Integritus Prime

I’ve been pondering this topic for some time. It’s a difficult one because I’ve been on the receiving end of these tactics from older women. Perhaps you have too. While thinking about how to write this post, I looked up emotional abuse, covert abuse, battered women syndrome, and why we pretend things are okay when we are in abusive situations. While I feel I’ve been in many of the situations these articles describe, I want to tease out some particular issues I’ve grappled with and it has to do with how older women internalize and embody the toxic patriarchy. Here’s my attempt – let me know what you think:

1. Excessive control: Older women who have likely been abused in some way tend to be excessively controlling. Because they lost control at an early age, they seek (subconsciously) to have as much control as possible. This may show up as an older woman telling you exactly how they want a report written or the dishes done. When you realize it’s excessive and push back, they may feel surprised because they don’t feel they are being controlling. In the patriarchy we are working to defeat, obsessive control is a hallmark – men control what their wives wear, what they say, where they go, and so on. Of course, in modern societies this has changed, but it still happens in some places, and is very toxic. Older women embody this characteristic and control their children, daughters-in-law, and even grandchildren in this way, if they have not learned to release this pattern.
2. Verbal Aggression: Another tendency I have noticed is how older women will shout you down the moment they feel “disobeyed”, which is how they label your desire to think critically, or to think for yourself. They will seek to shut you down because they see your behavior or thinking as rebellious or insubordinate. In their mind is a hierarchy in which you (especially if you are younger than them) must listen to them and not oppose them. This is also a toxic patriarchal characteristic.
3. Normalizing abuse and victim shaming: A very harmful example is when abuse is happening in the household, the older women will put on a show that everything is okay, and prevent children from speaking up about it, shaming them for embarrassing their mothers and grandmothers, and blaming them for being weak. The idea is to “just get on with it” despite the atrocious things being done to them (such as marital rape and physical beatings, and even the sexual abuse of their children). This kind of behavior shows deep internalization of abuse and patriarchy, to the extent that these women also become accessories to the crimes by actively hiding them and going on as if all is well. This is extremely harmful to children and can scar them for life, unless they take steps to heal at a root level.

These reflections are based on situations I’ve encountered in my own experience, through clients, and through observation. Share with me your own observations about how older women embody patriarchy.