Speaking very much from my own experience, I can put the pieces together as to much of the cause behind present day misogyny.
The underlying problem is the ubiquity of people without a fully developed, fully emerged self. {Questions I'd like to know the answer to: what causes it? The training for 'masculinity' though a failure to nurture sufficiently? A harsh post-industrial climate? That part needs investigation} Today, nonetheless we have a large number of people without a fully emerged adult personality. Maybe, indeed, they had one once, but harsh and stressful circumstances have caused it to retreat as they have regressed to the magical pre-Oedipal stage.
In terms of this regressive condition, as Gertrud B. Ujhely has explained in her article on the PreOedipal, every viewpoint or value is made up of soley two poles -- representing a polarised (un-nuanced) and two-dimensional view of existence. {In terms of this someone is either a saint or a devil, completely right, or absolutely wrong, with no gradations of grey inbetween. Furthermore, one sees the other as a necessary whole of either good or bad, and not as parts of likeable AND unlikeable aspects.}
This regressive mode which forms the lens thought which one comes to view the other does not enable one to perceive the full humanity of the person who is seen as 'other' (eg because of race or gender). The 'other' is merely the other polarity (not the other human being) in relation to oneself. The task allocated to this other is an instrumental one of giving the undeveloped self of the one who has regressed to the pre-Oedipal perspective, something to latch onto, in order to anchor and stabilise itself within what is felt to be an otherwise incomprehensible world of flux and change.
Thus the regressed male feels a painful need for an opposite polarity to stabilise and give organisational meaning to his mind in flux. He sees feminism as a threat, on quite a personal level, because it seems to take women out of his reach, making them nuanced, complex and something other than this simplified pole of "otherness" that he craves.
When I have communicated with various "feminist critics", I have received the impression that anything that I say that is nuanced or complex is simply not understood at all, unless it can be reduced to something that would fit within the pre-Oedipal perspective -- for instance as a cry of pain and horror that could be differentiated only crudely from the opposite polarity of pleasure and feeling safe. Thus the nuances of what I have to say, and the complexity of actual (in the real world -- experiential) gender relations are not at all understood. Rather, the "feminist critic" sees what I have to say in terms of his own painful condition, of gut level neediness (with me being seen on the opposite polarity, as triumphing over him in a mode of unrestrained pleasure, though my feminist self-assuredness.)
The fearful and regressed male, as we can see, mistakes the ability to engage in a mature sense with social and psychological nuances, to be be a sign of hubris and greedy triumphalism. Thus, such a person is deeply threatened (by virtue of the polarising nature of his mind) by the maturity that does not permit every value and meaning to devolve into a crude polarity. {He needs this crude polarity -- and you as the representation of it -- remember, in order to find order and meaning in life, and stabilise a weak and shaky undeveloped self that cries out helplessly within its state of flux for some reassuring dispensation of order.}
So it is from a regressive or regressed state of being that feminism is seen as a threat -- specifically as a way of withholding, in a very threatening way, the rights of men to have a full and complete adult self.
However, the solution that anti-feminism appeals to is a pathological one -- ie. that all women should regress to the pre-Oedipal stage experienced by these most unfortunate, regressive males. For women to become the shadowy mother figures of the pre-Oedipal consciousness to these men would not enable them to transcend their pathological regression -- that is, to become fully and calmly adult once and for all (which is what they ought to be seeking).
It's a false solution -- but the anti-feminist men can see no other way than to demand that women take the opposite polarity to them, in order that they may become, finally, "men", and so that their sense of security in the world may seem to be (momentarily, at least) restored.
The underlying problem is the ubiquity of people without a fully developed, fully emerged self. {Questions I'd like to know the answer to: what causes it? The training for 'masculinity' though a failure to nurture sufficiently? A harsh post-industrial climate? That part needs investigation} Today, nonetheless we have a large number of people without a fully emerged adult personality. Maybe, indeed, they had one once, but harsh and stressful circumstances have caused it to retreat as they have regressed to the magical pre-Oedipal stage.
In terms of this regressive condition, as Gertrud B. Ujhely has explained in her article on the PreOedipal, every viewpoint or value is made up of soley two poles -- representing a polarised (un-nuanced) and two-dimensional view of existence. {In terms of this someone is either a saint or a devil, completely right, or absolutely wrong, with no gradations of grey inbetween. Furthermore, one sees the other as a necessary whole of either good or bad, and not as parts of likeable AND unlikeable aspects.}
This regressive mode which forms the lens thought which one comes to view the other does not enable one to perceive the full humanity of the person who is seen as 'other' (eg because of race or gender). The 'other' is merely the other polarity (not the other human being) in relation to oneself. The task allocated to this other is an instrumental one of giving the undeveloped self of the one who has regressed to the pre-Oedipal perspective, something to latch onto, in order to anchor and stabilise itself within what is felt to be an otherwise incomprehensible world of flux and change.
Thus the regressed male feels a painful need for an opposite polarity to stabilise and give organisational meaning to his mind in flux. He sees feminism as a threat, on quite a personal level, because it seems to take women out of his reach, making them nuanced, complex and something other than this simplified pole of "otherness" that he craves.
When I have communicated with various "feminist critics", I have received the impression that anything that I say that is nuanced or complex is simply not understood at all, unless it can be reduced to something that would fit within the pre-Oedipal perspective -- for instance as a cry of pain and horror that could be differentiated only crudely from the opposite polarity of pleasure and feeling safe. Thus the nuances of what I have to say, and the complexity of actual (in the real world -- experiential) gender relations are not at all understood. Rather, the "feminist critic" sees what I have to say in terms of his own painful condition, of gut level neediness (with me being seen on the opposite polarity, as triumphing over him in a mode of unrestrained pleasure, though my feminist self-assuredness.)
The fearful and regressed male, as we can see, mistakes the ability to engage in a mature sense with social and psychological nuances, to be be a sign of hubris and greedy triumphalism. Thus, such a person is deeply threatened (by virtue of the polarising nature of his mind) by the maturity that does not permit every value and meaning to devolve into a crude polarity. {He needs this crude polarity -- and you as the representation of it -- remember, in order to find order and meaning in life, and stabilise a weak and shaky undeveloped self that cries out helplessly within its state of flux for some reassuring dispensation of order.}
So it is from a regressive or regressed state of being that feminism is seen as a threat -- specifically as a way of withholding, in a very threatening way, the rights of men to have a full and complete adult self.
However, the solution that anti-feminism appeals to is a pathological one -- ie. that all women should regress to the pre-Oedipal stage experienced by these most unfortunate, regressive males. For women to become the shadowy mother figures of the pre-Oedipal consciousness to these men would not enable them to transcend their pathological regression -- that is, to become fully and calmly adult once and for all (which is what they ought to be seeking).
It's a false solution -- but the anti-feminist men can see no other way than to demand that women take the opposite polarity to them, in order that they may become, finally, "men", and so that their sense of security in the world may seem to be (momentarily, at least) restored.
6 comments:
I thought we were supposed to magickally conjur up and return to them, their penis. I was always under the impression that PreOedipal men suffered from Disappearing Penis Syndrome, wherein strong, challenging females by virtue of their *otherness and make the penis disappear with their vast Primordial Tiamat like powers.
No seriously, that kind of dysfunctional dualism I can live without, but in fact have to buy a snorkel and swim through everyday. Between the snorkel and the hip boots, some days I manage NOT to get any on me--though it doesnt happen often.
You are right. Many men and women miss the complexities and nuances. Life is but a marching drum beat. They are unable to hear the subtle symphonis taking place all around them for the incessant--left Foot--Right Foot BOOM BOOM BOOM that is always taking precedence in their heads.
Yeah. Those sort of people seem to be everywhere these days. Unfortunately their 'masculinity' , their "overman" status, is based entirely on their conception of their rights to consume things, without pause or reflection. There is no attitudinal difference between this approach and the demand of the infant for the teet. But somehow this regression to magical thinking is supposed to make them 'overmen'?
It is the Subconscious counterpart to Dominionism pure and simple.
Yuck, I feel like I just stepped in something nasty.
Yes. Their self-undevelopment and immaturity also has political ambitions.
There is nothing mentally or morally wrong with men that only need women as sexual partners. It is called a personal choice. But it is also a womans right to reject that type of man if she finds him shallow. Lets not call horny men bad names.
I wasn't referring at all to horny men in the passage.
Why did you think I was?
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