The Agreeable Woman
The plague of agreeableness has haunted me for years. I used to think that agreeableness was equal to conventional femininity – outward signs of obedience: lowered eyes, neatly brushed hair, modest disposition. I had a very picturesque, but a very limited, Handmaid’s Tale-like perception of agreeableness. Once a trusted colleague and a good friend of mine mentioned, in passing, that I am very agreeable, and I was struck with disbelief at first; had to examine the evidence; and was appalled to discover that he was, indeed, right. I had a “natural” inclination to smooth out the rougher edges of day-to-day conversations; I had used words such as “just” and “only” every second sentence; I was so used to playing devil’s advocate, it became the norm for me to excuse most of the unacceptable occurrences I would learn about; to the public eye, my opinions were conventional, traditional, comfortable. Even though it took immense efforts for me to contain my opinionated tongue, and I raged and seethed, unseen, scream-crying every few days to let out the tension of unspoken words and built-up emotions. I was hurting myself behind closed doors, calling myself all kinds of derogatory words, for being a doormat on one hand, and on the other, for being an aggressive b*tch. I hurt myself through repressing my true thoughts and emotions, through continuously justifying why others must be right, and I must be in the wrong; I abused myself so badly, that slowly, but surely, my innate pain began to affect others – the people closest to me...
The way I expressed myself in other aspects of my life have always been considered “divergent”, I've been reprimanded often in my youth for “sticking out” with my bold looks and unusual choices. Only growing older I have realized that my teenage rebellion had been a cry for help: my soul's desire for true connection had to be deciphered by a select few, who, unburdened by prejudice would dare to talk to “the outsider”. It was a way to hide, and yet to send out vibrations to those who also, like me, suffered in silence, not understanding their own needs and desires, too scared to honestly ask for a frank conversation. So many go through this in their youth; and it's peculiar how much of this is forgotten and/or neglected as we grow older; as if we try to forget the pain of initiation as quickly as possible, resenting our past selves, seeing them as weak and pathetic; even though it is thanks to them that we survived.
Where am I going with this? Well, the combination of unjust upbringing of girls, harmful stereotyping of “normative” behaviors, indoctrination of the “right” emotive responses: all of this leads, in many cases, to internalization of the notion of sameness, of youth thinking that they are somehow to blame for “being different” (whispers: special snowflakes), and either embrace it as a badge of honor (which, ultimately still brings harm to many), or reject their true “wrong and unfitting” self and swap it to a fake exterior in order to be accepted and to belong. Obviously, this is a simplified view of the harm that can occur due to negligent parenting and socialization.
Everyone goes through this, and harm is done to men and women alike. I am focusing this discussion on women, however; mainly due to the reason that I am a woman myself, and speaking from experience allows me to investigate the empirical source with much scrutiny; but also, because the harm done to women is so glaringly grim, that the “not all men” crowd can shut it and go elsewhere to vent their frustrations.
“Female agreeableness” sounds so infuriating eye-roll-inducing conservatist, that I have given myself a headache on a few occasions trying to say it out loud. However, it is not just trendy discourse on the Internet. It is the reality for many of us women. And for many of us it begins early. “Good girls sit still”, “Look at her lady-like manners!”, “Look at you, a little princess!”, silent but unanimous approval of a quiet and meek girl; harsher punishment for little childish misdemeanors: “But you are a girl! If you were a boy, I'd understand!..” And as we grow older we see all kinds of virtue-signaling nonsense of a “different girl”; you can pick your stereotype: goth/emo/punk/dark girl; nerd/geek/next door/one-of-the guys girl; artsy/other-worldly/manic pixie girl; the combinations are endless; the media keeps feeding this garbage to the youth generation after generation; and yet “the strong” female role models are still few and far between.
And this is not a “natural order” of any sorts. What is natural to a human? To survive? To consume and produce waste? To seek out safety? To desire to bond with others of its kind? What kind of “human nature” one is talking about when appealing to nature fallacy in this case? To the fact that women menstruate and give birth? How does this apply to the “natural” tendencies for women to cook, clean, be patient, be stupid, be willing to listen to unstoppable nonsense, knit, ballet dance, wear lipstick, love drama, find delight in flowers, want to be a nurse, wear high heels, prefer to be led, be indecisive, modest, kind, compassionate, beautiful?... HOW? It does not follow. It does not compute. No logic comes from the vast majority of the presupposed “female” traits and activities. Yes, women and men are different. Yes, men tend to be physically stronger. Yes, the endocrine systems function differently. However...
There is no human nature! We have been shaping ourselves for thousands of years – yes, much of it was out of necessity, but what necessitates prejudice in the modern world? What makes women more “naturally inclined” to sit still? What makes women “the care-givers”? What makes women “good cooks”? Maybe, it's years and years and years of indoctrination and upbringing, or maybe she was just born this way! Ironically, most of the men I have encountered in my life, have been meek and modest, liking to cook and preferring to sit still and read or watch movies. And quite a few of my female acquaintances have been adventuring, daring, stern, assertive and preferred their witchcraft to embroidery. Anecdotal, I know! But how peculiar, how grotesque – people are ACTUALLY a diverse species, and sex has little to no bearing on one's preferences and inclinations!
But the hormones!.. We are wired differently! See how complex are the relationships between all the intricate patterns of the female cycle – she is bound to act, to feel, to see the world a certain way! And I agree. The hormones, the neurotransmitters, the little sparks of neurons signaling to each other – how astounding to see our complex human behavior explained through the firing of fairy lights in the neuroscience 101 videos! The male cycle is not talked about as much in popular culture, however. Why not? Why is the female cycle, so inherently tied to reproduction, has become the norm to discuss openly and even make fun of; and yet a male equivalent is all hush-hush? Maybe, we do not yet understand the complexity of the human organism enough to conclude that pink must be the color of preference to any female? Or, maybe, social sciences have studied human behavior for long enough to hypothesize that upbringing and environment may have something to do with it? You know, with the way we treat each other and assign meaning to random objects surrounding us, and oversimplify and overgeneralize, and like to put everything into neat little boxes to make the vast, scary world small and easy to digest?..
Maybe, it's another excuse to belittle women, to make them appear inferior, to justify the desire to boss them around, since they are so “unreasonable”? We may believe all of this is left far behind in the past; but modern social norms would beg to differ. Yes, we are leaps and bounds ahead in many areas affecting gender, but still too far behind to claim the problem is solved, the gender norms are abolished, the agreeable woman is free at last!..
What if I told you that seeing through all the gender nonsense is possible? What if I told you that “the agreeable woman” is just another patriarchal myth, aimed at undermining women from partaking fully in the decision-making process that determines not only their destiny, but the fate of humankind?
You'll most likely agree. Not because you are agreeable, but because you have reason. Because you have seen enough of life to chuckle at the silly gender stereotypes.
Problem solved, conversation over, we all agree, it's all good! But wait!.. This little girl has something else to say! Okay, okay, we can stay a little longer, child…
The little girl in me wants to relate to you a story of internalized hate, a story of an unconscious mind that is not aware of all the little toxic pathways that might have been created in the early childhood years. She wants you to realize that, even though you may rationally and consciously oppose gender-normative behaviors, you still may be a victim of internal conflict between your intellectual capacity to understand innate intricacy of the human species, and your emotional need for comforting and reassuring simplistic tales of how we choose flowers because we are girls.
And this little girl's request to you is to never, never, abandon dialectical materialism (Marx will not forgive). And on a serious note (that was true, though), the key to understanding the problem of agreeableness is to go back to the good old Freud (and his students!), and look at the good old psychoanalysis, and yes, yes, he was this and he was that, but taking into account some basic premises of the psycho-dynamic approach, and look into the childhood, and look into the influence of the outside world – the ads, the buzzwords, the trends, the kitchy new things – and see how we cannot separate the struggle for the female empowerment from class struggle; see how the “malleable” woman and “effeminate” man suit the modern day capitalist agenda; see how the environment WILL shape the children whether we accept this or not; see how the only way to solve the internal conflict of any woman (or any man) is to accept the calling of continuous human development, the full realization of the human potential, that is only possible in conditions where we all strive for freedom, and justice, and intellectual fulfilment, and communism!