One of the threads that ties the new global empire of disembodiment together is all the pretending that goes on, including the expectation that women will pretend not to pretend.
Take prostitution. When men pay for sex, the women they buy sex from are supposed to act like they're not being paid. As Kajsa Ekis Ekman puts it: "The best prostitute, therefore, is the one who doesn't act like a prostitute but never forgets that she is one."
Or surrogacy, where we're supposed to pretend a baby can have three fathers but no mother.
When it comes to the expectations imported to our sex lives from hardcore pornography, young women are expected to pretend we enjoy being smacked around and abused by our partners (don't kink-shame!) and that we aren't terrified of being choked.
Or gender identity, where women are supposed to pretend that the mental health issues or fetishes that make men believe they're women (like getting erections in frilly panties) have anything to do with the things that make us women (being female). We're supposed to pretend that sex, which has always shaped women's lives, doesn't matter. And then we're supposed to pretend we're not pretending. We're supposed to really mean it or at least put on a convincing display of 'allyship.'
Complicity in the lie is part of the price of admission to the artificial reality.
I promise I won’t keep saying this, but great piece once again.
You just explain this whole issue so brilliantly.
Anyway, there’s a part of me that thinks one thing the Ukraine war might achieve is a renewed respect for reality. It’s difficult to remember all the pretending about not pretending we’re supposed to be doing when there’s a war on.
I’m not saying it’s anything like worth the price, of course.