Women who seek knowledge

[Expedition26]

Mention the past without blaming is beating the dead horse? Why dont we throw away the history books then? We should learn from history not forget about it.

I said that because you have made NUMEROUS posts about women’s past suffering. That’s beating a dead horse. It’s one thing to bring it up and discuss it but this discussion is just going in circles about how hard things were for women and the dreams women weren’t able to see through. Life is hard. Our ancestors worked their arses off to make things easier for us and I’m grateful for that. But I’m out of this discussion if we are just going to keep comparing men’s lives to women’s.

 

[Joe]

But that's not how it initially came across.

That's why you wait and ask to get more data. Problem solved. No jumping to conclusions and theory making.

 

[Joe]

She started by saying, 'history proves that it was dangerous for women to seek objective knowledge'. What, and it wasn't dangerous for men? "While females had a hard time getting any closer to knowledge, it was almost impossible for mothers." What does she mean, is she implying that knowledge cannot be extracted from motherhood, or from household experience? I cook, clean, don't have a dishwasher, and I always find plenty of potential to learn, grow and practice during those moments. And I'm a man. Why is she saying a woman cannot learn from that? 'It is a difficult path for women to seek out knowledge and even more difficult to apply the knowledge when one has to cook, clean, and look after the children. Men had the 'luxury' to travel, study, engage in politics, while women were restricted in every possible way.' What the actual... This is beyond toxic. Insanely diminutive of the value of female experience, simply assuming their daily experience doesn't allow them to grok what matters, explicitly saying males were advantaged and thereby implicitly outsourcing responsibility to the other gender.

UG, I think you need to chill out. There's lots of barking up the wrong tree here and almost willfully getting the wrong end of the stick, similar to what Henchman did in his first post.

 

[Joe]

You see, I wanted to be an explorer, a lion hunter, a ship captain when I was a kid. I have been told, girls cant do these things.

That's not surprising, because I think the truth of the matter is that *most* women would not chose to do those things. So when you were told that, it was based more on observation rather than prejudice, although in the case of the relatively few women who would chose those things, that then can become and feel like prejudice.

 

[Joe]

I beg to differ. I argue, that women of tha past DID had aspirations and dreams but it was impossible from them to pursue these dreams. I DONT BLAME ANYONE FOR THAT.

Again, how many women do you think did have the kinds of aspirations you had? What percentage? I think you might be missing the evidence that shows that, when given a free choice, *most* women will tend NOT to chose the kinds of careers men do. There is a fairly reasonable and understandable explanation for that and it centers on the clear biological differences between men and women. Now, there is of course the argument that most women don't chose such careers because they have been 'conditioned' over many generations to believe they cannot, or do not want, to pursue those careers, but that argument must by definition completely ignore those very clear biological/emotional differences.

I'll give you an example: when I was a young boy, and was climbing out on the limb of a tall tree (for one example), my mother would be fretting and scared, my father would be goading me on. Do you think those two very different responses are the result of conditioning or discrimination etc.?

 

[Joe]

UG, I think you need to chill out. There's lots of barking up the wrong tree here and almost willfully getting the wrong end of the stick, similar to what Henchman did in his first post.

My point here UG is that there is NO need here for aggression in the way you respond to anything another member has written, no matter how clear it is (to you at least) that there's something nefarious afoot. Over the past several years (at least) many people have developed a sensitive spot and hair trigger for the radical feminist narrative and have come to see it as not just simply wrong but a destructive influence on society and human relationships. And they have trained themselves to respond to it with the furious put-down they believe it deserves.

While that perspective is, IMO, an accurate reading of that dynamic, it does not mean we here need to respond to any signs of that kind of narrative from another member as if it were some kind of clear and present danger to everything we hold dear. There is no reason, in fact, that any discussion on this forum cannot proceed in a polite and reasoned manner, regardless of the subject matter.

 

[Sybil]

Again, how many women do you think did have the kinds of aspirations you had? What percentage? I think you might be missing the evidence that shows that, when given a free choice, *most* women will tend NOT to chose the kinds of careers men do.

You right. I don't have evidence on percentage.
The alarming low number of explorer females made me think that I was a weirdo kid then.

 

[kenlee]

Speaking of men going off to war and leaving the women behind may no longer be an issue if this bill passes. I feel fortunate I was able to be home with my children as they were growing up but now that choice is taken away from the younger generations on so many levels. (Thanks Gloria)
I sometimes wonder how we might have evolved on our own without psychopaths running things. Guess this is the wrong reality for that.

Sending women to fight in the wars along with the men might indeed have a devastating effect on the morale of the men considering that it may very well be that the primary reason men go to war is, imo, to protect the female, the children and the family. To put it another way it may very well be that men (primarily) go to war because 'the women are watching' whether it be their wives, their girl friends, their potential future wives or potential future girl friends.

 

[forest_light]

Of course, the system and bureaucracy are not sensitive and careful according to their internal laws. So while working on another bureaucratic job I tried to have a little more human approach to people. A little personal, without distance, to be understandable in expression and to joke whenever possible. Simple humor helps a lot in such situations. People accustomed to the arrogance of the administration react very positively to the first signs of "humanity" in the approach. It was my strategy, to make my job easier (there was less quarreling and tension in the office) and to help the client. I was looking for a win win situation.
What I have learned from people, according to Gurdjieff, they have a developed essence but no developed personality (lack of education and culture) is that they very often say most kindly: "Listen son, I don't understand anything in these 'paper works'. Please help and do all you can. " People with such an attitude would finish the job quickly and with minimal energy consumption. I have noticed that once the tactics of the "ignorant peasant" were carried out consciously and deliberately and that it brought success.

I woke up this morning thinking about the 80 year old woman you mentioned in your earlier post. Yesterday, whilst writing my quick response (low battery on my device) I had been wondering how on earth this woman has managed to get through life?!! It’s quite gobsmacking to me, given how society / technology has transformed so quickly, and especially considering that she lost her husband and son, whom I assume she may have relied heavily on for support on many levels (or other relations/neighbours who may no longer be around). I wondered how she has coped since then and considered the amount of stress she would have experienced over a long period of time, even over the smallest of things... for someone elderly to be living (alone?) on so little money has a deeply debilitating effect on your wellbeing, without the added stress of not being able to read your mail, interact with government agencies for pensions, etc. I just cannot fathom how she has coped. Perhaps she had friends/neighbours that helped her in the past.

I did wonder while reading your post if there were some tactics being used consciously/unconsciously by her, to support her plea for help. You made reference to people who use the ‘ignorant peasant’ approach to get assistance and I had a feeling that this was a part of the ‘frequency’ of her request for help - as she emphasised to you several times she could not read / reasons justifying this. I didn’t get the impression she was asking if you knew of anyone who could help her learn to read. Hence my comment that if she was genuinely interested in learning to read (which I see as a way to improve her circumstances and broaden her interior / exterior world) she might actively seek some help... and then I found myself wondering, but would she?? What is there to motivate her, if nothing has before? Is she now feeling too broken, forsaken, forgotten... ‘too old’... does she see no point? I wondered, can she write her name? The name of her son? Does she know the shape of the word ‘love’. Does anyone hug her? Or ask if she is ok or needs help? Has she become ‘invisible’ to the world? (Apparently she has, generally speaking, when it comes to government departments!) How does she cope with information regarding the Covid debacle or even gain access to what she needs due to restrictions? Obviously I know very little about her whole life path and choices she has made, but in some ways it felt to me that you, AzarHyun, in that interaction with her, were bearing a great part of the weight and reality of her situation, because her problems have magnified to a point where she is overwhelmed and is struggling to help herself... and that is a lot of weight to hold in those moments.

I love that you said you would do ‘all in your power’ to help her. And that is all you can do. I also delighted to know of your ‘humanitarian approach’ in your role and your gift for weaving humour into your interactions with others. Sounds as though you are a bit of a rare creature in your job. I can imagine your role would be quite draining at times, for many reasons, but it’s great to know you have a supportive knowledge base / awareness to help you to ‘dance the dance’ as you interact mindfully with others.

I could not help but notice the irony of how incredibly different the life of your own grandmother has been, as opposed to the polar opposite of the 80 year old woman you are currently helping, through your work.

It’s almost as if these two women, neither of whom read, are living in completely ‘different worlds’ that in some ways run congruent to one another. If not different worlds, then it most certainly seems that they have both created very different ‘realities’ for themselves.

A powerful reminder to us all.

 

[jess]

It was part of the awakening process. Countless nights on the internet researching, made me question the true nature of our world. Now, I could never see the world the same way as I saw before. This new knowledge is pushing me to uncharted roads and painful self-discovery. It is unnerving.

In this thread, I would like to start a conversation with women, mothers on their experience on the path of seeking knowledge.

Responding to such by being 'offended' would, IMO, be the opposite of being a man. In any case, this discussion is not really about subjective personal experiences of women per se, but that women can share their personal, subjective experiences in order to look at and consider them in a more objective way, with some helpful input from others. Objective truth is genderless.

What an interesting thread, personally and from my understanding of seeking knowledge, what Joe says made a lot of sense to me: "Objective truth is genderless", it just seems to me that it is quite complex, if that search is from our personal and individual life history and the weight of the world - facts, history, conditioning.

Honestly and personally I recently readjusted my erroneous knowledge about gender difference, reading a lot about how these tendencies of gender difference, racial, etc., are used to execute political agendas, manipulation, etc., and in the end not for a real understanding of the problem. I realized that I had taken that knowledge -gender difference/ postmodernity- from my studies in arts, a little less than 10 years ago. It is quite subtle how mistaken beliefs can affect how you perceive the world, or in this case the male gender. It was very real for me to realize that these wrong beliefs were affecting my life.

On the other hand, I think that perhaps, as in the past, today we live in a very complicated world in terms of roles: female-male, I don't know if it could even be as unbalanced as in the past, but in the opposite direction, many of the women I remember like friends, work or school mates- women, several years ago, had the same problem, it is difficult to find a man who wants to get married, family responsibilities, be faithful to only one woman, etc, so much freedom and gender equality makes you lose the sense of values and commitment, I can say that in many of the cases that I have seen are the women who have to go after the man to propose marriage.
It happened to me that the search for knowledge, in my case, my need for spiritual guidance, comes after many of my beliefs and my old self has been broken, and I am looking to repair it, to heal it, now when I'm a mother and I have a husband, I do not necessarily believe that household chores affect your willingness to spiritual and personal growth in nowdays.

 

[United Gnosis]

Think about Hypatia or the midwives who were burned by the inquisition.. or Agrippina the younger, who was too clever to be left alive by her own son. I know countless men died too for several reasons, but less likely because they were judged to be too smart.

What are you saying? Are you saying that there is a gendered slant to suffering, that reality is naturally more hostile to females? What about Aggripina? Do you think there were never any cloak-and-daggers internecine murders within imperial families? Is that a reason to make a claim on suffering, treading on top of countless serfs' bodies which never even made history for displeasing some noble or another?

Perhaps you care to read other posts from this thread by women who implied, that chores cant give you a degree in the university.

And I went to university and I pray that either my mother or my father had the wisdom to tell me not to. So what? In which way does a university degree have anything to do with Knowledge? Quite to the contrary, for many if not most, university will strengthen programs and identification, leading those intellectuals always deeper into the matrix. Anyways. I believe university is very loosely connected with knowledge. Information, yes. But knowledge... not really.

Based on posts so far, I understood it to mean how women viewed the idea of knowledge and intellect in relation to themselves and men, and how that influence their perception of their place in society at large.

Thank you joe, that is a very apt way to put it, which does helps me grasp the undercurrents in this conversation. I guess I came at this from the perspective of a recovering intellectual, having perceived the inherent limits of rationality, I instantly associate knowledge with the upper-case K, and it evokes Being. From that perspective it made sense that I felt jarred by the concept 'female knowledge'.

However, your wording helps me make sense of it, thanks.

You see, I wanted to be an explorer, a lion hunter, a ship captain when I was a kid. I have been told, girls cant do these things.

And I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid. I was told, fatties can't do these things. Nobody ever told me, 'if you train, you'll become stronger'. Those basic b* 101 life skills were completely absent, rooted out I might say, from the masculine francophone serf class. Like probably most males, I had to figure out all of it myself.

Because I've never been told that I could accomplish a single one of these things. Nobody tells guys they can do it. So what? What does this have to do with anything anyways? Knowledge is ultimately a personal journey, where the being you grow defines the lessons you'll be able to understand and learn. How is being told you cannot do something limiting to your knowledge? I don't get it. It's the person's choice following being told they can/cannot do something. Can't the person learn from their experiences, whichever way it goes?

 

[United Gnosis]

My point here UG is that there is NO need here for aggression in the way you respond to anything another member has written, no matter how clear it is (to you at least) that there's something nefarious afoot. Over the past several years (at least) many people have developed a sensitive spot and hair trigger for the radical feminist narrative and have come to see it as not just simply wrong but a destructive influence on society and human relationships. And they have trained themselves to respond to it with the furious put-down they believe it deserves.

While that perspective is, IMO, an accurate reading of that dynamic, it does not mean we here need to respond to any signs of that kind of narrative from another member as if it were some kind of clear and present danger to everything we hold dear. There is no reason, in fact, that any discussion on this forum cannot proceed in a polite and reasoned manner, regardless of the subject matter.

I understand your points, but do believe it might be the other way around. I expressed disbelief, and I don't know how it came across as aggression, tho I'd love if you told me so I could avoid that mistake. Unless if you belong to school whereby challenging an idea constitutes violence?

I believe, to the best of my abilities, that I am not hypersensitized to woke. I'm fairly aware, but it stands at the level of a sad joke, not something overwhelming I have to jump at every opportunity. I didn't mention it in my reply, and I didn't jump in and react right away, because I didn't see a nefarious expression of ideology as you imply, I simply noted identitarian flaws in thinking, and was curious to see how it'd evolve, and after a few pages, despite a more explicit aspect to the discussion re:henchman, I was still seeing implicit identitarian assumptions, lacking reasoning or justification. Thus I sought to challenge them.

For instance, the point which I most impolitely expressed, that it is toxic to argue feminine experiences are restrictive of knowledge - do you not agree? Do you believe it makes sense to state that "It is a difficult path for women to seek out knowledge and even more difficult to apply the knowledge when one has to cook, clean, and look after the children"? In that sentence, what is the meaning of seeking knowledge? What is the meaning of applying knowledge? Is cooking, cleaning, and looking after children in a positive, a negative, or a neutral?

I wouldn't have said a negative. But it's just me.

 

[Laura]

Just want to mention here that Agrippina the Younger was one nasty piece of work. She wasn't after knowledge, she was after power. And, she had a LOT of it for a long time, but hubris got her.

 

[United Gnosis]

Just want to mention here that Agrippina the Younger was one nasty piece of work. She wasn't after knowledge, she was after power. And, she had a LOT of it for a long time, but hubris got her.

Thanks. I do not know her story, but that fits with my assumption - that's its fairer to think of her as a member of an imperial line, rather than as a member of one sex vs another. She had the opportunity for knowledge but went for power - so it disproves that women would necessarily go after knowledge if they had a chance they didn't have.

People will go after what they desire, based on the being they grew. Then, rather than playing oppression Olympics, optimizing the growth from the experiences typically available to you becomes a more worthwhile issue, imho.

 

[Natus Videre]

Overwhelmed by her work in the health care industry, my mother predominantly seeks knowledge as a coping mechanism. My father, on the other hand, underwhelmed by his work, mostly seeks entertainment and walks the path of knowledge only if he has to. Neither of them know why they seek knowledge and both eagerly wait for "retirement" to solve all their problems.

I think that once men and women understand why they are doing what they are doing, they will find more common ground in the sense that their complements will not overlap and cause friction anymore, as they will fit and balance each other.