False notions of love teach us that it is the place where we will feel no pain, where we will be in a state of constant bliss. We have to expose the falseness of these beliefs to see and accept the reality that suffering and pain do not end when we begin to love. In some cases when we are making the slow journey back from lovelessness to love, our suffering may become more intense. Acceptance of pain is part of loving practice. bell hooks, All About Love

As a society, we encourage girls and women to be emotionally accessible, and in touch with their feelings; we say that it’s an innately feminine trait. We say it, that is, until they have feelings that make us uncomfortable, at which point we recast them as melodramatic harpies, shrieking banshees, and basket cases.

Sady Doyle

For years, psychologists hypothesized that raising strong, confident boys had more to do with nurture than with nature, and that it was essential for parents--fathers, mainly--to instill in them a masculinity and sense of self. This masculinity was narrowly defined to exclude any interests or traits that could be considered girlish--things like sparkly dragons or painted nails. The underlying fear: Too much female, or mom, influence could sway a son's sexual orientation. The opposite has hardly been discussed--that too much male, or dad, influence will "make" a daughter gay. In fact, little girls who display what are thought of as typically male traits--such as playing sports, excelling in math and science, and wearing tomboyish clothing--are celebrated, and close relationships with their fathers are rarely questioned. It's one reason that schools hold father-daughter dances but tend to hold mother-son events that are sport-related, if they hold any at all.

Gender typing is believed to impede emotional development and account for anti social behavior in boys. In my work with families and parenting, I have observed that boys who are not trapped in gender roles grow up to be more independent, more open-minded, and more sexually tolerant than their peers. Their exposure to a greater repertoire of potential identities gave them a sense of parental acceptance that laid the groundwork for a natural assertiveness. These boys also more easily treated females with respect and openness.

"Most of our platitudes notwithstanding, self-deception remains the most difficult deception."

-the inimitable Joan Didion, On Self Respect

As we have so recently and publicly discussed, girls and women have “anger issues” in that they are socialized to not demonstrate anger, but instead to sublimate it where it can sometimes then manifest itself as anxiety or depression. Girls are not born less angry and more anxious, they’re rewarded for being less angry and more anxious. So, it should come as no surprise to anyone that large groups of stressed out girls and women collectively facing the dissolution of a cohesive social structure might be more disposed to fall prey to mass psychosis. It is arguable that men and boys experience similarly jarring episodes of anger and anxiety-channelling mass psychosis, but we call it male aggression and fund military industrial complexes to deal with it.

Soraya L. Chemaly, Stop Telling Girls They’re Hysterical

It's not okay how so many men behave as though they have the right to aggressively address strangers on the street because we're women, and it's not okay that we are expected to take it with a smile.

I recently conducted an interview with Joan Didion. We spoke over the phone; she from her hotel in Washington. She was on tour for Blue Nights, a reminisence about the life and death of her daughter, Quintana, and Didion’s thoughts about her own mortality. Over the next few weeks, we will be posting highlights from this interview, then it will all be posted on The Believer website.

- Sheila Heti

THE BELIEVER: When you were a little girl you wanted to be an actress, not a writer?

JOAN DIDION: Right.

BLVR: But you said it’s okay, because writing is in some ways a performance. When you’re writing, are you performing a character?

JD: You’re not even a character. You’re doing a performance. Somehow writing has always seemed to me to have an element of performance.

BLVR: What is the nature of that performance? I mean, an actor performs a character—

JD: Sometimes an actor performs a character, but sometimes an actor just performs. With writing, I don’t think it’s performing a character, really, if the character you’re performing is yourself. I don’t see that as playing a role. It’s just appearing in public.

BLVR: Appearing in public and sort of saying lines—

JD: But not somebody else’s lines. Your lines. Look at me—this is me, is, I think, what you’re saying.

BLVR: And do you feel like that me is a pretty stable thing, or unstable? Is it consistent through one’s life as a writer?

JD: I think it develops into a fairly stable thing over time. I think it’s not at all stable at first. But then you kind of grow into the role you have made for yourself.

BLVR: How would you gauge the distance between the role you have made for yourself—

JD: —and the real person?

BLVR: Yeah.

JD: Well, I don’t know. The real person becomes the role you have made for yourself.

Men in fancy conference rooms in government capitals, the United Nations and think tanks around the world rarely focus on the civilians caught in the crossfire, trapped in a hell they had no role in creating. As rape becomes increasingly relied upon as a weapon to humiliate, destabilize and exercise power, women's bodies become the battlefield between two warring sides. Not only do they get no say in war, they must pay its price in excruciating detail. This trend has only become more apparent as the very nature of war has changed from state-on-state to intra-state conflict.

According to Michelle Bachelet, former president of Chile and now head of UN Women, "in actual budget terms, the U.N. allocates only about 5 percent of its post-conflict funds to addressing women's post-conflict needs."

In Milwaukee, in an effort to solve cold cases, specifically those in which the victim's identity is unknown, the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner's office has started a new program.

They have created composite sketches based on the remains, then created website that features the photo, as well as specific details about the remains... tattoos, etc. Some of the photos of the remains are also posted online. While other cities have similar sites (with composite sketches), Milwaukee and Las Vegas are currently the only 2 places that feature pictures of the actual bodies.

Personally, it makes me a little squeamish, but there have been some positive results.

A news release from the Clark County, Nevada, Office of the Coroner/Medical Examiner states that since 2003, when it launched its own website and designated a group of investigators to handle cold cases, it has identified the remains of 30 people. The site says 152 remain to be identified, the oldest case dating back to 1969.

well, and this is happening:

Today in extreme and questionable geekery: a British company has almost sold out the 2,000 available tickets for two cruises that promise to recreate the Titanic's ill-fated maiden voyage on the 100th anniversary of the disaster next year. Floating piece of door and Leonardo DiCapriosicle not included.

The cruises are part of another reswelling of interest in the lore of the lost gigantic ship— next year, James Cameron's Titanic will be rereleased in 3D, festivals marking the 100th anniversary of the boat's demise will occur on both sides of the pond, and crazy, rich bastards will be able to pay a Russian company $59,000 to take a submarine down to the site of the wreckage.

The Titanic cruise passengers will thankfully cross the Atlantic on a ship that isn't named Titanic II: Titanic 2 Titanic, but rather the MS Balmoral. According to the Independent, exquisite attention has been paid to every detail, so that the passengers willing to pay the $10,000 or so the trip costs will be treated to the nerdiest, most historically accurate disaster recreation ever. They'll follow the exact path of the ship to the point where the vessel hit an iceberg and went down in the north Atlantic. Passengers will be served food from the same menu served to passengers during the Titanic's journey. Relatives of passengers on the original Titanic will be aboard. Presumably, half of those on board will lose their virginity to a poor lad with a heart of gold, after he draws them like he draws one of his French girls. Diamonds for everyone! The ship will briefly halt at the exact location where the Titanic went down, so that on April 15 at precisely 2:20 am, passengers will participate in a memorial service for the passengers lost to the chilly waters exactly 100 years before.

No word on whether or not Celine Dion will be providing the endlessly repeated soundtrack.

e.g. ryan (jezebel contributor)

gaslighting

article by Yashar Ali. italics and bolding my own

You're so sensitive. You're so emotional. You're defensive. You're overreacting. Calm down. Relax. Stop freaking out! You're crazy! I was just joking, don't you have a sense of humor? You're so dramatic. Just get over it already!

Sound familiar?

If you're a woman, it probably does.

...

When someone says these things to you, it's not an example of inconsiderate behavior. When your spouse shows up half an hour late to dinner without calling -- that's inconsiderate behavior. A remark intended to shut you down like, "Calm down, you're overreacting," after you just addressed someone else's bad behavior, is emotional manipulation, pure and simple.

And this is the sort of emotional manipulation that feeds an epidemic in our country, an epidemic that defines women as crazy, irrational, overly sensitive, unhinged. This epidemic helps fuel the idea that women need only the slightest provocation to unleash their (crazy) emotions. It's patently false and unfair.

I think it's time to separate inconsiderate behavior from emotional manipulation, and we need to use a word not found in our normal vocabulary.

I want to introduce a helpful term to identify these reactions: gaslighting.

Gaslighting is a term often used by mental health professionals (I am not one) to describe manipulative behavior used to confuse people into thinking their reactions are so far off base that they're crazy.

The term comes from the 1944 MGM film, Gaslight, starring Ingrid Bergman. Bergman's husband in the film, played by Charles Boyer, wants to get his hands on her jewelry. He realizes he can accomplish this by having her certified as insane and hauled off to a mental institution. To pull of this task, he intentionally sets the gaslights in their home to flicker off and on, and every time Bergman's character reacts to it, he tells her she's just seeing things. In this setting, a gaslighter is someone who presents false information to alter the victim's perception of him or herself.

Today, when the term is referenced, it's usually because the perpetrator says things like, "You're so stupid," or "No one will ever want you," to the victim. This is an intentional, pre-meditated form of gaslighting, much like the actions of Charles Boyer's character in Gaslight, where he strategically plots to confuse Ingrid Bergman's character into believing herself unhinged.

The form of gaslighting I'm addressing is not always pre-mediated or intentional, which makes it worse, because it means all of us, especially women, have dealt with it at one time or another.

Those who engage in gaslighting create a reaction -- whether it's anger, frustration, sadness -- in the person they are dealing with. Then, when that person reacts, the gaslighter makes them feel uncomfortable and insecure by behaving as if their feelings aren't rational or normal.

My friend Anna (all names changed to protect privacy) is married to a man who feels it necessary to make random and unprompted comments about her weight. Whenever she gets upset or frustrated with his insensitive comments, he responds in the same, defeating way, "You're so sensitive. I'm just joking."

My friend Abbie works for a man who finds a way, almost daily, to unnecessarily shoot down her performance and her work product. Comments like, "Can't you do something right?" or "Why did I hire you?" are regular occurrences for her. Her boss has no problem firing people (he does it regularly), so you wouldn't know from these comments that Abbie has worked for him for six years. But every time she stands up for herself and says, "It doesn't help me when you say these things," she gets the same reaction: "Relax; you're overreacting."

Abbie thinks her boss is just being a jerk in these moments, but the truth is, he is making those comments to manipulate her into thinking her reactions are out of whack. And it's exactly that kind manipulation that has left her feeling guilty about being sensitive, and as a result, she has not left her job.

But gaslighting can be as simple as someone smiling and saying something like, "You're so sensitive," to somebody else. Such a comment may seem innocuous enough, but in that moment, the speaker is making a judgment about how someone else should feel.

While dealing with gaslighting isn't a universal truth for women, we all certainly know plenty of women who encounter it at work, home, or in personal relationships.

And the act of gaslighting does not simply affect women who are not quite sure of themselves. Even vocal, confident, assertive women are vulnerable to gaslighting.

Why?

Because women bare the brunt of our neurosis. It is much easier for us to place our emotional burdens on the shoulders of our wives, our female friends, our girlfriends, our female employees, our female colleagues, than for us to impose them on the shoulders of men.

It's a whole lot easier to emotionally manipulate someone who has been conditioned by our society to accept it. We continue to burden women because they don't refuse our burdens as easily. It's the ultimate cowardice.

Whether gaslighting is conscious or not, it produces the same result: It renders some women emotionally mute.

...

When these women receive any sort of push back to their reactions, they often brush it off by saying, "Forget it, it's okay."

That "forget it" isn't just about dismissing a thought, it is about self-dismissal. It's heartbreaking.

No wonder some women are unconsciously passive aggressive when expressing anger, sadness, or frustration. For years, they have been subjected to so much gaslighting that they can no longer express themselves in a way that feels authentic to them.

...

From the way women are portrayed on reality shows, to how we condition boys and girls to see women, we have come to accept the idea that women are unbalanced, irrational individuals, especially in times of anger and frustration.

Just the other day, on a flight from San Francisco to Los Angeles, a flight attendant who had come to recognize me from my many trips asked me what I did for a living. When I told her that I write mainly about women, she immediately laughed and asked, "Oh, about how crazy we are?"

Her gut reaction to my work made me really depressed. While she made her response in jest, her question nonetheless makes visible a pattern of sexist commentary that travels through all facets of society on how men view women, which also greatly impacts how women may view themselves.

As far as I am concerned, the epidemic of gaslighting is part of the struggle against the obstacles of inequality that women constantly face. Acts of gaslighting steal their most powerful tool: their voice. This is something we do to women every day, in many different ways.

I don't think this idea that women are "crazy," is based in some sort of massive conspiracy. Rather, I believe it's connected to the slow and steady drumbeat of women being undermined and dismissed, on a daily basis. And gaslighting is one of many reasons why we are dealing with this public construction of women as "crazy."

...

When I was writing this piece, I was reminded of one of my favorite Gloria Steinem quotes, "The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn."

So for many of us, it's first about unlearning how to flicker those gaslights and learning how to acknowledge and understand the feelings, opinions, and positions of the women in our lives.

But isn't the issue of gaslighting ultimately about whether we are conditioned to believe that women's opinions don't hold as much weight as ours? That what women have to say, what they feel, isn't quite as legitimate?

This is what happens. You put it away for a little while, and now and again you look in the closet for something else and you remember, and you think, soon. Then it becomes something that is just there, in the closet, and other things get crowded in front of it and finally you don’t think about it at all. The thing that was your bright treasure. You don’t think about it. A loss you could not contemplate at one time, and now it becomes something you can barely remember. That is what happens.
— _Alice Munro, Chance

"I am one of the searchers. There are, I believe, millions of us. We are not unhappy, but neither are we really content. We continue to explore life, hoping to uncover its ultimate secret. We continue to explore ourselves. We like to walk along the beach, we are drawn by the ocean, taken by its power, its unceasing motion, its mystery and unspeakable beauty. We like forests and mountains, deserts and hidden rivers, and the lonely cities as well. Our sadness is as much a part of our lives as is our laughter. To share our sadness with one we love is perhaps as great a joy as we can know - unless it be to share our laughter. We searchers are ambitious only for life itself, for everything beautiful it can provide."
— James Kavanaugh

who said it? rapist or men's magazine?

I copy and pasted this, in its entirety, from Jezebel.com, because I couldn't cut out any part of it for a nice little box-filling quote.


The University of Surrey reports on the study (conducted jointly with researchers at Middlesex University), to be published in the British Journal of Psychology. Researchers gave a group of men and women quotes from the British lad mags FHM, Loaded, Nuts and Zoo, as well as excerpts from interviews with actual convicted rapists originally published in the book The Rapist Files. The participants couldn't reliably identify which statements came from magazines and which from rapists — what's more, they rated the magazine quotes as slightly more derogatory than the statements made by men serving time for raping women. The researchers also showed both sets of quotes to a separate group of men — the men were more likely to identify with the rapists' statements than the lad mag excerpts. The only slightly bright spot in the study: when researchers randomly (and sometimes incorrectly) labelled the quotes as coming from either rapists or magazines, the men were more likely to identify with the ones allegedly drawn from mags. At least they didn't want to agree with rapists.

Still, the results as a whole are pretty disturbing. Says lead study author Dr. Miranda Horvath, "We were surprised that participants identified more with the rapists' quotes, and we are concerned that the legitimisation strategies that rapists deploy when they talk about women are more familiar to these young men than we had anticipated." Her co-author Dr. Peter Hegarty adds,

There is a fundamental concern that the content of such magazines normalises the treatment of women as sexual objects. We are not killjoys or prudes who think that there should be no sexual information and media for young people. But are teenage boys and young men best prepared for fulfilling love and sex when they normalise views about women that are disturbingly close to those mirrored in the language of sexual offenders?

Many of the rapists quoted in the study talked about coercing women or having sex with them even though they were initially unwilling. However, so did the lad mags. Horvath says, "Rapists try to justify their actions, suggesting that women lead men on, or want sex even when they say no, and there is clearly something wrong when people feel the sort of language used in a lads' mag could have come from a convicted rapist." A lot of these stereotypes — that women say no when they really mean yes, or are "asking for it" by going out with a man or wearing a short skirt — have indeed been normalized, and it's sad but not surprising that they appear in a lot of lad mags. Defenders of such statements like to frame them as innocent, or even helpful, observations. But perhaps the news that they sound just like rapists will make people — and magazines — rethink their words.

Middlesex University generously provided us with a copy of the quotes the researchers used. See if you can tell the difference between the rapists and the lad mags:

1. There's a certain way you can tell that a girl wants to have sex . . . The way they dress, they flaunt themselves.

2. Some girls walk around in short-shorts . . . showing their body off . . . It just starts a man thinking that if he gets something like that, what can he do with it?

3. A girl may like anal sex because it makes her feel incredibly naughty and she likes feeling like a dirty slut. If this is the case, you can try all sorts of humiliating acts to help live out her filthy fantasy.

4. Mascara running down the cheeks means they've just been crying, and it was probably your fault . . . but you can cheer up the miserable beauty with a bit of the old in and out.

5. What burns me up sometimes about girls is dick-teasers. They lead a man on and then shut him off right there.

6. Filthy talk can be such a turn on for a girl . . . no one wants to be shagged by a mouse . . . A few compliments won't do any harm either . . . ‘I bet you want it from behind you dirty whore' . . .

7. You know girls in general are all right. But some of them are bitches . . . The bitches are the type that . . . need to have it stuffed to them hard and heavy.

8. Escorts . . . they know exactly how to turn a man on. I've given up on girlfriends. They don't know how to satisfy me, but escorts do.

9. You'll find most girls will be reluctant about going to bed with somebody or crawling in the back seat of a car . . . But you can usually seduce them, and they'll do it willingly.

10. There's nothing quite like a woman standing in the dock accused of murder in a sex game gone wrong . . . The possibility of murder does bring a certain frisson to the bedroom.

11. Girls ask for it by wearing these mini-skirts and hotpants . . . they're just displaying their body . . . Whether they realise it or not they're saying, ‘Hey, I've got a beautiful body, and it's yours if you want it.'

12. You do not want to be caught red-handed . . . go and smash her on a park bench. That used to be my trick.

13. Some women are domineering, but I think it's more or less the man who should put his foot down. The man is supposed to be the man. If he acts the man, the woman won't be domineering.

14. I think if a law is passed, there should be a dress code . . . When girls dress in those short skirts and things like that, they're just asking for it.

15. Girls love being tied up . . . it gives them the chance to be the helpless victim.

16. I think girls are like plasticine, if you warm them up you can do anything you want with them.

Answers. 1. Rapist, 2. Rapist, 3. Lad mag, 4. Lad mag, 5. Rapist, 6. Lad mag, 7. Rapist, 8. Lad mag, 9. Rapist, 10. Lad mag, 11. Rapist, 12. Lad mag, 13. Rapist, 14. Rapist, 15. Lad mag, 16. Lad mag

"But when a saga popular with pre-adolescent girls peaks romantically on a night that leaves the heroine to wake up covered with bruises in the shape of her husband's hands — and when that heroine then spends the morning explaining to her husband that she's incredibly happy even though he injured her, and that it's not his fault because she understands he couldn't help it in light of the depth of his passion — that's profoundly irresponsible.

...

But romanticizing an intimate relationship that leaves bruises and scars is a particularly terrible idea in a film aimed at girls. Talking about this is tiresome, but then so is putting it in the movie. From depicting the loss of virginity as a naturally violent, frightening, physically dangerous experience to making Bella a woman with no life at all outside of her literally all-consuming pregnancy, the narrative sledgehammers are all as distasteful as they are inelegant."

-npr

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

-teddy roosevelt

i haven't had the mental fortitude to write a word about what has happened recently involving Jerry Sandusky, child rape, and not only the complete failure over a period of years for multiple adults to do the right thing, but also the cover-up of despicable crimes. and subsequent rioting in the streets in favor... IN FAVOR of these men.

This week, several prominent alpha-type heterosexual males found out that they can’t just do whatever the fuck they please, and the news is going over about as well as you would expect.

one the best analogies i've ever read about the end of a relationship. learning that you can feel love for someone but know they are not the best for you.

And you and I, we will end the way a movie ends: lights will flood the theater, suddenly spotlighting the audience, who are blinking their glossy eyes back into reality. They will come to their feet, stretching muscles and sorting through the things they have brought, choosing quickly what to dispose and what to keep.

They have expected this, of course, the film reaching the end of its crackling length.

For weeks afterward they will bring it up in conversation, discuss the lines and themes which struck them like fists and stay with them like bruises blooming beneath the skin. The negative image of light once darkness descends. The radio will broadcast the songs that played in the background, lilted and lifted the scenes, and the people will remember, may sing along quietly. The story may visit them in dreams, veiled and vague, and they will wake up at home the same way they left the lobby, shaking loose the colors and characters.

They will lie in the morning light, eyes closed and then open, and think about what, if anything, it meant to them at all.

-l.j. markel