Yesterday Jessica took to task this diminishing and poorly thought out article in NY Mag about gender equality and drinking. Jesscia did a great job parsing the bullshit in the article as blaming feminism for women's rate of drinking and I wanted to add to her analysis from a different angle, as that of someone who has had many close friends enter recovery.
In the last few years, I have had several close friends come to a cross-roads with their drinking where they have either decided that they can't drink as much as they used to or they have entered recovery. Many of the transformations have been painful, they have been introspective for all of us and they have harnessed on the collective strength of women supporting each other in making the best decisions for themselves. Feminism has played a key role in this. Many of my female friends drink in excess, not because they wanted to be "one of the guys" but because they had lives that were difficult as women, either for internalized sense of failure, experiencing abuse, depression around money, depression around social stature or failed relationships. I am not just talking about drinking for fun, of course women engage in that as well, but I am talking about drinking as a way to numb the pain, difficulty and reality of this often cold cold world.
It has been through the support of feminism and the fundamental belief that women have the right to enjoy life and not hate themselves for the failures that society has in many ways set up for us have we found the strength to take care of ourselves. So while the type of thought expressed in the above article blames feminism for allowing women to act more like men, I am arguing that it is the pressure of patriarchy, racism and poverty that have frequently led women to drinking in excess and feminism that has given us the framework to understand it is not our fault, but a system built on our failures.
0 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Re: Women, drinking, and blaming feminism.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.feministing.com/cgi-bin/movabletype/mt-tb.fcgi/10844
Bravo! Samhita!
'I am arguing that it is the pressure of patriarchy, racism and poverty that have frequently led women to drinking in excess and feminism that has given us the framework to understand it is not our fault, but a system built on our failures'
Thats really insightful and touching, I will be using this line in my arguments now! THANK YOU.
Hell yes!
And all this misses the real point: of course more women are drinking! It's okay; we don't even have to excuse it for being a source of coping with the patriarchal/pathological pressures of society. Men would do the same thing too if they were barred by social preconditions and curtailed gender roles.
This is all straw man material; you can take out the progressive strive for gender equality by simply plastering the diminutive, negative consequences of the movement. The entitlement to get drunk, ergo, is that of MEN - and MEN ONLY! "No girls allowed in this pub; you used to be pure and sober, and look what it's become!"
As usual, Samhita, you RAWK!!! My mother's been a functional alcoholic since I was 16 years. Watching this wonderful woman kill herself slowly because of this disease has been excruciating.
Becoming a feminist was paramount to finding help for myself. It told me exactly what your post stated. The deck is stacked against me, so it's not all my fault. Also, that I have a right and a duty to work to unstack it. I learned from feminism that I deserve to take up space in the world, I am somebody, and I'm not crazy for realizing things are f*-ed up and need changing. I may be crazy, but not about that. ;0)
Since my recovery from being the adult child of an alchoholic, I have been sprinkling my talks with my mother with some thinly disguised feminist thought. I'm trying to share the aforementioned gifts with her. Maybe she'll get it one day, too.
baddesignhurts:
I regret that you feel insulted. Sheri said it best:
"I am a trauma therapist. It has been my experience that addicts are addicts because their lives are not-so-great... that's not to say their isn't a biochemical reward system activated, or that it isn't a disease, or that people are not responsible for their lives and their recovery."
No, patriarchy didn't cause my mother's drinking. My mother caused my mother's drinking, just as she is the only one who can arrest it. However, being born into the conservative 50's, it did contribute to her drinking by telling her that her only worth was in being a wife and mother, and that it was mainly her fault when her 2 marriages failed. It told her that her main goal should be finding that man who will take care of her for the rest of her life, so she left school. It does contribute to other diseases when doctors are taught, either implicitly or explicitly, to distrust the women who come to them with health issues.
Yes, we carry the genetic predisposition toward alcoholism in my family. However, I'm not an alcoholic, and feminism is a large part of the reason. As an ACA, over-responsibility is one of my main character defects, especially as regards my mother.
Patriarchy contributed to my lengthy stint as #1 enabler because as a female, I'm considered the main care-taker of my family. As her daughter, I was socially conditioned to clean up after her. When my aunt had some real situations come up as a result of her drinking, no one asked my male cousin why he didn't help her. Since I'm in recovery and my family is not, I've been accused of being "selfish" and "mean" for ending my enabling. My male cousin has not received the same criticism.
Feminism has helped me see that this is a role foisted upon me by a patriarchal structure. When I first entered a 12 step-program, knowing that helped me deal with the guilt and shame much more easily.
Further, recovery deals with not blaming OTHER PEOPLE. I have blamed no one. I have held a societal structure that privileges one group over another responsible.
As a matter of fact, I even stated in my original post that I "found help for myself," that "it's not ALL my fault," and that "I have a duty and RESPONSIBILITY to unstack it." My choices were my choices. Just because I recognize that my choices were limited from the outset doesn't mean I don't take responsibility for them. It means I have "the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, and the courage to change the things I can." I cannot change my mother's drinking. I CAN change patriarchy, one day at a time.
I really appreciate the sincerity of this post. I think it's important to address a few common misconceptions, however. In the fields of alcoholism and addiction, common wisdom is sadly lagging decades behind scientific findings.
I certainly agree that the patriarchy does not help women with alcohol problems. However, blaming it for alcohol problems distracts from the important fact that addiction is determined mostly from genetic factors. Getting people to realize that some are more prone to alcoholism than others is incredibly important, both for helping people make educated choices about their drinking, and helping alcoholics better understand their situation.
Also, although the concept of alcohol "numbing the pain" seems to be common knowledge, science suggests that it's not really a common reason people drink, but a common rationalization. Alcohol, like many substances and behaviors, triggers the brain's reward system, often subtly increasing future cravings for alcohol. This same reward system is triggered by stress, amplifying cravings, leading to the familiar "I need a drink" behavior. In that case, the relief that people feel is relief from the sress-triggered cravings, not from the stress itself. This pattern is really the on-ramp for addiction. Understanding this is also incredibly important for people to make responsible choices about drinking.
oh, come ON. "the pressure of patriarchy.... led women to drink in excess"? alcoholism/addiction are diseases. not caused by patriarchy or poverty. in fact, not CAUSED by any human force that we know. we don't say that patriarchy causes cancer, or cystic fibrosis, or what have you. i'm a child of an alcoholic, too, and i find this insulting in the extreme.
i feel this type of BS does a lot of harm to those in recovery because it's about assigning blame instead of finding a way to work through a situation. we can scientifically describe addiction, but we don't know the cause. so addicts work in recovery to find ways to cope, and that specifically includes NOT BLAMING OTHERS. step 4: made a searching and fearless moral inventory OF OURSELVES.
wow. just.... wow.
"we don't say that patriarchy causes cancer"
um...
Feminist practice and breast cancer: "The patriarchy has claimed my right breast..."
http://books.google.com/books?id=4LWOl_-2DoMC&pg=PA17&lpg=PA17&dq=patriarchy+cancer&source=bl&ots=xg1S_a1MP2&sig=i3AMqFsTEobcUFP8AsPfyx-ar70&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=6&ct=result
I am a trauma therapist. It has been my experience that addicts are addicts because their lives are not-so-great... that's not to say their isn't a biochemical reward system activated, or that it isn't a disease, or that people are not responsible for their lives and their recovery.
Along these lines, I think feminism fits well with dialoguing about the multiple layers of influences on addiction and recovery, and speaks to the importance of giving women a voice in their recovery from addiction, trauma, and institutionalized oppression.
(Women and Madness by Phyllis Chesler is a great book that discusses women, mental illness and the impact of the patriarchy- I highly recommend it)
I think feminism works for the same reasons that a lot of people turn to religion in these types of situations--they need something bigger than themselves to inspire hope for change.
That's not to say that I would privilege the socio-cultural over the scientific in determining the causes of alcoholism, but the socio-cultural aspects are the most important in recovery, and I think, Samhita, that your post wonderfully indicates that.