Woman in the era of post-patriarchy. Sex, gender, society Part 5: The archetype of femininity The archetype of femininity is our universal idea of ​​what a “real” woman should be. A few words need to be said about what an “archetype” is. According to Jung, an archetype is the name of the basic element that makes up the so-called. "collective unconscious". I do not undertake to judge the “collective unconscious”, since I am not sure of its existence, and therefore I consider the archetype only as a complex of very deeply established stereotypes, which, at the same time, is characteristic of many cultures. The archetype of femininity, with minor variations, will be presented in any patriarchal culture, and since almost all current cultures are fundamentally patriarchal, it is not surprising that the archetype of femininity will be universal, almost universal in nature. It is possible that the presence of such common archetypes as the archetype of femininity and the naturally complementary archetype of masculinity prompted Gustav Jung to think about the “collective unconscious,” but that’s another conversation. The archetype of femininity was formed over thousands of years of classical patriarchy and in those days its requirements were adequate to the prevailing conditions - in fact, this archetype was generated by them. Now, in the era of post-patriarchy, this archetype and its obligations are rather destructive, since they give rise to neurosis - just like the obligations of a “real man”, which were discussed in the previous part. What kind of obligations are these? A "real woman" should be beautiful. She should be a wife and mother. And she is a male object. Let's look at each of these postulates in more detail. Being beautiful is not just a postulate - it is the meaning of life, it is the cornerstone of a woman's existence, it is the foundation on which the alpha and omega of her existence stand. Beauty is strength, it is a cult, it is the power that all “real women” serve and worship. However, the cult of female beauty is supported not only by women, but also by men, of course. At the end of the first part, I mentioned that there are indirect arguments in favor of human polygamy and therefore, if you wish, you can find the biological prerequisites for this cult - the attractiveness of a female can serve as the main trump card for attracting an alpha male. At the same time, if you look at different cultures, the importance of female beauty will be assessed differently, and female beauty itself had very different standards - from the forced fattening of girls in preparation for a wedding in some African countries to the ugly curved, rickety frames of medieval maidens in countries of northern Europe. I’m not saying anything about the fact that there were cults of not female, but male beauty! Such diversity no longer speaks of biological, but of social determination of the perception of beauty. We live in an era of post-patriarchy, we live in an era of change, but with the legacy of classical patriarchy we bear the stamp of the undying cult of female beauty - in fairy tales, the lion's share of romance novels, classic stories about a woman, the beauty of the heroine appears as her main weapon, dignity, indicator her values. “Who in the world is the sweetest, the most ruddy and the whitest?” - asks the evil queen at the magic mirror. Cinderella's stepsisters hated her because she was more beautiful than them, but the prince fell in love with her again for her beauty. And Nastenka in the fairy tale “Morozko” is pretty, unlike her evil sister, she was also kind and hardworking, but Ivan the widow’s son falls in love with her primarily for her beauty. Why bother listing fairy tales - almost ALL fairy tales are about beauties! Beauty and the Beast, Sleeping Beauty, the Swan Princess, the Frog Princess and a legion of other fairy tales where beauties take part, even if they do not appear in the titles. I would say that it is harder to find a fairy tale WITHOUT a beauty than with a beauty - unless it is a fairy tale about animals, of course. The greatest exception to the list of women's stories is Charlotte's classic novelBronte "Jane Eyre" - it deliberately places emphasis on the ugliness of the main character and emphasizes that she was loved DESPITE her ugliness. Charlotte Bronte, a wonderful English writer. It’s unlikely that she considered beauty to be her strong point. The importance of beauty has become so familiar to us that it doesn’t even particularly strike us - it seems so ordinary and ordinary to us that it is extremely important for a woman to be beautiful. What girl? And most likely the first thing that comes to mind as an evaluation criterion is “beautiful” or “ugly”... “Why do you love your women?” - journalists asked the peasants not expecting a trick on the streets of cities on the “women's holiday” - and everyone answered as one about beauty. That’s how it’s supposed to be. I would like to emphasize that beauty is the most important attribute not only in the eyes of men, but also in the eyes of women themselves, because women go to such lengths and suffering in the name of beauty! The cult of beauty also has its victims - I mean teenage girls who died from exhaustion in the pursuit of beauty. Perhaps the main servants of this cult are women, i.e. often beauty is much more important for women themselves than for men, which is somewhat paradoxical, because what is female beauty for, if not for male attention? But no, beauty is much more than that! To thoroughly explore the topic of beauty, a very complex and multifaceted topic, you will need to write a separate article or even a book, so I will limit myself to only the briefest theses about the super-importance of beauty. Beauty is power. A true queen must be beautiful. In fairy tales, queens are always beautiful - no matter whether the queen is evil or good. The Snow Queen was dazzlingly beautiful. Beauty is not only external beauty, but also internal beauty. The heroines of fairy tales are not only beautiful, but also kind, and the heroine’s virtues seem to grow from her beauty, like from a seed. Although it can be understood the other way around - the beauty of the heroine is the fruit of her virtues, like an apple on an apple tree, as a REWARD for her spiritual labors. Further, beauty is luck and success. Yes, Barbra Streisand said that, they say, don’t be born beautiful and you will achieve success, but we understand that she blurted it out in the heat of the moment, out of resentment. Because Streisand gnawed her success with her teeth, but for beauties success falls at their feet. We are convinced of this by the entire world around us, advertising, Hollywood, modern books, old fairy tales and ancient myths. Beauty is a blessing, a gift from the gods, a seal of luck, a sign of fate. Beauty is the happiness of love. To be loved, you have to be beautiful. If you are ugly, no one will love you and no one will need you - except perhaps a loser who will take you only because true beauties do not shine for him. By the way, there is some truth in this postulate about the connection between beauty and love... Only the causes and effects have partly changed places. In reality, love endows the loved one with beauty in our eyes, i.e. a person becomes more beautiful to us the more we love him. Although, of course, external attractiveness also plays a role, especially in the first stages of communication... Speaking about love and beauty, we need to say a few words about sex. Leo Tolstoy spoke about this well, thoroughly and ponderously: “Women, especially those who have gone through a men’s school, know very well that talking about lofty subjects is just talk, and that a man needs a body and everything that puts him in the most deceptive but attractive light ; and this is exactly what is being done." Yes, it is believed that they want more beautiful people, i.e. They tie together not only beauty and love, but also beauty and sex. This connection can lead to the false belief that beauty provides special, the most complete sexual pleasure. In fact, the ability to receive sexual pleasure is hardly connected with the prevailing ideals of beauty in society. Moreover, too perfect conformity to the ideal can even be repulsive from the point of view of sexual attractiveness, and therefore one should not confuse sexuality andbeauty. Then, beauty is an Ideal to which we must strive. There is no such thing as too much beauty, you can always be more beautiful than you are now. Marilyn Monroe did not go out without makeup - but what about ordinary girls? There is no limit to perfection, the battle for beauty will go on forever. Sleeping Beauty. Good because it simply exists. No comments... A smart girl diligently practices the cult of beauty in its current understanding. And, finally, the main thing: beauty is a justification for existence. Beauty is an existential value, and therefore the existence of a beauty is justified and meaningful simply because she is a beauty. Beauty is an intrinsic value; it does not need to be justified or explained. A self-valued person is always beautiful, not even - he is always beautiful and he himself should know about it, that he is beautiful. He deserves admiration, respect, attention, love, because he is beautiful... Here we entered the philosophy of extreme individualism, a liberal ideology that has been so popular in the last few decades, but with regard to women this has been known since ancient times. Let's remember the fairy tales on which we were all brought up. The prince, even if he is handsome, needs to perform feats and crush evil, he needs to awaken the sleeping beauty, dispel the evil spell, but the beauty does not need to prove anything - her existence is completely justified and valuable in itself only because she beautiful. It’s a little more complicated with Cinderella, but she wasn’t a true beauty before she received the blessing of higher magical powers (remember that beauty is a blessing, a gift from the gods!), but then everything fell into place and justice triumphed. It’s unfair when a beautiful woman works, it’s fair when she lives in a palace and is loved by the whole world... I was reminded of a famous advertisement with a chic phrase: “You are a woman, not a dishwasher.” Wait, where is the beauty here? And it is that we are talking not just about a person, but about a WOMAN. A woman must be beautiful. All women are beauties! Or, to put it another way, you can see a beauty in every woman! No, the world MUST see beauty in every woman! That’s why men say on March 8th that they love their women for their beauty - because they MUST see them beautiful! And an ugly woman has no right to exist just like that... Therefore, the wonderful scientist, psychologist Karen Horney said: if I’m not pretty, then at least I’ll be smart. At least smart! Do you hear what sounds like an excuse? She needed to develop her mind and promote science in order to justify her existence!.. I would not be surprised if it turns out that all the women who left a mark on science and culture considered themselves HELPFULLY ugly and therefore had to justify their existence. Closing this bottomless topic of beauty (before it completely sucks in), I want to say that beauty in the conditions of its cult can also become a curse - if there is more of it than necessary... Don’t be born beautiful! To be too beautiful is to confuse and scare away men, to cause the envy and hatred of women. No one will see the personality, everyone will see only beauty and will be blinded by it. A person who is unlucky enough to be born too beautiful by the standards of his time becomes a kind of outcast, as he is perceived as biased, perceived as a celestial being, endowed with non-existent qualities, and inadequately assessed. Only representatives of two extremes will not look at the dazzling beauty: the sages and the scoundrels. The sage sympathizes, the scoundrel uses. So don't be too beautiful. Perhaps outright ugliness is preferable to dazzling beauty - at least scoundrels will not seek to use... Let us now move on to the second postulate - To be a wife and mother Yes, in our time this rule is no longer as dominant as in the times of classical patriarchy, but still it is still quite strong even in the most liberal communities. Under post-patriarchy, the obligation to “be a wife”and “being a mother” have separated and do not represent one whole, as it was before, and therefore “being a wife” I would classify as the third point, but “being a mother”... I draw your attention to this wonderful picture... The mother looks at we feel calm and satisfied—one might even say, complacent. And she has a reason for these feelings: her child looks at her as if she were a deity, and so that we have no doubts, folds his hands in prayer. There is adoration in the girl's eyes. Everyone is happy. Here is an even more idealistic picture. Here the center is no longer the mother and not the child’s loving prayer, the center here is the baby (it seems to me that he is a boy), to whom the attention of the mother and sister is directed. A kiss, a look, a nursing breast converge on it. Dad is at work, the Holy Family present in the picture is illuminated by the sun's rays... What seems most surprising to me in this picture is the attitude towards the child on the part of the girl - older brothers/sisters often cannot stand babies. A child for a woman is not at all what he is for men. For the vast majority of men, I think, a child is an eternal source of anxiety and problems. Sincere attention usually begins to appear only when the grown-up child begins to show interest in what is of interest to the man himself. E. Fromm called exaggerated paternal love “conditional” - i.e. love is not for nothing, not for the child’s self-worth, but for the child’s compliance with the father’s expectations. Fromm contrasts the conditional love of a father with the unconditional love of a mother, which differs fundamentally from a father’s: it is not earned, it is received as a gift, just like that. Of course, in a real parent it is unlikely that only one type of love is found; in fact, one can see a mixture of both types of love, but the general tendency is indeed this. One should not consider maternal unconditional love as a clearly better option in comparison with conditional paternal love - conditional love gives a person more freedom, gives the opportunity to influence the parent and stimulates development, while unconditional love is completely independent of the child himself and cannot be manipulated in any way. its sides - it either exists or it doesn’t, it’s either a blessing or a curse. The unconditionality of maternal love can perhaps be explained by the fact that a woman who gives birth to a child experiences something that no man can experience - true unity with another living being, unity on the physical level. Having experienced this kind of unity, having felt the complete dependence of the nascent body on the mother - first during pregnancy, and then during feeding. It is possible that this somewhat explains the fact that many women feel their child as a kind of extension of themselves. Can we say that we love unconditionally and therefore automatically, purely reflexively, protect parts of our own body, our arms and legs? Of course, merging with a child at this level is not familiar to all women. There are many women who do not experience unity with their child at all; there are also cases when a woman hates her child already at the stage of pregnancy - this could be, for example, in the case of an accidental, unwanted or even forced pregnancy, when the woman was raped, and the laws countries ban abortion. A woman can feel the fetus inside herself as a foreign, alien body, which, like a parasite, sucks vital juices, poisons life and which must be gotten rid of as soon as possible... They say that there is a maternal instinct. In the case of man, this can only be partially true, since man does not have instincts in the true sense of the word, although there are impulses that can be expressed in different forms and very individually. And therefore there are not so few women about whom they say (or they themselves say about themselves) that they do not have a maternal instinct. So it is not at all necessary that a mother will unconditionally love her child, although a number of popular statements, beliefs and ideologies say the opposite. In society there are quite clearrules about what a mother should be and therefore every woman, becoming a mother, is obliged to comply with them. Above I wrote about the cult of beauty. There is also a cult of motherhood and it is more pronounced than the previous one. This is easily explained by the fact that motherhood, unlike beauty, is a much more concrete, significant and extremely important thing for society. Therefore, the cult of the mother (the roots of which can be traced back to prehistoric times, during the times of matriarchy) could not but arise and not reach the present day. According to this cult (in its modern form, of course), a woman inevitably loves her child and lives the life of her child. In different societies and at different times, ideas about the form and how long a mother should be attached to her child have changed, but now I see trends towards the fact that a woman can remain in the phase of “active” motherhood for life. By “active motherhood” I mean a situation where the mother takes a very direct part in the life of the child and is the leading agent of socialization, i.e. She is the main person in the child's life. And this period cannot last less than two or three years for biological reasons: according to some data, the development of a child of primary preschool age cannot proceed normally if he does not have one, permanent person who takes care of him. The mother's continued participation in the child's life remains very important, although its importance may decrease somewhat due to the appearance of other significant persons. Different cultures give different instructions about the duration of the period of “active motherhood.” Sometimes this issue is left to the discretion of the family, sometimes it is strictly limited - first of all, this applied to boys, and in Sparta this applied to all children in general. I remember a heartbreaking episode from Taras Bulba, where at the very beginning of the story there was a scene of a mother saying goodbye to her sons. The traditions and cultural characteristics of the described society of the Zaporozhye Sich dictated such rules of education and socialization in which the importance of the mother for grown-up boys was relatively insignificant in comparison with the influence of the father and the male community, which was inevitable, given the conditions of the almost continuous war. However, classical patriarchy not only limited the influence of the mother on children - it also instilled in women the cult of motherhood. The slogan of the classic, exaggerated patriarchy can be derived from the words already cited above: “Every man is a soldier, every woman is the mother of a soldier!” This slogan dictates gender roles, spells out meanings for each gender, which were the inevitable destiny of every member of society to follow. The cult of motherhood was implanted and at the same time limited by the power of men, whose supremacy was obvious and all-sufficient, since the cult of war and strength was the dominant ideologeme of patriarchal society. Since motherhood is the main function of a woman, a child is an absolute, unconditional value for a woman. In the modern version of the cult of motherhood, this postulate about the absolute value of a child has expanded: now this is true not only for women, but also for men... It is important to emphasize that we are talking only about YOUR child. Taras Bulba with his famous “I gave birth to you, I will kill you” will not be understood now. The modern version of the cult of motherhood does not imply (or rather, does not prescribe as obligatory) love for children in general - only for one’s own. More precisely, her own, because it is believed that a mother loves all her children equally. There is also an implicit, but still firmly rooted in culture, postulate that the mother knows best what the child needs, how to raise him and what to do with him, since “there is a special connection between mother and child.” Of course, this does not mean that this is a connection between mother and child of only preschool age, no - the lifelong and inextricable nature of this connection is implied... With the end of classical patriarchy, the power of motherhood over a woman has increased many times over, since neither the power of traditions nor social obligations they can't anymorenothing to oppose the power of the mother cult. The holiness of the Fatherland and military duty are a thing of the past, relationships with public opinion and public institutions have been reconsidered, the family has been surrounded by a palisade of privacy, everything has become unimportant except for personal good and the good of your family - not even your family, but your child! But in parallel with this, the rights of the child grew, the cult of childhood grew, respect for the personality of the child was cultivated - we can recall, for example, the Convention on the Rights of the Child in New York on November 20, 1989, where several clauses were added to the declaration of the rights of the child stating that a child has the right to his opinion, the right to receive information and the right to freely express his thoughts. It would be worth talking about the disproportion between the privileges of children and the responsibility of parents separately, but not within the framework of this article; now I will limit myself to only theses. They are as follows: firstly, the cult of motherhood that we inherited from classical patriarchy remains, while the algorithms for limiting it are a thing of the past; secondly, children's rights and juvenile justice have created a situation where children have become the most privileged members of society. For a woman, a child has become both a cause of neuroticism due to the over-responsibility that society has placed on her, and at the same time a kind of document confirming her own worth and her own rights. The modern phenomenon, which has received the offensive nickname “yazhmat” among the people, well illustrates my statement. I think it’s worth giving a clear definition of “yazhmother” - this is, in fact, the personification of the postulate about the privilege and super-value of a child, who at the same time can behave completely ugly and interfere with others. But if anyone around him dares to make a remark to the child or his mother, then the mother reacts to this extremely aggressively. The attitudes of such a woman are simple: firstly, her child is extremely valuable, it is a confirmation of her own value, and secondly, she has the right to make claims to the world around her on the grounds that she has a child, and thirdly, “my mother “I don’t care at all about those around me, including the children around me. “You understand, if MY CHILD wants this toy, then I will steal, kill, go to the panel, but get it for him!” This position can sometimes be perceived as heroic, although in essence it is criminal. Any robber who goes out onto the highway in search of victims can hide behind the thesis that, they say, he will not allow HIS CHILD to live in poverty - but as for the people being robbed (who may also have children), I don’t care - don’t give a damn when it comes to YOUR CHILD. The world is not worth a child's tear if it is YOUR child. Live for the sake of YOUR CHILD, and any rudeness, any baseness and any crime is automatically justified if the reason for it was to protect the well-being of YOUR CHILD. And it is worth recognizing that post-patriarchy has created such conditions when, indeed, the position of the “yazhmother” becomes quite logical and consistent. In the post-patriarchal world, most of the previous values ​​really collapsed, society became atomized, the ideology of consumption and aggressive individualism (I wrote about this in more detail in the article “philosophy of betrayal”) became dominant, and therefore a person who, without any criticism, adopted these values ​​of modernity, but at the same time has become fully successful and will easily come to the attitudes of a “mother.” His child will be his last trump card, the last argument for a world in which he did not become successful, did not become a winner, but ended up in a septic tank for losers. Yes, one can also note this touch of “yazhmothers” - these are, as a rule, social losers. And usually they don’t really love or value their child, they only need him as a certificate of their own importance... However, this may not be the only thing. In modern conditions, a child can become for a woman, among other things, a way of economic well-being, a way to claim a percentage of the biological incomefather, and therefore there is an unspoken “profession” of hunters of wealthy men. Of course, the child himself is exclusively a means and not an end. In parallel with this, there is a second modern phenomenon, diametrically opposed to the phenomenon of the “yazhmother”, but equally post-patriarchal - this is “childfree”. This is not just childlessness, it is an active position, often accompanied by quite persistent propaganda of one’s views. Like the phenomenon of “yazhmat”, childfree bears the stamp of aggressive individualism, i.e. both of these phenomena grow from the same root, both of these phenomena are equally generated by post-patriarchy... Supporters of "childfree" can often be socially successful, educated people who in personal communication are much nicer than "mothers", but on the scale of society this phenomenon, of course, even more destructive, since it threatens the very existence of society. Now a few words about maternal love itself... I categorically do not like this phrase itself for the emotional load that is inherent in this concept. Here is a poem that probably reflects a typical attitude to the concept of maternal love: Life on Earth gave, So that I could see the sunset and dawn. She surrounded you with such care, which doesn’t even have a price. For you, in response to God, she will whisper her prayers. There is nothing in the world that is brighter than a mother’s love! She can listen and console, After all, for her forever, you remain a child, Even though the years have flown by. She will respond immediately, Even if you call her beyond the line. There is nothing in the world Stronger than mother's love! She will accept you anyone, Even though your heart and soul hurt. It hurts her when you are offended and life has passed with the wrong ones. When even everyone turns away, she opens her arms. There is nothing more precious than Earthly maternal love! Author: Ilchenko Polina This poem displays a number of properties of a conditional mother: her lifelong responsibility for the child, the absoluteness of unconditional love for the child (and, accordingly, the complete absence of conditional love), the invariability of her attitude towards the child (even though the child himself will inevitably change as you grow up), as well as the absolutization of the value of maternal love and, as a consequence, the mother herself... How many times have you heard the phrase that “a mother is sacred”, that “no one can replace a mother” and others such truisms? Are truisms really a priori true, like axioms in mathematics? I am a practicing psychologist and over the years of practice I have been convinced many times that women, oddly enough, are different, and all mothers are always women. And imagine - a woman will not necessarily love her child! What is love? A higher power, a faceless element, the whims of a little cupid with a bow and arrow? Or is it a derivative of man and will therefore bear the stamp of the human individuality of the one who loves? Is it possible to separate love from the lover? It is possible, of course, but only as an exercise in abstract thinking; in practice it is impossible - however, this can be said about any abstraction in general. There is no love in general - there is the love of a specific person, and therefore it can differ radically from the love of another person to exactly the same extent as one person differs from another. It is clear that with maternal love things are exactly the same as with love in general. Love is always individual, and therefore it must be treated individually, and the postulate about the absoluteness and holiness of maternal love is a complete generalization, unacceptable not only in psychology, but in general in modern life... There is no maternal love, there is the love of a specific woman to her specific child! She will be individual, and therefore a woman will inevitably love her other child DIFFERENTLY - contrary to the assertion that a mother loves all her children equally. It often happens that women choose their favorite - the child who best suits her aspirations, and may have a cool or even hostile attitude towards another child. What, you don't agree that a mother might be hostile toyour own child? I assure you - this is possible and, I think, every reader will be able, mentally going through familiar families and discarding stereotypes, to come to this conclusion: yes, a mother may not love her child! More than once I came across a situation where a mother felt hatred for her child - which, of course, she might not even admit to herself, but her actions and emotional reactions spoke for themselves. Of course, these are not the most typical, quite rare, but by no means unique cases. Since a number of supernatural, divine properties are attributed to mother and maternal love, it is not surprising that already in the second picture the child has his hands folded in prayer. Let us remember Fromm, who said that unconditional Mother's love is a blessing (if there is one) or a curse. Here is a parable that confirms this archetype. The man did absolutely nothing, but mother’s love was enough to make an angel out of mediocrity. Look, this non-human will grow wings thanks to his mother’s blessing! Saying that a woman does not always admit not only to others, but also to herself in her true feelings for the child, I mean that the main victims of stereotypes about what a mother should be are women themselves. If a woman does not experience absolute unconditional love for her child, if she does not want to devote all her time to children, if she has interests unrelated to motherhood, if the child annoys her or is uninteresting to her, then she will feel like a BAD MOTHER, which happens incompatible with good self-esteem and self-respect. Due to the fact that at present, parents are blamed exclusively for all troubles, failures and problems of a child (upbringing has become an almost exclusively family matter), ONLY parents bear full responsibility for the child. I write “parents,” but I mean mothers, since on the one hand there are a lot of single mothers, and on the other hand there are even more complete families in which the man is voluntarily or forcibly removed from upbringing. In such conditions, mothers inevitably become neurotic under the yoke of absolute responsibility for the child, for his success and competitiveness... Thus, the atomization of society has fully affected the approach to raising children - now it has almost completely ceased to be a public matter and is private character. This can be identified as one of the characteristic features of post-patriarchy - the private nature of upbringing, when ONLY the parent can make a remark to the child and only in a respectful, correct tone! This is not observed in countries with persistent patriarchal relations, in which any adult has the right to reprimand a child - there is a considerable amount of local cultural specificity, but still, in general, there is such a tendency. In such societies, as a rule, the authority of public opinion and established traditions is high, which has its effect in raising children - it becomes more social. To illustrate this point, I recommend watching, for example, the Iranian film “Children of Heaven,” in which any street vendor could sternly shake his finger at a noisy child, and he would treat a stranger with all reverence... The situation is completely different in the most developed and therefore most post-patriarchal countries like Finland or Sweden, in which, at the legislative level, the child is protected from punishment in general and from punishment from his parents in particular. A child can run around the tables in a restaurant and no one has the right to reprimand him. However, the dialectical law of the similarity of opposites works here too: in Norway there is a law “on child protection” and a social service “barnevarn”, endowed with broad powers, which monitors the implementation of this law. As a result, the upbringing of children at the state level takes on a social character, as it were, but just that “as if”! This does not change the essence of post-patriarchy, on the contrary -manifests itself most clearly, since the responsibility of parents in such a society becomes even more dominant. Social intervention in upbringing occurs not with the goal of taking on part of the educational function and easing the situation of mothers and fathers, but with the goal of controlling parents, checking their compliance with a certain ideal... Any, even the most insignificant reason, such as a child’s bad mood, can be the reason for testing At school. It’s as if parents are taking an exam throughout their offspring’s entire childhood and, if they fail, they are deprived of parental rights and even the right to see the child - if that is the will of the examiner. In controversial issues, the child’s opinion is significant, but an adult (parent, teacher, educator) has no respect. We can say that in relation to adults there is a presumption of guilt, which can be regarded as reverse discrimination. This is well shown in the Danish film “The Hunt,” based on real events. The topic of motherhood is no less broad and global than the topic of beauty, and it can be developed for a very long time, but it’s still time to stop here so as not to lose the main idea.. Let me remind you that we are looking at feminine clichés, those musts that weigh on every woman who strives to be “real.” A “real woman” is to the same extent a patriarchal and archetypal phenomenon as a “real man” and exactly as difficult to achieve in practice. Why? Because the most important condition for being a “real woman” is having a “real man” nearby. This puts a woman in a position obviously dependent on a man. Here we come to the third obligation - To be a male object. This somewhat vague obligation is no less (if not more!) dominant over women than the previous two. This position is inextricably linked with the previous two, and therefore I think that only by overcoming this obligation can a woman gain freedom from the first two... What do I mean when I say that a woman is a male object? Only that for thousands of years of classical patriarchy, woman was secondary to man. Here I need to make a small digression and return again to the topic of patriarchy. During the time of classical patriarchy, people looked (and look, since classical patriarchy still exists in some places) at the world from the position of the cult of power. Strength was the goal, strength gave power, strength was the object of worship and service. There was one philosopher and poet who poetically and sublimely reflected the sentiments of exaggerated, hypertrophied patriarchy - I'm talking about Friedrich Nietzsche. He lived just at the dawn of the crisis, when classical patriarchy with its clear guidelines began to gradually transform into an inarticulate, vague post-patriarchy, when the old world order had already begun to crack and crumble. The crisis highlights the contradictions and the very essence of things, which certain particularly sensitive natures, people of art (and I would classify Nietzsche more as artists rather than scientists!) can convey in their creativity. Let me remind you that I understand the essence of patriarchy as the cult of power, and the leading position of men is only a consequence of this cult... Nietzsche can be called a sophisticated singer of the cult of power, and a number of his aphorisms ideally illustrate the female obligation that she is a male object." A man should be raised for war, and a woman for the recreation of a warrior; everything else is stupidity.” (Thus spoke Zarathustra) What can I say? Patriarchy is the cult of force, war and competition, and Nietzsche expressed this with maximum clarity. “A man’s happiness is called: I want. A woman’s happiness is called: he wants.” (Thus said Zarathustra) In other words, a man is for himself, and a woman is for a man . Man is the subject, and woman is the object. The following expression about the same thing: “Comparing a man and a woman in general, we can say the following: a woman would not be so brilliant in the art of dressing up if she did not instinctively feel that her lot was in second roles.” (So said Zarathustra)of women, in the depths of their personal vanity there always lies impersonal contempt - contempt “for a woman.” a certain abstract man. Only as a male object is a woman ready to accept herself, and only as a male object can she please herself. To be a male object is to look at yourself through male eyes, to see and value yourself only from a male point of view - or rather, not even from a male point of view! , but with a patriarchal one. However, a man can also look at himself as a male object, but this will manifest itself in a completely different way from how it manifests itself in women. Erich Fromm wrote a lot about the very common so-called authoritarian type of personality, which values ​​above all else. power and strength. This type of personality is well suited for war and militarization: in Germany, on the eve of the Nazis coming to power, the vast majority of the population had the traits of an authoritarian personality - however, this was not only characteristic of that time and place. A man in such a society is perceived as a bearer of strength and the best he can do is to merge his strength with the strength of other men, feel unity with his fellow tribesmen, and submit to the leader. Moreover, the man submits not so much to the leader personally, but to the force that the leader personifies - he is also its personified embodiment... The same embodiment of force were such symbolic, mystical concepts as the “German” spirit, the “Japanese spirit of Yamato”, etc. . Using the example of aggressive militarized societies of hypertrophied patriarchy, one can see how men, joining in parades, felt themselves to be carriers and at the same time servants of power. Fromm said that by serving force, a person receives protection from it and pays for it with his freedom (in fact, he first outlined this concept in a book with the telling title “escape from freedom”), just as a person who disappears into a crowd refuses his personality and therefore ceases to bear personal responsibility. Now I write “man”, but I mean first of all a man. I don’t remember any footage of the Nazi women’s parade - it’s possible that they did exist, but still the parade is a man’s affair. Every man is a soldier, and every woman is only the mother of a soldier. But I remember well the newsreels, which show how a crowd of women greeted the Fuhrer - with tears of delight, with eyes full of love. A man raising his hand in a Nazi salute welcomes strength and the victory associated with it (Sieg Heil - literally “glory to victory”), while women greeted not only and not so much force, but a man, a man endowed with absolute power and strength, i.e. absolute alpha. There is a reasonable opinion that the Nazis came to power thanks to women’s votes - they say that women voted for Hitler more willingly than men, and it seems that Hitler himself willingly adhered to this opinion and repeatedly compared the crowd listening to him to a woman. It was not for nothing that the cult of masculinity and traditional patriarchal values ​​reigned in the Third Reich - in fact, the formula about a male soldier has a clearly militaristic, totalitarian spirit. According to fascist propaganda, the value of a woman is determined primarily by her physical form (beauty and health) and her ability to bear children - in strict accordance with the expectations of what a “real woman” should be! In Nazi Germany we will not find propaganda for education for women, women’s participation in management, scientific activities and art - after all, this in no way fits with the traditional values ​​of a “real woman”, who is supposed to be, to paraphrase Vysotsky, “a blond bride as a reward for a veteran” in in strict accordance with Nietzsche's aphorism about a man as a warrior and a woman as a rest for a warrior. Here it is appropriate to quote from the speech of the Minister of Public Education and Propaganda Joseph Goebbels on the opening of the exhibition “Woman” in Berlin on March 19, 1933 - that is, at the very beginningthe Nazis' stay in power: "You know that the National Socialist movement, as the only party, excludes women from immediate everyday politics. It is therefore in many respects cruelly but unfairly attacked. We remove her from the parliamentary-democratic machinations that determined German politics 14 of the past years, not because we do not respect women, but because we respect them too much. Today in public life, woman has the same importance as before. No one who understands modernity can harbor the extravagant idea of ​​ousting women from public life. , from work, from professional life and earnings. But at the same time, one cannot help but say that things that are a man’s business should remain with the man, and this includes politics and the defense capability of the people. This is not a negative judgment about a woman, but only an indication. her abilities and tasks in areas that most correspond to her essence. I will speak clearly about the danger of being considered a reactionary: the first, best and most suitable place of a woman is in the family, and the most wonderful task that she can perform is the task of giving children to her country and people." . I highlighted the main thing in bold - women should only give birth and should not be involved in management. Hitler expressed similar thoughts: “If they say that a man’s world is the state, a man’s world is his struggle, his readiness to act for the sake of the community, then perhaps one could say that a woman’s world is a smaller world. After all, her world is - this is her husband, her family, her children and her home." (from Hitler’s speech to National Socialist women at the NSDAP congress in Nuremberg, September 8, 1934) Indeed, in the world of patriarchy, a woman’s world is a man (husband), for whom she is a reward, an inspiration, a keeper of the hearth, the mother of his children . Of course, it was not the Nazis who came up with this - this order existed many millennia before them, and enough has already been said about the reasons for the emergence of patriarchy. The main thing: a woman under patriarchy is not self-sufficient, she depends on a man, she is a male object. Not a single person is a thing in itself, is not completely self-sufficient and is a product of social relations - in the words of Goethe, is the son of his time and his people. But a man is primary, he can serve higher powers - victory, fortune, providence, science, art, the Fatherland, the sovereign, beauty, God, etc. A woman must serve her family, children and husband, who will already serve all of the above things. Only a man has such an exclusively human prerogative as the ability to choose. As the song says: “Everyone chooses for himself a woman, a religion, a path. Everyone chooses for himself to serve the devil or a prophet. Everyone chooses his own word for love and for prayer. Everyone chooses a sword for a duel, a sword for battle.” (Author: Yu. D. Levitansky) These lines are about a man - about a classic patriarchal man, about a “real man”, for whom a woman is the same object as religion or a road, i.e. one of the options to choose from. We are so accustomed to such a patriarchal picture of the world that it practically does not strike us. Classic patriarchy appears a little more noticeably in attitudes that come from those places on the globe in which post-patriarchy is not manifested, and classical patriarchal relations have been preserved to this day. For example: “A woman is a flower. And a man is a gardener. The gardener cares for and grows the flower. The flower, in turn, thanks him, giving him its tenderness and beauty. The most caring gardener has the most beautiful flower.” (Eastern wisdom) It’s absolutely straight here and it is unequivocally stated that only a man is a subject with free will and the ability to influence the course of things, while a woman is only an object of male influence and the properties of this object depend entirely on the subject, on his will and efforts... From this point of view, in classical literature we are given a good example of an ideal woman -This is Chekhov's darling. This character perfectly met all three parameters of a “real woman.” Firstly, she was very sweet and feminine - it was not for nothing that everyone wanted to call her impersonally “darling”. Secondly, she had an unusually manifested maternal nature. And thirdly, she had no content of her own; she completely and completely accepted the attitudes and values ​​of her man. Perhaps the only thing that came from Darling herself was love and acceptance, completely selfless and selfless... However, given that Darling did not have her own content, selflessness and dedication on her part were simple and natural, it simply could not be otherwise . This must be why Chekhov describes his character without any approval, much less admiration, but rather with his characteristic bitter and compassionate irony. The gardener is a man. And a flower is a plant. Chekhov's darling. Have you ever thought that women live in another world? I am now addressing men... Just think - you are walking down the street, and people of the opposite sex are shooting at you. They lick you with their eyes, they evaluate you, they want to get to know you, you hear vulgar jokes, you are like on stage, there is nowhere to hide from greedy eyes. No, this can be pleasant (often women themselves like to emphasize their charms), but let’s imagine that you don’t want to be the center of attention, but it is intrusively, aggressively shown to you, they evaluate you as an OBJECT... Imagine all this and you will feel good The meaning of this picture is clear. The fact that a woman is an object and a man is a subject can be indirectly confirmed by the fact that you can find many aphorisms about a woman, but there are practically none about a man - vanishingly few in comparison with the ocean of witticisms, observations, epigrams and wise conclusions about women . Google it and see for yourself! Why is that? Discrimination against men, men are said to be uninteresting? No - it’s just that everything that is said about a person in general is attributed to a man! Next I will give several aphorisms with my comments: “Two things should be beautiful in a girl - her eyes and her lips, because with her eyes she can make you fall in love, and with her lips she can prove that she loves.” (Marilyn Monroe)Have you noticed the authorship? A man’s love and love for a man are the alpha and omega of a woman who has fully and completely accepted the rules of the patriarchal world and therefore expressed this thought with all directness, without any condescending nobility and games of compliments, which are often visible in men’s aphorisms. Monroe is the author of several more aphorisms that are as direct and honest as the diary entries of a 15-year-old schoolgirl... For example: “I agree to live in a world ruled by men as long as I can be in this world woman." In other words, everything suits me. It must be that being an object is not so bad, especially if you are an object of the highest quality. “The true beauty of a woman is in the gentleness of her character, and the charm is in the brevity of her speech.” (Ahikar) That's right: the main virtue of a woman in the world of classical patriarchy is to be comfortable for a man who, as long as he is not distracted, will do something useful. “A woman is a human being who dresses, talks and undresses.” (Voltaire) Everything is the same. Voltaire in his aphorism differs from the legendary Assyrian sage Ahikar only in that the 18th century Frenchman flavored his thought with a fair amount of irony, hinting at the inability of women to do anything worthwhile except to be a man's amusement. The point, of course, is not that Voltaire had a worse opinion about women than Ahikar, but about the peculiarities of the high society of France and nothing more. “There are no smart women. It’s wonderful how stupid they are and what a horror they are.” (M. Zhvanetsky) But the irony of the late Soviet overflow. There was never classical patriarchy in the USSR, nor was there post-patriarchy in its modern form, but elements of patriarchy remained in culture, as they remain now. It must be that something that has been formed over millennia cannot disappear without a trace in one or two generations. “If I closedthe door of my heart, the one who really needs me will knock it down with his foot...” (Unknown author) This “chic” aphorism of an unknown author (more precisely, as is now fashionable in some circles, not the author, but the “author”) illustrates to us how a woman looks at herself as a male object, and therefore leaves the final choice to the man. Of course, not every woman will correspond to this, but this “author” is definitely one of them. Also, between the lines, I read about the longing for a strong (i.e., “real”) man, which in the era of post-patriarchy has somehow become lacking for everyone who wants to be a “real” woman. “We look at a learned woman as a precious sword: it is carefully finished, skillfully polished, and covered with fine engraving. This wall decoration is shown to connoisseurs, but they do not take it with them to war or hunting, because it is just as unsuitable for use as a show horse, even a well-trained one.” (Jean La Bruyère) A bitter aphorism... Of course, it is no longer so relevant now, since there are a lot of learned women in the post-patriarchy era, but still I would not say that it is completely outdated. Many women receive education not so much for implementation in a profession, but only as a kind of addition to a conditional dowry, as a way to establish the necessary connections and make acquaintances. Why would a beautiful and healthy (capable of childbearing) woman ruin herself at work if she has such competitive advantages in the bride market? Education is just another advantage over competitors in this market, a design for decoration. “Women, especially those who have gone through a men’s school, know very well that talking about lofty subjects is just talk, and what a man needs is his body and everything that makes him look good.” the most deceptive but attractive light; and this is exactly what is being done.” (Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy) This quote, already given once, perfectly complements and explains the previous aphorism and my commentary on it, namely, a woman is not only a male object, she is also a sexual object. These are interconnected and, perhaps, almost inseparable things. It is very difficult for a man not to look at a woman as an object of desire; it is no less difficult for a woman to stop evaluating herself as an object of male desire and not to manipulate a man, taking advantage of his weakness. “There is nothing more dangerous than connecting your fate with the fate of a woman for just that that she is beautiful and young." (Vissarion Grigorievich Belinsky) The great critic Belinsky was a man with high ideals, he extolled justice, honesty and reason, but, apparently, he was very afraid of passions and carnal impulses. If a man and a woman link their destinies, then they should not - they simply must! - to be kindred spirits, but the trouble is that behind the youth, beauty, sexuality and hormonal veil before your own eyes, you may not be able to see the soul. The idea of ​​the need for kinship of souls is expressed by Belinsky in the following lines: “Seeing and respecting a person in a woman is not only necessary, but also the main condition for the possibility of love for a decent person of our time.” Vissarion Grigorievich was a socialist and had great faith in man, and therefore he was so ahead of his time that to many even now his words seem sublime nonsense. “For a woman, a man is like a pie: some like it with cabbage, and some like it with eggs.” . (Unknown author) This aphorism is already from the post-patriarchy era, with its characteristic cynicism. But here for the first time a woman receives some freedom of choice - at least in her preferences. Some women may seek security from a man - i.e. to the classic patriarchal role of the “real” woman, while others are more concerned with personal fulfillment. The best thing about the post-patriarchy era is some choice, although it is not always obvious. Life has changed and with it the attitude that a woman is a male object has changed. It has changed - but has not disappeared completely. It has changed - but has not disappeared. It took on specific, sometimes grotesque forms...Have you heard the expression that men are like children? That a man is a childfor life? That a man doesn’t grow up, he only changes his toys to more expensive ones - they say, he used to play with cars, but now he rides in cars. I have heard a lot of such “truths” from women - both in conversations with each other and in consultations. “All men are morons, what can we take from them...” women say with a sigh, discussing the flaws and immaturity of their men. In advertising, in movies, in books, it is often demonstrated how in a family a husband behaves like a capricious or touchingly clueless tomboy child: he will flare up, then forget, then play too much, then lose the right thing. We need to take him to the clinic, check his documents, tie a tie on him, and make sure he doesn’t eat anything harmful or get drunk with his alcoholic friends. How often comical and absurd is a family man in the eyes of modern times! I remember a joke attributed to F. Ranevskaya: “The union of a stupid man and a stupid woman gives birth to a mother-heroine. The union of a stupid woman and a smart man gives birth to a single mother. The union of a smart woman and a stupid man gives birth to an ordinary family. The union of a smart man and a smart woman gives birth to easy flirting.” " These words, of course, should not be taken seriously, but still the message that in an ordinary family a man is always a fool, manipulated by an intelligent woman, sounds very much in unison with the statement about the eternal male childhood. Here are some more wise sayings on this topic: “The husband is the head of the family, and the wife is the neck; where the neck turns its head, that’s where the head looks,” or “When a woman tells a man that he is the smartest, it means how good she is.” understands that she won’t find another fool like him.” But how do all these statements relate to the position that a woman is a male object? Here, after all, everywhere a man is presented as an inferior person who needs supervision and supervision, who will inevitably disappear without a woman’s care, just like a child without a mother... Even adultery from this point of view is perceived in such a way as to remove the right of personal choice from a man - or responsibility, which, however, is the same thing. You have repeatedly heard the expression that some woman “stole” her husband from the family? She took it and took it away, but it was the wife’s fault, they say, she didn’t notice. All responsibility falls on these two women: one is a homewrecker, and the second is a bored, uninteresting wife who has neglected herself, a kind of careless shepherdess who did not take care of the lamb that the she-wolf carried away. In such a situation, the responsibility will be on anyone, but not on the lamb - he is only a passive participant who does not have his own will, an OBJECT that is being manipulated. How can the attitude towards a man as an object (a female object!) be combined with the position that a woman is a male object?.. According to the dialectical law of the unity and struggle of opposites, this is the only way it can be - there is nothing that does not contain in itself of its own denial. The situation under post-patriarchy is as follows: in the big outside world, a woman is a male object, but in the world of the family the situation can change dramatically and now only the woman is the subject, and the man is objectified. In this situation, a man can ONLY realize himself outside the family, only in the outside world, where he will prove his worth and value, and a woman, strictly on the contrary, will be able to realize herself only within the confines of marriage. For a man, marriage becomes a musty prison; for a woman, it becomes the only place for personal fulfillment. As a result, men “run away from responsibility” and do not ask for marriage, women again and again sigh for “real men” who have become extinct as a species. But without fish there is fish, so I’m sure that you’ve all heard the formula “WHATEVER IT’S BAD, IT’S MINE.” This formula justifies the shed of endless seas of female tears with islands of broken hearts, and provides the conditions for the formation of neurotic relationships. Any sacrifices can be made in order to HAVE YOUR MAN, to own him as a thing, AS A SYMBOL CONFIRMING YOUR OWN VALUE. Here let's remember the postulate of absolute valuechild and draw parallels with the “eternal childhood” of a man. The value of having YOUR OWN man can often be forgotten with the appearance of your child - alas, it is not uncommon for the husband to become completely forgotten, pushed into the background or even into the background by the baby. It is possible that this is typical precisely for those women who, before the birth of a child, needed a husband as a symbol of their own value, as something that could be presented to the outside world. A child is a much more convenient symbol, because for a woman he is much more “MINE” than a husband, who can still be “taken away.” A still from the wonderful 1988 cartoon “The Cat That Walked By Itself.” Even without knowing the plot and without watching the cartoon itself, it is clear that the woman is wise and calm, and the man is a sweet and funny idiot. Thus, the third installation of the archetype of femininity, that a woman is a male object, has undergone very serious changes in the post-patriarchy era. Now the woman has become partly a commander, partly a mother, partly an inspiration for the dependent incompetent and bungler that any man is. The famous phrase “behind every great man there is a great woman” is precisely about this - a woman, they say, is a necessary condition for a man to do anything worthwhile. The statement that everything a man does is solely for the sake of a woman is again about this. R. Kipling has a wonderful fairy tale “The Cat that Walked by itself,” published in 1902, at a time when post-patriarchy was just emerging as a phenomenon, but this fairy tale in a grotesque form already reflected this trend: a woman tames a man and directs his activities. 9 years later, James Barrie's fairy tale "Peter Pan and Wendy" was published, in which male and female characters (Wendy's parents, Wendy herself and the entire Peter Pan gang) are presented in an appropriate light. Only a man tamed by a woman can become respectable, mature and correct, while one who remains unconquered and disobedient remains in eternal childhood. Perhaps it is no coincidence that these works come from England, where the suffragette movement was a noticeable phenomenon since the end of the 19th century. There were similar sentiments in the USA, and they can be illustrated, for example, by the work of D. London." “Did you vote for women’s equality or against?” inquired Charmian. “For!” She let out a cry of surprise, for I must admit that in my youth I , despite his ardent democracy, was an opponent of women's equality. Over the years, I developed a certain tolerance in myself, understanding, although without enthusiasm, the social inevitability of this reform. “Still, explain why you voted for it,” Charmian asked. “How?” “Only women achieve suffrage, they will demand prohibition,” I said. “Then you’re screwed, John - They, the wives, the sisters, the mothers, will surely ruin you!” (D. London, “John - Barleycorn”, 1913) London clearly speaks here of the inability of men to independently resist their own destructive desires and counts on women as those who will limit and guide. A little lower, he directly speaks about the diametrical opposition of the masculine and feminine principles - the masculine principle lives by the principle of desire and takes risks, while the feminine lives by the principle of reality and insures itself. “The tavern helped me in my youth to get away from petty female tutelage, opening up a wide, free male world for me. All paths led to the tavern. Thousands of unknown roads converged there and diverged from there throughout the world." (ibid.) I have encountered similar reasoning more than once among a variety of writers of the 20th century - both Western and domestic writers like Shukshin. I’m not a literary critic, but I’m sure that such an attitude cannot be found among writers of the early and mid-19th century; I’m not talking about times more distant from us. This attitude is a typically post-patriarchal phenomenon. But pay attention - even in such a seemingly dominant position, a woman remains a male object, a necessary condition,12.05.2019, 02.06.2019