Emotional Memes and Cliches

I've been paying lots of attention -- especially as I'm back to heavy lifting some feminist writing -- to the kinds of things that pop up on my Facebook feed. Today I've been interested in seeing the multitude of supporting memes geared toward women who are suffering. See the FB page for Somewhere Over the Rainbow for examples. I wonder about this: we know that women do not suffer more than men, but that they are much, MUCH more likely to share their emotional experiences.

Memes work in interesting rhetorical ways, allowing us to post about our feelings without saying so. In some ways they give us the opportunity (as in sharing songs and lyrics) to say what we feel better than we could say it. Yet the memes I most often see casually leave men out (as sufferers). Since I spend my time studying ways women have been casually left out, I'm surprised by this opposite (a little surprised -- okay, not much surprised).

The disturbing thing, as a feminist, about leaving men out of such touchy-feely, supportive memes is that we (feminists) are interested in getting men to express emotion: to fully feel emotion and talk about it. We believe (and this is supported by a good bit of scientific evidence) that actually expressing such feelings brings people closer, makes them more fully-realized (as Maslow would put it).

So, men suffer just as much and in much the same way as women. Memes, created in an environment that post-dates third wave feminism by decades, still fail to portray that suffering (at least in regards heterosexual romantic relationships). Why are we stuck reinforcing the same old cliches of strong men and emotional women? How can we move forward and connect strength and emotion together, creating a sphere where the emotionally honest and vulnerable are considered the strongest among us -- whether female or male?

Doing so will strengthen the position of women and the move toward equality that is the heart of feminism.

This is the problem: FYI (if you’re a teenage girl) | Given Breath

"We hope to raise men with a strong moral compass, and men of integrity don’t linger over pictures of scantily clad high-school girls." -- from the blog FYI (if you’re a teenage girl) | Given Breath

Again, somehow it is the fault of "girls" if "males" are incapable of seeing past a bit of skin to recognize the woman (girl) beneath it. Sadly, it is women like this mother who continue to provide room in our society for men "who can't help themselves" -- the slope from her line of accusatory thinking about teenage girls to an ability to excuse the true inappropriate behavior of males who take advantage of such girls/women is much, much too easy to slide down (as I learned again this weekend).