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« heh. The tapper. | Main | A conversation with Coley »
Root Causes of Misogyny
May 23, 2006
Belledame raises some interesting points here:
Here's the deal, though. One of the legacies of patriarchal culture (current "mainstream" U.S. version, at least, as handed down from Biblical morality via Calvinism and Victorianism) is the expectation that Twoo Luv conquers all. A good woman can save a man from his beastly impulses, in a romantic, monogamous, dyadic relationship. Traditionally, marriage; lately, that particular expectation, maybe not so much (depending on where you are and what your background is). Otherwise, though, it's all still very much there. We could talk about the heternormativity of that dictate all day, and probably have done, and will do, especially wrt how it affects women, not to mention queer folk and other sexually "alternative" people. Don't bet on the Prince. An orgasm is a gift you give yourself. Free yer ass and the rest will follow. Love/sex is not a scarce commodity. And so on.But there's a particular twist to the man's expectation in this patriarchally normative set-up, in that the *other* dictates he's received are: You don't have emotional needs. You don't turn to other men for tenderness, and women (except, *maybe*, for That Special Someone, assuming you ever find her), are there primarily for service/combat. So essentially, you're putting an awful lot of expectations on one woman; and very likely you don't even know that you *have* those expectations. They get reified into concrete "shoulds" like "laugh at my jokes" and "have sex __ number of times per __" and so forth. (And of course it could also be that woman in this equation is going off her own reified expectations of what "caring" looks like from a "traditional," sexist perspective...which may include such things as buying presents and spending money, yes. Bottom line: no one's able to ask for what they actually need. cue bitterness all around).
It's something I am really considering in the context of whether or not monogamous relationships are even possible. I just feel like monogamy sets us up to expect too much from each other, and that bitterness is what ultimately ensues.
It is interesting that I note within myself lately both a resignation to the fact that I have a special affinity for men who "have issues" and yet I feel myself desiring less and less to "fix" them, and instead focusing on how we fit together, flaws and all. It's a lesson I wish I had learned sooner - as I could have sidestepped a ton of unwanted chaos in my life.
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