The Emasculation of Women

”Just play dumb. It works every single time.” That was my sister’s trick to getting men to be attracted to her. We were in our late teens, in college and whenever we wanted to prowl the cafeteria for men, that’s the line my sister gave. She was (still is) an attractive young woman , 6 ft 3, had modeled for a modeling agency but also was a serious medical professional …. to be. But that was her game for getting men and I watched her near 100% success rate and also noticed that it was a deception I could not, did not desire to, pull. I do not want to hide my knowing to make myself desirable to men.

Now, a few decades later, I reflect on this idea and how it ties to innocence. As a kid, my nicknames were “Mama” from my siblings because I acted like one and certainly was a parent figure to my younger brothers when they were bullied at school and needed help standing up to their bullies. My other nickname was “know it all”. This one was from adults- our nannies used it as an accusation as they punished me more for my “ know it all”, my parents especially when it was seen as evidence that I was being bad (usually in the context of not being sufficiently surbordinate to authority figures like my dad or anybody older than myself); then as I got older by my ex- husband (although his brand of that nickname was “ you always run your mouth” or “ you talk back” or “ you don’t listen”); or as a working professional when my boss told me that “you don’t know your place”

Now dear reader, if you are like me you know the “correct” way to think and believe when it comes to knowledge. You know that one’s knowledge isn’t something that varies with gender (or race). You know that people just know stuff that they know and pretending they don’t know doesn’t make you the big man on campus. We know that. But what else do we know? Well I’ll ask you. Have you ever feigned ignorance to get sympathy, pity or an acknowledgment of your humanity? Isn’t it super effective? What was the crime that Eve (and Adam to a lesser extent) committed in Genesis? Their crime was knowing. Their knowing took away their innocence and once they lost their innocence, they deserved punishment. The Bible makes it clear, the sin is knowledge, seeking knowledge.

I want to say I can’t do what my sister did, I can’t adapt in that way to fit in society but the truth is, I have, many different times. I noticed that I kept my son’s hair long with its baby curls for way too long, well into elementary school because I wanted to protect him from being stripped of his innocence in the eyes of wider society, I know my chief reflexive response to men (and women) when I wanted to buy their good graces, was to feign ignorance. I know the reason that boss told me I didn’t know my place was because I displayed my knowing, in academic spaces, without trying to cover it or minimize it. I know that when I was written up by a boss years earlier and investigated, the damning answer that sealed my fate was “ I know”

Why are innocence and knowledge treated as mutually exclusive traits?In spiritual circles why are women who know seen as bad marriage partners? Why is it an insult to a man to tell him that his female partner wears the pants in their relationship? Why are some men (and some women) eager to tell me all about how men are supposed to lead, provide and protect? It feels like a bdsm scene that has become a lifestyle, a Halloween costume that one can never take off. Because to those that police it, the argument isn’t that you don’t know or even to question the accuracy of your knowledge; the argument is that you deserve punishment for knowing. Meaning there needs to be a deterrent to obtaining knowledge. They know it’s a role they are asking you to assume- that of the ignorant- but they require this of you so that they can occupy the role of the knower. They know the roles aren’t real and it requires continuous suppression to maintain. So it brings up the question, why the performance? Does the emperor really believe he is clothed and we can’t see his bare ass flapping in the wind?