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I Know That Feel Sister
Mar. 6th, 2017 05:54 pmI'm reading the newest book about the Tudor monarchs (as one does), and I found this amazing quote from Queen Elizabeth I: "If I wish to lead an immoral life, I do not know of anyone who can forbid me."
It's such a stereotype for a white woman with pretensions of being a writer to be interested in European monarchic dynasties
(although LET ME TELL YOU about East Asia, I fucking learned languages because that drama is PURE, shit doesn't get more lit than it was in China)
but I am obsessed with power, especially when it is wielded by women from behind the scenes – or front and center, as the case may be. When I was younger, I saw "power" as something to be resisted, but now that I'm older I've found that things are a bit more complicated. It's weird for me personally to be a woman in a position of power, because I'm simultaneously disenfranchised in relation to my male colleagues, made to feel guilty for rising above my female peers, assumed to be some sort of keeper of public morality, and expected to get things done without hurting or inconveniencing anyone (which is impossible, by the way).
I know for a fact that I'm a neurotic mess of personality disorders, so I always assumed I was just a delicate flower who couldn't deal with the world like an adult, but a friend of mine has decided to run for public office and now has to handle the exact same nonsense on a larger scale, which I've been watching play out in real time on the Facebook page she's set up for her campaign. She's handling herself well, but I can tell she's overwhelmed by the bizarre range of comments and responses she's been getting. To be honest, I'm overwhelmed by proxy.
I'm probably flaunting my own ignorance here, but I feel that women don't really have a lot of models for holding power within established political systems. We can all name at least five female activists we admire, but people like Elizabeth Warren, who are both in the system and in the public eye, are relatively rare.
I suppose what I'm trying to say here is that it makes me happy to read about women who are remembered by history for wielding political power and who were so done with sexist bullshit in, like, 1570.
It's such a stereotype for a white woman with pretensions of being a writer to be interested in European monarchic dynasties
(although LET ME TELL YOU about East Asia, I fucking learned languages because that drama is PURE, shit doesn't get more lit than it was in China)
but I am obsessed with power, especially when it is wielded by women from behind the scenes – or front and center, as the case may be. When I was younger, I saw "power" as something to be resisted, but now that I'm older I've found that things are a bit more complicated. It's weird for me personally to be a woman in a position of power, because I'm simultaneously disenfranchised in relation to my male colleagues, made to feel guilty for rising above my female peers, assumed to be some sort of keeper of public morality, and expected to get things done without hurting or inconveniencing anyone (which is impossible, by the way).
I know for a fact that I'm a neurotic mess of personality disorders, so I always assumed I was just a delicate flower who couldn't deal with the world like an adult, but a friend of mine has decided to run for public office and now has to handle the exact same nonsense on a larger scale, which I've been watching play out in real time on the Facebook page she's set up for her campaign. She's handling herself well, but I can tell she's overwhelmed by the bizarre range of comments and responses she's been getting. To be honest, I'm overwhelmed by proxy.
I'm probably flaunting my own ignorance here, but I feel that women don't really have a lot of models for holding power within established political systems. We can all name at least five female activists we admire, but people like Elizabeth Warren, who are both in the system and in the public eye, are relatively rare.
I suppose what I'm trying to say here is that it makes me happy to read about women who are remembered by history for wielding political power and who were so done with sexist bullshit in, like, 1570.
