Tag Archives: Power

What is a Woman: Maya Angelou

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Maya Angelou LA Times

You may write me down in history

With your bitter, twisted lies,

You may trod me in the very dirt

But still, like dust, I’ll rise.

~

Does my sassiness upset you?

Why are you beset with gloom?

’Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells

Pumping in my living room.

~

Just like moons and like suns,

With the certainty of tides,

Just like hopes springing high,

Still I’ll rise.

~

Did you want to see me broken?

Bowed head and lowered eyes?

Shoulders falling down like teardrops,

Weakened by my soulful cries?

~

Does my haughtiness offend you?

Don’t you take it awful hard

’Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines

Diggin’ in my own backyard.

~

You may shoot me with your words,

You may cut me with your eyes,

You may kill me with your hatefulness,

But still, like air, I’ll rise.

~

Does my sexiness upset you?

Does it come as a surprise

That I dance like I’ve got diamonds

At the meeting of my thighs?

~

Out of the huts of history’s shame

I rise

Up from a past that’s rooted in pain

I rise

I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,

Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

~

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear

I rise

Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear

I rise

Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,

I am the dream and the hope of the slave.

I rise

I rise

I rise.

~~~

She is talking about women. Real women. The history of black women which can ring true for all women. There was a time when all women had no rights, they were the objects and under the control of men. Now we are in a time when men are trying a new way to objectify women by claiming they “are” women. You can make it up but it will never be the same. Plastic surgery, hormone shots, chopping off your dick to be a eunuch. You will never be a woman. You will only be a Eunuch; a guy without a dick. Stay in your own lane and leave us alone. We have fought our fought and won. Now you are making us fight again. The new misogyny. A raping of women, pretending we are one.

What is a Woman: Edna St. Vincent Millay

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Edna St. Vincent Millay (storyinprogress.substack.com)

I, being born a woman and distressed by Edna St. Vincent Millay 

I, being born a woman and distressed

By all the needs and notions of my kind,

Am urged by your propinquity to find

Your person fair, and feel a certain zest

To bear your body’s weight upon my breast:

So subtly is the fume of life designed,

To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,

And leave me once again undone, possessed.

Think not for this, however, the poor treason

Of my stout blood against my staggering brain,

I shall remember you with love, or season

My scorn with pity,—let me make it plain:

I find this frenzy insufficient reason

For conversation when we meet again.

~~~

Distressed now by men who won’t stay in their own lane. Who want to occupy ours because being a man isn’t good enough for them and they believe the grass is greener. Once again, finding new ways to possess women in sports, prisons, locker rooms, women’s organizations, where we have fought to have our own sacred and safe space. Laws designed to protect us once, we now have to clarify sex and fight once more. XX-XY

What is a Woman: Tacocat

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Man pointing finger at woman who looks down holding papers in office hallway
Now men are trying to tell us we should accept them if they want to be a woman. They are just like “us.” Stay in your own lane boys. Be proud of who you are.

Men Explain Things to Me: Written by Lelah Maupin, Eric Randall, Brianna Mckenna, Emily E Nokes

Explain it to me
Explain it to me
Explain it to me, again

Though I know all about the words you’re spitting out
The floor is yours without a yawn
I already know where this is gonna go (I already know)
Where this is gonna go

Tell me to calm down
Tell me to calm down
Tell me to calm down, again

Don’t tell me what to do
My feelings won’t subdue
Just because you told them to
You’re a cliché, useless in every way (you’re a cliché)
You’re a cliché

Take up the whole sidewalk
Take up the whole sidewalk
Take up the whole sidewalk, again

This land is your reign in the palm of your hand
I walk around so you can stand
You’re in my way every day
You’re in my way, you’re in my way
We get it dude, already heard enough from you
The turning point is overdue

What is a Woman: Aretha Franklin and Annie Lennox

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Aretha Franklin and Annie Lennox (reddit.com)

Now there was a time
When they used to say
That behind every “great man”
There had to be a “great woman”

But in these times of change
You know that it’s no longer true
So we’re coming out of the kitchen
‘Cause there’s something we forgot to say to you (we say)

Sisters are doing it for themselves
Standing on their own two feet
And ringing on their own bells
Sisters are doing it for themselves, yeah

Now this is a song to celebrate
The conscious liberation of the female state
Mothers, daughters and their daughters too, yeah
Woman to woman
We’re singing with you

The “inferior sex” got a new exterior (yeah)
We got doctors, lawyers, politicians too
Everybody, take a look around
Can you see? Can you see? Can you see?
There’s a woman right next to you

Sisters are doing it for themselves (oh yes, we are)
Standing on their own two feet
And ringing on their own bells
Sisters are doing it for themselves

Now we ain’t making stories
And we ain’t laying plans
‘Cause a man still loves a woman
And a woman still loves a man
(Just the same though)

Sisters are doing it for themselves

There was a time (there was a time)
When they used to say (when they used to say)
That behind every great man
There had to be a great woman

But in these times of change
You know that it’s no longer true
So we’re coming out of the kitchen
‘Cause there’s something we forgot to say to you (we say)

Sister are doing it for themselves
Standing on their own two feet
And ringing on their own bells
Sisters are doing it for themselves

~~

Sister’s are doing it for themselves now and men are trying to take advantage by riding on our rails. They weren’t here before when we had no rights. This is a new form of misogyny these men who want to “be” women and take our power away from us. Walking in our locker rooms, bathrooms, taking advantage of us in sports; ripping our scholarships and trophies away from us, no where can a woman turn these days and feel we have a safe space from these men. A new type of rape of the woman – raping us of our rights. These rights that we have fought long and hard for, which men already had. XX-XY

Survivor Stories – What’s Love Got to Do With it?

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Tina Turner’s bio-movie in 1993, “What’s Love Got to Do With it,” starring Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne (as Ike Turner), was probably the first celebrity “coming out” about domestic violence. Tina, married Ike at a very young age of 23. She knew him for six years before this, though they were not a couple the whole time. At the time of their marriage, he had two sons, she had a son and they had a son together. Ike, turned out to be violently abusive, pushed drugs/alcohol on her and was a womanizer to boot. Tina actually tried to consider suicide at one point in the marriage. I think the movie really made people think about him as a person, but also made her a heroine.

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Narcissism on the Spectrum – What is Normal?

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I love this image, though I would not say “normal narcissism,” I would say Ego. I don’t think we should use the same word to talk about being a healthy person. However, I think people need to see this and I am not as good with graphics.

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What does Financial Abuse look like?

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How do I see this with men (and women who have more than the narcissist) who are survivors? They are robbed of all their money in court during a divorce.

With women, they are signing legal documents without reading – because they are being pushed into signing through on-going manipulation in the household. They have learned to just do whatever he says.

Ekaterina – Russian TV Series – Catherine the Great

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Of all the women in history, I think I can identify with Catherine the Great the most. I read Carolly Erickson’s book many years ago and was really caught by certain similarities. She married at a young age to an abusive man. She had her sons taken from her (for different reasons than I, naturally, but both political). She was a survivor and saw love as a way to redeem the much needed emotional vacancy within herself. She also never remarried (it is possible she married Grigory Potemkin but it is not documented). When I had heard about the Russian TV series Ekaterina (the correct Russian spelling is Yekaterina), I sat down to indulge myself in the two season portrayal of this great monarch.

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