Women's Month - Day seven
Aug. 7th, 2020 10:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
girlofprey“If women allow themselves to be consoled for their culturally determined lack of access to the modes of intellectual debate by the invocation of hypothetical great goddesses, they are simply flattering themselves into submission (a technique often used on them by men). All the mythic versions of women, from the myth of the redeeming purity of the virgin to that of the healing, reconciliatory mother, are consolatory nonsenses; and consolatory nonsense seems to me a fair definition of myth, anyway. Mother goddesses are just as silly a notion as father gods. If a revival of the myths gives women emotional satisfaction, it does so at the price of obscuring the real conditions of life. This is why they were invented in the first place.”
-Angela Carter, The Sadeian Woman, 1978
For some reason I remembered or heard the above quote as 'the best way to keep a woman down is to tell her she's a goddess', which must have been a summary I guess. I don't entirely agree with all of the above quote now - although I'm an atheist who doesn't actually believe in gods of any kind - but it still represents some problems that I have with a lot of ways women are talked about. It's also my entire problem with 'magical girl' characters, especially when they're one of the few, or the only, female characters in a story. Women are human. Writing about women as humans is okay, and accurate. You can write about ordinary women, struggling with things. That will also be interesting, if you make it as interesting as it is in real life. And probably mean a lot more to a lot of women.
-Angela Carter, The Sadeian Woman, 1978
For some reason I remembered or heard the above quote as 'the best way to keep a woman down is to tell her she's a goddess', which must have been a summary I guess. I don't entirely agree with all of the above quote now - although I'm an atheist who doesn't actually believe in gods of any kind - but it still represents some problems that I have with a lot of ways women are talked about. It's also my entire problem with 'magical girl' characters, especially when they're one of the few, or the only, female characters in a story. Women are human. Writing about women as humans is okay, and accurate. You can write about ordinary women, struggling with things. That will also be interesting, if you make it as interesting as it is in real life. And probably mean a lot more to a lot of women.
