Daily Archives: April 29, 2014

Experiencing Authenticity

feminist resistance

Free Space

The intertwinedness of body and mind helps explain women’s oppression. Women do not choose to think about their bodies and bodily processes negatively; rather they are forced to do so as a result of being embedded in a hostile patriarchal society. On this view the body is not just the thing we can prod and poke, it is shaped by a plethora of perceptions: if we feel bad about it, it becomes a ‘bad thing’; if we feel good about it, it becomes a ‘good thing’. But the way we think about it is not a matter of free choice unless we live in a society which gives space for that freedom. What feminist philosophers like de Beauvoir aim to do is to open up a space for that freedom to flourish.

excerpted from Becoming A Woman: Simone de Beauvoir on Female Embodiment © Felicity Joseph 2008

Ashley Strain: Why You Should Become An Existential Feminist

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