the one about Misogyny

No, I'm not going to spend this blog crying about the women in my life. (And some are definitely worth crying about...)

But am I going to talk about my experience at Isabel Allende's lecture at Bovard Auditorium? Yes. To catch you up, if you're not an avid magical realism reader, Isabel is the daughter of slain (debated) Chilean President Salvador Allende who has written all sorts of famous works of fiction, including her famous The House of Spirits. Anyways, I went to hear her speech because I like the magical realism genre and because it was extra credit to go for my "Peoples and Cultures of the Americas" (aka "Studies in Brazilian Gay Porn") class.

She's a lovely woman, very intelligent, obvi. She's also a self-proclaimed feminist.

Gross.

Or so I thought before I went.

I think that she helped me understand at least the mindset behind some of the "girl power" talk that used to make me roll my eyes. Not that I agree with it all, neither do a lot of non-feminist women.

She began by talking about the importance of female energy. I completely understood what she meant. Us theatre students, we get a lot of talk about different "energy." In business, they prefer to call energy "attitude." It's all the same, really. But contrasting with the modus operandi of men, when women are under pressure, Isabel pointed out that they usually don't respond with violence. Instead, they respond with greater relational and emotional intensity. She didn't claim that this was better 100% of the time, but at least valuable 100% of the time. She is a feminist who advocates for more balance in masculine-feminine energy and for the protection of the women whose rights seems so invisible in most underprivileged countries.

Sounds so noble, doesn't it?

...Doesn't it?

Then I began thinking about all this stuff Biblically. *Sighs in relief as sanity returns* We all have different gifts (Rom 12), and yes we should choose peace whenever possible (also Rom 12). But I think that feminism in general looks to distort the lines of what gifts we all have. Instead of embracing feminine qualities and doing a good job of being women, feminism attempts to put men and women in each others' places. And yes, we do all have a "place."

I don't know that Jesus would ever "jokingly" tell a woman to get to "her place" in the kitchen. That's misogyny, and I'm pretty sure that's not so okay with the Son of Man, Word? *smiles at Christian pun* However, I do think that if a woman ever offered to make Him a sandwich, He would've said "You, woman, are a keeper!"

I'm sure more artistic or life news will be on its way soon. Til then, the new OneRepublic album is worth your money. Ryan Tedder is one of my heroes. He could be yours too.

A mere mortal

From the City of Angels

Livin his dream