New Age, but it’s bred into us. On the surface it represents a brutish mentality that stops at nothing and tunes out emotion like white noise on the radio, and yet we can’t shake it off—because underneath this ode to repression lies something much more powerful. Throughout every formulaic John Wayne story is the message that we can survive anything. You don’t have to compromise, it says; you can get through without letting them break you. As demented as the packaging is, the message itself has some value.
The limited imagination of backlash feminists in the ’80s brought forth a model of feminine power that was no more than a mirror image of the ’50s
male. It adopted only the bad packaging of the power-hungry aggressor, rather than the quieter message of survival. Unfortunately, sexually abused or raped women, unconvinced by current images of recovery, often fall back on this model of repression and false toughness. The brassy, swaggering bravado of some poor girl who’s afraid of her own emotions is a sad statement on what we’re offering her as a way out.
There was a scene in a movie, I think it was Mi Vida Loca, in which one girl turns to another girl who’s been screwed over and tells her to “be a macha” and take care of herself. Instead of “macha” being the feminine twin of “macho,” the bullheaded brute, here it is more like the Yiddish mensch: Be a stand-up guy. Be a human. Show some dignity. The command to be a macha could be a call from one woman to another to find her guts and get through whatever is trying to destroy her without losing her pride. Sadly, we have no language in our current dialogue on rape or abuse to convey this to each other. Our history leads us to interpret such a statement as an order to feel nothing and achieve. We automatically assume that vulnerability, compassion, and the need to rely on others have no place in this kind of thinking because we relate it back to the bravado model of feminine strength borrowed from the ’50s male.
The question then becomes how to disentangle the powerful call to be a macha from the callous expectation of bravado and repression. In the context of an America that glorifies the iron will of the individual, even introducing a macha model alongside the ravaged image of a sexually abused or raped woman is difficult. We are culturally trained, traditionally, to see these ideals as opposites and interpret the “stronger,” stereotypically male model as the preferred one. Paradoxically, in self-help culture, we are trained to throw out the “stronger” model and favor the ravaged, traditionally female one for its emotional demonstration. This polarization is an unnecessary construct; I am suggesting that we widen the range to include something more representative of our true potential.
We need to articulate a new vision that equates feminine strength not with repression and bravado, but with compassion and grit. The single model of recovery from sexual abuse and rape that requires a woman to live in a cocoon of self-obsession and call it a safe environment has the same potential for social isolation as ’50s, middle-class suburbs. It also bears an eerie resemblance to the “separate sphere” mentality that early feminists
fought so hard to destroy. In the Victorian age, for example, it was popular to be sick. There were even fainting couches, furniture designed to collapse on. The idea was to wane visibly because it was better to be honored for a tragic demise than not honored at all.
Idealizing a state of breakdown, however, rather than the strength it takes to get past one, traps women into believing that moving beyond the trauma is heresy. We need to be able to turn to each other and say, “Be a macha,” and know that that means, “I’ll cry with you, hold your hand, and give you time. But I won’t watch you lie down.” Until we can whisper the truth—nothing was stolen from you, that was a lie—and honor women for both
The limited imagination of backlash feminists in the ’80s brought forth a model of feminine power that was no more than a mirror image of the ’50s
male. It adopted only the bad packaging of the power-hungry aggressor, rather than the quieter message of survival. Unfortunately, sexually abused or raped women, unconvinced by current images of recovery, often fall back on this model of repression and false toughness. The brassy, swaggering bravado of some poor girl who’s afraid of her own emotions is a sad statement on what we’re offering her as a way out.
There was a scene in a movie, I think it was Mi Vida Loca, in which one girl turns to another girl who’s been screwed over and tells her to “be a macha” and take care of herself. Instead of “macha” being the feminine twin of “macho,” the bullheaded brute, here it is more like the Yiddish mensch: Be a stand-up guy. Be a human. Show some dignity. The command to be a macha could be a call from one woman to another to find her guts and get through whatever is trying to destroy her without losing her pride. Sadly, we have no language in our current dialogue on rape or abuse to convey this to each other. Our history leads us to interpret such a statement as an order to feel nothing and achieve. We automatically assume that vulnerability, compassion, and the need to rely on others have no place in this kind of thinking because we relate it back to the bravado model of feminine strength borrowed from the ’50s male.
The question then becomes how to disentangle the powerful call to be a macha from the callous expectation of bravado and repression. In the context of an America that glorifies the iron will of the individual, even introducing a macha model alongside the ravaged image of a sexually abused or raped woman is difficult. We are culturally trained, traditionally, to see these ideals as opposites and interpret the “stronger,” stereotypically male model as the preferred one. Paradoxically, in self-help culture, we are trained to throw out the “stronger” model and favor the ravaged, traditionally female one for its emotional demonstration. This polarization is an unnecessary construct; I am suggesting that we widen the range to include something more representative of our true potential.
We need to articulate a new vision that equates feminine strength not with repression and bravado, but with compassion and grit. The single model of recovery from sexual abuse and rape that requires a woman to live in a cocoon of self-obsession and call it a safe environment has the same potential for social isolation as ’50s, middle-class suburbs. It also bears an eerie resemblance to the “separate sphere” mentality that early feminists
fought so hard to destroy. In the Victorian age, for example, it was popular to be sick. There were even fainting couches, furniture designed to collapse on. The idea was to wane visibly because it was better to be honored for a tragic demise than not honored at all.
Idealizing a state of breakdown, however, rather than the strength it takes to get past one, traps women into believing that moving beyond the trauma is heresy. We need to be able to turn to each other and say, “Be a macha,” and know that that means, “I’ll cry with you, hold your hand, and give you time. But I won’t watch you lie down.” Until we can whisper the truth—nothing was stolen from you, that was a lie—and honor women for both
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