Chani – and the actress who played her – were done *wrong*. Fremen weren’t equal. They were survivors. And survivors in desperation don’t have time for androgyny. Men are needed to do man things, and women are needed to do women things. Those things are equally important, equally needed. The women in Dune weren’t weaklings. They weren’t soft. They weren’t lazy. They weren’t one-dimensional. Androgyny isn’t feminist. Repeat after me, please. The women of the Fremen had power. Influence. My head hurts.
Category: Femininity/Womanliness
Women’s Work vs. Deep Work
In all but the most modern of times, men and women have had very different work. There is, and was, a varying degree of overlap. “Women’s work” is something that the group could rely on being done while child care happened. But what makes up “women’s work” is what will always get done while the…
Why You Don’t Know How to Plan Your Wardrobe
Why don’t you know how to plan your wardrobe? Because you’ve never been taught. And not only have you never been taught how to plan a wardrobe, you haven’t been taught any of the sub-skills you’d need to get there. Since you can’t plan your wardrobe, you can’t budget your clothing expenses. Since you can’t plan your wardrobe, you’re at the mercy of snap decisions. Since you haven’t planned your wardrobe, you spend money on clothes that don’t fit in with your lifestyle or goals. Your lack of skill in this area makes you a great consumer – from the vendor’s point of view.
Midlife Crisis and Rework
A midlife crisis is such a trite thing to go through, but there are seasons in life that are meant to give us pause. It becomes time to redirect our efforts and rework our lives. I have been given the privilege, as I approach my 50th birthday, to take a season off of my ordinary…
Bridges In the Mist
It was 3am. I was exhausted. Of the past 24 hours, I’d slept perhaps three. I hadn’t eaten anything that day, and barely allowed any water. I’d spent 12 hours in active labor and then had surgery. They’d just brought me my son back – having insisted on taking him away so I could rest….
Man and Woman
Woman is the why for man, Man is the what for woman. In some social structures, this balance is seen within marriage, in others “woman” is family/mother/society and “father” is authority/order/god. In the Modern West, we see this primarily in the marriage relationship. What remains is that balance, the innate nature of each sex. We…
Femininity is not Weakness
Modern feminism inhabits a paradigm that says that strength is masculine. They wouldn’t put it that way under torture, of course. But all virtues of character are masculine virtues… assertiveness, competition, drive-to-achieve, out-spokenness… those are what we should be. We should push hard and make our way in the world. Those are lovely things. In…