The Domination of Women

The domination of women

            In all of the books we’ve read this year, their has been one justifiable assertion, that women are not equal to men because men do not permit them to become equals. Rape, marketing, marriage, and even education are all areas that we are shown in which the rights of women in relation to men are discussed.

            Rape is defined as “the crime, committed by a man, of forcing another person to have sexual intercourse with him without their consent and against their will, esp. by the threat or use of violence against them.”, notice how it specifically refers to men as the people who are committing the crime (Oxford English Dictionary). In Jasmine, when Jasmine reaches America she is violently raped by ‘half-face’, who says to her, “I got one use for you, and you got no use for me, and you know what? That don’t bother me at all,” which further emphasizes how she is dominated by men (Mukherjee 113). This rape is a precursor to the dependence that Jasmine develops with every man she becomes romantically involved with. Even in India, she was so dependent on Prakash that when he was killed she made a promise to herself and her deceased partner that she would commit suicide to honor him. Throughout her life, Jasmine is controlled and dependant on the men in her life.

            In The Beauty Myth the topic of marketing is discussed over and over again. This is one of the most interesting aspects of the entire book. What I found the most interesting was that the marketing’s brainwashing of women has made it so that, “dieting is the essence of contemporary femininity.” (Wolf 200). When surveyed women, “the Austin (Texas) Stress clinic found, ‘dieting concern’ was strongly related to ‘positive feminine traits’ for men, food restraint was related to ‘socially undesirable femininity.’”(Wolf 200). This was one of the most interesting things I had ever read. This meant that men weren’t the one pressuring women into eating disorders, but rather the marketing industry. Pushing dieting products is much easier when your audience believes it’s a positive feminine trait.

            In A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Mary Walstonecraft claims that women are educated to be dependent on another and to be weaker and gentler. She questions the system and says that, “Should it be proved that woman is naturally weaker than man, from whence does it follow that it is natural for her to labor to become still weaker than nature intended her to be?” (Walstonecraft 85)

            In The Handmaid’s Tale we’re shown a world where women’s rights are taken away. They are no longer allowed to read or write, to have their own jobs, or to be independent of a man. This is most evident when Offred holds the commander’s pen, “The pen between my fingers is sensuous, alive almost, I can feel its power, the power of the words it contains.”(Atwood 186). Her loss of rights has caused Offred to feel something just by holding a pen.

            This running theme of ‘the domination of women’ by men is one of the most obvious and common themes in the books we’ve read this year. It’s discussed or described in the literature we’ve been reading.