I’ve consumed a lot of the work of Dr. Stacy Sims, and expert on women’s exercise and physiology, and she says it’s imperative for female athletes to strengthen their cores, and in particular, glutes, to prevent knee injuries. With homework and busy lives, it’s often too much to expect female high school and collegiate athletes to devote time outside of practice for core avid glute exercises as well as stretches. I know because I was one, and that dad is having the same experience with his daughter. Instead, coaches of female sports teams should recognize their athletes are not small men and devote practice time for core and glute work and knee stretches. If coaches want their athletes to perform well as women and girls, they need to train them as women and girls.
Gar! I keep trying to start a strength-training regime, only to have a flare-up of some pre-existing frailty interrupt it!
Sneaking past an exercise intolerance imposed by physical frailty takes a maddening amount of persistence, wiliness, self-restraint, and just plain dumb luck! As Paul Ingraham (friend of the Better Movement guy) puts it, "With extremely careful progression and load management... Carefully and methodically pushing my luck."
I’ve heard more recent research on training according to your cycle’s phases is now mixed (I ran my best half marathon during my luteal phase), but I still think all women and teenage girls, athletes in particular, need to be charting. If you always feel like crap two days before your period, you can identify that as a pattern, and then plan accordingly through supplementation, going to bed on time,
I was very honored by the mention, and I also suspect that there is far less disagreement between us than might initially appear. Our starting point seems to be the same: the inescapable reality of the body and the knowledge of its suffering.
The female body confronts us with asymmetry, limitation, vulnerability, and, as you put it way better than me, dependence. For women in particular, these realities are difficult to ignore, because they are inscribed so visibly in fertility, pregnancy, and in the long history of expectations that have surrounded them.
My argument has never been that every response to this suffering constitutes feminism, nor that every revolt against suffering is misguided or gnostic in nature. Revolt itself can even be necessary, and at times redemptive. In my book Autópsia do Feminismo https://amzn.to/3OOL4qG, I trace this possibility back to the figure of the Mater Dolorosa: suffering can be sublimated, transfigured, and ultimately ordered toward the truth revealed at Calvary. The uterus has long been associated with suffering —already in the Greek hystera — yet redeemed through Christ it becomes, symbolically, closer to the ancient Hebrew word רֶחֶם, mercy or maternal compassion.
My claim (and I recognize that this was not entirely clear in that article) is simply that the modern feminist movement represents one historically specific way in which this encounter with bodily suffering has been interpreted and politicized. I argue that this particular political form depends upon a specific theological genealogy — one that emerges within the context of Protestant reinterpretations of original sin, of a reconfigured Eve, and of the gradual symbolic displacement of the Virgin Mary as Theotokos and maternal mediator within the Christian imagination. I am fully aware that this is a strong thesis, which is precisely why it required an entire book to develop the argument with the care it demands.
But at the level of first principles, the reality of the body really is both gift and cross, and human beings are always tempted to respond to this reality in different ways. In that sense, I greatly appreciated your framing, because it keeps the conversation grounded where it properly belongs— not in abstract ideological labels (whether one chooses to speak of feminism, feminisms, or other terms), but in the deeper question of how we come to understand, interpret, and ultimately live with the frailty of our embodied lives.
"I trace this possibility back to the figure of the Mater Dolorosa: suffering can be sublimated, transfigured, and ultimately ordered toward the truth revealed at Calvary. The uterus has long been associated with suffering —already in the Greek hystera — yet redeemed through Christ it becomes, symbolically, closer to the ancient Hebrew word רֶחֶם, mercy or maternal compassion."
When is it alleviation of suffering and when is it refusal of suffering? Every example I can think of can go either way, yet it would be an even more cruel and unjust world if culture prioritized acceptance of suffering over alleviation. Am I refusing my createdness if I seek hormone therapy to ease my perimenopause symptoms? Brain fog, fatigue, depression, and anxiety already threaten to consume my waking hours, and it's only been a few months (I have other tell-tale symptoms as well, but these are the burdensome ones). Do laboring mothers reject frailty when they use epidurals?
I appreciate the idea of accepting one's own givenness, I even advocate for it at times. And I know that it is often pro-life to alleviate suffering. So perhaps it's the brain fog, but I'm having trouble seeing how these values are balanced here.
It's a very fair question! I think about it lot in terms of trying to restore wholeness/integrated function versus rejecting the body as flawed/enemy. Which isn't a totally reliable compass, but it's my first pass.
So, for example, I think it's pretty reasonable (and morally licit) for someone to take the Pill to manage endo symptoms while trying to explore what other interventions may help (trying to address malfunctioning reproductive system) versus not to take the Pill in order to turn off the reproductive system, thinking of it as not a part of oneself.
Like "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"? Ha! That's make sense. It leads to the question of how we define whether something is broken or not, which people will obviously have different answers to. And that question seems more navigable, esp since it starts with something that most agree is common sense.
Thank you. All too often advocates for ‘accept your embodiment’ or ‘givenness’ really mean ‘sucks to be you.’ Pain is, actually, BAD!! Jesus, when confronted with sick people, never gave them condescending lectures about the beauty of their misery; he simply healed them. He even begged God not to make him go through the Crucifixion. Disability advocates are absolutely correct in demanding that the built environment accommodate their needs — no one should be prevented from participating in public life because of their bodies. That includes women.
I’d like to add another element to the definition of feminism.
What limits, if any, are there to female agency and bodily autonomy, and who decides.
As to whether one can outrun one’s body, I would suggest one can.
We do it all the time.
Humans are not equipped with fins or gills so if we want to span large bodies of water, we build boats. In like manner, we are not equipped with wings so if we wish to fly, we build aircraft. If we want to counter the deleterious effects of bacteria and viruses, we develop antibiotics or vaccines. And if women want to control their fertility, we have reproductive medicine.
I wouldn’t contend that any of the above don’t come with potential downsides. But few human activities are free of the curse of tradeoffs.
"Where do you find it hardest to accept that frailty is not a passing interruption of a natural state of strength?"
Increasing age. All of the brain synapses still know how to direct performance of dozens of tasks that the rest of the body just can't carry out. The disconnect between what your brain can direct and what your body can carry out can be simply maddening. Or... it can just be a flat lesson that you are not the boss of you.
Ok that's very interesting about the sexed distribution of ACL injuries. I'd be curious to put that idea in conversation with this one, about broader movement patterns and societal factors also affecting youth ACL injuries. https://substack.com/@guenbradbury/p-148399359
> Where do you find it hardest to accept that frailty is not a passing interruption of a natural state of strength?
Where support is not immediately available--a widespread problem w/o a singular clear solution. It's all very well to say and believe that I personally have physical limits or needs--but what about the effects on people who also depend on me? Like, if I need to stay in bed all day, my young children are going to be negatively affected, b/c my husband's job is not set up for flexibility and, while we do have supportive friends, we don't currently have grownups who could drop everything to help on a moment's notice. It sometimes feels more "realistic" to just try to muscle through, even though that's ultimately less truthful (not to mention more harmful)!
Yep. Others depend on us to be, well, dependable, even when our bodies aren't.
When our bodies aren't reliable, we aren't reliable. And so working to fix the janky meat suit that carries us around is, to some extent, a practical moral obligation, and acceptance that a fix can't reasonably be found is fraught.
I decided to sign my kids up for ballet this fall, in part inspired by another OF reader (and friend) who told me that ballet was good for her as a kid because while sports are designed for boys/men and modified (or not) for girls/women, the female ballet parts are designed for women, and she felt affirmed in her female body. I'm told that ballet culture can get toxic but we found a studio which (I'm told, by my local friends) has a good culture.
"Are we ultimately trying to see a purpose to our frailty, or are we working to fix the janky meat suit that carries us around?"
How hard must we try to see that purpose? Does Christ obligate us to see some specific purpose in our specific frailty, or is it enough to trust that frailty needn't be void of purpose, and try to make the best of things in that light?
Working to fix the janky meat suit that carries us around is, to some extent, a practical moral obligation. To what extent, though? That's the rub. Summer of 2020, I think, I wrote my husband an essay (this is a totally normal thing to do, right?) pertaining to the social pressure we face to keep supposing we're fixable – an excerpt:
Tara Isabella Burton describes right-wing politics as an alliance between “atavists” (reactionaries) and “libertarians” against the “activist” (social-justice) left. Atavists worship the “strong gods” Matt McManus calls famished, principalities and powers “endlessly hungry and always on the verge of imploding from [their] own lack of substance” as humanity barely manages to keep the sucking maw of chaos at bay. Atavists see human possibility as brutally limited by harsh necessity, while “libertarians” see it as brutally limitless through sovereign choice.
Though this dichotomy doesn’t describe the libertarians I know best (economically-literate folk who see human choice as constrained – often tragically so – by contingency and scarcity), there are perhaps more versions of “libertarianism” than libertarians, and what Burton calls the libertarian (and I’d call the New Thought or Prosperity Gospel) notion of authentic selfhood, springing from will alone, fully realized in unconstrained choice, forms the prairie horizon of America’s mindscape. Burton says atavists and activists should recognize that they share the claim that our limitations, whether physical (atavists’) or social (activists’), define us, giving both “A-teams” common cause against this “libertarian” notion of authenticity. Framed this way, an atavist-libertarian alliance like the right doesn’t really deserve to exist. So, what really unites the right?
Perhaps what unites the right, both its atavist and libertarian strains, is fear of malingering. Both atavists and libertarians suspect activists threaten everyone, including the poor, by giving victimhood “too much empathy” – too much benefit of the doubt. Sincere atavists should regard victims as too unworthy to deserve this benefit, while libertarians claim human potential, even in victims, is too worthy to sell itself short with a “victim mentality”. Either viewpoint justifies responding to reports of suffering with fear, fear of malingering, fear of the victim mentality. This fear justifies withering skepticism toward those claiming something wrong with their lives that can’t be “cured” by self-improvement. After all, such claims just might be malingering, just might be that worthless victim mentality. Can we afford to bet that they’re not?
Moreover, in an increasingly technological world where the realm of untestable experience ought to be shrinking, why should people believe they deserve the benefit of the doubt simply by being people, by being informal witnesses to their own lives? Why shouldn’t increasing capacity to test reports of suffering against objective metrics (though it’s often not cost-effective to do so) cast increasing doubt on reports of suffering lacking confirming metrics? Activists’ insistence, then, that society must progress by giving claims of victimhood increasing benefit of the doubt, despite advancing technology, seems positively anti-scientific. If you say you’re innocently suffering, there must be evidence of this suffering (as well as your innocence) somewhere, evidence beyond your own hardly-disinterested say-so. So, where is this evidence, that we may believe it instead of you?...
...Complete disbelief in human limits seems too freakish to take seriously. Much more commonplace are nibbling doubts that any particular limit need be as limiting as someone supposes. Even applying these doubts to every particular limit doesn’t entail complete disbelief in human limits. It can, however, reduce social trust, trust that people are navigating their limits as best they can, and can’t be reasonably expected to do better.
Throwing your kids at home impromptu dance parties consisting entirely of A Capella Science tracks (already vetted – innuendo, salty language, and in the videos, occasional discomfiting images, are fairly tame, but present).
The trio
1) The Molecular Shape of You (Ed Sheeran Parody)
2) Evo-Devo (Despacito Biology Parody)
3) Nanobot (Havana Parody)
is particularly fine together, parodying sultry tunes that suit the subject, which is the biochemistry of embodiment.
There's some tongue-in-cheek objectifying language in there ("You're a chemical machine" (#1), "Though sentient and organic, I am a nanobot" (#3)), which got me wondering:
Why don't I find knowledge like this (especially presented in a format that flirts with objectification for entertainment value, but – I assume – doesn't seriously mean it) objectifying? Some people do, after all, and they're not crazy – focusing on the mechanics of embodiment *can* happen at the expense of the souls embodied.
Maybe it's because none of the analytical, mechanical knowledge presented strikes me as diminishing the value of ordinary human witness. Making up silly songs about stuff *is* a form of ordinary human witness, in fact. The woman singing about *being* a meta-nanobot (as I gather all organisms could be classified) humorously parodies objectifying lyrics. But not seriously at the expense of her sentience or agency. Whereas a two-step like the following *would* cheapen ordinary human witness and agency (I say as one who still feels a part of the US right – leastaways a US right that isn't bonkers):
Step 1) Sufferers are infantilized by not being trusted with the agency to reliably witness their own plight. Often, this is framed as a logical duty to dismiss their witness in favor of “the science” (somebody’s science, anyhow, possibly cherry-picked).
Step 2) If and when their witness is finally believed, the right cheerfully reassures them it won’t aid them because dangit, sufferers have agency and it doesn’t want to infantilize them!
I appreciate all the deep thinking going on here, but instead of spending time thinking of my response, I’m going to go lay on the floor and feel the sturdiness of it beneath me. ;)
As a small college athletic director, father of 2 female college athletes and husband to a former college athlete, I’m thankful that this conversation is rising up in this thread. More please! It was almost 20 years ago that we started to recognize the incident of ACL’s during certain times in our female athlete’s cycle. Culturally it was a dangerous conversation to talk publicly about. But after overcoming that impediment we were able to build various testing and strength and conditioning protocols to support our female athletes better. Now, due to the work of folks like Leah Libresco Sargeant we can take the conversation to an even deeper level. In intercollegiate athletics we say that team sports provides a laboratory for life lessons. Here is yet another one.
Could you define what you mean by ‘justice?’ Plenty of theorists state that they want justice for women, by which they mean ‘forced into abusive marriages in order to eat and live indoors and never allowed any participation in public life at all.’ Read, if you have a strong stomach, the works of Scott Yenor on this point.
My definition of ‘justice’ is ‘ensured by custom and law the absolute right and obligation to participate in public life, both in the market and in government.’ Women should vote, own property, and have their own income completely independent and inaccessible by their husbands. When that world exists, we will have justice for women.
Such a good article! It's hard to balance affirming the real goodness of the female body on the one hand but also recognizing and being honest about the tradeoffs and vulnerabilities inherent in female embodiment.
I’ve consumed a lot of the work of Dr. Stacy Sims, and expert on women’s exercise and physiology, and she says it’s imperative for female athletes to strengthen their cores, and in particular, glutes, to prevent knee injuries. With homework and busy lives, it’s often too much to expect female high school and collegiate athletes to devote time outside of practice for core avid glute exercises as well as stretches. I know because I was one, and that dad is having the same experience with his daughter. Instead, coaches of female sports teams should recognize their athletes are not small men and devote practice time for core and glute work and knee stretches. If coaches want their athletes to perform well as women and girls, they need to train them as women and girls.
I'm about to go do my deadlifts (new for me!) in the basement of my work building because I really want sustainable strength.
Gar! I keep trying to start a strength-training regime, only to have a flare-up of some pre-existing frailty interrupt it!
Sneaking past an exercise intolerance imposed by physical frailty takes a maddening amount of persistence, wiliness, self-restraint, and just plain dumb luck! As Paul Ingraham (friend of the Better Movement guy) puts it, "With extremely careful progression and load management... Carefully and methodically pushing my luck."
https://tryeverything.substack.com/p/sneaking-past-exercise-tolerance
I’m done physical therapy for lower back issues and for pelvic floor issues and in both cases it’s involved a surprising amount of glute work.
Yes, yes, yes! And not only should female sports teams be training girls according to their unique musculoskeletal anatomy, but according to their unique hormonal patterns as well, because that absolutely impacts injury risk and athletic performance: https://naturalwomanhood.org/menstrual-cycle-athletic-performance/ If we trained girls this way, we'd be preparing them for life as active adults better, too: https://naturalwomanhood.org/female-athletes-fertility-awareness/
I’ve heard more recent research on training according to your cycle’s phases is now mixed (I ran my best half marathon during my luteal phase), but I still think all women and teenage girls, athletes in particular, need to be charting. If you always feel like crap two days before your period, you can identify that as a pattern, and then plan accordingly through supplementation, going to bed on time,
I was very honored by the mention, and I also suspect that there is far less disagreement between us than might initially appear. Our starting point seems to be the same: the inescapable reality of the body and the knowledge of its suffering.
The female body confronts us with asymmetry, limitation, vulnerability, and, as you put it way better than me, dependence. For women in particular, these realities are difficult to ignore, because they are inscribed so visibly in fertility, pregnancy, and in the long history of expectations that have surrounded them.
My argument has never been that every response to this suffering constitutes feminism, nor that every revolt against suffering is misguided or gnostic in nature. Revolt itself can even be necessary, and at times redemptive. In my book Autópsia do Feminismo https://amzn.to/3OOL4qG, I trace this possibility back to the figure of the Mater Dolorosa: suffering can be sublimated, transfigured, and ultimately ordered toward the truth revealed at Calvary. The uterus has long been associated with suffering —already in the Greek hystera — yet redeemed through Christ it becomes, symbolically, closer to the ancient Hebrew word רֶחֶם, mercy or maternal compassion.
My claim (and I recognize that this was not entirely clear in that article) is simply that the modern feminist movement represents one historically specific way in which this encounter with bodily suffering has been interpreted and politicized. I argue that this particular political form depends upon a specific theological genealogy — one that emerges within the context of Protestant reinterpretations of original sin, of a reconfigured Eve, and of the gradual symbolic displacement of the Virgin Mary as Theotokos and maternal mediator within the Christian imagination. I am fully aware that this is a strong thesis, which is precisely why it required an entire book to develop the argument with the care it demands.
But at the level of first principles, the reality of the body really is both gift and cross, and human beings are always tempted to respond to this reality in different ways. In that sense, I greatly appreciated your framing, because it keeps the conversation grounded where it properly belongs— not in abstract ideological labels (whether one chooses to speak of feminism, feminisms, or other terms), but in the deeper question of how we come to understand, interpret, and ultimately live with the frailty of our embodied lives.
I really like this:
"I trace this possibility back to the figure of the Mater Dolorosa: suffering can be sublimated, transfigured, and ultimately ordered toward the truth revealed at Calvary. The uterus has long been associated with suffering —already in the Greek hystera — yet redeemed through Christ it becomes, symbolically, closer to the ancient Hebrew word רֶחֶם, mercy or maternal compassion."
When is it alleviation of suffering and when is it refusal of suffering? Every example I can think of can go either way, yet it would be an even more cruel and unjust world if culture prioritized acceptance of suffering over alleviation. Am I refusing my createdness if I seek hormone therapy to ease my perimenopause symptoms? Brain fog, fatigue, depression, and anxiety already threaten to consume my waking hours, and it's only been a few months (I have other tell-tale symptoms as well, but these are the burdensome ones). Do laboring mothers reject frailty when they use epidurals?
I appreciate the idea of accepting one's own givenness, I even advocate for it at times. And I know that it is often pro-life to alleviate suffering. So perhaps it's the brain fog, but I'm having trouble seeing how these values are balanced here.
It's a very fair question! I think about it lot in terms of trying to restore wholeness/integrated function versus rejecting the body as flawed/enemy. Which isn't a totally reliable compass, but it's my first pass.
So, for example, I think it's pretty reasonable (and morally licit) for someone to take the Pill to manage endo symptoms while trying to explore what other interventions may help (trying to address malfunctioning reproductive system) versus not to take the Pill in order to turn off the reproductive system, thinking of it as not a part of oneself.
Like "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"? Ha! That's make sense. It leads to the question of how we define whether something is broken or not, which people will obviously have different answers to. And that question seems more navigable, esp since it starts with something that most agree is common sense.
Thank you. All too often advocates for ‘accept your embodiment’ or ‘givenness’ really mean ‘sucks to be you.’ Pain is, actually, BAD!! Jesus, when confronted with sick people, never gave them condescending lectures about the beauty of their misery; he simply healed them. He even begged God not to make him go through the Crucifixion. Disability advocates are absolutely correct in demanding that the built environment accommodate their needs — no one should be prevented from participating in public life because of their bodies. That includes women.
I’d like to add another element to the definition of feminism.
What limits, if any, are there to female agency and bodily autonomy, and who decides.
As to whether one can outrun one’s body, I would suggest one can.
We do it all the time.
Humans are not equipped with fins or gills so if we want to span large bodies of water, we build boats. In like manner, we are not equipped with wings so if we wish to fly, we build aircraft. If we want to counter the deleterious effects of bacteria and viruses, we develop antibiotics or vaccines. And if women want to control their fertility, we have reproductive medicine.
I wouldn’t contend that any of the above don’t come with potential downsides. But few human activities are free of the curse of tradeoffs.
"Where do you find it hardest to accept that frailty is not a passing interruption of a natural state of strength?"
Increasing age. All of the brain synapses still know how to direct performance of dozens of tasks that the rest of the body just can't carry out. The disconnect between what your brain can direct and what your body can carry out can be simply maddening. Or... it can just be a flat lesson that you are not the boss of you.
Ok that's very interesting about the sexed distribution of ACL injuries. I'd be curious to put that idea in conversation with this one, about broader movement patterns and societal factors also affecting youth ACL injuries. https://substack.com/@guenbradbury/p-148399359
> Where do you find it hardest to accept that frailty is not a passing interruption of a natural state of strength?
Where support is not immediately available--a widespread problem w/o a singular clear solution. It's all very well to say and believe that I personally have physical limits or needs--but what about the effects on people who also depend on me? Like, if I need to stay in bed all day, my young children are going to be negatively affected, b/c my husband's job is not set up for flexibility and, while we do have supportive friends, we don't currently have grownups who could drop everything to help on a moment's notice. It sometimes feels more "realistic" to just try to muscle through, even though that's ultimately less truthful (not to mention more harmful)!
Yep. Others depend on us to be, well, dependable, even when our bodies aren't.
When our bodies aren't reliable, we aren't reliable. And so working to fix the janky meat suit that carries us around is, to some extent, a practical moral obligation, and acceptance that a fix can't reasonably be found is fraught.
I decided to sign my kids up for ballet this fall, in part inspired by another OF reader (and friend) who told me that ballet was good for her as a kid because while sports are designed for boys/men and modified (or not) for girls/women, the female ballet parts are designed for women, and she felt affirmed in her female body. I'm told that ballet culture can get toxic but we found a studio which (I'm told, by my local friends) has a good culture.
"Are we ultimately trying to see a purpose to our frailty, or are we working to fix the janky meat suit that carries us around?"
How hard must we try to see that purpose? Does Christ obligate us to see some specific purpose in our specific frailty, or is it enough to trust that frailty needn't be void of purpose, and try to make the best of things in that light?
Working to fix the janky meat suit that carries us around is, to some extent, a practical moral obligation. To what extent, though? That's the rub. Summer of 2020, I think, I wrote my husband an essay (this is a totally normal thing to do, right?) pertaining to the social pressure we face to keep supposing we're fixable – an excerpt:
Tara Isabella Burton describes right-wing politics as an alliance between “atavists” (reactionaries) and “libertarians” against the “activist” (social-justice) left. Atavists worship the “strong gods” Matt McManus calls famished, principalities and powers “endlessly hungry and always on the verge of imploding from [their] own lack of substance” as humanity barely manages to keep the sucking maw of chaos at bay. Atavists see human possibility as brutally limited by harsh necessity, while “libertarians” see it as brutally limitless through sovereign choice.
Though this dichotomy doesn’t describe the libertarians I know best (economically-literate folk who see human choice as constrained – often tragically so – by contingency and scarcity), there are perhaps more versions of “libertarianism” than libertarians, and what Burton calls the libertarian (and I’d call the New Thought or Prosperity Gospel) notion of authentic selfhood, springing from will alone, fully realized in unconstrained choice, forms the prairie horizon of America’s mindscape. Burton says atavists and activists should recognize that they share the claim that our limitations, whether physical (atavists’) or social (activists’), define us, giving both “A-teams” common cause against this “libertarian” notion of authenticity. Framed this way, an atavist-libertarian alliance like the right doesn’t really deserve to exist. So, what really unites the right?
Perhaps what unites the right, both its atavist and libertarian strains, is fear of malingering. Both atavists and libertarians suspect activists threaten everyone, including the poor, by giving victimhood “too much empathy” – too much benefit of the doubt. Sincere atavists should regard victims as too unworthy to deserve this benefit, while libertarians claim human potential, even in victims, is too worthy to sell itself short with a “victim mentality”. Either viewpoint justifies responding to reports of suffering with fear, fear of malingering, fear of the victim mentality. This fear justifies withering skepticism toward those claiming something wrong with their lives that can’t be “cured” by self-improvement. After all, such claims just might be malingering, just might be that worthless victim mentality. Can we afford to bet that they’re not?
Moreover, in an increasingly technological world where the realm of untestable experience ought to be shrinking, why should people believe they deserve the benefit of the doubt simply by being people, by being informal witnesses to their own lives? Why shouldn’t increasing capacity to test reports of suffering against objective metrics (though it’s often not cost-effective to do so) cast increasing doubt on reports of suffering lacking confirming metrics? Activists’ insistence, then, that society must progress by giving claims of victimhood increasing benefit of the doubt, despite advancing technology, seems positively anti-scientific. If you say you’re innocently suffering, there must be evidence of this suffering (as well as your innocence) somewhere, evidence beyond your own hardly-disinterested say-so. So, where is this evidence, that we may believe it instead of you?...
...Complete disbelief in human limits seems too freakish to take seriously. Much more commonplace are nibbling doubts that any particular limit need be as limiting as someone supposes. Even applying these doubts to every particular limit doesn’t entail complete disbelief in human limits. It can, however, reduce social trust, trust that people are navigating their limits as best they can, and can’t be reasonably expected to do better.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NMG5jkIWMST8Su3xHbcqEDyxKZmoKgl80L9ZMXMQDrY/edit?usp=sharing
Parenthetically, this is so great:
"I wrote my husband an essay (this is a totally normal thing to do, right?)"
Another totally normal thing to do!:
Throwing your kids at home impromptu dance parties consisting entirely of A Capella Science tracks (already vetted – innuendo, salty language, and in the videos, occasional discomfiting images, are fairly tame, but present).
The trio
1) The Molecular Shape of You (Ed Sheeran Parody)
2) Evo-Devo (Despacito Biology Parody)
3) Nanobot (Havana Parody)
is particularly fine together, parodying sultry tunes that suit the subject, which is the biochemistry of embodiment.
There's some tongue-in-cheek objectifying language in there ("You're a chemical machine" (#1), "Though sentient and organic, I am a nanobot" (#3)), which got me wondering:
Why don't I find knowledge like this (especially presented in a format that flirts with objectification for entertainment value, but – I assume – doesn't seriously mean it) objectifying? Some people do, after all, and they're not crazy – focusing on the mechanics of embodiment *can* happen at the expense of the souls embodied.
Maybe it's because none of the analytical, mechanical knowledge presented strikes me as diminishing the value of ordinary human witness. Making up silly songs about stuff *is* a form of ordinary human witness, in fact. The woman singing about *being* a meta-nanobot (as I gather all organisms could be classified) humorously parodies objectifying lyrics. But not seriously at the expense of her sentience or agency. Whereas a two-step like the following *would* cheapen ordinary human witness and agency (I say as one who still feels a part of the US right – leastaways a US right that isn't bonkers):
Step 1) Sufferers are infantilized by not being trusted with the agency to reliably witness their own plight. Often, this is framed as a logical duty to dismiss their witness in favor of “the science” (somebody’s science, anyhow, possibly cherry-picked).
Step 2) If and when their witness is finally believed, the right cheerfully reassures them it won’t aid them because dangit, sufferers have agency and it doesn’t want to infantilize them!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8FAJXPBdOg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydqReeTV_vk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObvxPSQNMGc
I appreciate all the deep thinking going on here, but instead of spending time thinking of my response, I’m going to go lay on the floor and feel the sturdiness of it beneath me. ;)
As a small college athletic director, father of 2 female college athletes and husband to a former college athlete, I’m thankful that this conversation is rising up in this thread. More please! It was almost 20 years ago that we started to recognize the incident of ACL’s during certain times in our female athlete’s cycle. Culturally it was a dangerous conversation to talk publicly about. But after overcoming that impediment we were able to build various testing and strength and conditioning protocols to support our female athletes better. Now, due to the work of folks like Leah Libresco Sargeant we can take the conversation to an even deeper level. In intercollegiate athletics we say that team sports provides a laboratory for life lessons. Here is yet another one.
Could you define what you mean by ‘justice?’ Plenty of theorists state that they want justice for women, by which they mean ‘forced into abusive marriages in order to eat and live indoors and never allowed any participation in public life at all.’ Read, if you have a strong stomach, the works of Scott Yenor on this point.
My definition of ‘justice’ is ‘ensured by custom and law the absolute right and obligation to participate in public life, both in the market and in government.’ Women should vote, own property, and have their own income completely independent and inaccessible by their husbands. When that world exists, we will have justice for women.
The frailty of the human condition is such that, when properly considered, sexual differences wane.
Giuseppe Ungaretti wrote this poem on the Belgian front in 1918. It's titled "Soldiers" but it applies to us all.
Soldati
Si sta come
d'autunno
sugli alberi
le foglie
---
Soldiers
We are as
in autumn
on branches
the leaves
Such a good article! It's hard to balance affirming the real goodness of the female body on the one hand but also recognizing and being honest about the tradeoffs and vulnerabilities inherent in female embodiment.