![]() So, what to make of “Flawless” overall? I’m liking the song more with every re-listen, but I’m not finding it any more feminist. Especially in public, otherwise you will emasculate him.”īut what if we question the premise itself? Why should a woman’s success be a threat to a man? What if we decide to simply dispose of that word - and I don’t think there is an English word I dislike more than emasculation. ![]() If you are the breadwinner in a relationship with a man, you have to pretend that you are not. You should aim to be successful, but not too successful, otherwise, you will threaten the man. We say to girls, “You can have ambition, but not too much. We teach them to shrink themselves, to make themselves smaller. The more “hard man” a man feels compelled to be, the weaker his ego is.Īnd then we do a much greater disservice to girls, because we raise them to cater to the fragile egos of men. We teach them to mask their true selves, because they have to be, in Nigeria’s speak, a hard man.īut by far the worst thing we do to males, by making them feel that they have to be hard, is that we leave them with very fragile egos. We teach boys to be afraid of weakness, of vulnerability. Masculinity becomes this hard, small cage and we put boys inside the cage. We define masculinity in a very narrow way. We are doing grave disservice to boys in how we raise them. Here’s a longer quote from the talk ( transcribed by Sugandha Banga): “Flawless” is a slice of a broader feminism that Adichie is trying to articulate via her TEDx talk, which focuses heavily on how we raise boys as well as girls. sex and marriage.īecause here’s the difference between a 4-minute song and a 30-minute talk: in one version, you just don’t have the time or ability to go deep into theory. But it also weirdly limits feminism within the same old patriarchal framework of what’s pertinent to a woman’s life, i.e. Because one thing that’s been bugging me about “Flawless” is the fact that it cuts a quote about sexuality and marriage with Adichie defining the scope of feminism. Actually, watch it even if you don’t really have the time. It’s a beautiful talk, so do watch it if you have the time. This is from Adichie’s 2013 TEDx talk, “We should all be feminists”: We teach girls that they cannot be sexual beings in the way that boys are.įeminist: a person who believes in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes. ![]() We raise girls to see each other as competitors, not for jobs or for accomplishments, which I think could be a good thing, but for the attention of men. Now marriage can be a system of joy, and love, and mutual support, but why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage when we don’t teach boys the same? I am expected to make my life choices always keeping in mind that marriage is most important. Otherwise, you would threaten the man.”īecause I am female, I am expected to aspire to marriage. You should aim to be successful, but not too successful. We say to girls: “You can have ambition, but not too much. We teach girls to shrink themselves, to make themselves smaller. The most-quoted passage comes from around the 1:30 mark, spoken by Adichie: My first impression of this song was via several all-caps posts on Tumblr, declaring “Flawless” to be the new feminist anthem that we’ve all been waiting for. Especially track #11, “***Flawless”, which features Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. ![]() Can we talk about Beyonce’s new album? I think we need to talk about Beyonce’s new album. ![]()
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