This Sunday, in The New York Times Book review, there was a review of She Matters, A Life in Friendships by Susanna Sonnenberg. It's a non-fiction account of Sonnenberg's female friendships.
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/13/books...books&_r=0
I suggest everyone read this review -- all of it. You will have a hard time keeping down your breakfast as you work you way through the paeans to this self-involved narcissistic author, but it is worth it because the review will give another glimpse into the narrow psyche of the early 21st century liberated woman.
Lots I can talk about, but two things stand out.
First, the opening paragraph. emphasis mine.
In other words, all my friends are always understood by how they affect ME...not who THEY are as people independent of me. It's pure narcissism disguised by a clever list of categories. And the failure to understand the friend you "wronged." You don't understand because you can't get outside yourself.
And then there's this -- about having babies.
This view of motherhood is both astonishing and predictable. Having kids is ALSO a narcissistic act, a "way to repair childhood wounds." It's not about creating a family or advancing the social fabric...it's about fucking therapy. And, of course, men now become superfluous once motherhood arrives because once again, it is all about ME.
This is it, guys. These are the attitudes of sophisticated educated women. These attitudes are all gussied up for the The New York Times sophisticates, but when you cut to the chase, these women are, at root, no different than the working class lizards you see on POF or OKC, or who populate the hamster thread. They have better vocabularies, they live in Greenwich Village or Lincoln Park or in university towns...but THIS IS WHO THEY ARE.
Entitled.
Solipsistic.
Totally self-involved.
This is the existential reality.
Be forewarned.
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/13/books...books&_r=0
I suggest everyone read this review -- all of it. You will have a hard time keeping down your breakfast as you work you way through the paeans to this self-involved narcissistic author, but it is worth it because the review will give another glimpse into the narrow psyche of the early 21st century liberated woman.
Lots I can talk about, but two things stand out.
First, the opening paragraph. emphasis mine.
Quote:Quote:
This memoir of female friendships inspired a parlor game I suspect many readers will want to play — musing about the friends who shaped our own lives. The first best friend, the one to whom you clung and whispered all your secrets, and then outgrew. The big-sister friend, who married before you, had children before you and showed you her way of navigating those passages. The friend who let you down, who vanished during a crisis, and the one who stayed by your side. The friend you wronged without understanding how. The friend you simply had fun with, and the one you called when you were in despair.
In other words, all my friends are always understood by how they affect ME...not who THEY are as people independent of me. It's pure narcissism disguised by a clever list of categories. And the failure to understand the friend you "wronged." You don't understand because you can't get outside yourself.
And then there's this -- about having babies.
Quote:Quote:
As it does for many women, having children provided Sonnenberg with a way to repair childhood wounds. But she also writes viscerally about the consuming nature of motherhood, including the fiercely protective love and the relentless demands. In the land of Cheerios, dirty diapers, fleeting naps and interrupted sleep, other mothers are a lifeline. “Our husbands were undone from us, phantoms of some former interest,” Sonnenberg writes. “I had nothing to say to men. Men! I could barely fathom their use, now that we’d made children.”
This view of motherhood is both astonishing and predictable. Having kids is ALSO a narcissistic act, a "way to repair childhood wounds." It's not about creating a family or advancing the social fabric...it's about fucking therapy. And, of course, men now become superfluous once motherhood arrives because once again, it is all about ME.
This is it, guys. These are the attitudes of sophisticated educated women. These attitudes are all gussied up for the The New York Times sophisticates, but when you cut to the chase, these women are, at root, no different than the working class lizards you see on POF or OKC, or who populate the hamster thread. They have better vocabularies, they live in Greenwich Village or Lincoln Park or in university towns...but THIS IS WHO THEY ARE.
Entitled.
Solipsistic.
Totally self-involved.
This is the existential reality.
Be forewarned.