Me? Well I’m not sure it’s one of my better qualities but it makes me me and at this stage I’m too old to change entirely.
Yes, you! ... and I think it's that "at this stage I'm too old to change entirely" feeling that is what a lot of one's 40s are focused on and some people are like, "you know what, fuck it, that's me, I can try to be my best self, but I'm not going to become a different person." and others are like, "fuck ..... just fuck ..."
― sarahell, Saturday, 20 February 2021 18:53 (three years ago) link
she and emil.y are not alone here and it shouldn't be assumed that they are just because they're the only ones saying so.
thanks for that, harbl. I would rather work things through with people who are bothered by my behavior and who I also really respect and like.
― sarahell, Saturday, 20 February 2021 18:54 (three years ago) link
Also--and I hate to bring class issues into this--most of the 40+ women I know are either still pretending they're teenagers or they're dealing with their grown children's problems and/or raising their grandchildren.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Saturday, 20 February 2021 19:17 (three years ago) link
(Know in RL, I mean.)
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Saturday, 20 February 2021 19:18 (three years ago) link
most of the 40+ women I know are either still pretending they're teenagers or they're dealing with their grown children's problems and/or raising their grandchildren.
honestly, I know a fair amount of these too --
― sarahell, Saturday, 20 February 2021 19:29 (three years ago) link
You're right, Christine, and I've been wanting to validate your sharing here without assuming anything about you. I wanted to say...the economic precariousness and/or straight poverty that a lot of Americans live in crosses a lot of other intersectional lines.
― Ima Gardener (in orbit), Saturday, 20 February 2021 19:30 (three years ago) link
Kate Manne has written extensively on what misogyny is for: a system of sorting Men (people) from Not-Men (women).
Misogyny doesn’t work by “hating all women” - what it does, subtly but powerfully, is sort “women” into “Good Women” who comply with the (conflicting and impossible) needs of patriarchy, and “Bad Women” who don’t - and punishes the latter, the most harshly.
Under a misogynist system, a woman can only gain power by positioning themselves as “Good Women” and weaponising “Bad Women’s” badness against them. By harshly punishing the “Bad Women”, she gets both power over other women, and the respect of men.
It’s win-win for the “Good Woman” and the system of patriarchy. Once you realise that, you understand why some women do this! But ultimately misogyny hurts all women, non-men, and “Men” as well - and you have to work to dismantle the entire dichotomy to destroy the system.
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Saturday, 20 February 2021 20:25 (three years ago) link
Imagine having to believe this instead of thinking about your own behaviour.
― scampless, rattled and puce (gyac), Saturday, 20 February 2021 21:01 (three years ago) link
I disabled killfile for a while, and clearly that was a mistake. I've The "No Boys" thread has always functioned (as well as a kind of social club) as a space where we could talk freely, without worrying about offending the everpresent ~feelings of men~. That was how I, and I think a lot of the people who responded to Sarahell, were using it. A collective sigh of "it does get better". To then have someone come screaming in, that the conversation is inadequately taking into account feelings of men and the feelings about men? It's a derailment.
To bring this back to the topic of conversation at hand, for me there are (at least) two streams both running in parallel and interbraiding, in many ways.
I believe the thing behind a lot of introspection at the moment is the constant overhanging threat of the pandemic. The pandemic has been this omnipresent tsunami of death and grief and fear, which has flattened everything in its path, but has dealt out burdens in different ways and different magnitudes. That I've noticed, even in my friend group, that the structure of our societies and the ways lockdowns have been constructed, mean that the burden of the pandemic has overwhelmingly been shifted onto mothers, gestational parents, and caretakers / carers. Who are overwhelmingly not-men. (While very different but no less real troubles have been shifted onto those who live alone, disabled people, LBGT/Queer people who don't necessarily have conventional family units that are protected by lockdown regulations. For me, it's not just the people who have died, it's my entire in-person, away-from-screen support network that I spent the previous few years building.) Everyone is coping with their tsunami of grief, including me, in different ways.
The other is this large-scale, cultural shifting of the narratives around "Women" (non-men) as we age. That 40 is not the traditional ending of one's life, it may be a rebirth and a beginning. I, personally, have a very long, multi-generational line of women and female role models in my family who went on to long, fruitful and rewarding "second acts" after their children were raised and their husbands either dropped dead of sudden ailments and/or dramatically left the family. 4 generations of women that I met, telling me that their lives *began* in their 40s and 50s. (Funnily enough, including an Edwardian relative who, after her husband died, cut her hair, started dressing like a man, took over the farm and asked her neighbours to call her "Tommy". I've always wondered about that!) That was my expectation for how my life would unfold, and I was finding it true, pre-pandemic. But I also think that many women are questioning the narratives around ageing in women automatically meaning a shrinking and narrowing.
I don't think that's *just* a middle-class narrative, it's just that the stories of, e.g. older women fighting for their pensions, class narratives about the feminisation of poverty hitting older women and child-rearing-aged women particularly hard, those stories are just not seen as glamourous or even political. All of the political and economic forces that are driving the feminisation of poverty, are coming from conservative male-supremacy-white-supremacy, about driving women back into family structures that best support capitalism, rather than being good for women. Discussions of ~patriarchy~ are not a distraction from 'class issues' - patriarchy *is* class issues.
Anyway. For me, personally, the narratives of "your life will get better in your 40s/50s" and "a global pandemic has changed everyone's lives to be unrecognisable in oppressive ways" are a huge collision.
Getting vaccinated on Friday was the first glimmer in a full year, where I felt like there might be an "After Times", rather than the smashed-up debris where the "Before Times" used to be.
I'm interested if other folks have started thinking about their After Times, how you think they will change, or if that's just not a thing yet in your countries?
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 10:34 (three years ago) link
In case my questions weren't overt enough in the wall-o-text:
What expectations were you raised with, within your families (mothers, aunts, grandmothers) as to how women should age? Did your female elders have "second acts"? Are your experiences similar to / different from them, and how?
Also, the thing that kept coming up while I was showing, is... What does "acting like a teenager*" look like, for a generation where the traditional markers of adulthood have been rendered inaccessible by economics?
*(I generally know what "acting like a teenager" means, in terms of, the person who does this in my family is my Boomer father, who has decided to spend his 70s doing all the funstuff he was too busy studying/working to participate in when he was young. I'm guessing you mean something else?) Please explain?
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 11:08 (three years ago) link
It’s a shame they’ve killfiled me again* because this
where we could talk freely, without worrying about offending the everpresent ~feelings of men~.
― scampless, rattled and puce (gyac), Sunday, 21 February 2021 11:13 (three years ago) link
I'm sure that the despair of a middle aged cis man whose wife recently died of cancer is really about how he never became a patriarch in the patriarchy.
― Zelda Zonk, Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:12 (three years ago) link
Exactly, it’s deliberately disingenuous because the men of ilx aren’t the abstract patriarchy, they are real people with real pain and the only way BB can look at those posts they made yesterday (in reply to me) is by removing all context from the matter.
― scampless, rattled and puce (gyac), Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:15 (three years ago) link
Zelda, I made it clear before posting that, that I had not read the thread - and even before my second set of posts, that I had read only a bit of it, which was... not that.
The idea that we should have to check the feelings of everyone in the room, including people who aren’t even in the room (and in fact are not even who the room is designed for) before having conversations about our own lives? That’s structural misogyny.
(That’s not even getting into the ableism of presuming that everyone is *capable* of pre-emptively doing that checking or understanding when and how it’s supposed to work. That goes double when that kind of sympathy-checking is seldom exercised on your behalf. Do I need to remind you how ILX reacted when I found out my mother has cancer? It is ableist to hold autistic people to these highly gendered neurological standards around the management of other people’s emotions.)
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:30 (three years ago) link
And yes, I do think the disparity between “how cis men are raised to believe their middle / old age is gonna look like” and how “people raised as women are taught to believe their middle / old age will look like” DOES contribute to the stuff that Sarahell was talking about.
And that I *would* like to talk about.
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:35 (three years ago) link
It is ableist to hold autistic people to these highly gendered neurological standards around the management of other people’s emotions.
― scampless, rattled and puce (gyac), Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:35 (three years ago) link
To be clear, I’m sorry someone’s wife died of cancer. That’s awful.
As far as I know, he’s never read or posted in this thread. I don’t see how these discussions connect. Sarahell moves the conversation to a different topic!
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:37 (three years ago) link
About as ungracious as you’d expect. Incredible how everyone else was able to see how it came across and acted accordingly, whereas you doubled down, mocked me (in some fairly misogynistic terms, no less) for even bringing it up, and now finally have squeezed about the most terrible excuse for an apology that you can bear now that it’s become clear that you’re alone on this. It’s such an indictment of ilx that you haven’t hit twenty yet.
― scampless, rattled and puce (gyac), Sunday, 21 February 2021 12:41 (three years ago) link
Having known and interacted with Sarahell for a long time, her action of “there’s a grieving widower in here, I’m going to take this conversation about gender to another thread” absolutely 100% WAS an act of consideration and being sympathetic.
It’s *bizarre* to me that anyone could read that act of consideration as inconsiderate or hostile.
It seems to me, to be about the complainers’ hostile views towards the poster(s), rather than anything she said it did.
We need to talk, again and again, about he gendered expectations of emotional labour. How this emotional labour of “anticipating and managing the emotional needs and reactions of other people, and always putting them before their own” is something disproportionately placed on people raised/treated as women.
Maybe because of my autism, maybe because of my unconventional upbringing, I honestly did not realise that this was something expected of me/women until I was in my late 30s. It’s one of those aspects of ~performing womanhood~ that I absolutely suck at because: autism - and I really chafe at the idea it is only *expected* of “Women” (cis men who can do it, will be rewarded for it, as the *skill* of emotional intelligence.) It’s OK for cis men to put their needs and emotions first. But if “women” don’t do it - RAGE!
It wasn’t until I was in my 40s, and in therapy, that I connected the ragestorms and clusterfucks of people being intensely angry at me for reasons I could not figure out - with this “transgression”. I had failed to anticipate someone else’s needs or manage their unexpected emotions; I had put my own needs first.
The weirdest thing was, that the biggest explosions of anger at my failure to perform this expected emotional labour were NOT actually from the men who tried to throttle me, or pulled over CD shelves on top of me, or threatened me and tried to physically hurt or discipline me.
It’s similar to the way that the biggest explosions of rage and hatred about female fat don’t come from angry men - they come from thin women who are FURIOUS that they have spent their entire lives hungry, on diets, and how dare we SHIRK our female obligation to be attractive by being so unapologetically fat while they work so hard at it.
It’s the same with these explosions of RAGE that I cannot (or as they have it, WILL not) perform this gendered emotional labour. The RAGE is about their fury and frustration and anger that *they* feel about having to do it, when here am I in my unapologetic autistic transmasculinity saying “this gendered labour is unfairly distributed. No one should have to regulate other people’s emotions as much as women are expected to do.”
This anger isn’t about me refusing / being unable to (delete as to your level of ableism) - it’s about their own resentment at still forcing themselves to. Hence why it’s Sarahell or me that end up as the punching bags for this rage. Other people’s rage is... not my job to manage.
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 14:07 (three years ago) link
Absolutely fuck this. Fuck this blasé attitude about real people who we really care about. FUCK YOU. Your refusal to care about other people has NOTHING to do with rejecting patriarchal standards and everything to do with the fact that you don't care about other people and can't be bothered to.
That's my fucking FRIEND. Fuck off with your idea that people getting upset are in service to the patriarchy. Funnily enough, I consider sarahell my friend also, and I STILL got upset. It isn't about ilx beef, it's about CARING ABOUT PEOPLE. If other people's rage is not your job to manage, then don't even think about attempting to manage HOW MUCH RAGE I AM EXPERIENCING RIGHT NOW. FUCK OFF.
― emil.y, Sunday, 21 February 2021 14:16 (three years ago) link
I’d settle for them managing their own shoddy behaviour, but all they ever have in the tank is “no u” and “actually here’s why my terrible behaviour is your fault. It’s unacceptable.
― scampless, rattled and puce (gyac), Sunday, 21 February 2021 14:20 (three years ago) link
I'm angry, too. I've always been angry at how everyone excuses Branwell's behavior, but I always just held my tongue and left any thread that they were in. Now I can speak my piece. I'm neuroatypical (probably autistic, but I've never been diagnosed. I was diagnosed as mentally ill.), non-binary, and was bullied pretty heavily when younger. We are painfully similar people. I was clueless when I was younger, and I probably hurt some people. The difference? I was willing to admit that I was wrong sometimes. My self-centeredness and selfishness has been a burden that I fight against every hour of my life. I don't seek out social issues to validate my self-image, I seek them out to try to change things. Also, "acting like a teenager," in rural Floridian underclass terms, means that you drink and heavily and get arrested all of the time. I'm crying in RL right now and getting incoherent, so I'll sayone more thing. Go away. Please go away. Stop seagulling us, by which I mean swooping down periodically, shitting on everything, and leaving. You are as bad as Dom ever was.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Sunday, 21 February 2021 16:29 (three years ago) link
I apologise when I have done something wrong. The idea that I should have to apologise for the absurd fantasies that people build up around their intensely negative interpretations of what I say?
Nah, mate. Not on.
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 17:00 (three years ago) link
Can we go back to the conversation we were having?
Because it’s not me that shits up threads at the moment - it’s people’s bizarre inability to ignore me or mute me rather than carry on feuding like this.
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 17:02 (three years ago) link
Dom used to go around saying things like “sometimes I fantasise about punching women in the face”.
I say things like “cisheteropatriarvhy oppresses ‘men’ and ‘not men’ in different and unequal ways’.
These are 100% exactly the same thing!!!!! Are you kidding me?
― mysterious nonbinary sea creature (Branwell with an N), Sunday, 21 February 2021 17:27 (three years ago) link
are you now Whitney G Weingarten?
― sarahell, Monday, 22 February 2021 03:05 (three years ago) link
omgggggggg!!! lol
― sarahell, Monday, 22 February 2021 03:50 (three years ago) link
So I sometimes get a one or two big hormonal zits around my period but I just got my period midway between my two vax shots and JESUS CHRIST my chin/jaw are an absolute mess, like, just the worst acne I’ve ever had. Anyone else having hormonal issues after their vax?
― just1n3, Thursday, 6 May 2021 02:39 (two years ago) link
now that you mention it, i did break out after my first vaccine and i usually don't
― here 1st (roxymuzak), Wednesday, 12 May 2021 17:42 (two years ago) link
Interesting you say so, because I’ve had the same. I also missed a period but that could have been stress related.. but that’s usually a delay, not a complete skip.
― Scamp Granada (gyac), Wednesday, 12 May 2021 17:50 (two years ago) link
i had an unusual forehead breakout after my first dose that i thought was due to increased peanut butter consumption since i discovered you can add powdered peanut butter to anything. also really weird small, painful zits on the end of my nose. i thought it was getting better, and it mostly has, but i got a few new pimples on my forehead during period, plus a huge cyst near my upper lip, though i usually get hormonal cysts. i'm not ready to say it was caused by the vaccine but it's possible. either peanuts or vaccine could have increased inflammation in my body. good news is i can try eating peanuts again?
― superdeep borehole (harbl), Friday, 14 May 2021 00:30 (two years ago) link
Which vax did you all get? Mine was moderna
― just1n3, Friday, 14 May 2021 08:19 (two years ago) link
moderna
― superdeep borehole (harbl), Friday, 14 May 2021 12:29 (two years ago) link
Pfizer. Didn't have any discernable breakouts and my periods were already deranged.
― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Friday, 14 May 2021 13:58 (two years ago) link
Sorry yall, I got the Pfizer and I experienced no side effects, I haven't had a period in ages and I didn't have one then, and my skin is excellent right now especially considering my personal habits which are not the healthiest. But I did pick up a new cleanser and moisturizer from TJ Maxx's sale section so I credit cosmetic science.
― Ima Gardener (in orbit), Friday, 14 May 2021 14:21 (two years ago) link
I got moderna and my period was same as always, maybe the mood symptoms were a little worse? Hard to say why but I doubt it was related to vaccine tbh. Prob just good old me.
― weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Friday, 14 May 2021 14:33 (two years ago) link
i also got moderna
― here 1st (roxymuzak), Monday, 17 May 2021 16:08 (two years ago) link
fucking period fairy brings me my menses 2 weeks ahead of schedule today weeit’s the turd in the punchbowl that has been this week
― terminators of endearment (VegemiteGrrl), Saturday, 24 July 2021 04:38 (two years ago) link
but explains the terrifying/crazy mood swing i had on monday, like fully at my desk crying at 10am for no reason, SOBBING watching bobs burgers at lunchtime, knowing there was no reason just thinking “ok THIS now!?!”i have had a couple really bad ones usually a week or so post-period tooold lady hormones are just gonna be semi regularly one on now i guess yay
― terminators of endearment (VegemiteGrrl), Saturday, 24 July 2021 04:43 (two years ago) link
I had the first full period I've had in 3 or 4 months last month. And it was a heavy but painless one, like I always had. I'm 50. This should be over by now.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Saturday, 24 July 2021 04:45 (two years ago) link
i apologize for the fact that the period fairy was trash
also apologize for acknowledging "it's the turd in the punchbowl" can be sung to the tune of "It's the eye of the tiger"
― sarahell, Saturday, 24 July 2021 04:45 (two years ago) link
lmao that just cheered me up infinitely
― terminators of endearment (VegemiteGrrl), Saturday, 24 July 2021 05:27 (two years ago) link
I AM TOO GODDAMN OLD TO BE FEELING LIKE AN INSECURE ADOLESCENT.
― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Saturday, 4 September 2021 02:31 (two years ago) link
It looks like I'm going to be treated as an adorable lost child for the rest of my life. I feel like one always.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Saturday, 4 September 2021 03:25 (two years ago) link
So there are, what, half a dozen of us left on ILX?
― mom tossed in kimchee (quincie), Tuesday, 28 June 2022 04:45 (one year ago) link
i think so, yeah
― terminators of endearment (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 28 June 2022 05:01 (one year ago) link
o we doing a non-boy roll call? i now formally announce that i am not a boy
― bule bulak oying (cat), Tuesday, 28 June 2022 05:17 (one year ago) link
it is actually a scientific fact that cats are not boys and dogs are not girls 🌠 ~the more u kno~
― bule bulak oying (cat), Tuesday, 28 June 2022 05:21 (one year ago) link
― commonly known by his nickname, "MadBum" (gyac), Tuesday, 28 June 2022 07:36 (one year ago) link
xp - uh, no offense, but we know you're not actually a cat. If you're a non-cis male human IRL, then welcome here.
― sarahell, Tuesday, 28 June 2022 08:43 (one year ago) link