In Adrienne Rich’s article she states that yes there has been heterosexual couplings and marriages throughout history but there has also been lesbian existance. She feels that lesbians developed as a result of the repeated struggle of women to resist oppression from men. She quotes that there are emotional impulses and contemplementarities drawing women toward women even though mystical or biological preferences draw them towards men. Men overrall are emotionally unavailable so that’s why women feel they should be open to other possibilities and choices. Supposedly, the lesbian relationships recreate mother-daughter emotions and connections. I am not too sure how valid that is, how can being in a serious relationship with someone recreate emotions shared between a mother and daughter? I can see the mental connection between women are likeminded, catering, nurturing, passionate individuals. But I can understand that there is a imbalance of power of males over women so there is equal power shared amongst two women. I completely agree that men tend to exploit women labor and control their produce, control or rob women of their kids, deny or force sexuality upon women, confine women physically and prevent their movement, use women as objects, cramp woman’s creativity, and withold women from certain knowledge and cultural attainments. Even though SOME men do engage in these acts, they are still most women’s preference in today’s society. In my opinion we will never live in a world that is completely bisexual, men want a woman’s nurturing warm embrase and women want men to dominate them, they want to feel a man’s touch, they want to cater or submit to their husband’s/boyfriend’s wants and needs. These acts that men do are overlooked, and not seen as a crime. Maybe if there was a penalty for treating women this way men would stop but since there is no penalty this treatment will always persist. Woman can choose the easy way out and date other women but mostly I see women stay in these heterosexual relationships and try to work out whatever issues they encounter.
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This interpretation made me think about this very differently, because I had quite different reactions to the things you mentioned, and I also drew different conclusions as well based off my personal opinions and the way I view relationships.
One thing I thought was interesting as well, was the mother and daughter nurturing relationship experienced by those women who choose to date and have sex with women. What I thought was interesting about that comparison was making this one, is that despite making remarks regarding the exploitation in certain male-female relationships, there is still a certain level of inequality and “roles” within a mother/daughter relationship as well. This kind of reminds me of the annoying question asked to some homosexual couples “who is the man/woman?”. While, that question I’ve personally never came across personally, as it may be one of those semi-mythological questions gay individuals point out as an example of misinterpretations of many homosexual relationships, I feel saying the relationship is akin to the mother-daughter relationship once again creates the roles people are asserting when asking who plays what “gender role”. I say this, in that, there is the one who teaches, and the one who is taught. The one who nurtures, and the one who is nurtured. The one who is more wise and experienced, and the one who is unwise and unexperienced. i don’t feel this is necessarily what she was getting at when making the mother-daughter relation, but it definitely came off to me as an interesting association to make, since we have discussed “roles” at length.
Moreover, this reminds me very much of a Freudian view. As if some love and desire for the past relationship that was so strong…or perhaps an attempt to create the relationship that wasn’t had between mother/daughter at a younger age, plays a role in the “decision” to be homosexual, or to pursue homosexual relationships.
I don’t have a great transition…but I did also want to comment on the idea of the bisexual society. I don’t know why I personally have this belief, but I do feel that despite the romantic elements, and being romantically attracted to certain genders (and this is a bit of why some people shy away from using or being identified solely as ‘homo/bisexual’, when there is a greater range of inclinations toward attraction to different genders), that there are sexual desires that individuals possess that are based on physical attractions that are not fully environmental (though what iS fully environmental)…for that reason, I feel that it is tough to imagine there being a truly bisexual world, because I do feel that this is making assumptions that are as of yet unproved regarding genetics, and what is or isn’t “default”.
I agree that this reminded me as well of the freudian view. The desire to connect to a certain type of relationship to reenact what was once or even never was plays a role in the “choice” to be homeosexual. I tend to think that there is also inequality in any relationship whether it be man on man or woman on woman or man on woman. One person is always looking to out do the other. We always have to define relationships by man or woman, even lesbian and homosexual relationships. One always has to be willing to be the domestic submissive while the other a successful businessperson. One always knows things the other doesnt and vice versa. We create relationships to grow as a human being, why else would we need to socialize?