Why I’m not a feminist

"It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent." 
-Madeleine Albright

Writing this I am filled me with angst. I have a science background, a PhD, and am surrounded by very left-brain thinkers. But here I am writing about the masculine and feminine archetype which will raise red flags for woo everywhere. However, it is a topic that needs to be explored to develop an understanding of the imbalance between the sexes, and it’s something I am passionate about.

Both men and women have a masculine and feminine energy. Although males and females are biologically and psychologically different (it may stereotypical of me to harp on about this), these differences are gender related and important. More on this later. But, here I am referring to energy (yup, that which we cannot see). The law of polarity states that everything has two poles. For example, love, hate; good, evil; light, dark; masculine and feminine. You can’t have light without darkness, just as you can’t have masculine without feminine energy; but both are very different.

Women of course have a strong feminine energy that needs to be nurtured, while men have more masculine energy; it too needs to be nurtured. When they are thrown out of balance chaos ensues. Over the centuries feminine energy has been sadly suppressed.

Think back to medieval times when women were powerful in their feminine strength, close to the earth, concocting herbal medicine and sharing their wisdom. We were natural healers and wise women, but over 80,000 of us were persecuted and burnt at the stake for having these wonderful attributes. Over history the embodiment of strong feminine traits has been abandoned through fear, and replaced with the shadow traits associated with female energy. Bitchiness, nagging, gossiping, manipulation are the shadow traits that we often associate with feminine. Anything spiritual or primal has been suppressed.

Even as history progressed we found ourselves in male dominated religion and workplaces. So, we tapped into our masculine energy and fought with much anger and aggression, again diluting our feminine energy till it was all but gone.

"A feminist is anyone who recognises the equality and full humanity of women and men." 
-Gloria Steinem

We could have approached the feminist movement with love- instead we attacked. We lost trust in our feminine attributes; vulnerability, surrender, creativity, softness; because throughout history these traits had us killed and repressed. So we just squashed them down because we associated these traits with both fear and weakness. We couldn’t see the power in the feminine.  All around us we saw power structures, systems, corporate ladders; so we grew into our alpha masculine where we had control, independence and power. We nurtured our masculine energy and still do so today.

Men now find their masculine energy is confused. In response to feminism they retracted from their power because they only saw attack and blame. Men are now frantically trying to tap into their feminine archetype because they are expected to step aside. Over recent years accusations of toxic masculinity have been thrown their way and they are scared to be too masculine. Masculinity has been deconstructed and is currently being reconstructed, but in the process the balance has been disrupted.

We are different. There are striking physical and behavioural differences between gender, including strength and size, timing of puberty, significant differences in risk-taking, reproductive requirements and mortality. These are important and affirm that men and women are different creatures. These distinctions between sexes have endowed us with differing approaches to love and life, all wrapped in the packaging of humanity. I have never had a desire to do all that a man can do and don’t understand why I would. We should celebrate differences in strengths and weaknesses.

Unfortunately throughout history males have been used as the yardstick for normal, and because women are different to men they have been either put in one of two baskets. ‘Men are normal and so women are inferior’, or ‘men are normal and women are superior’. The more recent ‘women are superior’ approach is driven by many factors. Women give birth, are empathetic, good communicators, are compassionate, and can take on many traditional male roles; these are all used as arguments to boost women into superior status. We are not superior, neither are men; we know this. But we are different.

We fight for sameness which is different from equality. If we truly want equality then we should care just as much about men getting a fair deal as we do ourselves. Feminism is not about equality, it is about getting back everything we were denied, and we still have a way to go. However, I would argue that now is the time to focus on equality and return to a state of egalitarianism. This refers to political philosophy that advocates all human beings are fundamentally equal and therefore equally entitled to resources. Previous humans (and those currently living in hunter gatherer populations) are egalitarian in nature, whilst also mindful of differences between the masculine and feminine.

We as women should nurture the differences between feminine and masculine energy and encourage a retreat back to our vulnerability, creativity, softness, and surrender. These are strengths not weaknesses. We could lift up men so they feel free to embrace their masculine energy once again without feeling attacked; then there is no need to dominate or adopt toxic masculinity.

We as women should continue to fight for equal rights- but while doing so leave the alpha masculine behind.

Humanity should be our race. Love should be our religion.

-Unknown