The problem of female speechlessness — my own, my friends’, my mother’s,
January 23, 2018 6:48 PM Subscribe
The secret female empowerment school known as The Academy "Urbaniak teaches what she calls “verbal martial arts,” practical techniques designed to interrupt that telltale moment of frozenness described with bafflement and shame by nearly everyone who experiences sexual assault, including the president’s alleged victims."
Wow, that was fascinating.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:42 PM on January 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:42 PM on January 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
More of this in the world, please.
posted by twilightlost at 7:53 PM on January 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by twilightlost at 7:53 PM on January 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
it worries me a little bit that the structure they've set up is exactly the same as the structure of many cults.
it seems like people are only benefiting from this, so i hope the ideas and methods are spread widely and that it doesn't start to turn insular.
posted by vogon_poet at 8:05 PM on January 23, 2018 [8 favorites]
it seems like people are only benefiting from this, so i hope the ideas and methods are spread widely and that it doesn't start to turn insular.
posted by vogon_poet at 8:05 PM on January 23, 2018 [8 favorites]
I was intrigued because I've known that same speechlessness. But the prices ... shit. She's not doing this out of the goodness of her heart. And I guess that's the point, in part - that she's treating her course, her time, her knowledge, like something worth paying for. But if you really want a revolution you're going to need more than the people who can afford this.
posted by bunderful at 8:11 PM on January 23, 2018 [9 favorites]
posted by bunderful at 8:11 PM on January 23, 2018 [9 favorites]
This makes me see how powerless I feel right now. I'm worried about money, my health is weird and not awesome, I don't have the energy to nourish my relationships and tend to feel isolated. When I act too assertive with my boss he gets weird and passive aggressive, when I'm not assertive enough I don't get what I want, so I'm worried about either losing my job or having my working conditions get worse.
Ugh. I want power. And I simply have no avenue to it that I can see.
posted by bunderful at 8:17 PM on January 23, 2018 [17 favorites]
Ugh. I want power. And I simply have no avenue to it that I can see.
posted by bunderful at 8:17 PM on January 23, 2018 [17 favorites]
Such stunning bullshit. Anyone, male or female, who pays for this kind of fake “training” needs education and therapy all right. Mentioning Arianna Huffington tells me all I need to know about the legitimacy of this.
posted by Ideefixe at 8:56 PM on January 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by Ideefixe at 8:56 PM on January 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
For better or worse, this is pretty directly a question that you talk about as part of some anxiety CBT:
Think of the most vulnerable request you could possibly make of the person whose attention and acquiescence you most wildly desire, then practice hearing them tell you no. - the idea of learning to think about the unthinkable what-ifs?
posted by mercredi at 9:21 PM on January 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
Think of the most vulnerable request you could possibly make of the person whose attention and acquiescence you most wildly desire, then practice hearing them tell you no. - the idea of learning to think about the unthinkable what-ifs?
posted by mercredi at 9:21 PM on January 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
I think this is, probably, a good thing and she's doing good work. or means to, and maybe is. there is a lot of worth in what she's talking about when it's not directly about sexual assault; when it's about saying Yes to things in general. I think it is a very good exercise to imagine people saying No to you -- as if women have to imagine that -- and flip it around so as to understand that a No will not emotionally devastate a man; he can take it just as well as you can.
but when it is directly about sexual assault. when it is about that precise kind of silence. then. I will never not feel sick when people preface an explanation of whatever activism or good thing they're doing, or the reportage on someone's else activism or good thing, with a 20-minute performative head-scratching about why do women do this? why the heck do they do this crazy thing, instead of 'kicking him in the balls' or 'just saying no' or whatever it may be that we keep forgetting to do in the moment. I mean: is it a problem to be fixed and good that some women are doing work to try to fix it? yeah. but is it a puzzle? are you kidding?
the answer to the Why is usually worked out to be some combination of social training and lack of preparation and the biological freeze reflex, after a whole lot of elaborate wondering. which all accounts for some people, some of the time. sure. Not having enough time to think out exactly what you want to do, in a situation where anything you do will have grave consequences, is a factor. thinking it out, talking to other women, getting training, working on it in advance will help with that. sure. paying lots of money for a course where you get to bond with other women in the same boat probably does a lot for some people.
but for all the times when that's not the explanation, the reason we react this way is because; you know that a bad thing is going to happen whether you say No or you say Yes or you say nothing. You know, but want to preserve the illusion you might be mistaken: to preserve the moment of indecisiveness, where it could go either way -- IF you said No THEN he would stop -- forever.
and if you say Yes or nothing, you have preserved a small space of possibility, an alternate timeline where if you had said No good and loud, he would have not done it. you have manufactured a whole universe where some man you maybe know and maybe like a lot and maybe love is not knowingly and deliberately a rapist. He's only a rapist just accidentally. Just because you froze. Just because he didn't hear you say anything. Just because you were passive. it's really wonderful -- you do one wrong thing or you wait one minute too long to do the right thing, and suddenly you have redeemed this man, and maybe he didn't even ever mean to hurt you at all! It just happened because you let it! silly you!
the power of that is enormous. the power to say no and be obeyed is better, but that power is contingent on either a man conceding it to you or on you being not just emotionally but physically strong enough to fight him off. that's not all up to you. the imaginative preservation of a man's goodness, on the other hand, is completely up to you.
the suffering that comes along with knowing that a man wanted to harm you is rarely given the weight it merits. but it's real. in the same way that it's one kind of trauma if a stranger hurts you and another kind if your husband hurts you, it's one kind if either man hurts you by accident and another, much worse kind if he does it on purpose. if you say an obviously coerced Yes when you mean No, or say nothing at all when you are afraid to say No, you don't have to know he would have done it on purpose. You can pretend he was confused. You can even pretend that if he knew now how you felt about it, he'd feel even worse about it than you do. It's pathetically obvious how not true this all is, but you can choose to believe it.
so like everything else that women do that's treated as inexplicable or nonsensical or a pure conditioned reflex: sometimes it is, but often it isn't. I think it is a very bad idea to notionally preserve a man's ignorance of your consent status just so that you don't have to know the worst about him, but I understand it perfectly.
“I respect and honor the punishment phase we are in, but the guy isn’t the enemy, the enemy is silence.”
ha ha that's cute, but I know who my enemies are.
posted by queenofbithynia at 9:28 PM on January 23, 2018 [107 favorites]
but when it is directly about sexual assault. when it is about that precise kind of silence. then. I will never not feel sick when people preface an explanation of whatever activism or good thing they're doing, or the reportage on someone's else activism or good thing, with a 20-minute performative head-scratching about why do women do this? why the heck do they do this crazy thing, instead of 'kicking him in the balls' or 'just saying no' or whatever it may be that we keep forgetting to do in the moment. I mean: is it a problem to be fixed and good that some women are doing work to try to fix it? yeah. but is it a puzzle? are you kidding?
the answer to the Why is usually worked out to be some combination of social training and lack of preparation and the biological freeze reflex, after a whole lot of elaborate wondering. which all accounts for some people, some of the time. sure. Not having enough time to think out exactly what you want to do, in a situation where anything you do will have grave consequences, is a factor. thinking it out, talking to other women, getting training, working on it in advance will help with that. sure. paying lots of money for a course where you get to bond with other women in the same boat probably does a lot for some people.
but for all the times when that's not the explanation, the reason we react this way is because; you know that a bad thing is going to happen whether you say No or you say Yes or you say nothing. You know, but want to preserve the illusion you might be mistaken: to preserve the moment of indecisiveness, where it could go either way -- IF you said No THEN he would stop -- forever.
and if you say Yes or nothing, you have preserved a small space of possibility, an alternate timeline where if you had said No good and loud, he would have not done it. you have manufactured a whole universe where some man you maybe know and maybe like a lot and maybe love is not knowingly and deliberately a rapist. He's only a rapist just accidentally. Just because you froze. Just because he didn't hear you say anything. Just because you were passive. it's really wonderful -- you do one wrong thing or you wait one minute too long to do the right thing, and suddenly you have redeemed this man, and maybe he didn't even ever mean to hurt you at all! It just happened because you let it! silly you!
the power of that is enormous. the power to say no and be obeyed is better, but that power is contingent on either a man conceding it to you or on you being not just emotionally but physically strong enough to fight him off. that's not all up to you. the imaginative preservation of a man's goodness, on the other hand, is completely up to you.
the suffering that comes along with knowing that a man wanted to harm you is rarely given the weight it merits. but it's real. in the same way that it's one kind of trauma if a stranger hurts you and another kind if your husband hurts you, it's one kind if either man hurts you by accident and another, much worse kind if he does it on purpose. if you say an obviously coerced Yes when you mean No, or say nothing at all when you are afraid to say No, you don't have to know he would have done it on purpose. You can pretend he was confused. You can even pretend that if he knew now how you felt about it, he'd feel even worse about it than you do. It's pathetically obvious how not true this all is, but you can choose to believe it.
so like everything else that women do that's treated as inexplicable or nonsensical or a pure conditioned reflex: sometimes it is, but often it isn't. I think it is a very bad idea to notionally preserve a man's ignorance of your consent status just so that you don't have to know the worst about him, but I understand it perfectly.
“I respect and honor the punishment phase we are in, but the guy isn’t the enemy, the enemy is silence.”
ha ha that's cute, but I know who my enemies are.
posted by queenofbithynia at 9:28 PM on January 23, 2018 [107 favorites]
Yeah this is a thinly disguised method of blaming women for assault and harassment by pretending it's about women's silence.
posted by medusa at 10:12 PM on January 23, 2018 [11 favorites]
posted by medusa at 10:12 PM on January 23, 2018 [11 favorites]
The Cara Delavigne story about Harvey Weinstein ordering her to make out with another woman present and she just started singing instead, and he got confused and let her go -- that sounds a lot like the old advice they gave girls to piss themselves or puke or act "crazy" if a stranger grabbed them in an alleyway, because you can scare him off if he thinks you're more trouble than you're worth. none of these things feel to me like one's inner dom rising, even if they are good for survival. which I am prepared to believe they might be.
I mean it's only a power move by accident. what it mostly was, was luck. good for her and god bless her, but I'm not sure the lesson is what it's said to be. "pretend the thing that's happening isn't happening, pretend you didn't hear what he just said" -- that IS the freeze reflex in action! and as the story shows, sometimes it actually works better than anything else.
posted by queenofbithynia at 10:25 PM on January 23, 2018 [20 favorites]
I mean it's only a power move by accident. what it mostly was, was luck. good for her and god bless her, but I'm not sure the lesson is what it's said to be. "pretend the thing that's happening isn't happening, pretend you didn't hear what he just said" -- that IS the freeze reflex in action! and as the story shows, sometimes it actually works better than anything else.
posted by queenofbithynia at 10:25 PM on January 23, 2018 [20 favorites]
That article is a meandering bunch of gibberish. I’m sure she’s very compelling in person, which is probably why her stuff sells. But selling is really what she’s about.
This is just “weaponized femininity” by the sounds of it. Maybe it will be helpful to some people in the moment, who knows. But it’s not revolutionary, which is what she’s claiming it is.
posted by tel3path at 2:54 AM on January 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
This is just “weaponized femininity” by the sounds of it. Maybe it will be helpful to some people in the moment, who knows. But it’s not revolutionary, which is what she’s claiming it is.
posted by tel3path at 2:54 AM on January 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Yeah, so, here’s the thing. In the end there is no one weird trick that’s going to stop a man from assaulting you, and literally anyone who is worth listening to already knows this. But that moment of terrified silence when you have to make a choice about what how you frame, to yourself, what’s going to happen next, fully aware that you have no control over it: that is not most of life. That moment is terrible, but what is almost more terrible is having to carry around the fear of that moment, and that knowledge that you cannot do anything about it, all the goddamn time.
The prices are ridiculous, the cult stuff is worrisome, and none of this should be received uncritically. But I am on board for anything that adds to the tools women have for walking through a world that hates them with their heads held high.
posted by schadenfrau at 4:08 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
The prices are ridiculous, the cult stuff is worrisome, and none of this should be received uncritically. But I am on board for anything that adds to the tools women have for walking through a world that hates them with their heads held high.
posted by schadenfrau at 4:08 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
Kind of uncomfortable with the way she seems to be appropriating and objectifying Taoism as some sort of token "exotic Asian" credential that gives her narrative/business proposition more "believability".
posted by aielen at 4:10 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by aielen at 4:10 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
The Tao that can be sold is not the.....?
posted by thelonius at 4:30 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
posted by thelonius at 4:30 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
Honestly, this thread is kind of exhausting, in that it seems like a bunch of people looking for reasons to tear this apart and not engage with the very uncomfortable fact that many women need to deliberately learn how to protect themselves in all levels of social interaction, because it is very much something we are socialized not to do from the earliest age, and those muscles fucking atrophy. There is a particular wasting away of the self that happens when you are taught to never have boundaries, and it requires deliberate work to build that back up. And above all, it requires an acknowledgment that there’s work to be done.
So yes, it’s priced out of almost everyone’s range, though 500 people for a couple of grand a piece, split between two business partners over, what? Two, three years? In NYC? Is actually not priced to be insanely exploitive. (Which doesn’t fix the problem, obviously, but I’m not going to shit on a woman for asking to be paid for her skills.) Perhaps she appropriates Taoism, or perhaps, like a lot of people, it’s something she’s incorporated into her worldview and that’s the thing she’s teaching. Shit, it’s not like Taoism is not meant to be followed. Perhaps she’s somehow blind to the fact that an assertive demeanor can’t protect you from a determined predator, or maybe she’s cognizant of the fact that defenselessness — literally not knowing how to defend your boundaries — is a goddamn scourge that permeates every area of these women’s lives, and just because you can’t give them a magic spell that will turn an assailant’s dick into a Boston fern on command that doesn’t mean teaching people how to defend themselves is worthless.
It’s really exhausting, the degree to which people will work to find a reasons to tear this down without bothering to engage with the idea that it has any value. I wonder why that could be.
posted by schadenfrau at 4:43 AM on January 24, 2018 [50 favorites]
So yes, it’s priced out of almost everyone’s range, though 500 people for a couple of grand a piece, split between two business partners over, what? Two, three years? In NYC? Is actually not priced to be insanely exploitive. (Which doesn’t fix the problem, obviously, but I’m not going to shit on a woman for asking to be paid for her skills.) Perhaps she appropriates Taoism, or perhaps, like a lot of people, it’s something she’s incorporated into her worldview and that’s the thing she’s teaching. Shit, it’s not like Taoism is not meant to be followed. Perhaps she’s somehow blind to the fact that an assertive demeanor can’t protect you from a determined predator, or maybe she’s cognizant of the fact that defenselessness — literally not knowing how to defend your boundaries — is a goddamn scourge that permeates every area of these women’s lives, and just because you can’t give them a magic spell that will turn an assailant’s dick into a Boston fern on command that doesn’t mean teaching people how to defend themselves is worthless.
It’s really exhausting, the degree to which people will work to find a reasons to tear this down without bothering to engage with the idea that it has any value. I wonder why that could be.
posted by schadenfrau at 4:43 AM on January 24, 2018 [50 favorites]
I wonder why that could be.
I get you. but the other reason could be that it's a prime moment for 'the culture' to decide that the real problem between the sexes is that women don't know how to say No. not that men don't like to take No for an answer, and for general purposes, don't have to. I am well prepared to drown men in scorn when they propose this, and they do propose it all over. I am not so prepared for women to offer it up as a feminist lesson. and she is doing more than that, and I'm not super opposed to her shtick. and I like her dorky thing about hey what if the Bene Gesserit Voice were REAL and you could HAVE ONE? but that's what lots of us are afraid is the next phase of reaction, is the idea that the solution is women need to say no harder, and I think we are right to be afraid of it.
like I am not against empowering exercises, or even empowerful ones. and (I tell this story like an ancient mariner but it did happen, so) it does give me some lasting comfort to remember how, when some guy grabbed my ass on my way home on a cold dark night, I chased him to the corner yelling HEY! HEY! I'VE SEEN YOUR FACE, I'LL KNOW YOU AGAIN! YEAH, YOU BETTER RUN! that is actually what I have in place of the standard freeze reflex, is the urge to scream things that don't make a whole lot of sense, on reflection. also, not to chase the perpetrator more than half-heartedly, because like in Miller's Crossing, what was I going to do when I caught him? so, having an instant rage reaction all queued up as your emotional Netflix next episode, all ready to play as soon as you hit the button, that's worthwhile, I know that. I'd pay money for it if I didn't already have it.
but some guy still grabbed my ass. he got everything he wanted out of that interaction, and I got nothing. so.
posted by queenofbithynia at 5:20 AM on January 24, 2018 [26 favorites]
I get you. but the other reason could be that it's a prime moment for 'the culture' to decide that the real problem between the sexes is that women don't know how to say No. not that men don't like to take No for an answer, and for general purposes, don't have to. I am well prepared to drown men in scorn when they propose this, and they do propose it all over. I am not so prepared for women to offer it up as a feminist lesson. and she is doing more than that, and I'm not super opposed to her shtick. and I like her dorky thing about hey what if the Bene Gesserit Voice were REAL and you could HAVE ONE? but that's what lots of us are afraid is the next phase of reaction, is the idea that the solution is women need to say no harder, and I think we are right to be afraid of it.
like I am not against empowering exercises, or even empowerful ones. and (I tell this story like an ancient mariner but it did happen, so) it does give me some lasting comfort to remember how, when some guy grabbed my ass on my way home on a cold dark night, I chased him to the corner yelling HEY! HEY! I'VE SEEN YOUR FACE, I'LL KNOW YOU AGAIN! YEAH, YOU BETTER RUN! that is actually what I have in place of the standard freeze reflex, is the urge to scream things that don't make a whole lot of sense, on reflection. also, not to chase the perpetrator more than half-heartedly, because like in Miller's Crossing, what was I going to do when I caught him? so, having an instant rage reaction all queued up as your emotional Netflix next episode, all ready to play as soon as you hit the button, that's worthwhile, I know that. I'd pay money for it if I didn't already have it.
but some guy still grabbed my ass. he got everything he wanted out of that interaction, and I got nothing. so.
posted by queenofbithynia at 5:20 AM on January 24, 2018 [26 favorites]
I honestly don't feel like I have enough information from a single article to make a judgement about the course itself but man, I find this woman to be super interesting. Maybe not terribly likable but in a world where abrasive and morally compromised yet interesting men are lauded and chronicled in all forms of media, I'm always here for profiles of women equivalents of that.
posted by soren_lorensen at 5:21 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
posted by soren_lorensen at 5:21 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
but some guy still grabbed my ass. he got everything he wanted out of that interaction, and I got nothing. so.
Yup. I think I’m frustrated that we don’t trust women to know the difference between these situations, or that we’re still censoring or policing ourselves based on how men and various patriarchy-enablers are going to react. I mean, they are going to be shitty no matter what. It literally does not matter what we do. And comporting ourselves so they have fewer moments to point at us in willful misunderstanding and shout “HA!” does more to hurt us than them, because they’re going to fucking do it anyway.
Because I think it’s easy to see how physical assault and the fear of it shape our lives, but the subtle erosion of women’s boundaries in all areas of life, the constant gas lighting, the ways people refuse to SEE you until you find you’ve started to become invisible, even to yourself...
That shit does damage. Real damage. And it’s so hard to see. It’s like fighting a ghost. I’ve been doing all this reading on trauma, and particularly developmental trauma, and there’s something rattling around inside my brain about how it interacts with misogyny. There are real developmental, neurological effects of emotional abuse, and if emotional abuse doesn’t characterize how many women are treated by the world at large simply for being women — from literal birth in their families of origin to their friends and partners to their peers and bosses — than I don’t know what does.
And it takes work to begin to see that, let alone train yourself out of it. I would be much, much happier if this woman also made a version of her course available online for free, but I’m also confident she’s not the only woman out there with these skills — and now we’re talking about it. So. There’s that.
posted by schadenfrau at 5:36 AM on January 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
Yup. I think I’m frustrated that we don’t trust women to know the difference between these situations, or that we’re still censoring or policing ourselves based on how men and various patriarchy-enablers are going to react. I mean, they are going to be shitty no matter what. It literally does not matter what we do. And comporting ourselves so they have fewer moments to point at us in willful misunderstanding and shout “HA!” does more to hurt us than them, because they’re going to fucking do it anyway.
Because I think it’s easy to see how physical assault and the fear of it shape our lives, but the subtle erosion of women’s boundaries in all areas of life, the constant gas lighting, the ways people refuse to SEE you until you find you’ve started to become invisible, even to yourself...
That shit does damage. Real damage. And it’s so hard to see. It’s like fighting a ghost. I’ve been doing all this reading on trauma, and particularly developmental trauma, and there’s something rattling around inside my brain about how it interacts with misogyny. There are real developmental, neurological effects of emotional abuse, and if emotional abuse doesn’t characterize how many women are treated by the world at large simply for being women — from literal birth in their families of origin to their friends and partners to their peers and bosses — than I don’t know what does.
And it takes work to begin to see that, let alone train yourself out of it. I would be much, much happier if this woman also made a version of her course available online for free, but I’m also confident she’s not the only woman out there with these skills — and now we’re talking about it. So. There’s that.
posted by schadenfrau at 5:36 AM on January 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
It’s really exhausting, the degree to which people will work to find a reasons to tear this down without bothering to engage with the idea that it has any value. I wonder why that could be.
Well, if it has value for people, then okay that's good for them. And there is indeed something to be said for anything that gives women a way to break out of the role we're socialised to play in our own powerlessness, and/or gives you something to do in the instant when that freeze reflex hits. I guess I'd just prefer it if this particular anything didn't blame our powerlessness on us in the first place, then package up the solution as a BDSM-style 'playful eroticism' with stilettos and riding crops. I mean, this stuff:
posted by Catseye at 5:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
Well, if it has value for people, then okay that's good for them. And there is indeed something to be said for anything that gives women a way to break out of the role we're socialised to play in our own powerlessness, and/or gives you something to do in the instant when that freeze reflex hits. I guess I'd just prefer it if this particular anything didn't blame our powerlessness on us in the first place, then package up the solution as a BDSM-style 'playful eroticism' with stilettos and riding crops. I mean, this stuff:
Here’s where Urbaniak’s experience as a dominatrix is probably the most apparent in the school’s rhetoric. “We have rage, an outward-moving emotion,” which Urbaniak would characterize as a dominant or “dom” state. “And here we have disappointment, an inward-moving emotion,” which she would characterize as submissive or “sub.” Historically, for the most part, women have been in the sub role, but in the 20th century we’ve both demanded and been forced into more dom roles. This has all happened incredibly quickly, from an evolutionary perspective, and without much expressed cultural awareness or oversight; as a result, we now have an uneasy relationship with both states. “Women are afraid to look like they’re higher than you and they’re afraid to look like they’re lower than you,” Urbaniak says.eh.
posted by Catseye at 5:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
Just to get it out of the way can I say that the writing and editorial framing of this piece seem to completely confuse the reader? I'm still not sure if I've read a piece on one cool trick (the sandbox) or about a methodology or a profile of a guru. Also, "giddy coven."
On to the substance. I've studied Taoist energy work a bit (my husband is training in it) and I practice martial arts and I vaguely see the relationship in the same way that I can say yoga makes me a better communicator because it helps me practice listening. Being able to sit with power dynamics and respond from a place of centeredness is a pretty awesome thing, if one can achieve it.
Historic Taoist belief around gender essentialism though is pretty freaky and I think we need to be careful about which archetypes we invite into our minds to help us rewire our brains. I am pretty profoundly uncomfortable with high heels, corsets and riding crops as the artistic framing for her particular school of rewiring one's brain, since I personally associate dominatrix stuff with the performance of power for men's sexual pleasure, as well as being very transactional. I can see how it works vs. the soft, flowy, earth-goddess giving thing, sure.
But it makes me sad that the best version of strength this school came up with is that. It speaks so hard to how messed up things may have gotten, that our image of feminine power goes there.
Teaching survival techniques can be really helpful, just like teaching self-defence can be helpful. The sandbox technique is one I've used myself, but I've also used the freeze technique, the it wasn't so bad technique, the stay at home where it's safe technique...they are all useful techniques to cope with shit. And coping with shit is a source of power, yes. Giving women space to practice saying no and yes, and working on body language and breathing and opening minds to possibilities all seem like good and important work. So I support that, sure. But it's still shovelling shit.
In the end, I feel like this is the Victorian fetish and orientalism version of the same self-help stuff that maybe? Is helping? But not preventing the devastating waste of human potential when we get beaten down coping. The way the article ends is pretty much on point, I guess, in a sort of ironic way... “What’s the difference between something that burns up a few news cycles and something that lasts?” Probably not this? But maybe what the women in the course do afterwards.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
On to the substance. I've studied Taoist energy work a bit (my husband is training in it) and I practice martial arts and I vaguely see the relationship in the same way that I can say yoga makes me a better communicator because it helps me practice listening. Being able to sit with power dynamics and respond from a place of centeredness is a pretty awesome thing, if one can achieve it.
Historic Taoist belief around gender essentialism though is pretty freaky and I think we need to be careful about which archetypes we invite into our minds to help us rewire our brains. I am pretty profoundly uncomfortable with high heels, corsets and riding crops as the artistic framing for her particular school of rewiring one's brain, since I personally associate dominatrix stuff with the performance of power for men's sexual pleasure, as well as being very transactional. I can see how it works vs. the soft, flowy, earth-goddess giving thing, sure.
But it makes me sad that the best version of strength this school came up with is that. It speaks so hard to how messed up things may have gotten, that our image of feminine power goes there.
Teaching survival techniques can be really helpful, just like teaching self-defence can be helpful. The sandbox technique is one I've used myself, but I've also used the freeze technique, the it wasn't so bad technique, the stay at home where it's safe technique...they are all useful techniques to cope with shit. And coping with shit is a source of power, yes. Giving women space to practice saying no and yes, and working on body language and breathing and opening minds to possibilities all seem like good and important work. So I support that, sure. But it's still shovelling shit.
In the end, I feel like this is the Victorian fetish and orientalism version of the same self-help stuff that maybe? Is helping? But not preventing the devastating waste of human potential when we get beaten down coping. The way the article ends is pretty much on point, I guess, in a sort of ironic way... “What’s the difference between something that burns up a few news cycles and something that lasts?” Probably not this? But maybe what the women in the course do afterwards.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
I’m truly fascinated that people read that article and came away with the notion of “cult”. Like… really?
In what manner? Is she isolating them from their loved ones? Making them wear only white and eat nothing but broccoli? Is she using abusive, manipulative mind games to keep people? I mean, “cult” has a specific, real-world definition and I’m curious as to how people think it applies.
Complaining about charging? What, like she doesn’t have NYC rent & groceries to pay for? And this is America; people Don’t value what they don’t pay for.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 5:41 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
In what manner? Is she isolating them from their loved ones? Making them wear only white and eat nothing but broccoli? Is she using abusive, manipulative mind games to keep people? I mean, “cult” has a specific, real-world definition and I’m curious as to how people think it applies.
Complaining about charging? What, like she doesn’t have NYC rent & groceries to pay for? And this is America; people Don’t value what they don’t pay for.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 5:41 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
since I personally associate dominatrix stuff with the performance of power for men's sexual pleasure
I mean, ok, but there are actual dominant women out there who are gonna be kind of annoyed about this framing.
I think it’s another one of those things that exists both as the genuine thing that it presents itself as AND as a bastardized twisted version that exists only for the pleasure or service of men, because that is true of literally everything in the world.
Like I can’t think of a single thing that patriarchy hasn’t stolen, in some way, shape, or form. That doesn’t invalidate the things it steals from. It just means we have to do some work to interrogate how they’re being used and how we’re interacting with them. And I think it means giving us some space for acceptance, because it is hard to figure out your shit in this context.
Similarly, if we limit ourselves to traditions that aren’t shitty for women, we have like...zero traditions to choose from. I am perfectly comfortable taking what I find useful from whatever and chucking all the misogynist garbage, because I am so practiced at it. It’s...it’s literally everything.
posted by schadenfrau at 5:47 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
I mean, ok, but there are actual dominant women out there who are gonna be kind of annoyed about this framing.
I think it’s another one of those things that exists both as the genuine thing that it presents itself as AND as a bastardized twisted version that exists only for the pleasure or service of men, because that is true of literally everything in the world.
Like I can’t think of a single thing that patriarchy hasn’t stolen, in some way, shape, or form. That doesn’t invalidate the things it steals from. It just means we have to do some work to interrogate how they’re being used and how we’re interacting with them. And I think it means giving us some space for acceptance, because it is hard to figure out your shit in this context.
Similarly, if we limit ourselves to traditions that aren’t shitty for women, we have like...zero traditions to choose from. I am perfectly comfortable taking what I find useful from whatever and chucking all the misogynist garbage, because I am so practiced at it. It’s...it’s literally everything.
posted by schadenfrau at 5:47 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
(And the rule about taking what’s useful and chucking the garbage obviously doesn’t apply to just misogyny; I know there are analogs and reflections of this along every axis of oppression.)
posted by schadenfrau at 5:48 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by schadenfrau at 5:48 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
I mean, ok, but there are actual dominant women out there who are gonna be kind of annoyed about this framing.
I'm okay with that. If an individual woman finds that high heels, corsets, and leather are fully her and that floats her boat, then I support her, I guess. Reservedly.
But I don't personally find the dominant/submissive model a good way to run a country, and I don't really want her getting her rocks off being my boss, or my son's boss, or our daughters' boss. If what women want is a society where we are not constantly fetishized and used for the pleasure of others at the cost of our essential selves I guess I just think we could start by not framing empowerment with riding crops.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:56 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
I'm okay with that. If an individual woman finds that high heels, corsets, and leather are fully her and that floats her boat, then I support her, I guess. Reservedly.
But I don't personally find the dominant/submissive model a good way to run a country, and I don't really want her getting her rocks off being my boss, or my son's boss, or our daughters' boss. If what women want is a society where we are not constantly fetishized and used for the pleasure of others at the cost of our essential selves I guess I just think we could start by not framing empowerment with riding crops.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:56 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
My rule of thumb whenever something is presented to as empowering for women is to ask, is this what the people who actually have power are doing? Are the Harvey Weinsteins of the world wearing thigh-high stiletto boots and corsets to work? No, no they're not. So.
posted by Catseye at 5:58 AM on January 24, 2018 [12 favorites]
posted by Catseye at 5:58 AM on January 24, 2018 [12 favorites]
Ironically one of the earliest times I can remember having that freeze reflex in the face of a man hitting on me, I was carrying a riding crop. (I was 12, I was on a horse, he blocked my path and called me beautiful and suggested I go over for a kiss.) It didn't really help.
posted by Catseye at 6:05 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by Catseye at 6:05 AM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
Second-wave feminism recognized this problem back in the 70s and developed a similar approach: they gave classes in assertiveness training.
It was a thing, until the backlash to feminism hit and instead of standing up for themselves, women backed away from the concept, going so far as to say, "I'm not a feminist..."
So yes, we need to break our cultural habit of teaching females to be people-pleasers, and teach them to feel comfortable asserting themselves, especially when it comes to saying No. But a warning: just as there was a backlash to first- and second-wave feminism, there will be a backlash to this contemporary women's movement. Don't fall for it. Stay strong, and continue to insist that women must be seen as strong and capable.
Speaking of which, why the hell have we returned to using the honorific 'Miss' instead of 'Ms'? Why should a marital status indicator be necessary for women?
posted by Lunaloon at 6:19 AM on January 24, 2018 [13 favorites]
It was a thing, until the backlash to feminism hit and instead of standing up for themselves, women backed away from the concept, going so far as to say, "I'm not a feminist..."
So yes, we need to break our cultural habit of teaching females to be people-pleasers, and teach them to feel comfortable asserting themselves, especially when it comes to saying No. But a warning: just as there was a backlash to first- and second-wave feminism, there will be a backlash to this contemporary women's movement. Don't fall for it. Stay strong, and continue to insist that women must be seen as strong and capable.
Speaking of which, why the hell have we returned to using the honorific 'Miss' instead of 'Ms'? Why should a marital status indicator be necessary for women?
posted by Lunaloon at 6:19 AM on January 24, 2018 [13 favorites]
Because it's always important to know what bitches are already someone else's property/worth something vs. who's up for grabs/whores and trash?
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:27 AM on January 24, 2018
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:27 AM on January 24, 2018
Honestly, this thread is kind of exhausting
Same, schadenfrau.
There's actually some pretty solid behavior analysis under the techniques and approaches that were mentioned in the article. In fact, much of what's described is actually not that different from the old Model Mugging classes from the 1990s, which I've always thought pretty solid. (Shoutout here to the old book OPTIONS FOR AVOIDING ASSAULT, q.v.) The article is very clear that there's not that much explicitly "dominatrix" stuff happening in the class. The prices are actually completely reasonable for two people who have to run a highly labor-intensive small business in Manhattan and are probably taking home maybe 40% of the gross after rent and taxes. (And it's split between them.) There is exactly zero victim-blaming I can see going on there. Having better tools to deal with potentially dangerous situations -- and, waaaaay more importantly, having tools to unwind the patriarchy on its much more insidious thousand-little-interactions-a-day basis -- looks to me like a recipe for a better world.
And -- maybe it's a little unusual to hear "Men are not your enemy", but if we're going with the idea that the patriarchy hurts everyone, then no, men doing this shit are doing wrong, but they're not the enemy. Their behavior has been shaped by patriarchy -- verbally framing them as "the enemy" isn't gonna be very useful or helpful to anyone. Reshaping men's behavior by radically changing women's responses sure does sound to me like a recipe for a better future for everyone.
But this is the Internet, where we are all trained to be jaded cultural critics and nothing is allowed to be sincere or good or meaningful. Gosh, I wonder who and what that whole crab bucket repertoire benefits.
posted by PsychoTherapist at 6:55 AM on January 24, 2018 [15 favorites]
Same, schadenfrau.
There's actually some pretty solid behavior analysis under the techniques and approaches that were mentioned in the article. In fact, much of what's described is actually not that different from the old Model Mugging classes from the 1990s, which I've always thought pretty solid. (Shoutout here to the old book OPTIONS FOR AVOIDING ASSAULT, q.v.) The article is very clear that there's not that much explicitly "dominatrix" stuff happening in the class. The prices are actually completely reasonable for two people who have to run a highly labor-intensive small business in Manhattan and are probably taking home maybe 40% of the gross after rent and taxes. (And it's split between them.) There is exactly zero victim-blaming I can see going on there. Having better tools to deal with potentially dangerous situations -- and, waaaaay more importantly, having tools to unwind the patriarchy on its much more insidious thousand-little-interactions-a-day basis -- looks to me like a recipe for a better world.
And -- maybe it's a little unusual to hear "Men are not your enemy", but if we're going with the idea that the patriarchy hurts everyone, then no, men doing this shit are doing wrong, but they're not the enemy. Their behavior has been shaped by patriarchy -- verbally framing them as "the enemy" isn't gonna be very useful or helpful to anyone. Reshaping men's behavior by radically changing women's responses sure does sound to me like a recipe for a better future for everyone.
But this is the Internet, where we are all trained to be jaded cultural critics and nothing is allowed to be sincere or good or meaningful. Gosh, I wonder who and what that whole crab bucket repertoire benefits.
posted by PsychoTherapist at 6:55 AM on January 24, 2018 [15 favorites]
I’m truly fascinated that people read that article and came away with the notion of “cult”. Like… really?
I think superficially the idea sounds a lot like the "badass bitch boot-camp" from that FPP, which might explain why at least a few people have jumped immediately to "Oh, this is probably a cult, just like that other thing."
(I'm reserving judgment on The Academy itself, because I haven't read the article. But I'll confess that reading the description immediately called that other FPP to mind for me.)
posted by tobascodagama at 7:00 AM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
I think superficially the idea sounds a lot like the "badass bitch boot-camp" from that FPP, which might explain why at least a few people have jumped immediately to "Oh, this is probably a cult, just like that other thing."
(I'm reserving judgment on The Academy itself, because I haven't read the article. But I'll confess that reading the description immediately called that other FPP to mind for me.)
posted by tobascodagama at 7:00 AM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
I got an extra dose of irritation for people who are yelling "They should give it away for cheap or free!"
You give it away for cheap or free. All this knowledge is basically in the public domain. For maybe $100 in decent books you too could put together a course outline that is reasonably similar to the Academy's.
I don't know how you're going to pay your rent or your other bills while giving it away for cheap or free, but that's not my problem. Just don't insist that someone else should do that for you.
posted by PsychoTherapist at 7:02 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
You give it away for cheap or free. All this knowledge is basically in the public domain. For maybe $100 in decent books you too could put together a course outline that is reasonably similar to the Academy's.
I don't know how you're going to pay your rent or your other bills while giving it away for cheap or free, but that's not my problem. Just don't insist that someone else should do that for you.
posted by PsychoTherapist at 7:02 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
Yes – while a backlash is predictable, that sort of backlash is exactly tiresome and predictable.
And to put things in another light – asking women to give away knowledge and skills for free isn't a shining beacon of feminism. I get why people feel aversion to power, it's just that aversion seems to become particularly vocal when addressed to women. It's a lot more nuanced when men are involved.
There are also background questions of individuality versus collectivism that I see behind a lot of reactions. When individual women share their experiences and then work with others to develop ways to help more, it's tempting to cast it as collective and related to womanhood... when that's kind of the temptation we need to move away from. Men are attributed agency and individuality even when they're behaving collectively. Why don't we do the same for women? We can see these women as individuals, using their individuality to improve things collectively, and it makes a lot more sense, plus it gives women more agency, collectively. Bonus: it opens everything for everyone. It is intersectional in its very nature.
Whereas if the reaction is a quick "oh no this is going to be turned against women collectively," well. If we don't see women as individuals, then yes, that's exactly what will happen. It is indeed predictable. A potential defense is recognizing we're individuals and have different ways of being in the world. What works for me won't work for others; what works for other's doesn't work for me. This is not a reflection of womanhood but of humanity.
posted by fraula at 7:14 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
And to put things in another light – asking women to give away knowledge and skills for free isn't a shining beacon of feminism. I get why people feel aversion to power, it's just that aversion seems to become particularly vocal when addressed to women. It's a lot more nuanced when men are involved.
There are also background questions of individuality versus collectivism that I see behind a lot of reactions. When individual women share their experiences and then work with others to develop ways to help more, it's tempting to cast it as collective and related to womanhood... when that's kind of the temptation we need to move away from. Men are attributed agency and individuality even when they're behaving collectively. Why don't we do the same for women? We can see these women as individuals, using their individuality to improve things collectively, and it makes a lot more sense, plus it gives women more agency, collectively. Bonus: it opens everything for everyone. It is intersectional in its very nature.
Whereas if the reaction is a quick "oh no this is going to be turned against women collectively," well. If we don't see women as individuals, then yes, that's exactly what will happen. It is indeed predictable. A potential defense is recognizing we're individuals and have different ways of being in the world. What works for me won't work for others; what works for other's doesn't work for me. This is not a reflection of womanhood but of humanity.
posted by fraula at 7:14 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
There is exactly zero victim-blaming I can see going on there.
There's a difference between 'victim blaming' and what this is, which is individualising the problem via casting it in a self-help framework. But individualising the problem is still something I have a problem with, yes. The theory of 'compression', of women being afraid of standing up to men because we have a psychological sense of discomfort with our societal role, and we need to break away from that discomfort? Well, it's not that there's nothing to that, I'm happy if it helps some women to think of it like that, but on the whole we're afraid of standing up to men because men can harm us. (Why did I freeze up when confronted by that creep I mentioned above, when I was 12? Was it because I felt an internal conflict between my 'dom' and 'sub' roles? No.)
It's like all that advice for women in the workplace, that recognises we are less likely to put ourselves forward for promotions or opportunities (yes!) but suggests that the solution is to be more assertive, be more like our male colleagues are. It ignores the reason why we're not more assertive in the first place, which is that our assertiveness gets read as aggressive, bitchy, unpleasant, in a way that men's doesn't and we know this.
I honestly do not say this because I am jaded and bitter and don't want anyone to have anything nice.
Reshaping men's behavior by radically changing women's responses sure does sound to me like a recipe for a better future for everyone.
I am not following this. Why do you imagine that in a hierarchy of power, there exists a way for those on the bottom to change the behaviour of those on the top by just... responding more assertively?
posted by Catseye at 7:15 AM on January 24, 2018 [12 favorites]
There's a difference between 'victim blaming' and what this is, which is individualising the problem via casting it in a self-help framework. But individualising the problem is still something I have a problem with, yes. The theory of 'compression', of women being afraid of standing up to men because we have a psychological sense of discomfort with our societal role, and we need to break away from that discomfort? Well, it's not that there's nothing to that, I'm happy if it helps some women to think of it like that, but on the whole we're afraid of standing up to men because men can harm us. (Why did I freeze up when confronted by that creep I mentioned above, when I was 12? Was it because I felt an internal conflict between my 'dom' and 'sub' roles? No.)
It's like all that advice for women in the workplace, that recognises we are less likely to put ourselves forward for promotions or opportunities (yes!) but suggests that the solution is to be more assertive, be more like our male colleagues are. It ignores the reason why we're not more assertive in the first place, which is that our assertiveness gets read as aggressive, bitchy, unpleasant, in a way that men's doesn't and we know this.
I honestly do not say this because I am jaded and bitter and don't want anyone to have anything nice.
Reshaping men's behavior by radically changing women's responses sure does sound to me like a recipe for a better future for everyone.
I am not following this. Why do you imagine that in a hierarchy of power, there exists a way for those on the bottom to change the behaviour of those on the top by just... responding more assertively?
posted by Catseye at 7:15 AM on January 24, 2018 [12 favorites]
It ignores the reason why we're not more assertive in the first place, which is that our assertiveness gets read as aggressive, bitchy, unpleasant, in a way that men's doesn't and we know this.
Except no. The premise is that, while we are conscious of some of the ways patriarchy shapes our interactions and constrains our choices, there are other ways it affects that are pre-conscious. That beyond limiting the avenues available to us, it gets insides our heads and limits the avenues we can see. That is a qualitatively different thing, and pretending it doesn’t exist, or that it might not need to be addressed with qualitatively different strategies or tactics, kind of adds to the problem.
There’s also some fixation in the BDSM angle that makes me wonder if people are reacting to that. I mean, it’s one framework to get at this stuff, and it’s working for these women. There was nothing I saw that indicated it held itself up as The One True Truth and Way of looking at, understanding, or addressing these phenomena. So...who gives a shit? If that framework doesn’t sparkle for you, use a different one. If this works for these women, why shit on them for it?
posted by schadenfrau at 7:35 AM on January 24, 2018 [6 favorites]
Except no. The premise is that, while we are conscious of some of the ways patriarchy shapes our interactions and constrains our choices, there are other ways it affects that are pre-conscious. That beyond limiting the avenues available to us, it gets insides our heads and limits the avenues we can see. That is a qualitatively different thing, and pretending it doesn’t exist, or that it might not need to be addressed with qualitatively different strategies or tactics, kind of adds to the problem.
There’s also some fixation in the BDSM angle that makes me wonder if people are reacting to that. I mean, it’s one framework to get at this stuff, and it’s working for these women. There was nothing I saw that indicated it held itself up as The One True Truth and Way of looking at, understanding, or addressing these phenomena. So...who gives a shit? If that framework doesn’t sparkle for you, use a different one. If this works for these women, why shit on them for it?
posted by schadenfrau at 7:35 AM on January 24, 2018 [6 favorites]
I'm often afraid of my own anger so while working on that issue I think the article was helpful because there are other responses than yelling or kicking a guy in the balls. Like, I realize that such men described in the article deserve that fate, my sense of the situations described is that the familiarity of the men and women disarm women from reacting. The familiarity of men who have sexually abused me on dates or bosses who mansplained and ignored my expertise was the reason I couldn't let myself get angry until the situation was over and I had time to process what happened, which of course is far to late and damaging to my sense of self worth. If I had the tools to redirect, which I think I could have actually done, I think I would have avoided a lot of bad outcomes. Singing would have been better than what transpired because I caved or didn't say no enough times. Kicking my boss or a guy like Harvey in the balls or shouting would just not have happened due to their familiarity and position, unfortunately, and they knew it. An unexpected turn of the mood by me taking control of the conversation would have been very effective in giving me time to make an escape without jeopardizing my sense of control.
posted by waving at 7:39 AM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by waving at 7:39 AM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
Perhaps she appropriates Taoism, or perhaps, like a lot of people, it’s something she’s incorporated into her worldview and that’s the thing she’s teaching.
It's possible to be doing something that helps women and has tangible results while still being culturally appropriative/objectifying. There are entire cultures and countries where Taoism is actually a major religion, and embedded in people's way of life with a long history. Not sure how I feel about (yet another) white female doing something with good intentions while getting to pick and choose what she wants out of other marginalized cultures/religion to serve her own narrative. (In her own words: "I spent years doing that — making money as a dominatrix and studying to be a Taoist nun, learning crazy cool energetic martial art healing techniques. I was going to become superhuman.”)
There are parallels with Goop - but I guess it's easier for people to deride Goop because its results/efficacy is more questionable. Whereas this is dressed up as female empowerment, and has obviously made some females feel and act in more empowered ways. But that doesn't mean it's any less culturally appropriative/objectifying. Just very tired of white females picking out "exotic" Asian cultural aspects for their own profit and branding.
posted by aielen at 7:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
It's possible to be doing something that helps women and has tangible results while still being culturally appropriative/objectifying. There are entire cultures and countries where Taoism is actually a major religion, and embedded in people's way of life with a long history. Not sure how I feel about (yet another) white female doing something with good intentions while getting to pick and choose what she wants out of other marginalized cultures/religion to serve her own narrative. (In her own words: "I spent years doing that — making money as a dominatrix and studying to be a Taoist nun, learning crazy cool energetic martial art healing techniques. I was going to become superhuman.”)
There are parallels with Goop - but I guess it's easier for people to deride Goop because its results/efficacy is more questionable. Whereas this is dressed up as female empowerment, and has obviously made some females feel and act in more empowered ways. But that doesn't mean it's any less culturally appropriative/objectifying. Just very tired of white females picking out "exotic" Asian cultural aspects for their own profit and branding.
posted by aielen at 7:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
That is a qualitatively different thing, and pretending it doesn’t exist, or that it might not need to be addressed with qualitatively different strategies or tactics, kind of adds to the problem.
I am fully aware that it a) exists, b) is a problem, and c) is worth addressing. And I have said several times now that if women find this particular course useful to them, then that's great. Nobody here is 'shitting on' the women who found this course useful.
posted by Catseye at 7:43 AM on January 24, 2018
I am fully aware that it a) exists, b) is a problem, and c) is worth addressing. And I have said several times now that if women find this particular course useful to them, then that's great. Nobody here is 'shitting on' the women who found this course useful.
posted by Catseye at 7:43 AM on January 24, 2018
The familiarity of men who have sexually abused me on dates or bosses who mansplained and ignored my expertise was the reason I couldn't let myself get angry until the situation was over and I had time to process what happened, which of course is far to late and damaging to my sense of self worth
I call this le shame d’escalier, because while I (obviously) don’t actually speak French, it somehow captures that delayed “godDAMMIT they got me AGAIN” feeling.
posted by schadenfrau at 7:56 AM on January 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
I call this le shame d’escalier, because while I (obviously) don’t actually speak French, it somehow captures that delayed “godDAMMIT they got me AGAIN” feeling.
posted by schadenfrau at 7:56 AM on January 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
I found the article thought provoking - Specifically in her summation of Hillary Clinton (and the internal struggle to try and fit oneself into every category at once), and how “performing” power can be unhelpful.
I'm really let down by some of the responses here - specifically - why does it matter what Urbaniak is wearing?
posted by Constant Reader at 8:08 AM on January 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
I'm really let down by some of the responses here - specifically - why does it matter what Urbaniak is wearing?
posted by Constant Reader at 8:08 AM on January 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
I'm really let down by some of the responses here - specifically - why does it matter what Urbaniak is wearing?
In the words of the article: "Though Urbaniak hasn’t worked as a dominatrix full-time in years, she certainly still looks the part, and the philosophy, lingo, and general sense of playful eroticism that pervades everything the Academy does are all straight from the dungeon." So in other words, because it's explicitly linked to the overall philosophy of the Academy.
I think it's missing the mark somewhat to be puzzled at why anyone's even mentioning the BDSM thing, as if it's all a total irrelevance. You could ask I suppose why the article features this so heavily, and whether that's the same degree of focus Urbaniak herself or her students would have put on it had the choice been hers. But in an article about a course in which, and I quote, "students are referred to as “mistresses” and in workshops sometimes dress in corsets and bondage gear; while teaching, Urbaniak wields a riding crop", it's surely not all that puzzling that people might comment on that aspect?
posted by Catseye at 8:21 AM on January 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
In the words of the article: "Though Urbaniak hasn’t worked as a dominatrix full-time in years, she certainly still looks the part, and the philosophy, lingo, and general sense of playful eroticism that pervades everything the Academy does are all straight from the dungeon." So in other words, because it's explicitly linked to the overall philosophy of the Academy.
I think it's missing the mark somewhat to be puzzled at why anyone's even mentioning the BDSM thing, as if it's all a total irrelevance. You could ask I suppose why the article features this so heavily, and whether that's the same degree of focus Urbaniak herself or her students would have put on it had the choice been hers. But in an article about a course in which, and I quote, "students are referred to as “mistresses” and in workshops sometimes dress in corsets and bondage gear; while teaching, Urbaniak wields a riding crop", it's surely not all that puzzling that people might comment on that aspect?
posted by Catseye at 8:21 AM on January 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Literally the only issue I have with this entire thing is the price tag. People got to get paid in a capitalist society, I know. But the cost of admission for what sounds like fairly insightful tools (and that many of them come from the kink scene doesn't surprise me, given the incredible amount of deconstruction of power and the emphasis on the importance of consent that goes on there) already rules out a huge swath of women who, because of other axes of oppression, are especially vulnerable to be targeted for sexual harassment and assault. Which isn't to say that women who can afford to drop a few grand on a seminar aren't vulnerable, of course. It's just a shame that the women who could especially benefit won't be able to cross that financial hurdle, even if I totally get that a person imparting well earned knowledge has every right to ask for compensation in exchange for that knowledge.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 8:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 8:40 AM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
The Cara Delavigne story about Harvey Weinstein ordering her to make out with another woman present and she just started singing instead, and he got confused and let her go -- that sounds a lot like the old advice they gave girls to piss themselves or puke or act "crazy" if a stranger grabbed them in an alleyway, because you can scare him off if he thinks you're more trouble than you're worth. none of these things feel to me like one's inner dom rising, even if they are good for survival. which I am prepared to believe they might be.
I mean it's only a power move by accident. what it mostly was, was luck. good for her and god bless her, but I'm not sure the lesson is what it's said to be. "pretend the thing that's happening isn't happening, pretend you didn't hear what he just said" -- that IS the freeze reflex in action! and as the story shows, sometimes it actually works better than anything else.
I don't think that's it. It's more that she flipped the script and behaved with noncomplementarity. It knocked him out of his current pattern and into another one.
posted by leotrotsky at 8:43 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
I mean it's only a power move by accident. what it mostly was, was luck. good for her and god bless her, but I'm not sure the lesson is what it's said to be. "pretend the thing that's happening isn't happening, pretend you didn't hear what he just said" -- that IS the freeze reflex in action! and as the story shows, sometimes it actually works better than anything else.
I don't think that's it. It's more that she flipped the script and behaved with noncomplementarity. It knocked him out of his current pattern and into another one.
posted by leotrotsky at 8:43 AM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
I mean it's only a power move by accident. what it mostly was, was luck. good for her and god bless her, but I'm not sure the lesson is what it's said to be. "pretend the thing that's happening isn't happening, pretend you didn't hear what he just said" -- that IS the freeze reflex in action! and as the story shows, sometimes it actually works better than anything else.
It's not pretending it's not happening. It's about having the wherewithall to recognize what is happening and do something despite it. This is not the same as the freeze reflex. I've experienced both these types of scenarios and it isn't the same at all. I wish someone had told/taught me this a couple of decades ago and not just for dealing with assault type scenarios. Somewhere along the line I figured it out, probably by accident, and it's something in my toolbox that has proven itself to be useful. It still is hard though.
posted by Jalliah at 9:01 AM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
It's not pretending it's not happening. It's about having the wherewithall to recognize what is happening and do something despite it. This is not the same as the freeze reflex. I've experienced both these types of scenarios and it isn't the same at all. I wish someone had told/taught me this a couple of decades ago and not just for dealing with assault type scenarios. Somewhere along the line I figured it out, probably by accident, and it's something in my toolbox that has proven itself to be useful. It still is hard though.
posted by Jalliah at 9:01 AM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
A veteran of the Russian Spetznaz opined in a documentary about their training that:
The riding crop is not a magic wand that gives one special magic powers. It's a prop, because this is all theater. The corsets, gloves, these are symbols of discipline and dominance. But like so much of human social experience, we use external props and costumes and symbols to perform acts that lets us internalize experiences. And then we take those experiences out into our everyday lives.
Anti-sex-worker prejudice is a thing.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 9:44 AM on January 24, 2018 [12 favorites]
Nobody "rises to the occasion'; under stress, you sink to the lowest level of your preparation.To me, that's really the vibe I get off The Academy. The ability to look at uncomfortable situations, and still be able to take decisive action.
The riding crop is not a magic wand that gives one special magic powers. It's a prop, because this is all theater. The corsets, gloves, these are symbols of discipline and dominance. But like so much of human social experience, we use external props and costumes and symbols to perform acts that lets us internalize experiences. And then we take those experiences out into our everyday lives.
Ki is, of course, mystical bullshit. That's why it works so well, both as a teaching idiom and a tool of practice in martial arts. It's as nonexistent as charm, leadership, or acting. Humans are all about bullshit."This is not about teaching women to "get their rocks off at work". But it is absolutely using the tools (both physical as well as intellectual) of professional sex work as a vehicle to something that's not specifically about sex, but about how one experiences and navigates one's life.
-Andrew Plotkin
Anti-sex-worker prejudice is a thing.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 9:44 AM on January 24, 2018 [12 favorites]
I noticed that many of the examples of what the students were volunteering when talking about scenarios from their own lives were not anything having to do with sex or sexual assault. Women who find themselves doing everything at home and don't know how to talk to their partner about fixing that. Women who should be getting raises but don't know how to ask. Getting shit work dumped on you by men of all varieties. Emotional labor.
It's not pretending it's not happening. It's about having the wherewithall to recognize what is happening and do something despite it. This is not the same as the freeze reflex.
Yes. I'm a big freezer. I hate that about myself. I have very little ability to cope with threats and I just shut down. I would have never done what Delvigne did. The usual advice given on Ask when it comes to "I don't know how to be when X happens" is to develop a script and practice it until it's second nature. Which seems like a lot of what's being done in these classes.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:53 AM on January 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
It's not pretending it's not happening. It's about having the wherewithall to recognize what is happening and do something despite it. This is not the same as the freeze reflex.
Yes. I'm a big freezer. I hate that about myself. I have very little ability to cope with threats and I just shut down. I would have never done what Delvigne did. The usual advice given on Ask when it comes to "I don't know how to be when X happens" is to develop a script and practice it until it's second nature. Which seems like a lot of what's being done in these classes.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:53 AM on January 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
Catseye I agree the article placed a lot of emphasis on how BSDM is used w/in the courses. It's when the statement shifted from this to whether a man in power would also dress in stilettos and/or corsets I felt an implication of prejudice for women who dress this way.
posted by Constant Reader at 10:20 AM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Constant Reader at 10:20 AM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
I used to play a fairly combat-heavy LARP with padded weapons and the freeze reflex was really common in new players. Many women showed it. Somewhat fewer men had it, but instead some had the "frothing rage when under pressure" response, which is more of a problem and I think is harder to break.
It can be trained out of someone with consistent rehearsal and preparation for pressure situations. If jumped by an orc I would cast this spell and then that spell entirely on reflex, and then I would pause to consciously assess the situation. I'm not saying a sexual harassment situation is like being attacked by an orc, but...
...that analogy worked way better than I expected.
I think a dominatrix brings a valuable perspective on the subtle ways that power exchange happens. Maybe the framing of the article is missing that point in favour of the overt stuff like corsets and riding crops.
posted by allegedly at 10:53 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
It can be trained out of someone with consistent rehearsal and preparation for pressure situations. If jumped by an orc I would cast this spell and then that spell entirely on reflex, and then I would pause to consciously assess the situation. I'm not saying a sexual harassment situation is like being attacked by an orc, but...
...that analogy worked way better than I expected.
I think a dominatrix brings a valuable perspective on the subtle ways that power exchange happens. Maybe the framing of the article is missing that point in favour of the overt stuff like corsets and riding crops.
posted by allegedly at 10:53 AM on January 24, 2018 [7 favorites]
It's when the statement shifted from this to whether a man in power would also dress in stilettos and/or corsets I felt an implication of prejudice for women who dress this way.
I suspect we are coming at this from very vastly different perspectives. I’m not talking about my personal views on somebody’s fashion sense. I’m talking specifically about what gets culturally sold to women as ‘empowering’.
posted by Catseye at 12:06 PM on January 24, 2018 [10 favorites]
I suspect we are coming at this from very vastly different perspectives. I’m not talking about my personal views on somebody’s fashion sense. I’m talking specifically about what gets culturally sold to women as ‘empowering’.
posted by Catseye at 12:06 PM on January 24, 2018 [10 favorites]
I agree the article placed a lot of emphasis on how BSDM is used w/in the courses
Does the article author really understand power-play and power exchange or are they using the BDSM aspects for titillation purposes, to sell the story? I think it's the latter. I can see how BDSM-informed discourse and practice on power dynamics aligns totally with the course goals. Power is a visceral thing.
posted by Thella at 12:32 PM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
Does the article author really understand power-play and power exchange or are they using the BDSM aspects for titillation purposes, to sell the story? I think it's the latter. I can see how BDSM-informed discourse and practice on power dynamics aligns totally with the course goals. Power is a visceral thing.
posted by Thella at 12:32 PM on January 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
I'm seriously not looking forward to dealing with this, and I've dealt with unwanted attention and contact a couple of times, if only mildly. I've even already experienced men talking over me or talking at me depending on how into their own testosterone they are because for most of my life my affect and way of interacting is less masculine.
And even I froze and didn't react as appropriately defensively or as angry as I should have been. I know part of this is a personal history of childhood abuse and conditioning, but I definitely haven't been conditioned in the same was someone cis/AFAB has.
And one of the fairly valid points that some cis/AFAB friends have brought up is that transwomen kind of skip past a lot of the cultural/intitutional misogyny and conditioning and oppression, and that isn't "fair' or whatever. And I can sympathize with that.
The other side of that coin, though, is that I probably don't have the coping skills, experience or strategy to recognize danger in the same ways. Like, the thought of someone spiking my drink is totally foreign to me.
I swear, though, the first dude that tries to grab my ass is going to be lucky to get even pieces of it back. I do not react well at all to having my space invaded due to a lot of issues with said history of childhood abuse.
And even now I'm sitting here thinking in terms of "I'm unattractive and not a likely target." like that actually means anything when it comes to sexual assault, abuse and power. Which, yay, is totally fucked and lots of fun.
Today's male privilege: I was riding the bus, and there's this old super creepy wino dude on the bus that I knew from my last job, and I can vigorously confirm that he is super creepy and a jerk. A few stops later a younger woman gets on, maybe 19, getting picked up from the stop near the community college campus. As she gets on the bus and passes to the back past me and old creepy wino dude.
Creepy old dude obviously focuses on her butt and turns his whole body around to watch her walking away.. except I'm now leaning out into the aisle blocking his view and staring him right in the eyes and slowly shaking my head "no" at him. He tried bobbing his head around me, but when creepy dude realized I was actually giving him a whole bunch of stinkeye and not just looking out the front of the bus he lurched back and was visibly startled and turned back around in a hurry. I will confess I enjoyed seeing him look a little scared and startled.
posted by loquacious at 12:56 PM on January 24, 2018 [14 favorites]
And even I froze and didn't react as appropriately defensively or as angry as I should have been. I know part of this is a personal history of childhood abuse and conditioning, but I definitely haven't been conditioned in the same was someone cis/AFAB has.
And one of the fairly valid points that some cis/AFAB friends have brought up is that transwomen kind of skip past a lot of the cultural/intitutional misogyny and conditioning and oppression, and that isn't "fair' or whatever. And I can sympathize with that.
The other side of that coin, though, is that I probably don't have the coping skills, experience or strategy to recognize danger in the same ways. Like, the thought of someone spiking my drink is totally foreign to me.
I swear, though, the first dude that tries to grab my ass is going to be lucky to get even pieces of it back. I do not react well at all to having my space invaded due to a lot of issues with said history of childhood abuse.
And even now I'm sitting here thinking in terms of "I'm unattractive and not a likely target." like that actually means anything when it comes to sexual assault, abuse and power. Which, yay, is totally fucked and lots of fun.
Today's male privilege: I was riding the bus, and there's this old super creepy wino dude on the bus that I knew from my last job, and I can vigorously confirm that he is super creepy and a jerk. A few stops later a younger woman gets on, maybe 19, getting picked up from the stop near the community college campus. As she gets on the bus and passes to the back past me and old creepy wino dude.
Creepy old dude obviously focuses on her butt and turns his whole body around to watch her walking away.. except I'm now leaning out into the aisle blocking his view and staring him right in the eyes and slowly shaking my head "no" at him. He tried bobbing his head around me, but when creepy dude realized I was actually giving him a whole bunch of stinkeye and not just looking out the front of the bus he lurched back and was visibly startled and turned back around in a hurry. I will confess I enjoyed seeing him look a little scared and startled.
posted by loquacious at 12:56 PM on January 24, 2018 [14 favorites]
I suspect we are coming at this from very vastly different perspectives. I’m not talking about my personal views on somebody’s fashion sense. I’m talking specifically about what gets culturally sold to women as ‘empowering’.
Do you care at all about what women themselves find empowering?
posted by schadenfrau at 1:58 PM on January 24, 2018
Do you care at all about what women themselves find empowering?
posted by schadenfrau at 1:58 PM on January 24, 2018
Do you care at all about what women themselves find empowering?
Wait, what? First I'm shitting on the women who went on this course, now I'm wantonly disregarding the preferences of women who want to wear thigh-high stilettos?
I have close to no idea what it is you think I'm saying, but I'm fairly sure it is not what I'm actually saying, and therefore this seems like a pretty pointless argument to have.
posted by Catseye at 2:04 PM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
Wait, what? First I'm shitting on the women who went on this course, now I'm wantonly disregarding the preferences of women who want to wear thigh-high stilettos?
I have close to no idea what it is you think I'm saying, but I'm fairly sure it is not what I'm actually saying, and therefore this seems like a pretty pointless argument to have.
posted by Catseye at 2:04 PM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
I also thought that, while there were some interesting tools identified here—about assertiveness, and (separately) about handling situations of real danger—the article wraps it up in some ethical and behavioural claims that just feel...off. There’s a bit where we seem to be told that equality is not a thing, either someone is dominant or submissive or “compressed” (because something to do with dogs, something to do with humans are animals, a reference to evolution). There’s a bit where we “honour the patriarchy” for, I guess, teaching us about the centrality of hierarchical relationships to human existence. There’s a bit about how we have to put down our weapons in some battle of the sexes and how women need “empowered softness”.
Suppose we just say:
—equality is good. Relationships of genuine dominance—not play-acting dominance, with consent, but involving a real and non-negotiated imbalance of power without constraint—are inherently bad.
—in the current social order, for reasons that are purely historical and contingent, we are all enmeshed to varying degrees in non-negotiated relationships of power imbalance. This is bad.
—Therefore, we need tools 1) on an individual level, to address the real dangers that this situation puts us in and 2) on a collective level, to dismantle this dumb system and work to usher in a genuinely egalitarian distribution of power. The former tools are behavioural and psychological and material (I would like, for example, as many women to have hiring power in Hollywood as men. I think that would help.) The latter tools are political and cultural and legal. Men who exploit their power over women should be faced with unpleasant practical consequences, from losing their jobs to going to jail. We will need both sets of tools for a really long time.
What does any of this have to do with honouring the patriarchy, domination, ways in which humans are like dogs and/or empowered softnesss? All that stuff gets my hackles up, and I don’t think I’m just being needlessly negative and pedantic. The vocabulary sounds to me like the vocabulary of systems of thought that basically essentialise inequality/dominance, as a permanent and normative feature of the human condition. Such systems of thought are both bullshit and dangerous and shouldn’t be given much quarter even when the people putting them forward seem well-meaning and helpful.
posted by Aravis76 at 2:42 PM on January 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
Suppose we just say:
—equality is good. Relationships of genuine dominance—not play-acting dominance, with consent, but involving a real and non-negotiated imbalance of power without constraint—are inherently bad.
—in the current social order, for reasons that are purely historical and contingent, we are all enmeshed to varying degrees in non-negotiated relationships of power imbalance. This is bad.
—Therefore, we need tools 1) on an individual level, to address the real dangers that this situation puts us in and 2) on a collective level, to dismantle this dumb system and work to usher in a genuinely egalitarian distribution of power. The former tools are behavioural and psychological and material (I would like, for example, as many women to have hiring power in Hollywood as men. I think that would help.) The latter tools are political and cultural and legal. Men who exploit their power over women should be faced with unpleasant practical consequences, from losing their jobs to going to jail. We will need both sets of tools for a really long time.
What does any of this have to do with honouring the patriarchy, domination, ways in which humans are like dogs and/or empowered softnesss? All that stuff gets my hackles up, and I don’t think I’m just being needlessly negative and pedantic. The vocabulary sounds to me like the vocabulary of systems of thought that basically essentialise inequality/dominance, as a permanent and normative feature of the human condition. Such systems of thought are both bullshit and dangerous and shouldn’t be given much quarter even when the people putting them forward seem well-meaning and helpful.
posted by Aravis76 at 2:42 PM on January 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
I also think Cesar Milan is bullshit, but that's a bad reading of "empowered softness". From the article:
Urbaniak remarks on how prepared she’d been for a wall of abject rage, and how awed she was to instead find a collective inclination toward empowered softness. “When a woman takes a position of power, she can afford compassion,” Urbaniak notes.
posted by airmail at 3:53 PM on January 24, 2018
Urbaniak remarks on how prepared she’d been for a wall of abject rage, and how awed she was to instead find a collective inclination toward empowered softness. “When a woman takes a position of power, she can afford compassion,” Urbaniak notes.
posted by airmail at 3:53 PM on January 24, 2018
Do you care at all about what women themselves find empowering?
Hi, I'm a woman – or, at least, an AFAB person who thought she was cis until age 46, two years ago – and I also feel uncomfortable with the message "wear thigh-high boots and corsets to feel empowered". There are many ways of claiming and embracing one's sense of power. Feeling discomfort or dislike for "wear an outfit that's strongly and closely associated with sexuality to reclaim your power" doesn't make me an anti-sex prude, or a bad feminist, or anything like that. Neither does raising questions about whether this is a good way, or the best way, to claim power.
For me, wearing a corset and thigh-high boots would feel actively disempowering. (I wear flat-soled footwear when I top. And when I bottom. And I never wear corsets because they don't feel good to me and I'll be damned if I sacrifice my sense of comfort and confidence to satisfy somebody else's visual preference.)
Helping women feel more powerful and better able to speak should not involve choosing one way to do it and telling the women for whom that doesn't work that they/we are doing it wrong.
posted by Lexica at 4:08 PM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
Hi, I'm a woman – or, at least, an AFAB person who thought she was cis until age 46, two years ago – and I also feel uncomfortable with the message "wear thigh-high boots and corsets to feel empowered". There are many ways of claiming and embracing one's sense of power. Feeling discomfort or dislike for "wear an outfit that's strongly and closely associated with sexuality to reclaim your power" doesn't make me an anti-sex prude, or a bad feminist, or anything like that. Neither does raising questions about whether this is a good way, or the best way, to claim power.
For me, wearing a corset and thigh-high boots would feel actively disempowering. (I wear flat-soled footwear when I top. And when I bottom. And I never wear corsets because they don't feel good to me and I'll be damned if I sacrifice my sense of comfort and confidence to satisfy somebody else's visual preference.)
Helping women feel more powerful and better able to speak should not involve choosing one way to do it and telling the women for whom that doesn't work that they/we are doing it wrong.
posted by Lexica at 4:08 PM on January 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
The other side of that coin, though, is that I probably don't have the coping skills, experience or strategy to recognize danger in the same ways. Like, the thought of someone spiking my drink is totally foreign to me
me too and me neither, even though I was AFAB and continue to be so at the present time and into the future. good example because I know what that is, I know it happens, I even know a bunch of stuff about the drugs that are used to make it happen. but what does that have to do with the way I behave at a bar? fuck all. I feel invisible and impervious unless I am being actively yelled at or grabbed, and even when that's a lot of the time it isn't even as much as an hour per day, added up. usually somewhat less. all the other hours when nobody's doing anything to drag me down, they lull me back to normalcy and away from alertness, every time.
so it isn't the same, I'm sure, because we had different childhood experiences and also because we are different individuals. but as another woman who knows with my brain a lot of things I wasn't fully trained to feel with my body, I really treasure and cling to that lack of experience and instinct and I intend to ride that train until the conductor flings me right through a window. when that happens, I will not be surprised but I bet I will not be prepared either.
the thing about the freeze reflex, the reflex everybody, including me, deprecates, is that you freeze when you cannot believe something so shocking can be happening at all, let alone to you. you freeze when all the rules are broken and the geometry is non-Euclidean and so on.
but the problem, then, is that in order to train out the freeze reflex you have to eliminate the shock; normalize and internalize the fact that men hate you so it doesn't get at you beneath your rationality the way seeing a four-inch centipede on the wall does. you can't be free to feel the normal-human horror at seeing at the awful things God made. instead, you have to practice and practice and practice imagining a guy demanding you do something outrageous, ordering you to do something obscene, expecting you to do something stupid, physically doing things to you. and when it is as natural as breathing, when a guy saying Hey come here and do this is no more startling than the weatherman saying it looks like rain, then you can be free from the tyranny of reflex and start building new reflexes or invent a specialized reaction for each instance, a fresh one every time, tailored to the circumstance.
but that is a loss as well as a gain. so I argue it both ways depending what's making me angriest at the time, but there isn't a right answer because it isn't a right situation. you have to cut off your own nose to spite the patriarchy no matter what.
posted by queenofbithynia at 5:07 PM on January 24, 2018 [9 favorites]
I don't think anyone is saying she should give it away for free. I think that if her goal is truly to radically change gender relations in the U.S., then yeah. There needs to be a more accessible form of material. A podcast, a book, a website - in addition to the pricey classes.
I've paid NYC rent and bought NYC groceries on WAY less than what she must be pulling in from those classes. And I've taken tons of classes in NYC and elsewhere (which I definitely valued), none of them over $300 unless you count the one that included several nights lodging.
It's really okay for her to want to make money - I want money too - but I feel iffy when people want to make money and dress it up as a revolution.
posted by bunderful at 5:53 PM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
I've paid NYC rent and bought NYC groceries on WAY less than what she must be pulling in from those classes. And I've taken tons of classes in NYC and elsewhere (which I definitely valued), none of them over $300 unless you count the one that included several nights lodging.
It's really okay for her to want to make money - I want money too - but I feel iffy when people want to make money and dress it up as a revolution.
posted by bunderful at 5:53 PM on January 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
I agree on the money. It's just too much except for the rich ladies. When people charge that much for anything, it's clear what kind of clientele they're shooting for and it's not me. Which is a shame because I think a lot of women need this kind of assistance in dealing with situations like this.
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:04 PM on January 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:04 PM on January 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
This article really pissed me off. It's not because assertiveness training is bad - for people who want it, go for it.
I know how to be assertive. I ask for what I want. I negotiate. I speak up. I yell at jerks who harass me on the street. I call out bigoted comments at work. All those exercises described in the article are things I do (without the pretending to be a dominatrix part). And you know what? I am punished for it. I am called a bitch. I have literally had colleagues fly into a rage and yell insults at me in meetings because I asserted a professional opinion different from theirs. I'm told I'm too pushy. I'm told to be less visible. I'm told to wait my turn. I'm told to keep my head down. My reviews at work are negative in transparently sexist ways.
That's why I think this is bullshit victim blaming. Because being more assertive and powerful doesn't work. It doesn't even work in the examples Urbaniak gives! Cara Delavigne singing didn't stop Harvey Weinstein from sexually harassing her - he did it anyway. Having the presence of mind to respond in an unexpected way is great, but it doesn't protect you.
Using dominance bullshit from an advocate of violent dog training, dominatrix fantasies, and watered down Taoism to sell women the idea that speaking up will protect you is selling victim-blaming ideology.
Fundamentally this approach ignores that feeling more powerful isn't the same as being more powerful.
posted by medusa at 6:51 PM on January 24, 2018 [17 favorites]
I know how to be assertive. I ask for what I want. I negotiate. I speak up. I yell at jerks who harass me on the street. I call out bigoted comments at work. All those exercises described in the article are things I do (without the pretending to be a dominatrix part). And you know what? I am punished for it. I am called a bitch. I have literally had colleagues fly into a rage and yell insults at me in meetings because I asserted a professional opinion different from theirs. I'm told I'm too pushy. I'm told to be less visible. I'm told to wait my turn. I'm told to keep my head down. My reviews at work are negative in transparently sexist ways.
That's why I think this is bullshit victim blaming. Because being more assertive and powerful doesn't work. It doesn't even work in the examples Urbaniak gives! Cara Delavigne singing didn't stop Harvey Weinstein from sexually harassing her - he did it anyway. Having the presence of mind to respond in an unexpected way is great, but it doesn't protect you.
Using dominance bullshit from an advocate of violent dog training, dominatrix fantasies, and watered down Taoism to sell women the idea that speaking up will protect you is selling victim-blaming ideology.
Fundamentally this approach ignores that feeling more powerful isn't the same as being more powerful.
posted by medusa at 6:51 PM on January 24, 2018 [17 favorites]
I would be interested in reading articles about this workshop written by people who demonstrate deeper knowledge of the communities, religions, industries, etc. that inspire its androgogy (gynogogy?).
posted by brainwane at 6:59 PM on January 25, 2018
posted by brainwane at 6:59 PM on January 25, 2018
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posted by schadenfrau at 7:01 PM on January 23, 2018 [6 favorites]