The “woman question” question

An earnest attempt to break out of my prison of one sided mirrors

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Bhasmasura was said to have been born of the bhasma¹ off Shiva’s body and was a highly disciplined and fiercely loyal devotee of Shiva. Through his extraordinary penance, physical prowess and intelligence he pleased Shiva and was offered a boon. He asked for immortality but Shiva, in his wisdom, saw what a torturous burden immortality was and refused his loyal devotee his wish. Instead, Bhasmasura then asked for the ability to instantly turn to bhasma anyone whose head he touched with his outstretched forefinger, and Shiva granted him this wish.

With this new ability, Bhasmasura went around terrorizing and subordinating everyone he came across, reveling in his own wit and ambition. There came a day when Bhasmasura, encouraged by his own successes and drunk on power, then went after Shiva himself to force him to grant Bhasmasura immortality after all. Shiva asked for Vishnu’s help in defeating Bhasmasura and so Vishnu took the earthly incarnation of a beautiful and enchanting woman named Mohini.

Bhasmasura fell in love with Mohini as soon as he saw her and was diverted from his mission. He asked Mohini to be his and Mohini agreed on condition that Bhasmasura should dance with her, perfectly following every single mudra, then and only then could he win her heart. So they danced together for long and Bhasmasura became entranced by Mohini and her graceful movements, desperately trying to mold himself to match her in every form and stance. Just as the dance was coming to an end and Bhasmasura was internally rejoicing for having won Mohini over, on the very last step Mohini put her outstretched forefinger on her own head and unthinkingly Bhasmasura mimicked her, instantly turning to bhasma himself.

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For those of you that follow me, it definitely isn’t a surprise to see me discussing the subject of female agency. A few months ago, it flared up as a particular fashion to discuss its existence among a lot of writers I followed. Some of them have subsequently become close friends of mine. Although, there is absolutely nothing new under the sun about such an incident. In fact, most people my age inwardly groan when a discussion on gender relations erupts. It always starts with someone stepping a toe outside the most recent skim of feminine sensibilities by being cheeky and provocative. Then comes the performative outrage of all the moral busybodies. Then the pretentious intellectuals “reflect” on The Whole Debacleᵀᴹ by trying to weave it into the wider, sociocultural narratives. Some of the most tediously derivative conjectures are spun in order to cover over the indecency of the truths that might have accidentally been laid bare. This usually bores most normal people, as it is meant to, and the crowd disperses from the scene of the crime, not even having perceived of its significance. This leaves only the most tone-deaf, pedantic and stubbornly hypnotized lexicals among us to pick at the thoroughly trampled and desecrated corpse of what was the original sin, so to speak.

There are all the usual arguments from all the usual suspects. The religious and/or conservatives arguing that women need to submit their agency to the men in their lives for the greater good of everyone. The feminists and the anti-feminists both arguing that women need to hold on to their agency and yet being entirely incapable of actually holding them accountable for anything at all. How must one have agency and learn to make decisions when one is shielded from all the consequences? Yet, one claims egalitarian teleology and the other deontology: like oil and water- these two do not mix well in theory but in practice you get a thick suffocating emulsion that sticks to everything it touches and gets in everyone’s way. The MRM and WRM both presumably believe in women’s agency too- rights can only be granted to an independent agent and so in fact these movements stake their existence on the assumption that women as a group have as much agency as men do. If only it were true of anything resembling even a significant minority of the current female population.

It is obvious that one cannot hold someone accountable when they do not wish to be accountable- it only bounces off them to the nearest agentic person. In lieu of such a catcher of blame, or indeed when the deflected burdens become too heavy to carry for anyone, it forms a gaping hole in the social fabric out of which countless people will find themselves flung into bottomless chaos. Alas, that these two rights movements are forever stuck in the far fringes of society² is the true depressing herald of our times to which hardly anyone will ever pay attention.

Then there are people scattered across the whole political spectrum, that believe that women inherently lack any agency at all and so obviously, are incapable of surrendering, or, in fact, of holding onto something that they don’t even possess. The men making this claim invariably turn out to be someone who accidentally stared at the gaping maw of willful feminine cruelty when they clearly weren’t ready for it. The trauma of it is so painful for a red blooded man that entire civilizations are built on the premise that, that which you can’t see can’t see you either and as long as you go “la la la la la..” loud enough the leviathan eternally prowling circles around you will politely leave you be. Contrary to what one might naively expect however, majority of the people that argue that women have no agency are women themselves, as they go around deflecting all blame and shamelessly absolving themselves of any and all wrongdoing. Is there some sort of contradiction in someone claiming to not really be responsible for any of their actions while insisting that their opinions on the matter are still their own and must therefore be respected? Fear not, we are all cunning creatures capable of strategic selective blindness. But when you willingly play pawn to such primordial deities you eventually become fodder to them. The red queen revels in your devotion to her now, only to lop your head off later when you have fulfilled your purpose- that is the nature of her blessing.

This hurricane of collective codependent abuse is always raging online nowadays, no matter which corner of the internet you end up on, and us habitual outliers are left at the eye of the storm to haplessly witness the glorious destruction it leaves in its wake. There is, again, this naive assumption that the eternal deities will leave you alone if only you can pretend them out of existence hard enough. We have yet to learn our lessons on that score and so the storms must rage on. No form of love, trust, friendship or camaraderie shall survive unscathed it in the end. No beauty or truth is left untainted. Only that which is simply insignificant enough to be missed, is humble enough to bow or that which boasts the deepest roots will be left behind in the end.

Having witnessed this phenomenon for so many years, I am not particularly impressed by any single incident anymore unless and until someone I have come to respect and care about gets pulled into it (or willingly jumps in). The fact is that such conflicts arise in ideas and truths that have long seemed entirely self-evident to me and until the correct context, timing and need is reached, it feels quite pointless and even boring to attempt any argument. Everyone is only staring at their own reflected shadows in everyone and everything around them. I do not put myself above this kind of solipsism either, and in fact I have long felt completely paralyzed in place shouting “is there anybody out there?” Over and over, unconvinced of all the enthusiastic “yes”s in answer, as, far too often and in due course, I always find out that the “yes”s are not addressed to me after all. Often, in my moments of clarity, I find myself trapped in this prison made of one-way mirrors pointed outward- I see people but they see only themselves.

This time the illusion certainly lasted longer- I was personally asked by a number of the people mentioned above to address this subject including Walt himself. I was unconvinced if this request was made to me or to the various projections I have come to inhabit for so many people. Perhaps that is what made me hesitate and prevaricate, as this draft sits unfinished on my dashboard month after month, collecting a litany of the greatest hits from the hurricane that wont make it into the final draft. After all, I was an active participant in it before it threw me up as the malcontent that I am. I am yet perfectly capable of crafting a narrative that is just unique and new enough to cause a harmless new debacle- some delicious fresh kindling to the fire and some exhibitionist stroking of my ego. But I shan’t do that today. Today I want to make an example of myself as an agentic woman and address the subject directly. Will this break my prison of projection? Only time will tell. But at this point I have spent far too much time turned away from it all in disgust. Subjects like these clearly do not stop mattering because you find a way to temporarily shelter from them, they become a festering undercurrent in the common discourse and haunt your conscience, if you have one.

Stating the self-evident

Do women have agency? Do men? The simple, self-evident answer here is a resounding “no”. No one is just born with agency, only the potential for it. The rest of it is all socially constructed as much as the term sticks in one’s craw these days. But really, agency is possibly the one, perhaps the only, thing that one learns through their socialization. It takes monumental effort and skill to instill a good, well-developed sense of one’s independence, vulnerabilities, potential for action and boundaries- in short, one’s sovereignty- in a child. It becomes much harder to do the older you get.

Not everyone can learn to be agentic through the same means either. In fact, hardly ever do any two individuals respond exactly the same to the same set and succession of circumstances, and so the skill of intentionally imbuing agency in someone is the least generalizable skill there possibly can be³. It takes fluid intelligence and creativity to play this part. One has to set an example that is inspiring enough without becoming alienating or disappearing into the mundane. One has to instruct just the correct amount, no more or less, and in the correct ways, and at the correct moments in time. But also have the patience to let things breathe and grow as they will. One needs the strength of character to acknowledge when things still do not turn out as expected, as is often the case, without then going on a tailspin existential crisis about one’s methods and understanding of the world. Obviously, not each and every one of these factors need to be checked out on some pedantic list of “must”s. They are more guidelines. The real job involves being an agentic person yourself and navigating these decisions in real time. It requires being present, vigilant and perceptive.

As the astute people might have guessed already, this role is traditionally played chiefly by the women in any society. Not just for their kids as the mothers but just in general, for all their peer adults as well. This is what makes a community and the wider society dynamic and anti-fragile. There is, of course, no prohibition against men playing the same role but there are several reasons why most men simply fall short of it.

Men are physically stronger, slightly smarter on average, have a higher variance in most traits and behaviors, and they build and run most of the inanimate things that make a civilization function. Men are also born “without innate value”, as opposed to women that are valued just for existing, as a rather loud cohort from the aforementioned hurricane never tires of pointing out. It is true, in strictly biological terms- women are the limiting factor for reproduction and so they are treated as though they are innately more valuable than men. Strictly in the biological sense, men are driven to find their place in the hierarchy, and then to find a better one. While women are driven to disregard old hierarchies and pretend away the differences for the sake of one’s personal tastes, thus sprouting new hierarchies- reproduction tends to be quite indifferent to all the morals and aesthetics of the past as the present tests their resilience and the future brings unpredictable change. Thankfully, we are not purely biological creatures, at the mercy of momentary whims and predictable behaviors. At least, not all of us.

What all this means in practice, is that men are driven to act out of necessity much more than women are. Women most often do not need but instead they want for things⁴, as for the vast majority of women, someone(most often a man) will always step forward to take care of your needs. There is greater room for cultivating agency when you aren’t driven by needs- if your actions are not forced by elements outside your control quite as much, you have much greater room for exercising your own will. As a woman, your individual choices also tend to inherently have a much greater impact, both positive and negative, because most of the big decisions that impact people’s lives are actually made by women. Notice that just because there is room for cultivating agency does not mean that women actually end up with higher agency. That is, at the end of the day, also a choice that one must make for themselves.

Men are driven to inflate the value of the structure which they must inhabit. So much chaff is carried along by any society only due to men’s fear of change, and of losing one’s place. The rebellious men that bring about real change are very often of unnaturally feminine temperaments, and even then, a successful rebellion requires sanction by the presence of women. One of the beautiful things about being human is that we are remarkably androgynous in that both men and women can embody both the masculine and the feminine, or neither. Feminine forms of agency can be exercised by men and vice versa, only with significant handicap.

When you build something, especially something inanimate, you expend a part of yourself and anchor it to the pertinent moment in time. It is taking of potential, alive with unbound possibilities, and crystallizing it into a definite and mortal reality. It is, in a small measure, a death of sorts to create each one of the inanimate wonders that we have all become so comfortably accustomed to. This is actually one of the most difficult things one can do, and I have always admired the men in my life for making it look so effortless. Women on the other hand, have the privilege of primarily being in charge of birthing instead of building. A task that takes just as much effort as building, to be fair, but also yields something that is inherently more valued. It is something that takes a certain amount of selfish recklessness and ruthlessness, as one is required to take real actualized resource and put it into creating new potential- which necessarily includes the potential of death and negation as well. Here, again, the sheer range of possibilities, if properly faced and not ignored, give women a far greater chance at being agentic. But paradoxically also makes it possible for them to be the complete opposite.

Naturally, when you anchor so much of your own self to the passing moment, only to see it decay and diminish over time, you lose the ability to effectively anticipate the coming moment. Whereas birthing of animate things that, as a rule, outlive and outgrow you and hold just as many, if not more, unbound possibilities as you- well, that is the ultimate precipice. Therein is the perfectly crafted opportunity for growth and self-actualization, of a fated confrontation with the leviathan in all its mythic glory, of one’s own heroic destiny if only one chooses to step up and take charge of it.

Stagnant Perfection

So far I have painted an inspiring picture of what feminine agency can look like, but we all know that none of it is manifest in so much of the modern world. These are the times of BPD women and NPD men, of spiraling generational cycles of abuse, of disorienting inversions of reality. These are times ruled by “incentive structures”, prediction models and the all-too-powerful engines of economy shredding and blending all of reality into a bland tasteless slop that can be forced down your gullet, for your own good no less. And these are the times of widespread voluntary infertility and the inescapable sterility that follows. In short, these are times where a million inanimate catchers of blame will happily swallow up as much of your individual self as you throw at them.

Is one really supposed to believe that men have any more agency than women in the modern hellscape that we are so meticulously painting? They certainly are subject to higher persecution and accountability than women, but it is rather naive to think that what is essentially just the inertia and lag of our sociocultural structures is some sort of collective forward-looking vision on the part of men. No, what we instead have is a hailstorm of deflected blame, accountability, and responsibilities that falls on the shoulders of men only because they lack all the privileges that women are traditionally afforded just for existing; and because they have not as a group mustered enough selfish recklessness to not care for all the dire consequences of leaving it all behind and running for shelter- yet. It is obvious to anyone paying attention that we are headed there at a breakneck speed.

As mentioned elsewhere, I am relatively new to the New World and clearly still hold on to the ancient ideas and wisdoms that are my inheritance from the other end of the earth. Part of it is the understanding and appreciation of the innumerable manifestations of human spirit, including the entire range of the divine feminine as well as the divine masculine. One finds inspiration, motivation as well as justification in the many archetypes that animate one’s psychological landscape. It is worth examining why one is gripped and compelled by certain archetypes and not the others. It is worth studying the rules by which daemons live and die- knowing which ones rule your being and which ones you compel forth with your actions. To observe when they die and to prepare for the brith of new ones.

I do not wish to incur the wrath of all the religious people that are reading this. Any tradition that is sufficiently old in any consistent form always carries plenty of wisdom and value in it, whether intended or not. But I would like to point out that any religion or creed that does not acknowledge the divine feminine in its terrible entirety, will never engender agency and consciousness in its adherents, whether female or male. It will in fact, attempt to weed it out to the best of its ability, starting with the women but always ending with the men.

To acknowledge that reality is a dance between the ever changing and momentary is and ought, is to confront being as a whole- birth and death. If one must insist by their creed that there is one final perfected state that the world is tending towards, a very masculine paradigm by its definition, what other choice is there, but to try and deny everything that does not fit that perfect vision? And fair enough, it is an intoxicating vision that drives man to build and achieve a great many things.

However, the masculine in its isolation is inevitably impotent. The intoxication does not last forever and then the perfectly stagnant utopia of one’s dreams starts looking more like a prison. One starts clawing at the walls one’s built for themselves, trying to bring them down. Needing to fool oneself, to go behind one’s own back- a very diabolical predicament. In the place of building anew, one starts to halt all growth and to stagnate in place, wrought with internal conflicts, struck dumb by the callous indifference of reality. With this artificial freezing of time, all archetypes and impulses are cleaved from their contrapositives by way of willful trickery. Good may be tortured into existence without any conception of bad or evil- a flat facade with no back side. The attempt at freezing of time, in a final “end of history” moment, is the murder of the agentic feminine- of the eternal goddesses. New spirits cannot be allowed to incarnate with the inevitable passing moment because they always hold the possibility of disturbing the deathly perfection of the final stagnant moment.

The last real birth in this utopia is that of the upside down and inside out, that which will consume all subsequent life and confuse it into bewildered subservience. Every being is to be dissected, examined, and documented before it can hope to be posthumously declared alive- formerly. The bastions of individualism will preach that the only true way to be a sovereign individual is to follow all the rules and do exactly as you are told. The rich and powerful accrue more wealth and power in the name of fundamentalist egalitarianism, never once bothered by the contradiction. Any pursuit of truth and scientific discovery will only be allowed with the stipulation of predefined and peer-reviewed answers. Freedom itself stands on its head and ties everyone up into biting insoluble knots- you better show your reverence by braying about it at the top of your lungs. How else will anyone know just how committed you are to your freedom and agency?

Here, everyone is left to live off of the perfectly preserved corpse of the past, for nothing new can be allowed to grow. How dare you refuse that sweet nectar? It is willful heresy, I say! Haven’t you found happiness yet!? Aren’t you fulfilled!? Haven’t you found yet your very own stale, rotten chunk of flesh to chew? Of course, you better be feeling guilty while you look for it. That is the only kind of meaning anyone is afforded- guilt, sickness and the exactly correct variety of hunger and longing. C’mon now, the incentive structure has preordained that you should play your part in this circus, or die trying. Who the hell do you think you are to go against it? Do you think you know better than all the greats that have come before you?

But so it goes in this torturous asymptote-

Everyone standing perfectly still while thinking that they are running as fast as they possibly could- a fitting inversion of the unopposed reign of the Red Queen.

In the place of the positive and negative, good and bad, it is a bland homogenous neutral. Better not discriminate.

In the place of masculine and feminine, a castrated agender husk of the formerly masculine. One can never really rid themselves of either one without losing the other too.

It is the sacrifice of the entire infinite future potential, crystallizing it into perfect momentary finitude. Just an ever shrinking sliver out of reach, so one may always pretend to strive for it.

It is what happens when the eternal and ever-changing is burned out of everything leaving behind that which refuses to reproduce or reincarnate, that which is necessarily fragile and stagnant- in short, dead matter.

(Thank you to

John Exum

,

FOOL Ψ

and

Apoc

for their help in editing and

Rajeev Ram

for his help in finding such evocative images for this piece on such short notice!)

1. Bhasma is the grey-white ash that is left behind after complete, high temperature combustion of any biological matter. In Hindu rituals, it can come from either “sacrificial” burning of offerings to specific deities or in the same vein, from cremated bodies. The bhasma itself represents a saturation of that which cannot reincarnate, as it is left behind when the “spirit” leaves the matter being burned(sacrifice and spirit here being only very loose translations of the original Sanskrut words and concepts). Shiva is often described as being covered in bhasma as he embodies death, destruction and rebirth.

2. Before anyone raises the objection that feminism is the same as a women’s rights movement and that it is far from being fringe, let me ask what actual rights have feminists been fighting for? Perhaps at some point in history there was overlap but there clearly isn’t one today.

3. Sometimes people do end up learning it through accidental circumstances too.

4. The vast majority of modern women clearly treat their wants as if they are needs, thus eschewing away their agency.