Nice work mapping reality and thanks for attempting to imagine a better future. The gender wars need a positive vision that moves us forward.
While I appreciate the idealism, my realist tendencies mean I struggle to imagine the catalyst that disrupts the current trend. Sex / gender communism is politics derived from culture derived from biology... And women are the majority of voters, by a wide margin in western, developed nations. So, I believe the situation worsens before it improves.
Someone else I follow recommended this post and I read it, then subscribed. You put into words what I have experienced about other women but not really understood, since I've always been outside the "sisterhood" by choice. I never liked or trusted most other women and you explain here why. And what you say about reading - I read in preference to any other means of obtaining information, books for decades and now online, but I spend no time scrolling silly social media junk. I read online the same type of material I read in print, thoughtful articles with real facts and meaningful analysis, truthful news, and good books. Substack has been great, I subscribe to a number of good thinkers who produce excellent material. So it's not about being online, it's about what you consume online. The Internet is just a tool, it's what you do with it that matters.
If I can say a little about where my perspective comes from, I am an older professional woman and I always worked in a male-dominated technical industry, which was a very comfortable place for me. My father gave me the wonderful gift growing up of telling me I could be whatever I wanted to be, and never once made any kind of issue out of my being female (in the 1960s !). So I went to college and majored in science, then spent my career in industry working almost always with men, and a few very smart women. I don't get along with most women, I just don't talk their language, and it used to intimidate me but now I go my own way and enjoy my small group of friends who treat life the same way. As you say, it is liberating not to be concerned about what others think of me - not that I ever cared anyway! I just learned a protective shell so that I looked like I fit in to be able to get along professionally.
Sounds like you came of age when the sisterhood wasn’t trying to stifle excellence because there were fewer women, and separately you were never expected to be a woman in any particular way. I appreciate knowing that someone else sent this to you, by the way. It means I’m scratching particular intellectual itches for people.
Good for you about the reading. The most feminist thing one can do is stop using social media.
There were a few women who were out to get other women they saw as competition. I was very careful around them. The men were great to work with. And yes this was in the late 70s to early 80s. After that I worked myself into a consultant role as an expert in my field so I became a resource and not a competitor. No more trouble after that with other women. At the time I entered this industry the few women had to be better technically than the men to be taken seriously. Many of us went on to be respected experts.
Increasingly, I have this fantasy enter my head of turning the clock back to ca. 2012-2015 for the purposes of avoiding the insanity that you and so many of us have since dealt with. It's like the meme with the boy standing at the forking path, with us collectively choosing to head toward the stormy castle. Instead, something like your manifesto serves to me as an "OK... let's just try this whole thing again" to lead us down the other path toward the sunny meadow. Thank you for putting this out there, nicely done!
Yes, because the effort required to read engages you with the text more than passively listening, and podcasts will never go as deeply into an idea as a book. You can certainly absorb from them, but not to the extent you would if you really struggled with the text and ideas. Fiction is one thing - that’s a story. But if you’re going to learn, there’s no substitute for actually reading and wrestling.
I agree completely, it is more engaging to read, (I don't find much difference now between reading a paper book and the same content online which is so convenient). You really need to pay attention to learn from reading. You also can feed your brain information at the rate that it can comprehend, which may be different than listening to someone talk. For me, I need the information to come faster than most people can talk (I am a fast reader), and so my attention wanders when listening because I'm not getting the input quickly enough to keep my mind engaged. You can also read more slowly, or go back over a difficult concept, until you comprehend it. I only watch videos if there is no other way to obtain access to content and I really want to consume it. If something is only offered in video or podcast form, I nearly always skip it.
Well researched and written! My liberation from corporate life (the biopharma industry is about 90% female, if I were to guess) was when I was ostracized by the other hens for 1) not getting the COVID gene therapy injection, 2) not signing our Corporate Diversity Pledge which was highly recommended by our "leaders" right before annual evaluations were to start, and 3) not adding pronouns to my personal profile even though everyone else in my department did. I had seriously had enough!
Thank you for explaining and making sense of so much in such a concise article.
Once you see the PMC cliques (and all that entails), the mean-girlism, and the use of women and minorities as human shields for bad ideas, you can't unsee it.
This is excellent. I imagine it will resonate strongly with many men reading it. A postfeminist manifesto, or any manifesto, emerges only after a substantial period of de-assimilation when the individual has left the ideological fold and begun to rebuild inner authority.
Feminism assimilates much like the Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation. You are now free to define a post-assimilationist reality defined by character building, reasoning, and personal responsibility, informed by the wisdom gained through that recovery process.
As a man, it resonates with me--most definitely NOT as an opportunity to spike the football--that's not what this is about--rather as an explanation of what is going on and providing concise, empirically provable answers to difficult-to-answer questions.
Thank you for reading. I think I've been writing this in my head the whole time. I am hoping it resonates with women more but...we have seen that is not often the case. I have never forgottenen your star trek metaphor.
Women who want to keep posing as victim will accuse both of us of internalised misogyny. The women hurt and betrayed by these women will start to listen.
It ain't just feminists, although they seem to be some of the most storied practitioners of the art. Modern humans in general lovingly cultivate and curate their respective victim statuses.
Holy shit. I'm not even a woman and reading this felt like a cool, healing salve on my eyes and my mind. I hadn't even finished Part 1 and I was wondering, "What freed her? Was she freed the way I was freed?" And then you confirmed it: you put down social media and you read. That's literally what did it for me too. The ideology that is responsible for all of this bears the same marks, no matter what form it takes or what community it has infected and adopted as it's cause-- feminism, racial justice, LGBT/queer/trans justice and gender ideology, etc. It all looks ths same with interchangeable characters. It is a many-headed hydra.
You and I were both freed from the grasp this ideology had on our perceptions in a very similar way-- I wonder if we could "bottle" what we did into a digestible prescription to offer to people.
My "liberation from liberation politics (Marxism) also was helped along by being attacked or shunned by my own allies when I stepped out of line in (what I believed and still do believe) a really nuanced way, and it really pissed me off and gave me the fire of courage and rebellion to drive the research I was doing to uncover what was happening and why i was seeing what I was seeing.
Did you have an experience similar to that that helped motivate your throwing off of the shackles?
First, I was socially ostracized by a group of professional democrat women for being insufficiently woke, but that was a cover for them disliking me for status hierarchy reasons. That spurred me to stop using social media altogether, and then I dug into gender ideology. Being forced to say males are females was the moment I couldn’t take it anymore. But even more, I just wasn’t thinking for myself, and that couldn’t have been clear while I was still glued to the phone. Thank you for the words. I wonder sometimes if I would be here had I not been socially outcast.
You really undermine your own argument with your sanctimony. It is widely understood that women have superior verbal abilities to men. However, I am speaking of analytical ability. Not that it matters to you, because all you’re interested in is moralizing. Women who come for me employ this same tactic. And if you’re a man, it’s honestly worse.
Also, analytical ability and verbal reasoning aren’t the same. I didn’t answer that person because they undermined their own argument by using ad hominem
I will dig deeper into this. I am peripherally familiar with Peterson, and more familiar with Stoic texts (that’s what basically saved me from depression plus Indic philosophy. And thanks for the compliment, been a hard week for me writing wise.
As for your IQ point, I am frequently accused of false generalization by people who don’t understand that pattern recognition is the basis of all knowledge, and of how we go through the world, because we can’t know if every individual is potentially harmful or helpful.
I’ve written about a lot of that evidence on women’s competition, but the book that really drove it home was Warriors and Worriers. It has original research and cross cultural studies referenced, and is by a woman to boot.
Nice work mapping reality and thanks for attempting to imagine a better future. The gender wars need a positive vision that moves us forward.
While I appreciate the idealism, my realist tendencies mean I struggle to imagine the catalyst that disrupts the current trend. Sex / gender communism is politics derived from culture derived from biology... And women are the majority of voters, by a wide margin in western, developed nations. So, I believe the situation worsens before it improves.
I agree, it will worsen. But at least know that women like me are out there trying to right many wrongs.
So interesting. Thankyou Nathalie for driving this connection 🙏
Someone else I follow recommended this post and I read it, then subscribed. You put into words what I have experienced about other women but not really understood, since I've always been outside the "sisterhood" by choice. I never liked or trusted most other women and you explain here why. And what you say about reading - I read in preference to any other means of obtaining information, books for decades and now online, but I spend no time scrolling silly social media junk. I read online the same type of material I read in print, thoughtful articles with real facts and meaningful analysis, truthful news, and good books. Substack has been great, I subscribe to a number of good thinkers who produce excellent material. So it's not about being online, it's about what you consume online. The Internet is just a tool, it's what you do with it that matters.
If I can say a little about where my perspective comes from, I am an older professional woman and I always worked in a male-dominated technical industry, which was a very comfortable place for me. My father gave me the wonderful gift growing up of telling me I could be whatever I wanted to be, and never once made any kind of issue out of my being female (in the 1960s !). So I went to college and majored in science, then spent my career in industry working almost always with men, and a few very smart women. I don't get along with most women, I just don't talk their language, and it used to intimidate me but now I go my own way and enjoy my small group of friends who treat life the same way. As you say, it is liberating not to be concerned about what others think of me - not that I ever cared anyway! I just learned a protective shell so that I looked like I fit in to be able to get along professionally.
Sounds like you came of age when the sisterhood wasn’t trying to stifle excellence because there were fewer women, and separately you were never expected to be a woman in any particular way. I appreciate knowing that someone else sent this to you, by the way. It means I’m scratching particular intellectual itches for people.
Good for you about the reading. The most feminist thing one can do is stop using social media.
There were a few women who were out to get other women they saw as competition. I was very careful around them. The men were great to work with. And yes this was in the late 70s to early 80s. After that I worked myself into a consultant role as an expert in my field so I became a resource and not a competitor. No more trouble after that with other women. At the time I entered this industry the few women had to be better technically than the men to be taken seriously. Many of us went on to be respected experts.
Increasingly, I have this fantasy enter my head of turning the clock back to ca. 2012-2015 for the purposes of avoiding the insanity that you and so many of us have since dealt with. It's like the meme with the boy standing at the forking path, with us collectively choosing to head toward the stormy castle. Instead, something like your manifesto serves to me as an "OK... let's just try this whole thing again" to lead us down the other path toward the sunny meadow. Thank you for putting this out there, nicely done!
I wish I had deprogrammed myself sooner. I always had an inkling it was fucked up.
Thanks for the kind words!
I agree that stepping away from social media is important. But why is reading a better way to learn than podcasts or audiobooks?
Yes, because the effort required to read engages you with the text more than passively listening, and podcasts will never go as deeply into an idea as a book. You can certainly absorb from them, but not to the extent you would if you really struggled with the text and ideas. Fiction is one thing - that’s a story. But if you’re going to learn, there’s no substitute for actually reading and wrestling.
I agree completely, it is more engaging to read, (I don't find much difference now between reading a paper book and the same content online which is so convenient). You really need to pay attention to learn from reading. You also can feed your brain information at the rate that it can comprehend, which may be different than listening to someone talk. For me, I need the information to come faster than most people can talk (I am a fast reader), and so my attention wanders when listening because I'm not getting the input quickly enough to keep my mind engaged. You can also read more slowly, or go back over a difficult concept, until you comprehend it. I only watch videos if there is no other way to obtain access to content and I really want to consume it. If something is only offered in video or podcast form, I nearly always skip it.
I am exactly like this - mind wanders. And margin notes! I’m in conversation with the author.
Well researched and written! My liberation from corporate life (the biopharma industry is about 90% female, if I were to guess) was when I was ostracized by the other hens for 1) not getting the COVID gene therapy injection, 2) not signing our Corporate Diversity Pledge which was highly recommended by our "leaders" right before annual evaluations were to start, and 3) not adding pronouns to my personal profile even though everyone else in my department did. I had seriously had enough!
A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.
Thank you for explaining and making sense of so much in such a concise article.
Once you see the PMC cliques (and all that entails), the mean-girlism, and the use of women and minorities as human shields for bad ideas, you can't unsee it.
Intrasexual competition explains so much, and yet there’s silence around it.
In a way, this is the necessary and expanded description of a basic statement:
Stop Lying.
That's it. It's something when we've come to point in culture where it's dangerous to say that out loud.
Most things I say are about what’s in plain sight that no one will name, making it particularly ridiculous
And I'm soft pedaling it to leave any chance of being heard.
When you've cut yourself off from correction, you've really cut yourself off from everything, and certainly love and connection.
https://featureassets.amuniversal.com/assets/1a28967011a00130fd8a001dd8b71c47
Or worse, what happens if you can't forgive and reform yourself: (Why suicides are in hell)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGXcWypVv1Q
This is excellent. I imagine it will resonate strongly with many men reading it. A postfeminist manifesto, or any manifesto, emerges only after a substantial period of de-assimilation when the individual has left the ideological fold and begun to rebuild inner authority.
Feminism assimilates much like the Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation. You are now free to define a post-assimilationist reality defined by character building, reasoning, and personal responsibility, informed by the wisdom gained through that recovery process.
As a man, it resonates with me--most definitely NOT as an opportunity to spike the football--that's not what this is about--rather as an explanation of what is going on and providing concise, empirically provable answers to difficult-to-answer questions.
I appreciate knowing that. I’ve been writing this essay in my head probably for probably a year and a half.
Thank you for reading. I think I've been writing this in my head the whole time. I am hoping it resonates with women more but...we have seen that is not often the case. I have never forgottenen your star trek metaphor.
Women who want to keep posing as victim will accuse both of us of internalised misogyny. The women hurt and betrayed by these women will start to listen.
It ain't just feminists, although they seem to be some of the most storied practitioners of the art. Modern humans in general lovingly cultivate and curate their respective victim statuses.
So different from cats, or animals in general.
When victimhood is the coin of the realm, expect people to counterfeit it.
Gresham's Law applies to much more than monetary economics.
Well-said.
We have a particular set of status games that lead to worse outcomes, yes
Cats are always playing status games, but Wokemon is not one of them.
My partner and I both lold at this bc we have three cats
LOL
Holy shit. I'm not even a woman and reading this felt like a cool, healing salve on my eyes and my mind. I hadn't even finished Part 1 and I was wondering, "What freed her? Was she freed the way I was freed?" And then you confirmed it: you put down social media and you read. That's literally what did it for me too. The ideology that is responsible for all of this bears the same marks, no matter what form it takes or what community it has infected and adopted as it's cause-- feminism, racial justice, LGBT/queer/trans justice and gender ideology, etc. It all looks ths same with interchangeable characters. It is a many-headed hydra.
You and I were both freed from the grasp this ideology had on our perceptions in a very similar way-- I wonder if we could "bottle" what we did into a digestible prescription to offer to people.
My "liberation from liberation politics (Marxism) also was helped along by being attacked or shunned by my own allies when I stepped out of line in (what I believed and still do believe) a really nuanced way, and it really pissed me off and gave me the fire of courage and rebellion to drive the research I was doing to uncover what was happening and why i was seeing what I was seeing.
Did you have an experience similar to that that helped motivate your throwing off of the shackles?
First, I was socially ostracized by a group of professional democrat women for being insufficiently woke, but that was a cover for them disliking me for status hierarchy reasons. That spurred me to stop using social media altogether, and then I dug into gender ideology. Being forced to say males are females was the moment I couldn’t take it anymore. But even more, I just wasn’t thinking for myself, and that couldn’t have been clear while I was still glued to the phone. Thank you for the words. I wonder sometimes if I would be here had I not been socially outcast.
Zealots hate the "apostate" more than the heathen. Always have.
You really undermine your own argument with your sanctimony. It is widely understood that women have superior verbal abilities to men. However, I am speaking of analytical ability. Not that it matters to you, because all you’re interested in is moralizing. Women who come for me employ this same tactic. And if you’re a man, it’s honestly worse.
Also, analytical ability and verbal reasoning aren’t the same. I didn’t answer that person because they undermined their own argument by using ad hominem
I don’t know, what do you see of theirs?
I will dig deeper into this. I am peripherally familiar with Peterson, and more familiar with Stoic texts (that’s what basically saved me from depression plus Indic philosophy. And thanks for the compliment, been a hard week for me writing wise.
As for your IQ point, I am frequently accused of false generalization by people who don’t understand that pattern recognition is the basis of all knowledge, and of how we go through the world, because we can’t know if every individual is potentially harmful or helpful.
I’ve written about a lot of that evidence on women’s competition, but the book that really drove it home was Warriors and Worriers. It has original research and cross cultural studies referenced, and is by a woman to boot.