Penny Hero (dot) Net

Instead of doing my essay, I’m reading about Helen Cixous… and thinking about who I am. Part of me looks at her ideas of “feminine writing” and feels that it’s not writing that I love, but it’s so-called “male writing”. Part of me is fine with that. I’m fine with that because that’s what I’ve been doing all my life, and it’s something that I enjoy. I’m fine with it because my job right now is to teach and tutor other students how to succeed in this “phallocentric” discourse. I like descriptive grammar and I like to learn the ins and outs of prescriptive grammar. I like critically analyzing things and giving feedback and translating ideas in to other ways of expressing ideas and helping other people learn to translate their ideas into a written academically accepted language. I’m also (apparently) very good at it… in fact, I’m convinced that my writing really is the only thing that has carried me so far through college with a 3.5something GPA.

But this other part of me thinks about this and wonders if I might be happier rejecting these ideas and embracing (or rather, creating) this more intuitive, flowing, or as-of-yet not quite understood way of writing that Cixous seems to be encouraging. I read about her and I think yes! I do have trouble translating my own thoughts into the “logic” and “clarity” that are demanded by Academia and any other respected nerd field. I think for a second that I’ve come to the very very essence of “writer’s block”.

But then my mind takes another turn… and I realize how much I dislike the ‘essentialist’ position that Cixous seems to take. She seems to be participating in the very discourse she wants to deconstruct by allowing ideas of “female” to correspond inherently with the repressed. She seems to directly connect “Woman” and women’s sexuality with all other things that are de-emphasized in our socially constructed discourse. Things like intuition, concepts of mothering, and nurturing, or poetry. I’m offended by this. I don’t believe that there is anything more than a coincidental parallel construct between most of these things. I don’t believe that anything is is inherently “Vaginal” about child-rearing except that that’s the corridor through which a baby enters the world. I agree with Cixous’s critics when they make the point that her essentialism seems to defeat the goal she seems to have: that of breaking up the oppressive writing discourses we have. In fact, she could only succeed in creating a second oppressive discourse… and even if “female writing” did become a dominant language through which our world is seen, it would still be as engendered and as incomplete as she seems to feel the current system is.

I thought a lot about what I learned from commentary on her work (since I couldn’t find her actual works online yet…) and how I feel my own world is constructed.

When reading her, I also think about how in my own emotions, I often want to take on the expressive role, and give support, or attempt to be a stable thing for someone else to recieve what I give. I know that this is what is called the “male” role. I also keep thinking about how sometimes I want to be on the recieving end in a relationship. My own lifestyle matches this kind of ambiguity/confusion in how I (and I’m sure many other women) absolutely loathe shaving, plucking, waxing… and yet I continue to do so. I do it because I feel like I deserve the effects of this practice (being seen as a woman, whatever that really means to me), even while I hate the chores I’m obligated to do in order to be seen as a woman.

I see this ambiguity/confusion in my own sexuality… in my attraction to other people, especially people who would allow me to be more expressive and “active” than I could ever be in a “traditional heterosexual” relationship. this translates to my attraction to “feminine” men, and other women. I don’t want to be expected to settle into a pattern of being the reciever, being acted upon, or approached. But it’s more than that. I would be equally unhappy (and in fact I’ve found that I always am) in relationships where I am the one always in the ‘active position’. I’m always seeking the back-and-forth. I want to be both sides, and I want to be neither one. And I don’t want to be expected to be either one. In the contemporary ‘academic’ understanding, there exists here an irreconcilable paradox. But in the language that I think Cixous is advocating the development of, there is none. (this language she’s talking about… I don’t think is a bad idea… I just don’t like the essentialist thinking that seems to have begun it, or the engendered discourse that it could only lead to).

It seems like what I’m wishing for is for the entire “gender” discourse to just dissapear. The entire discourse including what it has done to writing, thinking, language, and thus the way we percieve the world… I wish that it would never have been developed… and we could all simply be human beings. And things like sex would not have double meanings for people. (for men it’s essential to have or risk social alienation. for women it’s essential to not really want it, or risk a completely different kind of social alienation… “sluttiness”.)

It all comes down to this conflict between me wanting to be comfortable and accepted in this society, and wanting to just be me without the meaningless obligations that come with not having a penis.

That… and my confusion about how I feel about the writing discourses… and academia… and my desire to be respected and such, and my disatisfaction with the path I must take in order to become respected.

*Pause*

I’m also feeling obligated to apologize for the disconnectedness of this entry… because this entry doesn’t adhere to the academic, ‘analytical’ patterns that would normally give an intellectual exploration like this a more “serious” readership/audience, I feel like I need to make some kind of excuse for it, and “claim” that I really am a “smart person” and that my thoughts here shouldn’t just be discounted as ramblings, or rantings… that this “paper” really was well thought out, and that it is (I guess) really structured in a way so that I can try to exercise my own ideas of what I think could be a new, more fluid “dance” between what Cixous calls “feminine writing” and what she thinks is the current logical masculine writing.

like she even says, the new discourse won’t make sense to the current contemporary systems. I think that in and of itself is evidence that what I’m doing here is a kind of play between those systems… because I really do come from the “contemporary” discourse, (and other reasons) I could never hope to create or contribute to “essentially feminine” writing. In principle, i wouldn’t want to. I want a language through which I could express more directly my thoughts and feelings.

I think that’s what I’ve tried here… and so, it would be expected that most everyone reading this (unless you are from venus. haha) will think that it is sloppy, poorly written etc etc.

I went to http://www.moveon.org/unitednotdivided/ and said

I believe that the democratic system we employ in the United States is a useful and usually a very just and fair system. However, I believe that if left to a majority vote by the population in America, the American people will vote to ratify this amendment to the US constitution which will allow descrimination and hate to have constitutional backing. The argument that “might does not always make right” has already been made in conjunction with the majority opinion during the civil rights movement. It has already been pointed out that if the american public had been allowed to vote on the issue of whether or not slavery should have been abolished in the US, it may not have passed. In cases of moral precident, when the majority opinion may for some reason be in favor of discrimination and hate, someone else must step in and speak for the moral minority.

Gay marriage does not threaten our society. If anything, removing obstacles to the recognition of gay marriage will send a message of acceptance and tollerance for all lifestyles that all American citizens engage in. It will unite people of very different worlds under a hate free and multi-colored American bannar.

Give our society a chance to prove that we are evolved enough to grow and transcend old discriminatory habits that no longer apply to our growing and changing society. I am positive that the gay and allied community will prove that we are just as capable of contributing to the health and well being of society and its children, because we are no different from heterosexual people, in relationships or single. We are all human beings, and we are all Americans.

If you are alarmed by the idea of having the United States Constitution amended to define marriage as a “union between a man and a woman”, please click on the link, send your comments, and call your senators. (their phone numbers will be sent to you with the confirmation email.)