Can You Actually Have a Relationship with a Feminist?

Started by Roy, Nov 19, 2005, 12:03 PM

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Roy

I was doing some research about feminism as a social malady when I came across an insightful piece about Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

After reading the original article (link below), I thought it might be fun to use the "change/change all" text tools in MS Word to see how this piece might read if gender-specific words were reversed (his=her, etc.) and Narcissism = Feminism.

Here is the result -- inexcusably lengthy, but maybe worth a five-minute glance.

Apologies to the author, who never thought his piece would be sampled and morphed by MRAs.

   
Quote
Feminism FAQ #6: The Spouse / Mate / Partner of the Feminist
Sam Vaknin, PhD

Question:
What kind of a spouse/mate/partner is likely to be attracted to a Feminist?
Answer:
THE VICTIMS


On the face of it, there is no (emotional) partner or mate, who typically "binds" with a Feminist. They come in all shapes and sizes. The initial phases of attraction, infatuation and falling in love are pretty normal. The Feminist is putting on her best face - the other party is blinded by budding love. A natural selection process occurs only much later, as the relationship develops and is put to the test.

Living with a Feminist can be exhilarating, is always onerous, often harrowing. Surviving a relationship with a Feminist indicates, therefore, the parameters of the personality of the survivor. He is molded by the relationship into The Typical Feministic Mate/Partner/Spouse.

First and foremost, the Feminist's partner must have a deficient or a distorted grasp of his self and of reality. Otherwise, he (or she) is bound to abandon the Feminist's precarious ship early on. The distortion is likely to belittle and demean the partner - while aggrandizing and adoring the Feminist.

The partner is, thus, placing himself in the position of the eternal victim: undeserving, punishable, a scapegoat. Sometimes, it is very important to the partner to appear moral, sacrificial and victimized. At other times, he is not even aware of his  predicament.

The Feminist is perceived by the partner to be a person in the position to demand these sacrifices from the partner, superior in many ways (intellectually, emotionally, morally, financially).

The status of professional victim sits well with the partner's tendency to punish himself, namely: with his masochistic streak. The torment, which is a life with a Feminist is a just, punitive measure.

In this respect, the partner is the mirror image of the Feminist. By maintaining a symbiotic relationship with her, by being totally dependent upon the source of masochistic supply (which the Feminist most reliably constitutes and most amply provides) - the partner enhances certain traits and encourages certain behaviors, which are at the very core of Feminism.

A Feminist is never whole without an adoring, submissive, available, self-denigrating partner. Her very sense of superiority, indeed her False Self, depends on it. Her sadistic Super-Ego directs itself at the partner, thus finally obtaining a legitimate source of satisfaction (which does not endanger the very existence of the Feminist).

It is through self-denial that the partner survives. He denies his wishes, hopes, dreams, aspirations, sexual needs, psychological needs, material needs, everything, which might engender the wrath of the Feminist Godess-like supreme figure. The Feminist is rendered even more superior through and because of his self-denial.

It is easy to explain self-denial undertaken to facilitate and ease the life of a Great Woman. The Greater the Woman (= the Feminist), the easier it is for the partner to ignore his Self, to dwindle, to degenerate, to turn into an appendix of the Feminist and, finally, to become nothing but an extension, to merge with the Feminist to the point of oblivion and of dim memories of one's Self.

The two collaborate in their macabre dance. The Feminist is formed by her partner inasmuch as he forms her. Submission breeds superiority and masochism breeds sadism inasmuch as the reverse is true.

The relationships are characterized by rampant emergentism: roles are allocated almost from the start and any deviation meets with an aggressive, even violent reaction.

The predominant chord in the partner's mind is utter, unadulterated confusion. Even the most basic relationships - with wife, children, or parents - remain bafflingly obscured by the giant shadows cast by the intensive interaction with the Feminist.

A suspension of judgment is part and parcel of a suspension of individuality, which is both a prerequisite to and the result of living with a Feminist. The partner no longer knows what is true and right and what is wrong and forbidden.

The Feminist recreates for the partner the sort of emotional ambience that led to her formation in the first place: capriciousness, fickleness, arbitrariness, emotional (and physical or sexual) abandonment. The world becomes uncertain and frightening and the partner has only one sure thing to cling to: the Feminist.

And cling he does. If there is anything which can safely be said about those who emotionally team up with Feminists, it is that they are overtly and overly dependent, even compulsively so.

The partner doesn't know what to do - and this is only too natural in situations of conflict, as any relationship with a Feminist is. But the typical partner also does not know what he wants and, to a large extent, who he is and what he wants to become. A lack of answers to these questions is serious.

It is serious because it hampers the partner's ability to gauge reality, evaluate and appraise it for what it is. His primordial sin is that he fell in love with an image, not with a real person. It is the voiding of the image that is mourned when the relationships end.

The break-up of a relationship with a Feminist is, therefore, more emotionally charged than usual. It is the culmination of a long chain of humiliations and of subjugation. It is the rebellion of the functioning and healthy parts of the partner's personality against the tyranny of the Feminist.

The partner is bound to have totally misread and misinterpreted the whole interaction (I hesitate to call it a relationship, usually there was none but in the aspirations and the hopes of the partner). The lack of proper interface with reality might be (erroneously) labeled "pathological".

Why is it that the partner seeks to prolong his pain? What is the source and purpose of his masochistic streak? In all likelihood, the partner is an inverted Feminist, a suppressed one, or a latent one - in the limited sense that his psychological make-up and formation are identical to those of the Feminist.

His deep-rooted, deep-seated identity fosters the frequent follies-a-deux which is the Feministic couple. Upon the break-up of the relationship, the partner (and the Feminist) engage in a tortuous and drawn out post mortem.

But the question who really did what to whom (and even why) is irrelevant. What is relevant is to stop mourning oneself (this is what the parties are really mourning), start smiling again and love in a less subservient, hopeless, and pain-inflicting manner.

THE ABUSE

Abuse is an integral, inseparable part of the Feministic Personality Disorder.

The feminist idealizes and then DEVALUES and discards the object of her initial idealization. Her abrupt, heartless devaluation IS abuse. ALL feminists idealize and then devalue. This is THE core of pathological feminism.

The feminist exploits, lies, insults, demeans, ignores (the "silent treatment"), manipulates, controls. All these are forms of abuse.

There are a million ways to abuse. To love too much is to abuse. It is tantamount to treating someone as an extension, an object, or an instrument of gratification. To be over-protective, not to respect privacy, to be brutally honest, or consistently tactless - is to abuse.

To expect too much, to denigrate, to ignore - are all modes of abuse. There is physical abuse, verbal abuse, psychological abuse, sexual abuse. The list is long. Feminists are masters of abusing surreptitiously. They are "stealth abusers". You have to actually live with one in order to witness the abuse.

There are three important categories of abuse:

OVERT ABUSE - The open and explicit abuse of another person. Threatening, coercing, beating, lying, berating, demeaning, chastising, insulting, humiliating, exploiting, ignoring ("silent treatment"), devaluing, unceremoniously discarding, verbal abuse, physical abuse and sexual abuse are all forms of overt abuse.

COVERT OR CONTROLLING ABUSE

Feminism is almost entirely about control. It is a primitive and immature reaction to life circumstances in which the feminist (usually in her childhood) was rendered helpless. It is about re-exerting one's identity, re-establishing predictability, mastering the environment - human and physical.

The bulk of feministic behaviors can be traced to her panicky reaction to the remote potential for loss of control. Feminists are hypochondriacs (and difficult patients) because they are afraid to lose control over their body, its looks and its proper functioning. They are obsessive-compulsive in an effort to subdue their physical habitat and render it foreseeable. They stalk people and harass them as a means of "being in touch" - another form of feministic control.

But why the panic?

The feminist is a solipsist. She carries the whole universe in her mind. To her, nothing exists except herself. Meaningful others are her extensions, assimilated by her, internal objects - not external ones.

Thus, losing control of a significant other - is equivalent to the loss of control of a limb, or of one's brain. It is terrifying. It is paradigm-shattering.

Independent or disobedient people evoke in the feminist the realization that something is wrong with her worldview, that she is not the center of the world or its cause and that she cannot control what, to her, are internal representations.

To the feminist, losing control means going insane. Because other people are mere elements in the feminist's mind - being unable to manipulate them literally means losing it (her mind). Imagine, if you suddenly were to find out that you cannot manipulate your memories or control your thoughts... Nightmarish!

Moreover, it is often only through manipulation and extortion that the feminist can secure her feministic supply. Controlling her sources of feministic supply is a (mental) life or death question for the feminist. The feminist is a drug addict (her drug being the FS) and he would go to any length to obtain the next dose.

In her frantic efforts to maintain control or re-assert it, the feminist resorts to a myriad of fiendishly inventive stratagems and mechanisms.

Here is a partial list:

UNPREDICTABILITY

The feminist acts unpredictably, capriciously, inconsistently and irrationally. This serves to demolish in others their carefully crafted worldview. They become dependent upon the next twist and turn of the feminist, her next inexplicable whim, upon her next outburst, denial, or smile.
Because she is assumed to be the only one intimately acquainted with her self - she becomes the source of certitude and veracity. In other words: the feminist makes sure that SHE is the only reliable existence in the lives of others - by shattering the rest of their world through her seemingly insane behavior. She guarantees her stable presence in their lives - by destabilizing their own.

DISPROPORTIONAL REACTIONS

One of the favorite tools of manipulation in the feminist's arsenal is the disproportionality of her reactions. She reacts with supreme rage to the slightest slight.

Or she would punish severely for what she perceives to be an offence against her, no matter how minor.

Or, she would throw a temper tantrum over any discord or disagreement, however gently and considerately expressed. or, she would act inordinately attentive, charming and tempting (even over-sexed, if need be).

The ever-shifting code of conduct coupled with the inordinately harsh and arbitrarily applied "penal code" are both of the feminist's design and unbeknownst to the "offenders". Neediness and dependence on the source of all justice meted - on the feminist - are thus guaranteed.

DEHUMANIZATION AND OBJECTIFICATION (ABUSE)

People have a need to believe in the empathic skills and basic good-heartedness of others. By dehumanizing and objectifying people - the feminist attacks the very foundations of the social treaty.

This is the "alien" aspect of feminists - they may be excellent imitations of fully formed adults but they are emotionally non-existent, or, at best, immature.

This is so horrid, so repulsive, so phantasmagoric - that people recoil in terror. It is then, with their defenses absolutely down, that they are the most susceptible and vulnerable to the Feminist's control. Physical, psychological, verbal and sexual abuse are all forms of dehumanization and objectification.

ABUSE OF INFORMATION

From the first moments of an encounter with another person, the feminist is on the prowl. She collects information with the intention of applying it to extract feministic supply.

The more she knows about her potential source of supply - the better able she is to coerce, manipulate, charm, extort or convert it "to the cause".

The feminist does not hesitate to abuse the information she gleaned, regardless of its intimate nature or the circumstances in which she obtained it. This is a powerful tool in her armory.

IMPOSSIBLE SITUATIONS

The feminist engineers impossible, dangerous, unpredictable, unprecedented, or highly specific situations in which she will be sorely needed.

The feminist, her knowledge, her skills or her traits become the only ones applicable, or the most useful to resolving them. The feminist contrives her own indispensability. It is a form of control by proxy.

CONTROL BY PROXY

If all else fails, the feminist recruits friends, colleagues, mates, family members, the authorities, institutions, neighbors - in short, third parties - to do her bidding.

She uses these them to cajole, coerce, threaten, stalk, offer, retreat, tempt, convince, harass, communicate and otherwise manipulate her target.

She controls these unaware instruments exactly as she plans to control her ultimate prey. She employs the same mechanisms and devices. And she dumps her props unceremoniously when the job is done.
Another form of control by proxy is to engineer situations in which abuse is inflicted upon another person.

Such carefully crafted scenarios involve embarrassment and humiliation as well as social sanctions (condemnation, opprobrium, or even physical punishment). Society, or a social group become the instruments of the feminist.

AMBIENT ABUSE

The fostering, propagation and enhancement of an atmosphere of fear, intimidation, instability, unpredictability and irritation. There are no acts of traceable explicit abuse, nor any manipulative settings of control.

Yet, the irksome feeling remains, a disagreeable foreboding, a premonition, a bad omen. This is sometimes called "gaslighting".

In the long term, such an environment erodes one's sense of self-worth and self-esteem. Self-confidence is shaken badly.

Often, the victims adopts a paranoid or schizoid stance and thus renders himself or herself exposed even more to criticism and judgment.

The roles are thus reversed: the victim is considered the mentally disordered component of the dyad and the feminist - the suffering soul.



http://www.mental-health-matters.com

(See Articles > List Alphabetically > Narcissism FAQ's)
It's a terrible thing ... living in fear." (Roy - hunted replicant. "Blade Runner.")

Farmer Jon

What further causes concern is what the offspring of such relationships will grow up to be like.  If the feminist has her way, manipulating the children to suit her, or more disconcertingly, to suit other feminists as partners and spouses for the future, it sets in motion a hereditary sociological disease.  Such a disease would be self-perpetuating, especiallly if the families are large enough, and enough effort is placed into crafting the 'next generation' to suit the feminists ideals.

It would be interesting to know how Germaine Greers three children grow up, and the personality traits of her (second) husband, aswell as other prominent feminists.

jaketk

I am sure that many of the feminists who read this site, but never post, are going to have problems with this article. But if you take some of the points one by one, there is actually a lot of truth in them. Most of the points made do not only apply to relationships with feminists. The article more or less describes what many feminists think and how many feminists view the world, and themselves. What strikes me most about Vaknin's analysis is that so much of the behavior is not only common, but accepted within the feminist movement. Visit any random feminist website or blog and you can literally see this sort of behavior in action.

It is unfortunate that many children will grow up in household with a person like this, someone so willing to devalue and dehumanize them, particularly if they are male. But I think that there is still hope that those kids will rebel against such stringent, degenerating roles. Most of the males of my generation have no real love for or of feminism, though most are not willing to say so out loud. I think once it becomes acceptable to offer the sort of criticism Vaknin did in the article, we will see more boys and men rejecting feminism as a whole rather than just avoiding relationships with feminists.

Farmer Jon

Quote
But I think that there is still hope that those kids will rebel against such stringent, degenerating roles.


Once the kids have matured, or atleast reached some state of advanced adolescence they may well show the signs of rebellion.  But it's difficult to rebel against a set of principles - if feminism even qualifies for that - which is supported so thoroughly and convincingly throughout society, and without any form of inspiring opposition.  If certain elements of feminism continue to teach, preach and raise children through the methods Vaknin identifies, then why should the the children question the beliefs of their parents generation?  If they are so emotionally castrated (males) or empowered (?) (females), then how is the cycle going to be broken?  Are they indeed going to rebel at all in the way dreamers may hope.

Quote
Most of the males of my generation have no real love for or of feminism, though most are not willing to say so out loud.


Jaketk, which generation/age group do you belong to?

PaulGuelph

Farmer, my mother is a hardline feminist, but I am an MRA. She taught me about feminism and I learned to hate it.
Men's Movie Guide:  http://www.mensmovieguide.com   The Healing Tomb: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B081N1X145

jaketk

males tend to rebel more often than girls do. social norms are inevitablly questioned, and typically this is done by males. the rebellion probably would not come in the form of the complete obliteration of feminism, but more likely as a reformation of the ideology, which may or may not result in the destruction of the old ideology. the more constrictive feminism's rules, the more likely the rebellious response.

the basic problem feminists face is that they often fall back on gender roles when it is convenient. men are protectors when war starts or someone pulls a gun. women are helpless when it comes to violence and threats. in a way, they simultaneuously attempt to cripple and yet foster traditional masculinity.

i'm only 22. i am not sure what specifically my generation is called, but i like the term Matrix-babies. granted the connotation suggests that we exist in a dream world, which is technically true. it can also mean anyone who was 13-22 when The Matrix came out. in a way, the Matrix is applicable to males' situation with feminism.

jaketk

Quote from: "PaulGuelph"
Farmer, my mother is a hardline feminist, but I am an MRA. She taught me about feminism and I learned to hate it.


that reminds me of the way many people were raised as catholics or christians, and yet rejected the religion. i think that if something is very restrictive or full of rules, eventually people question it and reject on the principle that they do not like being told what and how to think.

PaulGuelph

You are right jaketk.

But I also didn't like how she treated my dad and I was tired of being second class. I felt like I had something to say too.

Just like mom, I have opinions too and that's how we are similar. It was kinda crappy being the son of a feminist. Lots of garbage I could complain about, but she wasn't all bad. Ideology makes people do mean things that they wouldn't normally do.

There must be more people like me now than there were before. Mom was ahead of her time.
Men's Movie Guide:  http://www.mensmovieguide.com   The Healing Tomb: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B081N1X145

jaketk

i'm one. though i grew up in a mostly male house, my aunts were constantly talking about feminism. my oldest aunt would literally wake me up at 2am and rant. that is perhaps more extreme than what most people normally go through, but i think most folks who end up rejecting ideologies do so because of things akin to that.

KellyMB

Quote"Roy"

"A Feminist is never whole without an adoring, submissive, available, self-denigrating partner."

Did anyone else think of Hugo and his upcoming nuptuals?

Lee R.

Quote from: "Farmer Jon"
What further causes concern is what the offspring of such relationships will grow up to be like.  If the feminist has her way, manipulating the children to suit her, or more disconcertingly, to suit other feminists as partners and spouses for the future, it sets in motion a hereditary sociological disease.  Such a disease would be self-perpetuating, especiallly if the families are large enough, and enough effort is placed into crafting the 'next generation' to suit the feminists ideals.

It would be interesting to know how Germaine Greers three children grow up, and the personality traits of her (second) husband, aswell as other prominent feminists.

I don't think it is possible for men who post to SYG and the like to have a realtionship with a Feminist, for the simple reason that they just won't shut up about this or that female injustice at the hands of us evil men.

I dated one once, and she literally couldn't go for one hour without bringing up some Wymyn's Studies point.  That is the last time I date a professor who is a published feminist.  Yuk.

whome112

My mother is a feminist: Maybe not as hard line as some, still. My grand-aunts, one of which lived with us, hated males, all males, doubly so for little boys. It was a common joke for the women... "See how funny it is when they squirm."

I lived with a feminist for nearly five years. I did some good work for lone fathers in those years. I loved and hated her. I've talked about her here and in other sites, the genius who couldn't make coffee...

There are emotional scars which show. Hurts which will never heal.

Yes, an MRA can live with a feminist, some do. He'll have scars.

whome
ay what you mean: Mean what you say.
http://jwwells.blogspot.com

ramcharger1985

Feminists are incapable of forming relationships. They have black holes in their chest, instead of hearts. I come from a neutral household, no one even told me about feminism until I found out for myself around age 15. I've hated it ever since, and that was 5 years ago.

rantmeister

I don't mean to over-plug myself here, but the theme of attempting a relationship with a feminist is central to my book. A warm and playful German girl is transformed into a resentful, backstabbing and selfish ideologue. Nothing could curb the enthusiasm with which she embraced her own destruction. She even majored in women's studies. I tried to pull her back, but she was too far gone. In 30 years, she's never changed - even faced with the stark results of her feminist antics.

So, I know from personal experience that such women can rarely be transformed or de-programed. Most likely they will disregard the kindness you show them, and interact with you as an opponent. The question of whether you can have a relationship with a feminist can be rephrased as: Can you have a relationship with someone who hates you? I suppose so, as long as you're willing to hate yourself as well.

rm

devia

I have a relationship with everyone I interact with. I'm not sure what the original poster meant by relationship.

If he meant an inimate relationship then I would say it is impossible to have a deep friendship with anyone whose views are opposed to your own.

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