flyingskull (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
flyingskull) wrote2007-07-09 05:07 am
flyingskull) wrote2007-07-09 05:07 am
Sorry, everyone, I was abducted...
... by well-meaning family and forced to go to nan's (Jamaica) to recuperate from what they called: "Your cretinous propention for overwork."
I'm all rested now and very sun-kissed and things and here I am.
So dear![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
baeraad asked me what a strong feminine woman would be like and I got to thinking about that. Fact is I don't know. I think there are two kind of differences in general between males and females of the species Homo Sapiens. One is physiological (different build of body, different hormonal fluxes and so on) and the other is social and cultural, the behavioural brainwashing we all get since birth.
The physiological differences are not immense or many, that's obvious, but they do colour our thoughts and emotions in part and, IMO, can't be dismissed as non-existent, BUT what really complicates things are the learnesd social responses so that it's now quite hard to understand when one's own attitudes and choices are truly one's own and when they are a reaction one way or another (embracing or rejecting) to social gender archetypes and stereotypes.
One woman may be strong because she embraces the cultural gender mores and lives a happy and fulfilled life; another may be strong because she rejects the cultural gender mores and attempts to re-create herself according to her views, thus living a happy and fulfilled life. I could go on for hours. Maybe being 'weak' for a woman could mean wanting to be a man - though, of course, not in the transgender sense - and have the virtues our culture attributes to males... but this sounds awfully like one of the worst clichés in history, after all.
So, yes, there's a bit of me who wants to say a 'strong' woman is one who accepts her physiology and lives as she thinks best, ignoring what other people tell her she should be, but the biggest part of me knows this is as fallacious as they come. Hell, I don't even know if I'm 'strong' or 'weak'. The only thing I can tentatively say is that probably I'm stronger now, after being physically weak and incapacitated for a long time, than I was before. Maybe all I am now is a little more aware of who I am. Maybe that's all the strength that's needed, what say?
Oh,ingriam, I haven't forgotten you and your interesting fics. Not at all. And, as you write Alkanphel TEH PRETTY!!ELEVENTYONE!!!11, look at my pretty in icon. :-D
I'm all rested now and very sun-kissed and things and here I am.
So dear
baeraad asked me what a strong feminine woman would be like and I got to thinking about that. Fact is I don't know. I think there are two kind of differences in general between males and females of the species Homo Sapiens. One is physiological (different build of body, different hormonal fluxes and so on) and the other is social and cultural, the behavioural brainwashing we all get since birth.The physiological differences are not immense or many, that's obvious, but they do colour our thoughts and emotions in part and, IMO, can't be dismissed as non-existent, BUT what really complicates things are the learnesd social responses so that it's now quite hard to understand when one's own attitudes and choices are truly one's own and when they are a reaction one way or another (embracing or rejecting) to social gender archetypes and stereotypes.
One woman may be strong because she embraces the cultural gender mores and lives a happy and fulfilled life; another may be strong because she rejects the cultural gender mores and attempts to re-create herself according to her views, thus living a happy and fulfilled life. I could go on for hours. Maybe being 'weak' for a woman could mean wanting to be a man - though, of course, not in the transgender sense - and have the virtues our culture attributes to males... but this sounds awfully like one of the worst clichés in history, after all.
So, yes, there's a bit of me who wants to say a 'strong' woman is one who accepts her physiology and lives as she thinks best, ignoring what other people tell her she should be, but the biggest part of me knows this is as fallacious as they come. Hell, I don't even know if I'm 'strong' or 'weak'. The only thing I can tentatively say is that probably I'm stronger now, after being physically weak and incapacitated for a long time, than I was before. Maybe all I am now is a little more aware of who I am. Maybe that's all the strength that's needed, what say?
Oh,
ingriam, I haven't forgotten you and your interesting fics. Not at all. And, as you write Alkanphel TEH PRETTY!!ELEVENTYONE!!!11, look at my pretty in icon. :-D
no subject
Again, I'm not talking about Martin here.
Hmmm... okay. I think I must have misunderstood something you said in another post.
What's with you and being so defensive of authors you worship, luv?
I don't know. I really don't. ^_^;;;
I just prefer Pterry, so sue me. :P
So do I, actually. You should see how defensive I get about him. ;)
I think we're really Apes Who Tell Stories and that we can't help telling stories about everything and being triggered to tell stories by everything.
True, but stories, like everything else, get increasingly refined over time. One person tells a story, another person hears it and likes it but thinks it could do with being a bit more elaborate, so when he tells it to a third person he adds his own little twists to it. The third person likes the story too, but thinks that some of the themes should be emphasised a little more... and so on. Completely original stories, I think, are very dull stories indeed that are mostly about eating and mating. Interesting thoughts need time to build.
(okay. Sometimes stories get less interesting over time instead, as cowards remove the parts that disturb them and replace them with something safe and bland. But that is as may be)
Archetypes are old, strong stories, shaped by a lot of different people. People don't need archetypes, as such, but without them, it's back to the eating and the mating again. The civilised person is an archetype too, after all, and one that took a lot of time and a lot of effort - by great thinkers and common people alike - to build.
We make our own legends and create our own personal myths all the time.
Do we? Or do we just discover them? ;)
Then again, maybe it's just me who's a deeply unoriginal person. =]
Open Arms
Believe me I have NOT ranted against Martin - except for puking at prologue which I SITLL do - not even once in all the bitchfest and things. You're just a lovely person with a somewhat unhealthy need to defend authors you like. :P :P
We make our own legends and create our own personal myths all the time.
Do we? Or do we just discover them? ;)
Possibly both, now I think on it. Prolly we start by discovering stereotypes and then we make our own, some of us, obviously, not all. I mean, if one is satisfied with the stereotype why move on? But if one is not then creating one's own myth seems unavoidable.
AND I've avoided putting gender tags on the above so bow to my sudden and unexpected attack of moderation. :-D
Re: Open Arms
Thank you. Glad to be back. :)
I love travelling, I just tolerate places.
One might hope so, since you've made a career out of it. On the other hand, you may notice that I (should the author thing fall through) plan on making a career out of the Internet, which exists mostly to make sure people don't have to move around. =]
Believe me I have NOT ranted against Martin - except for puking at prologue which I SITLL do - not even once in all the bitchfest and things.
Duly noted. I'm very sorry for jumping to conclusions - I guess you mentioned Martin close to the other thing, and I assumed a connection that wasn't there.
And you don't have to like the prologue. Few people do, really. =]
Prolly we start by discovering stereotypes and then we make our own, some of us, obviously, not all.
Aha! ;) But that was exactly what I said - that the archetype is a starting point that one can go to. It's like saying, "okay, I'm sort of like this" before you go on saying "and here are the ways in which I'm not like this."
Admittedly, not everyone does that - I know at least one person who really does seem like she's built her identity from the ground up without applying any labels to herself. But I know that I, personally, make a lot of use of archetypes - if only by breaking them apart for scraps. My current self-image... well, there's a lot of opinionated intellectual, some black-clad, pony-tailed emo poser, mysterious stranger, armchair philosopher, cultured Epicurean... I don't think I contain any original parts at all, but I like to think that the end result is unique. =]