I agree with everything written here, but in addition to internalized misogyny, women want to excuse or minimize their partner's bad behavior because they feel ashamed about being partnered with such a garbage man. I see this in my psychotherapy practice over and over, where women try to defend or justify their man's bad behavior (or take a long time to disclose it to me at all). They're not just worried about how his behavior makes him look bad, but how it makes them look bad for remaining partnered with such a douchebag. The rational goes something like this: "He can't be that bad because only a stupid, weak woman would be with a man who did the thing my man did. I don't want to see myself as a stupid, weak woman, and I also don't want to completely disrupt my life by leaving him, so here are all the reasons why the thing he did wasn't as bad as it appears to be." And it's not just Mormon wives who fall into this trap. I'm in the Seattle suburbs where most of my clients are educated, successful, secular, liberal women, and I still see this over and over and over. There are sadly a lot of garbage men in the world, and a lot of sad women covering for them.
This is really interesting, it made me stop and realize the ways I 'curate the environment' for my husband so I don't need to deal with the fallout from his discomfort ... that's a result of his choices. So thank you. While I don't have a ready answer for exactly how I stop doing this, it's made me think and I'm certainly going to start!
Thanks Andrea- I think it’s especially common for moms in survival mode who just don’t have the bandwidth the deal with their husbands mood on top of everything else. So they make sure the house is in order, the kids aren’t bothering him, she takes over more than her fair share of household duties to not have to ask him to do his fair share and deal with the pushback, etc, etc. I started noticing all sorts of things when I read Codependent No More ❤️❤️
I think this is an important point. I’ve witnessed a lot of men taking their discomfort out on the women closest to them. Because they haven’t been given opportunities to learn how to deal with their discomfort and/or (often) haven’t taken the opportunities they have been given, they don’t know how to regulate themselves and it gets ugly for the women in their lives.
It's also the difference between externalizers and internalizers. Men are more often conditioned to be externalizers, which is to say, blaming everyone but themselves for their bad behavior, whereas women are more often conditioned to internalize and blame themselves and take responsibility for the bad behavior of others.
I wonder how much of this is conditioned. I have a 4 year old son, and inspite of my best efforts he majorly externalizes and has since toddlerhood.
I used to believe most behaviors were conditioned but I’m afraid having children has turned me into a bit of an essentialist. Certain gender specific traits seem like innate personality sometimes.
Of course, this could be a behavior that is natural to all humans and suppressed in girl children as they grow up.
Whooo boy. Do I see this a lot where Iive. And where I live is a small (600 or less) rural town where the major occupations are farming and logging. So needless to say, gender rolls are very rigorous here. Women do women's work and men do men's work.
I was at my off farm job the other day at the local school (I'm a farmer AND a learning assistant) and one of the people I work with was commenting how her daughter brought an outdoor cat in and how it vomited all over said daughter's room. Mr Manly Man was home, and texted his wife and said 'cat puked in the house. You will have a lot of work to do when you get home.' And the others in the staff room all tittered and were like 'oh men haha. They sure can't handle vomit can they?'
And I'm thinking...they also can't handle blood, and diapers, and life. BECAUSE YOU FUCKING LET THEM GET AWAY WITH THIS SHIT! How much longer must we let men get away with being garbage humans? I've had it to here with this nonsense. I left the staff room. Because having conversations about this just doesn't happen here.
Anyway, all this to say that when I read this piece, I could feel myself getting upset because I see this shit everyday.
I too get so frustrated by the norms and women reinforcing them like this! Thinking down the line, I feel women that don't put up with this and do demand more equal partnership are likely to have few/no kids, and more traditional/patriarchal women have more kids. Therefore, the more patriarchal norms keep perpetuating at disproprtionate rates. Maybe access to this info on the internet mitigates it to some degree compared to in the past.
“These two things are true at the same time: 1. men are victims of this system. 2. men need to be held accountable for their actions.
These two things are also true at the same time: 1. women are victims of this system. 2. women need to be aware of the explicit and subtle ways we hold up this system.”
Celeste, thanks for your articles. I love reading them! So thought provoking! I am not generally a consumer of reality tv (with the exception of Queer Eye occasionally with my daughter) but I have been unable to stop myself from watching this show. Maybe because I live in the area it’s filmed, maybe because I’ve known women similar to these women, or maybe because I’m around the age of their moms, but it fascinates me. I feel so conflicted because these women are the breadwinners for their families and I admire that, and they talk about female empowerment (mock funeral for Layla’s divorce, etc). However, I could never identify what made me feel itchy about the show, until I read your article. The internalized misogyny is rampant. They are no different than devout Mormon housewives who uphold and support patriarchy obediently, these women just do it publicly and spend a lot more money in the process.
I felt conflicted too- I was definitely fist pumping them on during like Layla’s divorce party, Jessi crushing it in her business and every time they gave themselves permission to stand up for their own desires in the face of pressure from the church or families to conform. I just cringed a little when they kept saying momtok was all about female empowerment when… there’s still some digging to do there.
As always, another thought-provoking post! I look forward to Sunday mornings because I know there will be another intelligent/insightful/entertaining post from you. Keep writing. Thank you!
Hi, I liked this article. It immediately brought to my mind the parallel problem of internalized racism. Toni Morrison identified this and laid it out bare in The Bluest Eye. Laverne Cox amplified that message.
Some people might scoff at this notion, and I'm not trying to inject racism where it wasn't mentioned at all. I want to point out that the same system propagating internalized misogyny among White Mormon wives and women in heteronormative relationships who accept "trad" values is propagating internalized racism AND misogyny among marginalized communities of non-White people. I'd love to see an article about that at some point. And the inclusion of Black and Brown people who practice the Mormon faith.
This was brilliant - thank you for sharing. I really appreciated how thoughtfully you laid the two sides out - the reality of holding both sides accountable for their actions.
Haven't watched this show, but the characters in it remind me of women I know in my own life trying to make excuses for the terrible actions of their husbands, boyfriends, and male friends. We're all guilty of internalized misogyny in certain points of our life. I had the same feelings about men keeping their junk in their pants when the whole Roe v. Wade chaos was going on just a few years ago. It's actually terrifying driving by and seeing angry mobs in front of Planned Parenthood clinics.
Oh this is good. It infuriates me when in documentaries women deny their man could ever harm someone. Yet they will easily vilify his victims and blame them for his mistakes. Could it be because women are held responsible for their husbands actions, so they would rather deny they married a monster. Its an endless vicious cycle innit?
Needless to say, I loved this! I haven’t watched this far into the show yet but as soon as you mention the Jen covering for Zac op-Ed, my brain immediately was like, omg just like Ballerina Farm! Which of course if your point!
I loved all of this and especially tying it to internalized misogyny but I’m sad you’ve finished watching this bc it would be fun to watch together! As in “together” in a chat. I need someone to witness the sheer Mormon-ness of it w me :)
I wondered as I watched the show why I disliked the women. I hated the men and I knew exactly why. I understand better why I felt such contempt for Jen, which side now was the only one with the last name displayed 🤷🏽♂️.
Natural consequences is one of the tenets of our parenting. When we devoid our children, and now I learned also others, we deny them the opportunity to learn from their own mistakes. We too must accept that life is best appreciated when it catches up with us, even when we hate it.
Yes so many connections to parenting here! You think the “nice” thing is to keep them from pain but then they never learn both from their mistakes or how to move past guilt and shame.
God, here I was thinking I had no internalized misogyny then I remember that I fucking felt bad for reporting sexual harassment because it would ruin my college chaplain's career/life. That asshat is the one who repeatedly abused and groomed students.
Oh this is a great article. Ya know the phrase, “Behind every great man is a woman” ? It’s like these women have taken the idea of that but reversed it to blame themselves “behind every loser man is a women who wasn’t a good enough cheerleader” or some bullshit. It’s always the women’s fault
I agree with everything written here, but in addition to internalized misogyny, women want to excuse or minimize their partner's bad behavior because they feel ashamed about being partnered with such a garbage man. I see this in my psychotherapy practice over and over, where women try to defend or justify their man's bad behavior (or take a long time to disclose it to me at all). They're not just worried about how his behavior makes him look bad, but how it makes them look bad for remaining partnered with such a douchebag. The rational goes something like this: "He can't be that bad because only a stupid, weak woman would be with a man who did the thing my man did. I don't want to see myself as a stupid, weak woman, and I also don't want to completely disrupt my life by leaving him, so here are all the reasons why the thing he did wasn't as bad as it appears to be." And it's not just Mormon wives who fall into this trap. I'm in the Seattle suburbs where most of my clients are educated, successful, secular, liberal women, and I still see this over and over and over. There are sadly a lot of garbage men in the world, and a lot of sad women covering for them.
Oh this is such an important point- thanks for brining it up Diana!
The cognitive dissonance is real.
I finally woke up and left the guy. Still cannot believe how long I covered for him, excused his shitty behavior.
Late is better than never! I've met plenty of women who never leave the guy.
This is really interesting, it made me stop and realize the ways I 'curate the environment' for my husband so I don't need to deal with the fallout from his discomfort ... that's a result of his choices. So thank you. While I don't have a ready answer for exactly how I stop doing this, it's made me think and I'm certainly going to start!
Thanks Andrea- I think it’s especially common for moms in survival mode who just don’t have the bandwidth the deal with their husbands mood on top of everything else. So they make sure the house is in order, the kids aren’t bothering him, she takes over more than her fair share of household duties to not have to ask him to do his fair share and deal with the pushback, etc, etc. I started noticing all sorts of things when I read Codependent No More ❤️❤️
I think this is an important point. I’ve witnessed a lot of men taking their discomfort out on the women closest to them. Because they haven’t been given opportunities to learn how to deal with their discomfort and/or (often) haven’t taken the opportunities they have been given, they don’t know how to regulate themselves and it gets ugly for the women in their lives.
It's also the difference between externalizers and internalizers. Men are more often conditioned to be externalizers, which is to say, blaming everyone but themselves for their bad behavior, whereas women are more often conditioned to internalize and blame themselves and take responsibility for the bad behavior of others.
I wonder how much of this is conditioned. I have a 4 year old son, and inspite of my best efforts he majorly externalizes and has since toddlerhood.
I used to believe most behaviors were conditioned but I’m afraid having children has turned me into a bit of an essentialist. Certain gender specific traits seem like innate personality sometimes.
Of course, this could be a behavior that is natural to all humans and suppressed in girl children as they grow up.
Whooo boy. Do I see this a lot where Iive. And where I live is a small (600 or less) rural town where the major occupations are farming and logging. So needless to say, gender rolls are very rigorous here. Women do women's work and men do men's work.
I was at my off farm job the other day at the local school (I'm a farmer AND a learning assistant) and one of the people I work with was commenting how her daughter brought an outdoor cat in and how it vomited all over said daughter's room. Mr Manly Man was home, and texted his wife and said 'cat puked in the house. You will have a lot of work to do when you get home.' And the others in the staff room all tittered and were like 'oh men haha. They sure can't handle vomit can they?'
And I'm thinking...they also can't handle blood, and diapers, and life. BECAUSE YOU FUCKING LET THEM GET AWAY WITH THIS SHIT! How much longer must we let men get away with being garbage humans? I've had it to here with this nonsense. I left the staff room. Because having conversations about this just doesn't happen here.
Anyway, all this to say that when I read this piece, I could feel myself getting upset because I see this shit everyday.
How much longer 😭
I too get so frustrated by the norms and women reinforcing them like this! Thinking down the line, I feel women that don't put up with this and do demand more equal partnership are likely to have few/no kids, and more traditional/patriarchal women have more kids. Therefore, the more patriarchal norms keep perpetuating at disproprtionate rates. Maybe access to this info on the internet mitigates it to some degree compared to in the past.
“These two things are true at the same time: 1. men are victims of this system. 2. men need to be held accountable for their actions.
These two things are also true at the same time: 1. women are victims of this system. 2. women need to be aware of the explicit and subtle ways we hold up this system.”
AMEN!🙌🏻
Celeste, thanks for your articles. I love reading them! So thought provoking! I am not generally a consumer of reality tv (with the exception of Queer Eye occasionally with my daughter) but I have been unable to stop myself from watching this show. Maybe because I live in the area it’s filmed, maybe because I’ve known women similar to these women, or maybe because I’m around the age of their moms, but it fascinates me. I feel so conflicted because these women are the breadwinners for their families and I admire that, and they talk about female empowerment (mock funeral for Layla’s divorce, etc). However, I could never identify what made me feel itchy about the show, until I read your article. The internalized misogyny is rampant. They are no different than devout Mormon housewives who uphold and support patriarchy obediently, these women just do it publicly and spend a lot more money in the process.
I felt conflicted too- I was definitely fist pumping them on during like Layla’s divorce party, Jessi crushing it in her business and every time they gave themselves permission to stand up for their own desires in the face of pressure from the church or families to conform. I just cringed a little when they kept saying momtok was all about female empowerment when… there’s still some digging to do there.
As always, another thought-provoking post! I look forward to Sunday mornings because I know there will be another intelligent/insightful/entertaining post from you. Keep writing. Thank you!
That’s so kind! Thank you Adrianne!
Hi, I liked this article. It immediately brought to my mind the parallel problem of internalized racism. Toni Morrison identified this and laid it out bare in The Bluest Eye. Laverne Cox amplified that message.
Some people might scoff at this notion, and I'm not trying to inject racism where it wasn't mentioned at all. I want to point out that the same system propagating internalized misogyny among White Mormon wives and women in heteronormative relationships who accept "trad" values is propagating internalized racism AND misogyny among marginalized communities of non-White people. I'd love to see an article about that at some point. And the inclusion of Black and Brown people who practice the Mormon faith.
Thanks for such an insightful article.
This was brilliant - thank you for sharing. I really appreciated how thoughtfully you laid the two sides out - the reality of holding both sides accountable for their actions.
Haven't watched this show, but the characters in it remind me of women I know in my own life trying to make excuses for the terrible actions of their husbands, boyfriends, and male friends. We're all guilty of internalized misogyny in certain points of our life. I had the same feelings about men keeping their junk in their pants when the whole Roe v. Wade chaos was going on just a few years ago. It's actually terrifying driving by and seeing angry mobs in front of Planned Parenthood clinics.
The double standard is infuriating.
Oh this is good. It infuriates me when in documentaries women deny their man could ever harm someone. Yet they will easily vilify his victims and blame them for his mistakes. Could it be because women are held responsible for their husbands actions, so they would rather deny they married a monster. Its an endless vicious cycle innit?
Needless to say, I loved this! I haven’t watched this far into the show yet but as soon as you mention the Jen covering for Zac op-Ed, my brain immediately was like, omg just like Ballerina Farm! Which of course if your point!
I loved all of this and especially tying it to internalized misogyny but I’m sad you’ve finished watching this bc it would be fun to watch together! As in “together” in a chat. I need someone to witness the sheer Mormon-ness of it w me :)
Honestly shocked I haven’t seen more people making the parallels from Jen and Zac to Hannah and Daniel. It’s the same freaking story!
And I’m here to discuss the Mormonism of it all alllll day long. Did you get to the baby blessing and testimonies?? 🫣🫣🫣 gave that scene a stink eye 😒
I wondered as I watched the show why I disliked the women. I hated the men and I knew exactly why. I understand better why I felt such contempt for Jen, which side now was the only one with the last name displayed 🤷🏽♂️.
Natural consequences is one of the tenets of our parenting. When we devoid our children, and now I learned also others, we deny them the opportunity to learn from their own mistakes. We too must accept that life is best appreciated when it catches up with us, even when we hate it.
Yes so many connections to parenting here! You think the “nice” thing is to keep them from pain but then they never learn both from their mistakes or how to move past guilt and shame.
God, here I was thinking I had no internalized misogyny then I remember that I fucking felt bad for reporting sexual harassment because it would ruin my college chaplain's career/life. That asshat is the one who repeatedly abused and groomed students.
Oh this is a great article. Ya know the phrase, “Behind every great man is a woman” ? It’s like these women have taken the idea of that but reversed it to blame themselves “behind every loser man is a women who wasn’t a good enough cheerleader” or some bullshit. It’s always the women’s fault
Great writing! Thanks for making my brain think.
You are such an amazing writer, wow I am mulling over your ideas. Bullseye 🎯