Our Blood: Prophecies and Discourses on Sexual Politics

“alone” in life is directly derived from this conditioning. If

there is a form of “female perdition” under patriarchy, surely

it is this dread of isolation—a dread which develops from the

facts of the case.

Confusion, too, is an integral part of fear. It is confusing to

be punished for succeeding—for climbing a tree, or excelling

in mathematics. It is impossible to answer the question, “What

did I do wrong? ” As a result of the punishment which is inevitable when she succeeds, a girl learns to identify fear with confusion and confusion with fear. By the time she is a

woman, fear and confusion are triggered simultaneously by

the same stimuli and they cannot be separated from each other.

Fear, for women, is isolating and confusing. It is also consistently and progressively debilitating. Each act outside a woman’s allowable sphere provokes punishment— and this

punishment is as inevitable as nightfall. Each punishment inculcates fear. Like a rat, a woman will try to avoid those high-voltage electric shocks which seem to mine the maze. She too

wants the legendary Big Cheese at the end. But for her, the

maze never ends.

The debility which is intrinsic to fear as women experience

it is progressive. It increases not arithmetically as she gets

older, but geometrically. The first time a girl breaks a gender

class rule and is punished, she has only the actual consequences of her act with which to contend. That is, she is isolated, confused, and afraid. But the second time, she must coa-tend with her act, its consequences, and also with her memory

of a prior act and its prior consequences. This interplay of the

memory of pain, the anticipation of pain, and the reality of

pain in a given circumstance makes it virtually impossible for

a woman to perceive the daily indignities to which she is subjected, much less to assert herself against them or to develop and stand for values which undermine or oppose male supremacy. The effects of this cumulative, progressive, debilitating aspect of fear are mutilating, and male culture provides only one possible resolution: complete and abject submission.

This dynamic of fear, as I have described it, is the source of

what men so glibly, and happily, call “female masochism. ”

And, of course, when one’s identity is defined as a lack of

identity; when one’s survival is contingent on learning to destroy or restrain every impulse toward self-definition; when one is consistently and exclusively rewarded for hurting oneself by conforming to demeaning or degrading rules of behavior; when one is consistently and inevitably punished for accomplishing, or succeeding, or asserting; when one is battered and rammed, physically and/or emotionally, for any act or thought of rebellion, and then applauded and approved of

for giving in, recanting, apologizing; then masochism does

indeed become the cornerstone of one’s personality. And, as

you might already know, it is very hard for masochists to find

the pride, the strength, the inner freedom, the courage to organize against their oppressors.

The truth is that this masochism, which does become the

core of the female personality, is the mechanism which assures

that the system of male supremacy will continue to operate as

a whole even if parts of the system itself break down or are

reformed. For example, if the male supremacist system is reformed, so that the law requires that there be no discrimination in employment on the basis of gender and that there be equal pay for equal work, the masochistic conditioning of

women will cause us to continue, despite the change in law, to

replicate the patterns of female inferiority which consign us to

menial jobs appropriate to our gender class. This dynamic