Canon EOS 5D
ƒ/4
24 mm
1/20
1250
“We need to nurture the feminine energy in women, and men… the young men. The old men are hopeless. We have to wait for them to die off.”
– Isabel Allende, Chilean Novelist (in red)
21 responses to “Grrrl Power”
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Wow, Isabel Allende in TED… never thought of that… very nice, she is the epitome of a methodically creative artist (she begins a new book every 8th of january). She is your neighbor, btw, she lives in California with her husband… And Tracy, well, Tracy is so cool…
😀Jeez I know that I know the woman from India, can´t recall her tho… (hint?) and the other lady I don´t know.
I read today about cetacean intelligence and social hierachy. We know they are deemed very (most?) intelligent animals. Coincidentially, their families are structured around the mother:
"Resident orcas living in British Columbia, Canada, and Washington, USA live in extremely stable family groups. The basis of this social structure is the matriline, consisting of a mother and her offspring, who travel with her for life. Male orcas never leave their mother’s pod, while female offspring may branch off to form their own matriline if they have many offspring of their own. Males have a particularly strong bond with their mother, and travel with them their entire lives, which can exceed 50 years."
Funny connection between cetacean intelligence and their female-oriented social structure -matriline- and the sugestion made by Isabel Allende in the words you quote. (Though I wouldn´t agree on just waiting for older males to die off. There are many old males who praise female energy and suggest as well the need of nurturing the feminine side of our human nature to bring us back to a balance and forward to a higher point in our evolution as a species and as a whole conciousness.)
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SJ/GG: That woman from India is Lakshmi Pratury, the founder of Tamarind Grove, who hosted the Dipti Naval show a couple months ago…!!! love Tracy Chapman’s music, and I know one other person in this photo… Amazing, how this world is all inter-connected!
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@drona: Thx for the pointer!!!! =]
@glyph: if you were refering to me and my comment ( you mention the example in nature of a matriarchy and I was the one to make it), you got me wrong. I am not a feminist, but an integrator. I stand for the idea of unity, wholeness and oneness. Reread my last sentence: "…nurturing the feminine side of our human nature to bring us back to a balance and forward to a higher point in our evolution as a species and as a whole conciousness.)" Never implied "female is better", or "female should rule". For what I know on Isabel Allende, the woman is an advocate of rescuing the feminine principle in our nature (AS important AS the masculine) for she comes from a society who suffered a violent dictatorship with a strongly settled concept of male superiority over women [which is the story of many other societies worlwide].
But, well, if you didn´t undertand this at first reading, perhaps you won´t now either after my further explanation. No problem. =)
[edit] Side note: I do love men -one in particular, but as a kind of individuals too- I get along with men better than with women, and from my closest relationships men are far majority. I´d never talk in favour of women just for a mere genres consideration! 😀 [/edit]
@benjiman: I agree. =)
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[Edit: looks like glyph hunter removed his provocative comment. shame.]
Woman should rule. At least in foreign policy. Imagine…
glyph_hunter: Another example, perhaps closer to home: the hedonistic bisexual sisterhoods of bonobos, whose sexual antics keep them out of most zoos (e.g., some parents freak out when they see primates in the missionary position).
"Bonobo females also engage in female-female genital sex (tribadism) to socially bond with each other, thus forming a female nucleus of Bonobo society. The bonding between females allows them to dominate Bonobo society – although male Bonobos are individually stronger, they cannot stand alone against a united group of females."
It’s good to have positive role models. =)
Bonobos use sex to avoid violence. "Chimpanzees and Bonobos both evolved from the same ancestor that gave rise to humans, and yet the Bonobo is one of the most peaceful, unaggressive species of mammals living on the earth today. They have evolved ways to reduce violence that permeate their entire society. They show us that the evolutionary dance of violence is not inexorable" – from Wrangham & Peterson, Demonic Males
If Kurzweil’s plan to upload our brains to computers comes to pass, we will likely test it on a primate before a human (given FDA regulation, and the need to do animal trials…), and that could get pretty interesting (Templeton’s blog). We would want the resulting hyperintelligence to originate from a female bonobo, not a male chimp…
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Hey great photo.
can i use this photo on my website http://www.tracychapman.co.nr?
And did Tracy give a talk on her own!?
thanks alot.
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With respect to glyph’s deletion of a posting that I was too late to read, I must state that Allende offers some great insights (speaking as a father to a young daughter). However, as is critical to the proper conveyence of ideas via the written/spoken word – the last portion of her comments could (most likely) have been resisted and the full weight of the message would have remained intact without grave offense.
At the expense of some pop psychology, Isabel may have some unattended issues with her "daddy". However, I’m not a psychologist… I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night.
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I wonder what percentage of the world’s leaders would have to be female before a "network effect" of sorts would be established for Peace to reign. Most female leaders of state in recent history took their nations to war at a moment’s notice — for example: Golda Meir, Indira Gandhi, Margaret Thatcher. But it has been argued that they did that to survive in a male dominated world.
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(off-topic: pst! I got the flat!!! I am moving!!! :D)
@glyph: Sorry to see it go too, it had opened the discussion to further debate and that is always welcome.
@Jurvey, thanks for the dear bonobo example. I still find that other species (what was their name!), the crazy ones which lack of front lobe and fight each other more funny, tho 😀 And about bonobos it still makes dizzy this idea of sexual exchanges among girls to reaffirm the relationship… -not even for the sake of world peace I´d do it!- =S
Well, uhm…. maybe for world peace I would… but ONLY for it. 😀
drona, interesting comment on the history of females on power and their behavour -and their justification for their behavour-. It welcomes a remark on a difference I think it´s utterly necessary to make: to distinguigh between "feminine and masculine energy" (which Isabel referes to and me), and "female and male individuals". Both genres have both types of energies, that´s why Isabel says: "the feminine energy in women, and men… the young men.". This means that these women you talk about were driven by a strong male energy, at least for great part of their period on power. The fact that they were females was merely anecdotic.
We may need not more women in power as much as beings with a greater quota of feminine energy on, or with a balance of the two preferently, regardless their phenotypical sex.
When Isabel talks about feminine nature opposed to the masculine, she refers more to the yin/yang dichotomy, the creative and the receptive, darkness and light, energy and matter… (particle and wave?) which are both part of one thing and both need each other to lead to balance and harmony.
This makes me remember a great conversation we have long ago with Steve and others here -it begins some comments above- about these principles and Life, The Matrix, The Oracle and The Architect…. =)
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Alieness: ah, yes, our friends the baboon… From Sapolsky:
When baboons hunt together they’d love to get as much meat as possible, but they’re not very good at it. The baboon is a much more successful hunter when he hunts by himself than when he hunts in a group because they screw up every time they’re in a group. Say three of them are running as fast as possible after a gazelle, and they’re gaining on it, and they’re deadly. But something goes on in one of their minds—I’m anthropomorphizing here—and he says to himself, "What am I doing here? I have no idea whatsoever, but I’m running as fast as possible, and this guy is running as fast as possible right behind me, and we had one hell of a fight about three months ago. I don’t quite know why we’re running so fast right now, but I’d better just stop and slash him in the face before he gets me." The baboon suddenly stops and turns around, and they go rolling over each other like Keystone cops and the gazelle is long gone because the baboons just became disinhibited. They get crazed around each other at every juncture.
A typical male baboon is too impulsive and can’t possibly do the disciplined thing. Baboons are far less disciplined than chimps and when you map their brain anatomy you notice that they don’t have a whole lot of frontal cortical function. Even though there are tremendous individual differences among the baboons, they’re still at this neurological disadvantage, compared to the apes, and thus they typically blow it at just the right time. They could be scheming these incredible coalitions, but at the last moment, one decides to slash his partner in the ass instead of the guy they’re going after, just because he can get away with it for three seconds. The whole world is three seconds long—they’re very pointillist in their emotions.
P.S. In today’s NYT: Morality and Primate Behavior
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Sí, si, si!
I LUUUUUUUV that passage!!! thankyou thankyou thankyou 😀
And I can relate to this at times… " The whole world is three seconds long—they’re very pointillist in their emotions." Yeah… my patience deficit screws it all up sometimes… and when my 3second-lasting emotions are too strong there´s a tsunami ahead…
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[thinking] …what´s interesting is the process by which some strong 3second-lasting emotions evolve into almost 3year-lasting, and are still buzzing like first time… but I won´t mention that… [/thinking]
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