On Feminine Solidarity
or: Das Schwert in der Scheide (The Sword in the Sheath/Vagina)
A different view on emancipation: surprisingly it is often
women who make other women's lives miserable.
"After a while I didn't think it was a
terrible life, no, not really. After a while, I hurt so much
I didn't feel any difference. What was happier than seeing
everybody gobble down the shiny mushrooms and bamboo shoots
I had helped to prepare that day? What was more satisfying
than having Huang Taitai nod and pat my head when I had finished
combing her hair one hundred strokes? How much happier could
I be after seeing Tyan-Yu eat a whole bowl of noodles without
once complaining about its taste or my looks..."
(From: "The Joy Luck Club" by
Amy Tan, P. 51)
Who is the enemy in the above text? Is it the "bad husband",
or that "bad mother-in-law" that just happened to raise
her son that way?
It's a teaching from the Martial Arts that "the enemy is
within" - perhaps an interesting starting point for any
analyses regarding the situation of women today.
Many are complaining nowadays over the slow progress of all
attempts to achieve equality between men and women. The masters
of the orient tell us, first to localize the enemy in its actual
position, and then to expect a successful war. As long as we
can only assume its position, any expedition will be a potential
fiasco.
All over the world the belief is that "men" are the
enemies of feminine emancipation, and this is repeated over and
over again. It is repeated, because it seems so obvious. But "obvious" doesn't
necessarily mean "correct". Actually, regarding men
as our "enemies" is nothing but a theory, an attempt
to explain our current situation.
Admittedly, there are arguments that for a man an emancipated
woman is quite inconvenient, for he wants to maintain a comfortable
life. Nevertheless I never met a man in my life ever, who really
would have requested me to cook his supper, or iron his shirts.
The only one that ever prophesied me such a man was my grandmother
who herself raised her son and grandson as men quite incapable
regarding household chores.
Not long ago I travelled to India, the "country of the
abused women". This country is full of goddesses, and awards
its living women highest honours if they commit Sati (i.e. if
they follow their deceased husband onto the pyre), a country
where in some regions on 100 little boys there are only 70 little
girls, since some were aborted, and others murdered while still
babies... etc., etc. Which is more horrifying for the newlywed
Indian girl - her unknown husband or the hell of a life her new
mother-in-law is going to give her?
The insanity of all this is, that this mother-in-law has just
been in the very same situation when she had gotten married,
some 30 years ago. She as well had had to suffer a lot - but
why didn't she learn to treat her daughter-in-law in nicer ways
now?
Too often it's us, women, that make life impossible for other
women. This starts with our crediting any male physician with
more professional competence than a female one. We prefer male
dentists, gynecologists, lawyers, politicians... and should not
be surprised at all when we see the econimic consequences of
our choices. Women will never step up the ladder if we, their
co-women, throw a club between the legs whenever possible.
Perhaps we simply should stop lamenting, and look deep inside
ourselves, and forgive women. The ones that did harm to us, (mothers,
stepmothers, bad female teachers). And ourselves.
And then go out, and support other women. For a world with more
justice. For a world with more chances for every one of us!
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