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Ah, dating. As humans, when we grow into pubescence, we begin to lose sight of ourselves. Or maybe we begin to realize that we never knew ourselves in the first place. And so, in response, we cling tighter to others. We are being formed, and formation requires outside forces: nothing much is created in barren space. So we create ourselves through others, plucking heartstrings, an enormous, clamorous orchestra augmenting the disharmonic chords of puberty. We build so much of ourselves around the idea of something or someone to complete us, papier-mache-ing a mold to our side, a mold which is broken many times over and distorted many more.

On Feminism, Dating and Dependence

Ah, dating. As humans, when we grow into pubescence, we begin to lose sight of ourselves. Or maybe we begin to realize that we never knew ourselves in ...

Apr 9, 2016

Ah, dating. As humans, when we grow into pubescence, we begin to lose sight of ourselves. Or maybe we begin to realize that we never knew ourselves in the first place. And so, in response, we cling tighter to others. We are being formed, and formation requires outside forces: nothing much is created in barren space. So we create ourselves through others, plucking heartstrings, an enormous, clamorous orchestra augmenting the disharmonic chords of puberty. We build so much of ourselves around the idea of something or someone to complete us, papier-mache-ing a mold to our side, a mold which is broken many times over and distorted many more.
The first time my own fragile papier-mache was broken was also the first time I really came to believe that dependence can make you weak. I suffered from an unrequited romance, a depth of feeling on my part that I had no idea I was capable of producing, let alone be consumed by. The second time I realised that love can make you weak was when I had my heart broken. It ached: sometimes dully, but mostly violently. I guess by that point I was well aware of how dependence and vulnerability are deeply important to functional relationships, but also how terribly destructive they can be. For a while, I tried to simply care less; I looked up to people who, in their words, didn’t give a shit. But that was a lie to myself, and also impossible.
Maybe this is just my upbringing talking, the influence of having grown up in a country that doesn’t really acknowledge social issues and lives by the maxim “she’ll be right” — it’ll work out in the end, don’t complain about it — but I never considered the destructiveness of dependence in a wider context of gender norms or stereotypes. In fact, I never actively considered or applied any kind of ostensibly feminist ideals to my dating life, or to my life more broadly, until I started college. This was, and partly still is, because I believe that many crucial components of a good relationship — respect, care, love, support — are not necessarily compatible only with feminism, but also with being a good human being. Ideally, it wouldn’t be necessary to make a division between respecting women as a special or persecuted class and respecting all human beings in general.
Having said that, it does remain an ideal. It makes me angry that we need feminism, but we absolutely, indubitably do. The remnants of a historically male-centric society are still very much present in this world, and I would struggle to date anyone who refuses to acknowledge that. It’s less about gendering dependence, and more about having the humility — and the guts — to recognize social imbalance. Feminism is the simple acknowledgement of that imbalance, and a subsequent willingness to offer the same opportunities and privileges to both genders.
To this day, I have not encountered a valid criticism of feminism, especially in relation to dating. Every single anti-feminist I’ve ever come across has beliefs that are rooted in a fundamental misunderstanding of what feminism is and what it seeks to do. You can be a feminist stay-at-home mom. You can be a feminist woman who loves taking care of her partner. Feminists do not have to be alone, though some choose to be. You can be a feminist and love men, women, or whoever you want to love: feminism and misandry are not the same thing. So it doesn’t make sense to me that feminists are still seen as cliquey, as undateable, as too angry. As James Baldwin observed about the civil rights movement in the U.S: “To be black and conscious in America is to be in a constant state of rage”. To an extent, to be female and conscious in this world is to be in a constant state of rage too. Many structural violences are indisputably skewed towards women; sexual, domestic, physical, even financial. Females are persecuted and harassed in a way that most men will never have to understand, and worse, will never have to urgently, or immediately, or personally care about.
And males? Male feminists should at least be willing to talk. To acknowledge that there are some terrors that they will never feel, simply by virtue of their genitals. To be ready to get angry: if not in the same way I or another woman would, at least on our behalf and with some understanding of where our anger comes from and why it’s productive and not just ‘emotional’. I don’t expect my partner to be able to see things from a female point of view — a position which is unattainable and therefore disingenuous — but I do expect them to understand that women are screwed, and to do their part in making things a little better. I expect them not to see me as automatically being inferior or less capable. I expect them to respect me both as a woman and as a human. I don’t think that’s a lot to ask.
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