MADGIRLS are an essential cultural force!
“When we are taught that our anger is undesirable, selfish, powerless and ugly, we learn that WE are undesirable, selfish, powerless and ugly. When we forgo talking about anger, because it represents risk or challenge, or because it disrupts a comfortable status quo, we forgo valuable lessons about risk and challenge and the discomforts of the status quo. By naturalizing the idea that girls and women aren’t angry but are sad, by insisting that they keep their anger to themselves, we render women’s feelings and demands mute and with little social value. When we call our anger sadness instead of anger, we often fail to acknowledge what is wrong, specifically in a way that discourages us from imagining and pursuing change. Sadness as an emotion, is paired with acceptance. Anger on the other hand, invokes the possibility of change and fighting back.” (pg.25)
These are the words and premise of a new book entitled, Rage Becomes Her, written by Soraya Chemaly. It has given me a whole new way to reframe the power of women’s anger, a way that is altogether different from how it is seen through the traditional patriarchal lens….i.e, a threat to established patriarchal power and norms.
In a 2011 study conducted by Dr. Kerri Jackson, a professor of communication studies and psychology at UCLA, she concludes, “It’s OK - even expected for men to express anger but when women have negative emotion, they’re expected to express their displeasure with sadness” which often manifests as depression…Multiple experiments reveal that an angry woman’s face is one of the most difficult to parse and an androgyness face with an angry expression is overwhelmingly categorized as male…Power... is considered to be an entrance requirement for anger and is not necessary for sadness. Anger is an ‘approach’ emotion while sadness is a ‘retreat’ emotion.’” (pgs. 4 & 5, Chemaly).
Thus, power-wielding men in a patriarchal culture are able to express anger without sanction and are often perceived as more powerful when they do. Women when angry, however, generally internalize or suppress that anger and are consequently seen as less powerful.
Chemaly’s premise, based on her extensive reading of the research literature, is one that promotes and encourages the expression of women’s anger because it is an important cultural resource. When women are angry, it is in large part because they are experiencing injustice and/or inequality, both of which the culture needs to know about in order to change and improve itself. Suppression of women’s anger or not making it part of the definition of femininity, “renders it ineffective as a personal or collective resource.”
Additional research findings cited by Chemaly find that:
· Anger, not sadness, is associated with controlling one’s circumstances such as in competition, independence and leadership
· Anger, not sadness is linked to perceptions of higher status and respect.
· Angry people are more optimistic, feeling that change is possible and that they can influence outcomes. Sad and fearful people tend toward pessimism, feelings of powerlessness to make change.
The fact that the culture separates anger from femininity has major ramifications for women. The empowering act of expressing anger is deemed ‘not feminine’ by patriarchy. “For one thing it means that we render women’s anger ineffective as a personal or collective public resource…(I have intentionally repeated that because it is new and needs to be repeated over and over again.) The culture needs to hear women’s anger as a source of information about what is working and what is not. (The “Me Too” movement is a perfect example of this). How women’s anger is treated culturally is a powerful regulation, in essence, a silencing of input from women. It is a powerful regulation of women’s pushback against their own inequality.” (p. 5 Chemaly).
Witness the male response in the Kavanaugh hearings where women’s anger was labeled ‘mob’ behavior and a ‘threat’ to the dignity and power positions held by males. In contrast, Kavanaugh and the Senators’ anger was perceived as righteous and justified, starkly demonstrating the different perception and treatment of anger expressed by men and women under patriarchy. Anger is inappropriate, threatening and unfeminine in females but mainly expected and supported in males.
The longer this discrepancy goes on, the longer women’s voices and needs will not be heard and used as a source of information for the culture to create change. As Nelson Mandela once said, “When the women of the world are happy, the world will be a happy place.” The anger of women means that they are unhappy. Until women’s expression of anger is accepted as a powerful cultural resource, the imbalance of power will not be altered. It is imperative that women use anger in order to effect change, despite the heavy sanctions against it under patriarchy.
Some other research Chemaly cites is also of interest. Actually, the whole book is a terrific read and I highly recommend it!
By the time children are preschoolers, they already associate anger with masculine faces and report believing that it is normal for boys to be angry but not for girls. Once again, the Kavanaugh hearing is a perfect example of this stereotypic expectation of women and men expressing anger and this is learned before a child is five!).
By the time children enter school, adults consistently demonstrate discomfort with the idea of a righteously angry girl making demands...and girls are admonished to be ‘nicer’ three times more often than boys. Chemaly believes that by “teaching girls to be likeable...we often forget to teach them, as we do boys, that they should be respected.”
People’s perceive girls’ and women’s anger, aggression and assertiveness as all falling under one negative quality--anger. Thus, when women are assertive, they are seen as “ball-busters.” For boys and men, however, these three qualities are acceptable and even positive.
Anger remains the emotion that is least acceptable for girls and women and yet it is the culture’s first line of defense against injustice and inequality. So Chemaly suggests that we reframe how we think about anger and pushback against the cultural stereotypes of anger for girls and women. I end with an inspirational quote she gives us as a springboard for how to think differently about anger for ourselves, other women and the culture: “Anger is an assertion of rights and worth. It is communication, equality and knowledge. It is intimacy, acceptance, fearlessness, embodiment, revolt, and reconciliation. Anger is memory and rage. It is rational thought and irrational pain. Anger is freedom, independence, expansiveness, and entitlement. It is justice, passion, clarity and motivation. Anger is instrumental, thoughtful, complicated, and resolved. In anger, whether you like it or not, there is truth.”
Anger is a demand for accountability. It is evaluation, judgement and refutation. It is reflective, visionary, and participatory. It’s a speech act, a social statement, an intention, and a purpose. It’s a risk, a threat, a confirmation and a wish. It is both powerlessness and power, palliative and provocation. In anger, you will find both ferocity and comfort, vulnerability and hurt. Anger is the expression of hope…Re-envisioned, anger can be the most feminine of virtues: compassionate, fierce, wise, and powerful. The women I admire most--those who have looked to themselves, the limitations and adversities that come with our bodies and the expectations that come with them--have all found ways to transform their anger into meaningful change. In them, anger has moved from deliberation to liberation.
Your anger is a gift you give to yourself and the world that is yours. In anger I have lived more fully, freely, intensely, sensitively, and politically. If ever there was a time not to silence yourself, to channel your anger into healthy places and choices, this is it.” (ps. 295-6.)
RAGE BECOMES HER by Soraya Chemaly Read it! And tell us what you think!