March 3, 2024 – Northcote
It's taken a while to get through this one. We moved house, there's a genocide happening and I've been distracted. I think dealing with all that and digesting the content of this was too much for me.
I saw Clem launch this and was so impressed with her knowledge and eloquence and already am on this side of the argument so was keen to really feel connected with a point of view I've held for a long time.
Reading this, however, was a little difficult. The book is aimed at unhappy women in unhappy marriages, or perhaps undecided women not yet in marriages. It goes through the cultural, economic and historical roots of marriage, as well as the current state of the wedding industrial complex. Ford paints a grim picture of subjugation, misogyny and oppression, essentially attempting to bring the brain worms out into the sun to exorcise them.
I oddly didn't feel like I learned that much, or perhaps I felt like I didn't learn much that surprised me. Ford is pretty angry about all of this, rightfully so, but I felt a little like I was the target of the anger. Like when you're with someone who is ranting about something but the rant goes on for so long that you kind of feel like they're ranting at you? Or at the very least like the rant is going on for a long time and is making you feel a bit uncomfortable because being yelled at our being in the vicinity of yelling IS just a bit uncomfortable.
Don't get me wrong, I am angry too. But I want to talk about alternative models, about how to get out of this mess, and about helping women escape bad situations. I want to write the "so you want to leave him" manual. I want to design better worlds.
I think a lot of people will find this interesting and maybe even convincing, but I'm not sure it will change a lot of minds of people firmly in the opposite camp. It's too angry for that.
For me, I struggled through, and it left me feeling bitter and bummed out. YMMV.