DirkGently (10,829 posts)
9. Motherhood is a tremendous power.
Oh, sweet Jesus! If motherhood is a tremendous power, why rip that power out of your womb?
I remember studying Karen Horney's holistic approach to fictional characters, but don't remember this specific element.
Well, there's your problem right there. Fictional characters aren't real...
Not too hard to see the threat to paternalism posed by the people who actually have the babies, though. So many attacks on women clearly orbit around resentment that men can't control the entire reproductive process, and therefore fear it.
I've been hearing this all my adult life. How the hell is this a threat to paternalism? Women can't control the whole process either. Last time I checked, you harpies haven't figured out how to make your own sperm. And "reproduction" means you actually have to reproduce. Abortion, especially the kind that kills babies halfway out of the womb, doesn't fit that category.
Thus, the many ways a woman can be accused of "doing it wrong," whether it's being blamed for having too few babies, or too many, or (at least formerly) not enough boy babies, or not having the baby with the "right" man, or trying not to have a baby, or trying to have a job and also have a baby. So many rules to break, and crimes to commit, according to some.
What ARE you talking about? Anyone here accused a woman of "doing it wrong"? Maybe women who drink, smoke & take drugs while they're pregnant could be accused of "doing it wrong" so there's that. Being blamed for not having boys ended ages and ages ago when scientists discovered men were responsible for the sex of the baby (part of that shared reproductive thing). Who a woman reproduces with is none of my business. I've certainly wondered why some of my friends (male & female) married who they did, but that has nothing to do with patriarchy.
It's almost like women once ruled the world with the power of womb, and men are terrified they will figure out how to take it back.
Oh, honey, that whole mother goddess thing ended several thousand years ago. Superstition was big back then because they didn't know any better. In early hunter-gatherer societies they also worshiped hunting gods. If Grok whacked Grokette on the head with a club, dragged her into his cave by her hair & impregnated her, then he better damn well feed her dinner! But, bless your heart, if you haven't figured out how to take back this fictional power by now, you better just give it up.
Hell, the modern feminist goddesses you worship today still depend on men. Hillary would be nothing without Bill. No one would even know who she was. She puts up with his constant cheating (she ****ing enables him) just so she can hitch her wagon to his star. And what kind of feminist destroys the lives of other women for the crime of being raped and taken advantage of by a powerful man?
Conservative women seem to have figured out this whole self empowerment thing, though. Compare Phyllis Schlafly to Gloria Steinem. Schlafly is an attorney, wrote like 20 books, started the Eagle Forum (still exists today), almost single-handedly defeated the Equal Rights Amendment, served on several pro family boards and worked tirelessly to raise awareness of the importance of stay-at-home moms. Oh, and she did all this while raising 6 children. Steinem needed a rich sugar daddy just to keep her bitchy magazine afloat. Guess fish really do need a bicycle.
Cindie