edited December 2021

    image

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  • wrenn
    wrenn Member Posts: 2,707
    edited December 2021

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  • illimae
    illimae Member Posts: 5,710
    edited December 2021

    Alice, I love that!

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  • Betrayal
    Betrayal Member Posts: 1,374
    edited December 2021

    Love the sign and the attribution.

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  • AliceBastable
    AliceBastable Member Posts: 3,461
    edited December 2021

    This may be my favorite thing I've seen this year. I wish my Mom could have lived to see Kamala Harris as Vice-president. For years, she wanted a woman president - the first one she wanted to run that I remember her talking about was Barbara Jordan. I don't know if she had contributed to other presidential campaigns, but she frequently sent small donations to Hillary Clinton, and was thrilled with the little things they sent (which I now have 💙).

    image

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  • MinusTwo
    MinusTwo Member Posts: 16,634
    edited December 2021

    Alice - great visual aid. Thanks for posting.

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  • DivineMrsM
    DivineMrsM Member Posts: 9,620
    edited December 2021

    "We weren't born distrusting and fearing ourselves. That was part of our taming. We were taught to believe that who we are in our natural state is bad and dangerous. They convinced us to be afraid of ourselves. So we do not honor our own bodies, curiosity, hunger, judgment, experience, or ambition. Instead, we lock away our true selves. Women who are best at this disappearing act earn the highest praise: She is so selfless. Can you imagine? The epitome of womanhood is to lose one's self completely. That is the end goal of every patriarchal culture. Because a very effective way to control women is to convince women to control themselves."
    ― Glennon Doyle, Untamed

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  • exbrnxgrl
    exbrnxgrl Member Posts: 12,424
    edited December 2021

    Divine,

    Truth! And it perfectly explains why I put up with my marriage for 23 years

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  • Trishyla
    Trishyla Member Posts: 1,005
    edited December 2021

    And me for 27 years, exbrnxgirl. My sister and I have been marveling at how all of the strong, capable, outspoken women in our family (us included) have been so damned obsequious to the men in our lives. We are caretakers who manage to find controlling but dependent men.

    I'm working on changing my behavior, but I think she's given up. It's a shame because she deserves better. As do I.

    Trish


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  • Nkb
    Nkb Member Posts: 1,436
    edited December 2021

    We have been socialized to criticize others. I think women are so strong that they scare men who have to tear them down to feel competent.

    bell hooks on self-acceptance

    "One of the best guides to how to be self-loving is to give ourselves the love we are often dreaming about receiving from others. There was a time when I felt lousy about my over-forty body, saw myself as too fat, too this, or too that. Yet I fantasized about finding a lover who would give me the gift of being loved as I am. It is silly, isn't it, that I would dream of someone else offering to me the acceptance and affirmation I was withholding from myself. This was a moment when the maxim 'You can never love anybody if you are unable to love yourself' made clear sense. And I add, 'Do not expect to receive the love from someone else you do not give yourself.' "

    ― "All About Love: New Visions"

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  • exbrnxgrl
    exbrnxgrl Member Posts: 12,424
    edited December 2021

    Trishyla,

    Wow! I thought 23 years of being put down, lied to, and verbally/emotionally was bad enough. People often ask if I’m lonely or sad to be single after being married for so long. My answer? A resounding NO! I no longer have to walk on eggshells around my narcissistic, alcoholic ex.

    “We have been socialized to criticize others. I think women are so strong that they scare men who have to tear them down to feel competent.”

    nkb,

    Word! My ex lied about so many things so he would seem equally or more accomplished than I was. He later blamed his lying on me by claiming I would have put him down if he told the truth. A true narcissist.


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  • magiclight
    magiclight Member Posts: 8,690
    edited December 2021

    Strong, resilient women don't get much support. Here is a story from today by Monica Hesse in the WP that just might make me watch It's a wonderful life. Her take away is that Mary Bailey is the (s)hero of that story:

    By Monica Hesse (WP)

    "It's a Wonderful Life is the story of Mary Bailey, who twice saves her husband's floundering business, pulls him back from the brink of suicide/jail, and raises four children while successfully gut-rehabbing a historic home," observes another member of Team Mary.

    "Mary Bailey is the true hero of 'It's a Wonderful Life,' " says Caleb Norris, a film buff with whom I chatted about our shared Mary devotion. "And some mopey ­man gets all the glory."

    Mary deals with the same leaky roof and small-town limitations as her husband with one major difference: She never complains. She doesn't need an angel named Clarence to descend from heaven and inform her that she's actually led a wonderful life. She knows intuitively that wonderful lives are not made by collecting passport stamps or military honors; they are made by investing in the community around you and wallpapering the bejesus out of an old Victorian...Once you see it, you can't unsee it: The entire movie celebrates the personal sacrifices of a nice man while ignoring the identical sacrifices of a nice woman. Why? Because "It's a Wonderful Life" assumes something that society assumed in the 1940s and sometimes continues to assume to this day: A wife is supposed to sacrifice, buck up, make do, slog through. But when the husband does it, the whole town must take note."

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  • exbrnxgrl
    exbrnxgrl Member Posts: 12,424
    edited December 2021

    I love that movie but never looked at it that way. Go Mary Bailey 👏

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  • Miriandra
    Miriandra Member Posts: 1,327
    edited December 2021

    Ugh, even more reason not to watch that train wreck again. I rather liked the "Lost Ending", though. ;)

    SNL - "It's a Wonderful Life" Lost Ending

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  • DivineMrsM
    DivineMrsM Member Posts: 9,620
    edited December 2021

    magiclight, after reading your post, I can totally see the how Mary Bailey is the true hero of “It’s a Wonderful Life.” The reason it makes sense is we often see this kind of scenario in real life where the woman is doing most of the work, doing all the right things, providing most of the support and then a man steps in and is given the credit and accolades, making the woman’s contributions all but invisible.

    Nkb, I love the quote by bell hooks, may she rest in peace.

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  • magiclight
    magiclight Member Posts: 8,690
    edited December 2021

    On a very different note: From the Center for Infectious Disease research and Policy

    A third of Ohio deer test positive for COVID-19 virus

    The working theory based on our sequences is that humans are giving it to deer, and apparently we gave it to them several times.

    My thoughts...

    Who are the people who did this? Women? Men? Children?

    Where did this happen? Forests? Back yards? Roadways?

    Do deer know about the 6 ft. distance rule?

    Who develops rules about human/deer distance during a pandemic?

    ?????

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  • Janett2014
    Janett2014 Member Posts: 3,833
    edited January 2022

    I have enjoyed this thread, but I confess that I’ve gotten behind. I saw the following recently and want to share. Apologies if this has already been posted here. I didn’t go back and read all that I have missed.



    image

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