Tag Archives: misogyny

We Are “Needful Things” at Heart

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Jenny Kissed Me is an excellent blog featuring a steady array of very thoughtful poetry. (http://jeglatter.wordpress.com/2013/06/20/let-go-of-everything-that-does-not-serve-you/) In the poem linked here, she describes emptiness as a place of fulfillment and strength and uses the image of the mother’s breast as the model of need fulfillment. “Dear One, Let go of everything/That does not/Serve you/Then lay, rest//And suckle here,/Until your emptiness/Becomes/A strong new you.”

Clinical theory offers object-relations theory to explain the “needfulness” of the human heart, suggesting as the subject begins to formulate it “needs” objects with which to constitute itself. Or, better stated, it needs objects against which to define itself, this process of definition often described as “object separateness.” The mother, according to this theory is the first object, the “primary object”, and her breasts are the “primary” part of her as they are quickly learned to be satisfaction for a primary need, physical hunger.

But a primary dimension of the human experience will always be “emptiness” or an “object hunger” which we will return to if we do anything meaningful in life. If our ego is mature…if we have “ego integrity”…we will be able to let down our boundaries here and there and step into that “neediness” and there find a Strength that we will not find otherwise.

Marilynne Robinson wrote a marvelous novel entitled Housekeeping about twenty years ago, a novel that was turned into an excellent movie by the same name. In the novel she noted something that grabbed me even before I knew why, “Need can blossom into all the compensations it requires.” Robinson knew that need, though a very scary dimension of the heart, is fertile territory if we dare to go there. And, by describing it as “fertile” I am assigning it femininity and I do so deliberately; for, there in the maw of primordial hunger is our Source and it/He/She is the Ultimate compensation that can be found there. But, unfortunately, addiction of all varieties is always a ready temptation when we visit that matrix of life.

However, emptiness is antithetical to everything we are taught in Western culture and this is not unrelated to the misogyny that we making inroads into in the past 100 years. Our culture emphasizes “be strong” in an ego-maniacal way, not realizing that real strength is found in weakness. Sounds a whole lot like the teachings of Jesus, doesn’t it? Hmm.

And let me close with a facetious note. Stephen King wrote a short story entitled “Needful Things.” I sometimes like to think that this is a good description of the human race.

 

Julia Kristeva, Semiotics, and Violence Against Women

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I recently referred to one of my favorite writers, Julia Kristeva, and her work in the field of linguistics and semiotics. And I’m glad I did so as one of by blog-o-sphere friends find her intriguing and has done some research on her which she shared with me and has stimulated a renewed curiosity of Kristeva on my part. Semiotics is the field of studying the intricacies of language but not a superficial study as in an ordinary language class. Semiotics, particularly as approached by Kristeva, delves into the heart of the linguistic process, down into the “guts” of the verbal process and uses her background in linguistics, philosophy, religion, and psychology to explore this murky, frightening, even terrifying dimension of the human heart as it was constellating. For the heart is comprised of images, feelings, conflicted drives, and emotions which most of us spend our lives oblivious to, even though this dimension of the heart drives our lives even without our awareness of it. This is the unconsciousness, a domain of “feeling” and these “feelings” control us more than reason and even determine how we use our reason. This is the reason that advertising always aims first at our feelings and this certainly true about political advertising..

Kristeva also focuses much of her work on women and the ravages that patriarchy has done on this “fairer sex”, and continues to do so today even though in our culture the tyranny of patriarchy has been diminished in the past hundred years…somewhat! I’m going to share with you my friend “V’s” recent thoughts on this dimension of Kristevan thought. I warn you, don’t read this if you are not open to having patriarchy subjected to a keen analytical mind. And, men, don’t be frightened! The views of Kristeva and her ilk…and of Ms. “V”…merit our consideration and do not have to threaten our masculinity. These views actually can help us participate in a cultural redefinition of “manhood” which our culture and our world so sorely needs.

 

Btw, I’ve been reading about Julia Kristeva this morning. Thanks for turning me on to her. I had never read any of her works. Also been watching some of her video interviews today. I’m now watching the video lecture “The Need to Believe and Desire to Know” on YouTube. What really intrigued me was what I found on her Wikipedia page. I quote:
“It has also been suggested (e.g., Creed, 1993) that the degradation of women and women’s bodies in popular culture (and particularly, for example, in slasher films) emerges because of the threat to identity that the mother’s body poses: it is a reminder of time spent in the undifferentiated state of the semiotic, where one has no concept of self or identity. After abjecting the mother, subjects retain an unconscious fascination with the semiotic, desiring to reunite with the mother, while at the same time fearing the loss of identity that accompanies it. Slasher films thus provide a way for audience members to safely reenact the process of abjection by vicariously expelling and destroying the mother figure.”

I also see a similar symbolism in the crucifixion of Christ. Jesus had feminine qualities which is why most females can relate to him. Even images depict him with a feminine quality. During his time, it was a ‘shame’ for men to have long hair. Women had to cover their heads (hair). A mother image was created in Jesus using mother type symbolism, such as bosom, milk, birth, etc. James W. Prescott, Ph.D. said:

“The dualistic philosophy and theistic theology of gender morality, has had and continues to have devastating consequences for woman and her children. As death of the body is necessary in some religions for salvation, re. the Crucifixion, so too is the death of woman (and her body) necessary for the death of sin and wickedness.”

I’ve searched high and low to find the origins of the love/hate relationship with the mother/women, especially among males, and I found it interesting that nature has created a ‘natural’ repulsiveness towards the mother among her male children as they grow older. This occurs in order to keep sons from mating with their mothers.

I have a dear friend from Wales, and a couple of years ago, he shared a video with me. I’ve tried to locate it but have not been successful to date and he’s forgotten the name of the video. It shows this man searching via spiritual and religious avenues to find that ultimate connection he is driven to experience. It shows him taking part in all the religions and spiritual disciplines and yet still continues to search Towards the end, you see stairs, but don’t know what’s at the top until the end. The man starts up the stairs, and the closer he comes to the top the younger he gets. Then you see this gray cord, and he turns into an infant. The cord is an umbilical cord. At the top of the stairs was his mother. Subconsciously, he was longing for that connection he once felt with his mother when he felt security, when he felt intimacy, nurture and love. When he felt one with his mother.

Back to the Wiki page, it states: “Upon entering the Mirror Stage, the child learns to distinguish between self and other, and enters the realm of shared cultural meaning, known as the symbolic. In Desire in Language (1980), Kristeva describes the symbolic as the space in which the development of language allows the child to become a “speaking subject,” and to develop a sense of identity separate from the mother. This process of separation is known as abjection, whereby the child must reject and move away from the mother in order to enter into the world of language, culture, meaning, and the social. This realm of language is called the symbolic and is contrasted with the semiotic in that it is associated with the masculine, the law, and structure.

According to Schippers (2011), where Kristeva departs from Lacan is in her belief that even after entering the symbolic, the subject continues to oscillate between the semiotic and the symbolic. Therefore, rather than arriving at a fixed identity, the subject is permanently ‘in process’. ”

“Kristeva is also known for her adoption of Plato’s idea of the chora, meaning “a nourishing maternal space” (Schippers, 2011). Kristeva’s idea of the chora has been interpreted in several ways: as a reference to the uterus, as a metaphor for the relationship between the mother and child, and as the temporal period preceding the Mirror Stage. In her essay “Motherhood According to Giovanni” from Desire in Language (1980), Kristeva refers to the chora as a “non-expressive totality formed by drives and their stases in a motility that is full of movement as it is regulated.” She goes on to suggest that it is the mother’s body that mediates between the chora and the symbolic realm: the mother has access to culture and meaning, yet also forms a totalizing bond with the child.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Kristeva

Check this new study out. Scientists find the cells of children in the mothers brains, showing the connection between mother and child is deeper than they once thought. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=scientists-discover-childrens-cells-living-in-mothers-brain

 

Perils of the Muslim Brotherhood and other Misogynists.

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There is a story in today’s New York Times about the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and its concerns about women’s rights. I will share just one tidbit to illustrate the absurdity of their efforts. “A woman needs to be confined within a framework that is controlled by the man of the house,” said a Brotherhood “family expert.” He further explained, “ Even if a wife were beaten by her husband,” she must be shown, “ how she had a role in what happened to her.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/15/world/middleeast/muslim-brotherhoods-words-on-women-stir-liberal-fears.html?_r=0)

The empowerment of women in my country, the United States, is one of the most significant developments I have watched unfold in my lifetime. The importance of this development is very much related to having been born into a very traditional, patriarchal, and impoverished southern family in the United States in 1952. Of course, I knew nothing of family politics in those early years as “power structures” was a notion that I didn’t learn about until much later. But once I had completed college, began reading the social sciences, philosophy, and literature voraciously, I became aware of their presence and began to interpret my own personal life from the perspective I gained.

My Dad was the “head of the household” and he had the Bible to affirm this status. He and the local church emphasized his supremacy and the duty of his wife and six children to dutifully obey his authority. And for years we complied though early in our lives we began to see the inconsistencies in his teachings and in his day to day life and our loyalty was increasingly with mother.

A key feature of dad’s power was control of the purse strings and on that note he made a politically disastrous move in the late 1950’s when he coerced mother into taking a job at a nursing home. She later would recall how she hated doing taking this job, she hated leaving her children alone in the evening hours, and hated not being able to provide the “mother-hen” love that she showered upon us her brood But she, of course, had to cave in at some point and relent because our financial needs were pronounced and dad was the “head of the household.” She worked a bit more than a year before he changed his mind and wanted her to quit though at that point she liked working, her sense of accomplishment was rewarding, and the increased disposable income was a welcome relief from the tedium of abject poverty. But, still dutiful, she acquiesced and quit her position. But, within the year she returned to work, probably because of economic need but also I’m sure because of her wish to return to the life that she was discovering in her job.

This return to work sealed dad’s fate, setting in motion forces which would allow my family to modernize and, more or less, join the world. For, mother thrived in this job as a nurses aide, gained the confidence of her boss, even enrolled in nursing school (LPN school) and completed her licensure requirements. All this time, she was bringing in steady income and this income actually superseded that which dad made in his work as a laborer in the community. Meanwhile, we kids were growing up and becoming more and more aware of dad’s short comings and, admittedly, were always being enticed by mother’s love and not-too-subtle frustrations and anger at her husband.

And, to make a long story short…and perhaps I will try to develop the story more in the future…mom finally succeeded with her quest for independence and left dad, along with her brood, in 1969. This was necessary as dad had become increasingly depressed, hostile, and had even threatened aggression on one occasion. Within two months of this separation, dad had died of an heart attack.

The point of this personal anecdote is that when women gain employment, they gain empowerment, they have the opportunity to find an identity, and to engage in the world. But when they make progress of this sort, it does pose threats to the family dynamic and, in sociological terms, to the social fabric. For one of the bedrocks of traditional, conservative cultures is the subservience of women. If women gain liberties…if I might misapply the wisdom of Todd Akin and making, admittedly, a contorted statement…the gods might just “shut this whole thing down.” Men want control.

The Muslim Brotherhood stance is very telling and I can imagine how it has the Saudi political/religious establishment “shakin’ in their booties.” If they allow these “uppity” women to make any further inroads into their political fiefdom, it will place profound stresses on the social and cultural fabric. But, reality is that a dynamic culture must allow stresses to occur and to find that as they address these stresses they can benefit immensely. But, of course, Egypt is not a dynamic society. And the “gods” always fight change, “tooth and toenail.” (And this same dynamic can currently be seen in my country particularly with the far-right extreme of the Republican party.)