There is no easy answer to this or to the many other questions she raises, but Filipovic dives deep into the machinery of American culture and politics to uncover the underlying causes of continuing inequality, demonstrating the necessity of re-framing our deeply held cultural beliefs. We’re here to prop it up, not live in it.” Which brings us back to the question: so how do we build a system that doesn’t require one group of people to sacrifice for the support of the other? What she uncovers time and time again is that “f course women can’t flourish in a system that needs us as support for someone else’s building. Through an intersectional lens, Filipovic looks at female friendship, sex, parenting, marriage, work-life balance, food and body image, and personal identity, revealing the antipathy and even outright hostility American society has for women’s pleasure and fulfillment, an opposition that often rises to outright hatred when race and class become involved. Rather, it combines history, recent sociological research, interviews with women from a range of backgrounds, and some of Filipovic’s own personal experience to focus on the root causes that render the American system of politics and culture inadequate to the task of promoting equality and, to an even greater degree, happiness. The H Spot is not a narrative of personal discovery or a self-help guide on how to make the “right” choices. Throughout this study, she asks the vital question: “what would we make if we all had the tools?” The current system is rigged what could we build that would actually promote equality - and by extension, happiness - on a systemic, bottom-up level?
In The H Spot: The Feminist Pursuit of Happines s, journalist Jill Filipovic dives into the history of American social norms and expectations, rooting out and revealing the many ways American culture, in the name of morality and rugged individualism (coupled with healthy doses of late-capitalist consumerism) undermines women at nearly every turn. The concept remains radical for women, however, because our social, political, and cultural systems are not actually built for us these systems were constructed knowing our labor is what allows many men to be able to pursue happiness in the first place. The inclusion of happiness as a right guaranteed to all men was a radical proposition in 1776, though it is now a defining aspect of American exceptionalism. The Declaration of Independence enshrines the “pursuit of happiness” as an “inalienable Right,” right next to life and liberty as essential endowments for all people.
The H-Spot: The Feminist Pursuit of Happiness by Jill Filipovic.
0 kommentar(er)
