Excellent post. It’s rare to see someone doing a point by point critique of their former views. Great that some things stood the test of time and that you’ve clarified where you stand in other issues. We need more of this kind of writing in the world!!
I also found the Venn diagram in this post helpful - what do you think of it?
Loved these lines: “ What I didn’t realize is that a few years after men had received legal and social permission to co-opt the word “woman”—they would take the word “female” too¹.” and omg that Merriam-Webster Webster definition!! Yikes!
Urgh I tried talking to chatGPT and it spewed the woke answers. If you ever debate the robots, please do publish it! (But of course the robots don’t know what’s real anyway so …)
Thank you! 🌺 Yes, I felt the need to do an updated critique especially because this video has been so impactful, and a lot of people trusted in my perspective. So, I want them to know where I stand today, and to offer new framework to think about this topic.
And OMG Yes, in fact I have spoken with AI about the meaning of the word woman, and I published my results in my IG stories in 2022. Unfortunately I no longer have access to those records since I got banned lol but I remember asking it what a woman is, and receiving those circular answers.
I thought it was crazy that the developers even thought to program the robot with this ideology-the least it could do is spout the actual dictionary definition but it just responded like a woke, fearful college student.
In response to the Venn Diagram in the post you've linked...I think it's pretty accurate if you are viewing it from that lens, but I don't agree with the framework that gender = gender roles. Gender is actually meant to be a synonym for biological sex.
I also disagree with the general premise that femininity and masculinity are social constructs, and that they need to be abolished. I think these are natural traits that often get distorted and degraded by the cultures we live in.
I also don't believe in abolishing gender roles-I think that's impossible, given that our sexed bodies literally perform different functions. It's more of a question about-who dictates what these roles look like, and who is best served by them. Gender roles should promote balance and harmony, rather than oppression and exploitation.
I think I will write about this at some point! Haha thank you for the inspiration 💜
Thanks so much, this is really helpful! And yes if you do end up writing something on gender / gender roles / masculinity and femininity, would be really interesting to read.
Had an abusive male partner who was into Mankind Project, exploring the sacred masculine etc so I must admit that experience put me off the sacred masculine / feminine ideas as it just ended up as another tool of oppression and a way to invisibilise power dynamics by saying, “men and women are just *different*, we process things differently, we communicate differently, we live/clean/cook differently and you just need to be ok with that.” His idea of doing accountability was not talking about conflicts and this felt like a way to silence me and make the problem “disappear.” So what appeared like a (neutral seeming) “difference” about conflict styles was actually a power dynamic, but he was pretending it was just a neutral difference based on gender. And the problem was that I wasn’t accepting enough, loving enough etc.
I also read a bunch of couple therapy books including John Welwood that reinforced that the reason I was struggling was because I wasn’t embracing my “inner feminine” ENOUGH by being open hearted and empathetic and in touch with my feelings (when I actually was - he was just not reciprocating and felt entitled not to).
And i have found myself recoiling from it in other spaces too as “former feminists” (eg trad wives) have fully embraced the sacred masculine / sacred feminine ideas, masculinity as a thing and femininity as a thing, to tell women to be more soft and nurturing and let men take care of them and be happy taking care of kids at home…
All that said, I am open to the idea that maybe I’ve been looking at this the wrong way and that maybe there is a better way to define masculinity/femininity (besides obviously biological functions each is able to perform like childbearing, menstruation and breastfeeding for the latter) that’s also not tied up completely in traditional patriarchal gender roles…
Hey, thank you for sharing. I totally understand feeling turned off from sacred masculine/feminine based on how it has been used against you.
I definitely see various definitions of these concepts floating around in different subcultures.
What I can say is that there is no substitute for healing and doing the real trauma work. "sacred" masculinity/femininity is about accessing balance and harmony within yourself and your relationships, and that can only be fully actualized with deeper self-work.
Of course some people will use these concepts as a bandaid to avoid looking at themselves in the mirror, or as a tool to manipulate others.
You've definitely given me food for thought and to consider when writing about this topic in the future! 💜
Awesome look forward to the future post on this. And indeed, definitions for the key terms much appreciated (masculinity, femininity, gender roles) as I think that’s where I get stuck!
Eg is femininity about nurturing? Men take care of babies in Māori culture. And even Western men are very nurturing in early stages of relationships when they’re trying to get a woman! (Though it’s a trap lol)
Or is femininity about emotional expressiveness? Some of my female Northern European friends and Chinese friends are really not all that expressive. Indian men are very expressive (my dad cries at the drop of a hat at the movies)
Is it about long hair? My Sikh family have very long hair under their turbans!
If femininity and masculinity are at least in part biological/ realities rather than merely social conditioning then what concrete and consistent features define both and hold constant across cultures and across time periods in history so we don’t fall into the tautological social construction trap of “femininity is whatever someone says it is” and it therefore becomes a meaningless term…nor imbue it with meaning that upholds the patriarchal status quo and/or doesn’t hold up as an “objective” measure across time & cultures.
I can easily say what male vs female means but find it much harder to say what masculine vs feminine means.
So look forward to your future piece to enlighten me!
PS chatGPT deleted my questions where it determined “this content may violate our usage policies”. In red font and with a scary superscript exclamation mark in red circle. Here were my questions it deleted:
“The gender perspective makes “woman” a meaningless and arbitrary category. If anyone or anything can identify as a “woman” then “woman” doesn’t mean anything”
When this got gobbled up, I asked again:
“If anyone or anything can identify as a woman, the category “woman” ceases to have meaning and becomes arbitrary”
I also appreciated what you said in your vid about lesbians having to “prove” they’re not transphobic by being willing to sleep with trans women. I would like to note that I do not have arachnophobia but I also do not feel compelled to have sex with spiders to prove it 😅
Excellent post. It’s rare to see someone doing a point by point critique of their former views. Great that some things stood the test of time and that you’ve clarified where you stand in other issues. We need more of this kind of writing in the world!!
I also found the Venn diagram in this post helpful - what do you think of it?
https://jobrew.substack.com/p/we-cant-beat-gender-identity-ideology?utm_medium=web
Loved these lines: “ What I didn’t realize is that a few years after men had received legal and social permission to co-opt the word “woman”—they would take the word “female” too¹.” and omg that Merriam-Webster Webster definition!! Yikes!
Urgh I tried talking to chatGPT and it spewed the woke answers. If you ever debate the robots, please do publish it! (But of course the robots don’t know what’s real anyway so …)
Thank you! 🌺 Yes, I felt the need to do an updated critique especially because this video has been so impactful, and a lot of people trusted in my perspective. So, I want them to know where I stand today, and to offer new framework to think about this topic.
And OMG Yes, in fact I have spoken with AI about the meaning of the word woman, and I published my results in my IG stories in 2022. Unfortunately I no longer have access to those records since I got banned lol but I remember asking it what a woman is, and receiving those circular answers.
I thought it was crazy that the developers even thought to program the robot with this ideology-the least it could do is spout the actual dictionary definition but it just responded like a woke, fearful college student.
In response to the Venn Diagram in the post you've linked...I think it's pretty accurate if you are viewing it from that lens, but I don't agree with the framework that gender = gender roles. Gender is actually meant to be a synonym for biological sex.
I also disagree with the general premise that femininity and masculinity are social constructs, and that they need to be abolished. I think these are natural traits that often get distorted and degraded by the cultures we live in.
I also don't believe in abolishing gender roles-I think that's impossible, given that our sexed bodies literally perform different functions. It's more of a question about-who dictates what these roles look like, and who is best served by them. Gender roles should promote balance and harmony, rather than oppression and exploitation.
I think I will write about this at some point! Haha thank you for the inspiration 💜
Thanks so much, this is really helpful! And yes if you do end up writing something on gender / gender roles / masculinity and femininity, would be really interesting to read.
Had an abusive male partner who was into Mankind Project, exploring the sacred masculine etc so I must admit that experience put me off the sacred masculine / feminine ideas as it just ended up as another tool of oppression and a way to invisibilise power dynamics by saying, “men and women are just *different*, we process things differently, we communicate differently, we live/clean/cook differently and you just need to be ok with that.” His idea of doing accountability was not talking about conflicts and this felt like a way to silence me and make the problem “disappear.” So what appeared like a (neutral seeming) “difference” about conflict styles was actually a power dynamic, but he was pretending it was just a neutral difference based on gender. And the problem was that I wasn’t accepting enough, loving enough etc.
I also read a bunch of couple therapy books including John Welwood that reinforced that the reason I was struggling was because I wasn’t embracing my “inner feminine” ENOUGH by being open hearted and empathetic and in touch with my feelings (when I actually was - he was just not reciprocating and felt entitled not to).
I did find I resonated with this post on feminine energy as I find it hard to define what it would actually mean besides the patriarchal ideas I grew up with - https://zawn.substack.com/p/my-therapist-tells-me-to-have-more?triedRedirect=true
And i have found myself recoiling from it in other spaces too as “former feminists” (eg trad wives) have fully embraced the sacred masculine / sacred feminine ideas, masculinity as a thing and femininity as a thing, to tell women to be more soft and nurturing and let men take care of them and be happy taking care of kids at home…
All that said, I am open to the idea that maybe I’ve been looking at this the wrong way and that maybe there is a better way to define masculinity/femininity (besides obviously biological functions each is able to perform like childbearing, menstruation and breastfeeding for the latter) that’s also not tied up completely in traditional patriarchal gender roles…
Hey, thank you for sharing. I totally understand feeling turned off from sacred masculine/feminine based on how it has been used against you.
I definitely see various definitions of these concepts floating around in different subcultures.
What I can say is that there is no substitute for healing and doing the real trauma work. "sacred" masculinity/femininity is about accessing balance and harmony within yourself and your relationships, and that can only be fully actualized with deeper self-work.
Of course some people will use these concepts as a bandaid to avoid looking at themselves in the mirror, or as a tool to manipulate others.
You've definitely given me food for thought and to consider when writing about this topic in the future! 💜
Awesome look forward to the future post on this. And indeed, definitions for the key terms much appreciated (masculinity, femininity, gender roles) as I think that’s where I get stuck!
Eg is femininity about nurturing? Men take care of babies in Māori culture. And even Western men are very nurturing in early stages of relationships when they’re trying to get a woman! (Though it’s a trap lol)
Or is femininity about emotional expressiveness? Some of my female Northern European friends and Chinese friends are really not all that expressive. Indian men are very expressive (my dad cries at the drop of a hat at the movies)
Is it about long hair? My Sikh family have very long hair under their turbans!
If femininity and masculinity are at least in part biological/ realities rather than merely social conditioning then what concrete and consistent features define both and hold constant across cultures and across time periods in history so we don’t fall into the tautological social construction trap of “femininity is whatever someone says it is” and it therefore becomes a meaningless term…nor imbue it with meaning that upholds the patriarchal status quo and/or doesn’t hold up as an “objective” measure across time & cultures.
I can easily say what male vs female means but find it much harder to say what masculine vs feminine means.
So look forward to your future piece to enlighten me!
PS chatGPT deleted my questions where it determined “this content may violate our usage policies”. In red font and with a scary superscript exclamation mark in red circle. Here were my questions it deleted:
“The gender perspective makes “woman” a meaningless and arbitrary category. If anyone or anything can identify as a “woman” then “woman” doesn’t mean anything”
When this got gobbled up, I asked again:
“If anyone or anything can identify as a woman, the category “woman” ceases to have meaning and becomes arbitrary”
I also appreciated what you said in your vid about lesbians having to “prove” they’re not transphobic by being willing to sleep with trans women. I would like to note that I do not have arachnophobia but I also do not feel compelled to have sex with spiders to prove it 😅