Crosspost "Each new iteration of the misogynistic family depends on the daughter's low-self esteem in order to function and then reproduce itself." from /r/fourthwavewomen:

In a misogynistic family, the mother has already accepted the brainwashing. She's given birth, she's got a lower-value job (if at all), she's filled with internalised misogyny, and she's probably unable to escape now even if she wanted to. Reflection on her quality of life in this situation is too hard, so she ensures that her own experience is duplicated for her daughter. Then she'll have someone to either commiserate with, or to sneer at in order to feel good. Once her daughter is fully trained to be a chef/nurse/psychologist/secretary then she can finally relax, and while daughter is still in training she can take out her suppressed anger and anxiety on her. This is her reward for having been "a good woman".

In order that the family remain in the bubble, the daughter must agree to take care of mother, father, and brother because the mother's energy is waning after a lifetime of being dragged down, and she needs someone to take over the mantle of filling in the gaping gaps that the father and brother leave in the reality of the world (the superior beings can't seem to do much that even warrants respect, let alone warrants being almost worshipped in the form of being served daily, but surely we must persist in serving them... because? Because... we musn't ask questions.)

The daughter is treated as less than and still must be loving, eager, and giving towards her father and to her brothers, despite not wanting to do so. Again, filling in of gaps so that they don't have to feel any way at all, nor have to self-reflect on their behaviour.

The daughter holds a certain amount of social power, despite the fact that when she says no and chooses herself, she ends up attacked, demonised, scorned, insulted, and more by nearly everyone in her family. Because she has been trained to fill in the gaps to make everyone feel good throughout her entire existence, if she doesn't do that anymore she makes can make them feel very bad.

A daughter with low self-esteem is the linchpin everything rests on. If she breaks the chain even imperfectly, it still has an impact on changing the way things are in the world:

  • It prevents the cycle from repeating for the next generation, if she has children.
  • It forces the mother to take a look at her life. (Even if she ends up hating the daughter, at least she's not getting an easy ride out, and is trapped with just herself to take care of the men with no extra help. Making her bed and lying in it, instead of forcing the hand of an unwilling women who always had better things to do with her life.)
  • It shows the brother and father that not every woman exists to serve them. (Even if they don't change their mind about women's value, it doesn't matter. They now subconsciously know that one less woman in the world lives to cater to them.)

Being the linchpin and then removing oneself just requires great courage, which is specifically trained out of girls in these types of families.

So here's to all the women specifically trained to have low self-esteem and to put themselves last, who removed themselves, and in doing so removed the linchpin, and inflicted their own social power. Changing the world in our sphere of influence is something all of us can do, even if we feel like we've done nothing at all.

(I am not speaking about women in countries where doing so will end in violence. Their choices are unfortunately more limited)

Posted by judgemycomposure | 3 January 2022 | Link