From 119cf7f780375187dbe3d064263a9de3a17f538d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Jake Zerrer Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2025 12:31:01 -0500 Subject: Move from github pages to server --- .github/workflows/deploy.yml | 66 ---- 404.html | 151 --------- bin/publish | 15 + deps.edn | 7 - dev/repl.clj | 41 --- home/.gitignore | 3 + home/404.html | 151 +++++++++ home/deps.edn | 7 + home/dev/repl.clj | 41 +++ home/src/components.clj | 50 +++ home/src/core.clj | 27 ++ home/src/highlight.clj | 50 +++ home/src/pages.clj | 79 +++++ home/src/pages/missionary.clj | 151 +++++++++ home/src/pages/second_sex.clj | 696 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ server/server.nix | 16 + src/components.clj | 50 --- src/core.clj | 27 -- src/highlight.clj | 50 --- src/pages.clj | 79 ----- src/pages/missionary.clj | 151 --------- src/pages/second_sex.clj | 696 ------------------------------------------ 22 files changed, 1286 insertions(+), 1318 deletions(-) delete mode 100644 .github/workflows/deploy.yml delete mode 100644 404.html create mode 100755 bin/publish delete mode 100644 deps.edn delete mode 100644 dev/repl.clj create mode 100644 home/.gitignore create mode 100644 home/404.html create mode 100644 home/deps.edn create mode 100644 home/dev/repl.clj create mode 100644 home/src/components.clj create mode 100644 home/src/core.clj create mode 100644 home/src/highlight.clj create mode 100644 home/src/pages.clj create mode 100644 home/src/pages/missionary.clj create mode 100644 home/src/pages/second_sex.clj delete mode 100644 src/components.clj delete mode 100644 src/core.clj delete mode 100644 src/highlight.clj delete mode 100644 src/pages.clj delete mode 100644 src/pages/missionary.clj delete mode 100644 src/pages/second_sex.clj diff --git a/.github/workflows/deploy.yml b/.github/workflows/deploy.yml deleted file mode 100644 index 1431b13..0000000 --- a/.github/workflows/deploy.yml +++ /dev/null @@ -1,66 +0,0 @@ -name: Build and Deploy to GitHub Pages - -on: - push: - branches: [ main ] - workflow_dispatch: - -permissions: - contents: read - pages: write - id-token: write - -concurrency: - group: "pages" - cancel-in-progress: false - -jobs: - build: - runs-on: ubuntu-latest - steps: - - name: Checkout - uses: actions/checkout@v5 - - - name: Setup Java - uses: actions/setup-java@v4 - with: - distribution: 'temurin' - java-version: '17' - - - name: Cache Clojure dependencies - uses: actions/cache@v4 - with: - path: | - ~/.m2/repository - ~/.gitlibs - ~/.deps.clj - key: ${{ runner.os }}-clojure-${{ hashFiles('**/deps.edn') }} - restore-keys: | - ${{ runner.os }}-clojure- - - - name: Install Clojure CLI tools - uses: DeLaGuardo/setup-clojure@13.4 - with: - cli: 1.12.1.1550 - - - name: Build site - run: clojure -M -m core - - - name: Setup Pages - uses: actions/configure-pages@v5 - - - name: Upload artifact - uses: actions/upload-pages-artifact@v3 - with: - path: 'target/html' - - deploy: - environment: - name: github-pages - url: ${{ steps.deployment.outputs.page_url }} - runs-on: ubuntu-latest - needs: build - steps: - - name: Deploy to GitHub Pages - id: deployment - uses: actions/deploy-pages@v4 diff --git a/404.html b/404.html deleted file mode 100644 index 6eb0dd5..0000000 --- a/404.html +++ /dev/null @@ -1,151 +0,0 @@ -

< home

404 Oh, be some other path!

What's in a path? That which we call a page
by any other path would fail to load

\ No newline at end of file diff --git a/bin/publish b/bin/publish new file mode 100755 index 0000000..0ca651d --- /dev/null +++ b/bin/publish @@ -0,0 +1,15 @@ +#!/usr/bin/env bash + +set -e + +# Change to the project root directory +cd "$(dirname "$0")/.." + +echo "Building site..." +cd home +clojure -M -e "(require 'core) (core/-main) (shutdown-agents)" + +echo "Publishing to server..." +scp -r target/html/* git@jakezerrer.com:/var/www/html/ + +echo "Site published successfully!" diff --git a/deps.edn b/deps.edn deleted file mode 100644 index 5a4bbd0..0000000 --- a/deps.edn +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7 +0,0 @@ -{:paths ["" "src" "resources"] - :deps {org.clojure/clojure {:mvn/version "1.12.0"} - io.github.borkdude/html {:mvn/version "0.2.2"} - missionary/missionary {:mvn/version "b.46"} - zprint/zprint {:mvn/version "1.3.0"}} - :aliases {:dev {:extra-paths ["dev"] - :extra-deps {ring/ring-jetty-adapter {:mvn/version "1.14.1"}}}}} diff --git a/dev/repl.clj b/dev/repl.clj deleted file mode 100644 index ced6fae..0000000 --- a/dev/repl.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,41 +0,0 @@ -(ns repl - (:require [core :refer [-main]] - [ring.adapter.jetty :as jetty] - [ring.middleware.file :as file] - [ring.middleware.content-type :as content-type] - [ring.util.response :as response])) - -(defonce server (atom nil)) - -(defn app [request] - (or ((file/wrap-file identity "target/html") request) - (response/not-found "Not Found"))) - -(def handler - (-> app - content-type/wrap-content-type)) - -(defn start [] - (when-not @server - (reset! server (jetty/run-jetty handler {:port 8080 :join? false})) - (println "Server started on http://localhost:8080"))) - -(defn stop [] - (when @server - (.stop @server) - (reset! server nil) - (println "Server stopped"))) - -(defn restart [] - (stop) - (start)) - -(defn serve [] - (start)) - -(defn build [] - (-main)) - -(comment - (restart) - (build)) diff --git a/home/.gitignore b/home/.gitignore new file mode 100644 index 0000000..34f5ad2 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/.gitignore @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +.cpcache +.nrepl-port +target diff --git a/home/404.html b/home/404.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..51e5fa7 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/404.html @@ -0,0 +1,151 @@ +

< home

404 Oh, be some other path!

What's in a path? That which we call a page
by any other path would fail to load

\ No newline at end of file diff --git a/home/deps.edn b/home/deps.edn new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5a4bbd0 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/deps.edn @@ -0,0 +1,7 @@ +{:paths ["" "src" "resources"] + :deps {org.clojure/clojure {:mvn/version "1.12.0"} + io.github.borkdude/html {:mvn/version "0.2.2"} + missionary/missionary {:mvn/version "b.46"} + zprint/zprint {:mvn/version "1.3.0"}} + :aliases {:dev {:extra-paths ["dev"] + :extra-deps {ring/ring-jetty-adapter {:mvn/version "1.14.1"}}}}} diff --git a/home/dev/repl.clj b/home/dev/repl.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ced6fae --- /dev/null +++ b/home/dev/repl.clj @@ -0,0 +1,41 @@ +(ns repl + (:require [core :refer [-main]] + [ring.adapter.jetty :as jetty] + [ring.middleware.file :as file] + [ring.middleware.content-type :as content-type] + [ring.util.response :as response])) + +(defonce server (atom nil)) + +(defn app [request] + (or ((file/wrap-file identity "target/html") request) + (response/not-found "Not Found"))) + +(def handler + (-> app + content-type/wrap-content-type)) + +(defn start [] + (when-not @server + (reset! server (jetty/run-jetty handler {:port 8080 :join? false})) + (println "Server started on http://localhost:8080"))) + +(defn stop [] + (when @server + (.stop @server) + (reset! server nil) + (println "Server stopped"))) + +(defn restart [] + (stop) + (start)) + +(defn serve [] + (start)) + +(defn build [] + (-main)) + +(comment + (restart) + (build)) diff --git a/home/src/components.clj b/home/src/components.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d4d30a0 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/src/components.clj @@ -0,0 +1,50 @@ +(ns components + (:require [borkdude.html :refer [html]] + [highlight :refer [highlight-styles]])) + +(defn template [body] + (html + [:html + {:style {:font-family "monospace"}} + [:head + [:style + [:$ + (str + (highlight-styles :code "default") + (highlight-styles :output "default") + "li { line-height: 1.6; }" + "p { line-height: 1.6; font-family: Palatino; }" + ".page-body p { max-width: 44em; }" + ".page-body blockquote { max-width: 44em; }" + ".highlight { padding: 1px; padding-left: 6px; }")]] + [:meta {:charset "UTF-8"}]] + [:body + [:<> body] + [:footer + [:br] + [:br] + [:p "---"] + [:span + [:a {:href "https://git.jakezerrer.com/jakezerrer.git/"} "page src"] + " | " + [:a {:href "mailto:contact@jakezerrer.com?subject=Blog post"} "contact me"]]]]])) + +(defn page [body] + (template + (html + [:<> + [:p [:a {:href "/"} "< home"]] + [:div {:class "page-body"} + body]]))) + +(defn blockquote [body [from to]] + (html + [:figure + {:style {:margin-left "0" :margin-bottom "2"}} + [:blockquote + body] + [:figcaption + (html + (if (nil? to) + (html [:<> (str "p. " from)]) + (html [:<> (str "pp. " from "-" to)])))]])) diff --git a/home/src/core.clj b/home/src/core.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b8ba344 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/src/core.clj @@ -0,0 +1,27 @@ +(ns core + (:require [clojure.java.io :as io] + [pages :refer [pages e-404]])) + +(defn clean [] + (let [target-dir (io/file "target")] + (when (.exists target-dir) + (doseq [file (file-seq target-dir) + :when (.isFile file)] + (io/delete-file file)) + (doseq [dir (reverse (filter #(.isDirectory %) (file-seq target-dir))) + :when (not= dir target-dir)] + (.delete dir))))) + +(defn build [] + (doseq [[path page-fn] (pages)] + (let [target-path (if (= path "/") + "target/html/index.html" + (str "target/html" path "/index.html")) + target-file (io/file target-path)] + (io/make-parents target-file) + (spit target-file (str (page-fn))))) + (spit (io/file "404.html") (str (e-404)))) + +(defn -main [] + (clean) + (build)) diff --git a/home/src/highlight.clj b/home/src/highlight.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f229b1a --- /dev/null +++ b/home/src/highlight.clj @@ -0,0 +1,50 @@ +(ns highlight + (:require [clojure.java.shell :as shell] + [borkdude.html :refer [html]] + [zprint.core :as zp] + [clojure.string :refer [join]])) + +(defn highlight [lang src] + (let [result (shell/sh "pygmentize" "-l" lang "-f" "html" :in src)] + (:out result))) + +(defn code [style v] + (html + (let [s style] + [:div + {:class s} + v]))) + +(defmacro highlight-clj [& body] + (let [out (atom []) + _res ;; return value of final form; currently unused + (let [prev-ns *ns* + t #(swap! out conj %)] + (ns example) + (add-tap (bound-fn* t)) + (let [res + (last (map eval body))] + (remove-tap (bound-fn* t)) + (in-ns (ns-name prev-ns)) + res)) + code + (join "\n\n" (map zp/zprint-str body)) + tap-out (join "\n" (map zp/zprint-str @out {:style :backtranslate})) + joined (apply str + (concat code))] + `(html + [:div + {:style {:border-left "5px solid #ddd"}} + [:div {:class "code"} + [:$ + (highlight "clojure" + ~joined)]] + [:p {:style {:padding-left "6px"}} "tap contents:"] + [:div {:class "output"} + [:$ + (highlight "clojure" + ~tap-out)]]]))) + +(defn highlight-styles [k style] + (let [result (shell/sh "pygmentize" "-S" style "-f" "html" "-a" (str "." (name k)))] + (:out result))) diff --git a/home/src/pages.clj b/home/src/pages.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a793fd3 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/src/pages.clj @@ -0,0 +1,79 @@ +(ns pages + (:require [borkdude.html :refer [html]] + #_ + [pages.missionary :refer [missionary]] + [pages.second-sex :refer [second-sex]] + [components :refer [template page]])) + +(def home-uri "/") +(def books-2025-uri "/books-2025") +(def second-sex-uri "/second-sex-quotes") +(def past-work-uri "/past-work") +#_ +(def missionary-uri "/code/missionary") + +(defn home [] + (template + (html + [:<> + [:p "Hello."] + [:p "My name is Jake Zerrer. This is where I keep things online. Look around."] + [:ul + (map + (fn [[uri name]] + (html + [:li [:a {:href (str uri)} name]])) + [[books-2025-uri "Selected reading list, 2025"] + [second-sex-uri "The Second Sex: Selected Excerpts"] + [past-work-uri "Past work"]])]]))) + +(defn books-2025 + [] + (page + (html + [:<> + [:h1 "Selected reading list, 2025"] + [:ul + [:li "The Second Sex (Simone de Beauvior)"] + [:li "The Places in Between (Rory Stewart)"] + [:li "Either/Or: A Fragment of Life (Søren Kierkegaard)"] + [:li "The Philosophy of History (G. W. F. Hegel)"] + [:li "This Life: Secular Faith and Spiritual Freedom (Martin Hägglund)"] + [:li "The Power Broker (Robert Caro)"] + [:li "Mating (Normal Rush)"]]]))) + +(defn past-work + [] + (page + (html + [:<> + [:h1 "Past work"] + [:p "I have spent most of my professional life working as a software engineer:"] + [:ul + [:li "In 2024, I ran product engineering at Normal Computing"] + [:li "In the summer of 2023, I traveled and prototyped a devex tool called refuge"] + [:li "From 2018 to 2023, I worked as a software engineer at Flexport"] + [:li "From 2014 to 2017, I worked as a software engineer at a small startup"]] + [:p "I had a previous career as a theatrical sound designer in New York City."]]))) + +(defn e-404 [] + (page + (html + [:<> + [:h1 "404 Oh, be some other path!"] + [:p "What's in a path? That which we call a page" + [:br] + "by any other path would fail to load"]]))) + +(defn pages [] + {home-uri home + books-2025-uri books-2025 + past-work-uri past-work + #_#_ + missionary-uri missionary + second-sex-uri second-sex}) + +(comment + (require '[repl :refer [restart build]]) + (restart) + (build)) diff --git a/home/src/pages/missionary.clj b/home/src/pages/missionary.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2bb06de --- /dev/null +++ b/home/src/pages/missionary.clj @@ -0,0 +1,151 @@ +(ns pages.missionary + (:require [components :refer [page]] + [borkdude.html :refer [html]] + [highlight :refer [highlight-clj]])) + +(defn missionary [] + (page + (html + [:<> + [:h1 "FRP in Clojure with Missionary"] + [:h3 "August 2025"] + [:p "I've been working in Clojure on and off for nearly a decade now. In +that time, I've spent thousands of hours working in other languages +professionally: Python, Ruby, TypeScript / Flow / JavaScript, Kotlin, and Java. +I've experimented with many more, to varying degrees: Zig, Janet, Prolog, and +Factor, to name a few. At the end of the day, though, I always find myself +coming back to Clojure."] + [:p "Though it's hard to pin down exactly why I find myself so drawn by +the language, it seems to have something to do with the relatively high incidence +of exposure to new, mind-expanding ideas that I've experienced while working +in Clojure and its ecosystem."] + [:p "For one reason or another, Clojure seems to attract a high density of +smart people who are experimenting with fairly radical ways of solving hard +problems. Something about the combination of the language's simple macro system, +data orientation, reasonable performance, and practical approach to +functional programming make it a great foundation for building more complicated +experimental language constructs."] + [:p "It is via Clojure that I first came to be exposed to datalog, for example, +which helped me begin to be able to articulate why I struggled with SQL's +relativel lack of expressivity. From there, I discovered prolog and the world of +\"search programming\", which gave me an entirely different way to frame +certain problems."] + [:p "Similarly, I first learned of Datomic through Clojure, which blew my +mind the first time I encountered it. The idea of treating your entire database +as a single, immutable value would never have occurred to me on my own; +once I encountered it, however, the alternative seemed patently absurd."] + [:p "The Clojure library " [:span.inline-code "meander"] " showed me that term rewriting systems +could be used for data transformation. (Did you know that term rewriting systems +have the full power of turing machines?) The folks over at Hyperfiddle +have proven that you can effectively abstract away the network connection that +sits between a client and a server, and they have credited Clojure for that +accomplishment. Similarly, my experience so far with Rama, from Red Planet Labs, +have made it hard for me to go back to \"traditional backend programming\". +(I could write a whole series of posts on that topic. Reach out if you'd find +that interesting.) They, too, credit Clojure for their progress."] + [:p "In this post, I want to use the FRP library " [:span.inline-code "missionary"] " to give an +example of what it means to embed an entirely new concept within an existing +programming language. On the one hand, missionary is simply a library. On the +other hand, it differs significantly from the kind of library that you might +find in other programming languages because it introduces its own syntax and +semantics that integrate seamlessly with the host language, Clojure. (This is +the old \"promise of the DSL\" that lisps are famous for.)"] + [:p "First, though: what is missionary? At a high level, missionary +seeks to make it easier to write correct asynchronous (and concurrent) programs +correctly, efficently (meaning that it makes effective use of available CPU +resources), and in a manner that will feel comfortable to functional programmers. +To accomplish that, missionary draws inspiration from a number of interesting +programming ideas and diciplines:"] + [:ul + [:li "Functional Reactive Programming, or FRP"] + [:li "Process supervision"] + [:li "Structured concurrency"] + [:li "Ambiguous programming"] + [:li "TKTK"]] + [:p "To start our journey, I want to show you the equivelant of a \"hello, world!\" +program, written with missionary. This program captures the current time, in milliseconds; +it sleeps for one second; and then it captures the current time again."] + (highlight-clj + (require '[missionary.core :as m]) + + (def run + (m/ap (tap> [:a (System/currentTimeMillis)]) + (m/? (m/sleep 1000)) + (tap> [:b (System/currentTimeMillis)]))) + + (m/? (m/reduce {} nil run))) + [:p "(In these examples, you'll note my use of the " [:span.inline-code "(tap> ...)"] " function. This +function appends the value of its argument to a list. After the program runs, +I print the contents of that list to the \"tap contents:\" box below the code.)"] + + [:p "TKTK Note, however, that " [:span.inline-code "run"] " doesn't actually execute until we feed it +to the " [:span.inline-code "reduce"] " function. It's too early to explain how " [:span.inline-code "reduce"] " has anything +to do with running a program – we'll have to build some other intuition first. +For now, when you see " [:span.inline-code "reduce"] ", just think \"run a sequence of operations.\""] + + [:p "You might be thinking: " + [:em "I could write this code just as easily without missionary. +What's the point? "] + "Great question. We should go ahead and do that. Let's write this program once +without missionary, and then again with missionary but with a bit of additional +debugging thrown in:"] + + (highlight-clj + (defn log + "Emit `v` to `tap>`, capturing the current time and active thread along the way." + [v] + (tap> [v (System/currentTimeMillis) (.getName (Thread/currentThread))])) + (defn run-native [] + (log :native-a) + (Thread/sleep 1000) + (log :native-b)) + + (tap> (-> (run-native) + (time) + (with-out-str))) + + (def run-missionary + (m/ap (log :missionary-a) + (m/? (m/sleep 1000)) + (log :missionary-b))) + + (tap> (-> (m/reduce {} nil run-missionary) + (m/?) + (time) + (with-out-str)))) + ;; TODO: Fix bug where second log doesn't + ;; always print! + + [:p "A few things might jump out immediately."] + [:p "First, both " + [:span.inline-code "run-native"] " and " + [:span.inline-code "run-missionary"] + " block during their evaluation. Notice that the runtime + for each is approximately 1000ms."] + [:p "Second, " + [:span.inline-code "run-native"] + " evaluates the entire expression on the repl's main thread.i By contrast, " + [:span.inline-code "run-missionary"] + " seems to move the + form after the sleep expression to some kind of background thread. What's + that about?"] [:p "Oh, by the way. At the beginning of this post, I made + it clear that Clojure has had a major impact on the way I think about + programming, in large part because the language has facilities that make it + particularly attractive for experimentation. While I believe that to be + true, I know that Clojure is hardly alone in its expressiveness. If you are + a Haskeller, an OCameler, a Common Lisper, an APLer, or even a C + programmer, and you're thinking to yourself \"Clojure isn't special in this + regard\", well, I'm sure you're right! Shoot me an email with your + thoughts, I'd love to learn more about why your language of choice is + unique in this regard. I'll update this post with your contribution."] + [:h2 "References"] + [:ul + [:li "TODO flow spec"] + [:li "TODO task spec"] + [:li "TODO process supervision"] + [:li + [:a {:href "https://github.com/leonoel/missionary"} "Missionary"]] + [:li [:a {:href "https://github.com/hyperfiddle/electric"} "Electric Clojure"]] + [:li [:a {:href "https://github.com/noprompt/meander"} "Meander"]] + [:li [:a {:href "https://jimmyhmiller.com/meander-rewriting"} + "Introduction to Term Rewriting with Meander"]]]]))) diff --git a/home/src/pages/second_sex.clj b/home/src/pages/second_sex.clj new file mode 100644 index 0000000..97b7602 --- /dev/null +++ b/home/src/pages/second_sex.clj @@ -0,0 +1,696 @@ +(ns pages.second-sex + (:require [components :refer [page blockquote]] + [borkdude.html :refer [html]])) + +(defn second-sex [] + (page + (html + [:<> + [:h1 "The Second Sex: Select Excerpts"] + [:p "One of my goals for 2025 was to finally crack the spine on Simone de +Beauvoir's " [:em "The Second Sex"] ". Having now achieved that goal, I can say +that it is without a doubt one of the most transformative books I have ever +read." [:p "This page includes various excerpts that spoke to me for one reason +or another, taken from the 2011 edition translated by Constance Borde and +Sheila Malovany-Chevallier. (Note: I transcribed these by hand; please shoot me +a note if you find any errors.)"]] + [:p "I have decided to publish this snippet of my personal marginalia mostly to +encourage others to pick up her masterpiece and give it a read. It is a challenging +book that asks a lot of its reader, but I promise it is worth the effort. As my partner +pointed out to me, " [:em "The Second Sex"] " can be understood as the first major +effort to build a comprehensive history and philosophy of women's place in the +world. Particularly in an era of regressive politics, " [:em "The Second Sex"] + " serves as an important reminder of just how oppressive women's condition +was prior to the sexual revolution. I fear that many of today's conservative +voices are pushing an antifeminist narrative on young women who may not +understand just how much they have to lose."] + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Insofar as woman is concerned the absolute Other, that is–whatever magic +powers she has–as the inessential, it is precisely impossible to regard her as +another subject. Women have thus never constituted a separate group that posited +itself " [:em "for-itself"] " before a male group; they have never had a direct or +autonomous relationship with men. \"The relationship of reciprocity which is the +basis of marriage is not established between men and women, but between men by +means of women, who are merely the occasion of this relationship\", said +Lévi-Strauss. Woman's concrete condition is not affected by the type of lineage +that prevails in the society to which she belongs; whether the regime is +patrilineal, matrilineal, bilateral, or undifferentiated (undifferentiation +never being precise), she is always under men's guardianship; the only question +is if, after marriage, she is still subjected to the authority of her father or +her oldest brother–authority that will also extend to her children– or of her +husband. In any case: \"The woman is never anything more than the symbol of her +lineage. Matrilineal descent is the authority of the woman's father or brother +extended to the brother-in-law's village.\" She only mediates the law; she does +not possess it. In fact, it is the relationship of two masculine groups that is +defined by the system of filiation, and not the relation of the two sexes."]) + [80 81]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Here is an important fact that recurs throughout history: abstract rights +cannot sufficiently define the concrete situation of woman; this situation +depends in great part on the economic role she plays; and very often, abstract +freedom and concrete powers vary inversely."]) + [100]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "\"Woman is a possession acquired by contract; she is personal property, and the +possession of her is as good as a security–indeed, properly speaking, woman is +only man's annexe.\" Here [Balzac] is speaking for the bourgeoisie, which +intensified its antifeminism in reaction to eighteenth-century license and +threatening progressive ideas. Having brilliantly presented the idea at the +beginning of " [:em "They Physiology of Marriage"] " that this loveless institution +forcibly leads the wife to adultry, Balzac exhorts husbands to rein in wives to +total subjugation if they want to avoid the ridicule of dishonor. They must be +denied training and culture, forbidden to develop their individuality, forced to +wear uncomfortable clothing, and encouraged to follow a debilitating dietary +regime. The bourgeoisie follows this program exactly, confining women to the +kitchen and to housework, jealously watching their behavior; they are enclosed +in daily life rituals that hindered all attempts at independence. In return, they +are honored and endowed with the most exquisite respect. \"The married woman is +a slave who must be seated on a throne,\" says Balzac; of course men must give +in to women in all irrelevant circumstances, yielding them first place; women +must not carry heavy burdens as in primitive societies; they are readily spared +all painful tasks and worries: at the same time this relieves them of all +responsibility. It is hoped that, thus duped, seduced by the ease of the +condition, they will accept the role of mother and housewife to which they are +being confined. And in fact, most bourgeois women capitulate. As their education +and their parasitic situation makes them dependent on men, they never date to +voice their claims: those who do are hardly heard. It is easier to put people in +chains than to remove them if the chains bring prestige, said George Bernard +Shaw. The bourgeois woman clings to the chains because she clings to her class +privileges. It is drilled into her and she believes that women's liberation +would weaken bourgeois society; liberated from the male, she would be condemned +to work; while she might regret having her rights to private property +subordinated to her husband's, she would deplore even more having this property +be abolished; she feels no solidarity with working-class women; she feels closer +to her husband than to a woman textile worker. She makes his interests her own."]) + [129 130]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Abortion was officially recognized, but only for a short time, in Germany +before Nazism and in the Soviet Union before 1936. But in spite of religion and +laws, it has been practiced in all countries to a large extent. In France, every +year 800,000 to 1 million abortions are performed–as many as births–and +two-thirds of the women are married, many already having one or two children. In +spite of the prejudices, resistance, and an outdated morality, unregulated +fertility has given way to fertility controlled by the state or individuals. +Progress in obstetrics has considerably decreased the dangers of childbirth; +childbirth pain is disappearing; at this time–March 1949–legislation has been +passed in England requiring the use of certain anesthetic methods; they are +already generally applied in the United States and are beginning to spread in +France. With artificial insemination, the evolution that will permit humanity to +master the reproductive function comes to completion. These changes have +tremendous importance for woman in particular; she can reduce the number of +pregnancies and rationally integrate them into her life, instead of being their +slave. During the nineteenth century, woman in her turn is freed from nature; +she wins control of her body. Relieved of a great number of reproductive +servitudes, she can take on the economic roles open to her, roles that would +ensure her control over her own person."]) + [138 139]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:<> + [:p + "[Of man:] But he does not like difficulty; he is afraid of danger. He has +contradictory aspirations to both life and rest, existence and being; he knows +very well that \"a restless spirit\" is the ransom for his development, that his +distance from the object is the ransom for his being present to himself; but he +dreams of restfulness in restlessness and of an opaque plenitude that his +consciousness would nevertheless still inhabit. This embodied dream is, +precisely, woman; she is the perfect intermediary between nature that is foreign +to man and the peer who is too identical to him. She pits neither the hostile +silence of nature nor the hard demand of a reciprocal recognition against him; +by a unique privilege she is a consciousness, and yet it seems possible to +possess her in the flesh. Thanks to her, there is a way to escape the inexorable +dialectic of the master and the slave that springs from the reciprocity of +freedoms."] + [:p + "[...] [Woman] emerged as the inessential who never returned to the +essential, as the absolute Other, without reciprocity. [...] She is nature raised +to the transparency of consciousness; she is a naturally submissive +consciousness. And therein lies the marvelous hope that man has often placed in +woman: he hopes to accomplish himself as being through carnally possessing a being +while making confirmed in his freedom by a docile freedom. No man would consent +to being a woman, but all want there to be women. [...] Appearing as the Other, +woman appears at the same time as a plenitude of being by opposition to the +nothingness of existence that man experiences in itself; the Other, posited as +object in the subject's eyes, is posited as in-itself, thus as being. Woman +embodies positively the lack the existent carries in his heart, and man hopes to +realize himself by finding himself through her."]]) + [160 161]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "The apologue of the caterpillars provides the key to this attitude: whatever +his hidden intention, hit is significant in itself. Pissing on caterpillars, +Montherlant takes pleasure in sparing some and exterminating others; he takes a +laughing pity on those that are determined to live and generally lets them off; +he is delighted by this game. Without the caterpillars, the urinary stream would +have been just an excretion; it becomes an instrument of life and death; in +front of the crawling insect, man relieves himself and experiences God's +despotic solitude, without running the risk of reciprocity. Likewise, faced with +female animals, the male, from the top of his pedestal, sometimes cruel, +sometimes tender, sometimes fair, sometimes unpredictable, gives, takes back, +satisfies, pities, or gets irritated; he defers to nothing but his own pleasure; +he is soverign, free, and unique. But these animals must not be anything but +animals; they would be chosen on purpose, their weaknesses would be flattered; +they would be treated as animals with such determination that they would end up +accepting their condition. In similar faction, the blacks' petty robberies and +lies charmed the whites of Louisiana and Georgia, confirming the superiority of +their own skin color; and if one of these Negroes persists in being honest, he +is treated even worse. In similar fashion, the debasement of man was +systematically practiced in the concentration camps; the ruling race found proof +in this abjection that it was of superhuman essence."]) + [222 223]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:<> + [:p + "As for Stendhal, we saw that woman barely takes on a mythical value for him: he +considers her also being a transcendence; for this humanist, it is in their +reciprocal relations that freedoms are accomplished; and it is sufficient that +the " [:em "Other"] " is simply another for life to have, according to him, a little spice; +he does not seek a stellar equilibrium, he does not nourish himself with the +bread of disgust; he does not expect miracles; he wishes to concern himself not +with the cosmos or poetry but with freedoms."] + + [:p "That is, he also experiences +himself as a translucent freedom. The others–and this is one of the most +important points–posit themselves as transcendents but feel they are prisoners +of an opaque presence in their own hearts: they project onto woman this +\"unbreakable core of night\". In Montherlant there is an Alderian complex where +heavy bad faith is born: these pretensions and fears are what he incarnates in +woman; the disgust he feels for her is what he fears to feel for himself; he +intends to trample in her the ever possible proof of his insufficiency; he asks +scorn to save him; woman is the ditch in which he throws all the monsters that +inhabit him. Lawrence's life shows us that he suffered from an analogous complex +but more purely sexual: woman in his work has the value of a compensatory myth; +through her is found an exalted virility of which the write was not very sure; +when he describes Kate at Don Cipriano's feet, he believes he has won a male +triumph over Frieda; nor does he accept that his female companion challenges +him: if she contested his aims, he would probably lose confidence in them; her +role is to reassure him. He asks for peace, rest, and faith from her, just as +Montherlant asks for the certitude of his superiority; they demand what they +lack. Self-confidence is not lacking in Claudel: if he is shy, it is only the +secret of God. Thus, there is no trace of the battle of the sexes. Man bravely +takes on the weight of woman: she is the possibility of temptation or of +salvation. For Breton it seems that man is only true through the mystery that +inhabits him; it pleases him that Nadja sees that star he is going toward and +that is like a \"heartless flower\"; his dreams, intuitions, and the spontaneous +unfolding of his inner language: it is in these activities that are out of the +control of the will and reason that he recognizes himself: woman is the tangible +figure of this veiled presence infinitely more essential than her conscious +personality."] + + [:p + " As for Stendhal, he quietly coincides with himself; but he needs +woman as she does him so that his dispersed existence is gathered in the unity +of a figure and a destiny; it is as for-another that the human being reaches +being; but another still has to lend him his consciousness: other men are too +indifferent to their peers; only the woman in love opens her heart to her lover +and shelters in its entirety. Except for Claudel, who finds a perfect witness in +God, all the writers we have considered expect, in Malraux's words, woman to +cherish in them this \"incomparable monster\" known to themselves alone. In +collaboration or combat, men will come up against each other in their +generality. Montherlant, for his peers, is a writer, Lawrence a doctrinaire, +Breton a leader of a school, Stendhal a diplomat or a man of wit; it is women +who reveal in one a magnificent and cruel prince, in another a disturbing +animal, in still another a god or a sun or a being \"black and cold...like a man +struck by lightning, lying at the feet of ths Sphinx,\" and in the other a +seducer, a charmer, a lover. "] + + [:p + "For each of them, the ideal woman will be she +who embodies the most exactly the " [:em "Other"] " able to reveal him to himself. [...] +[The] only earthly destiny reserved to the woman equal, child-woman, sould +sister, woman-sex, and female animale is always man. Regardless of the ego +looking for itself through her, it can only attain itself if she consents to be +his crucible. In any case, what is demanded of her is self-forgetting and love. +[...] Feminine devotion is demanded as a duty by Montherlant and Lawrence; less +arrogant, Claudel, Breton, and Stendhal admire it as a generous choice; they +desire it without claiming to deserve it; but–except for the astonishing +" [:em "Lamiel"] "–all their works show they expect from woman this altruism that Comte +admired in and imposed on her, and which, according to him, also constituted +both a flagrant inferiority and an equal superiority."] + + [:p + " We could find many more +examples: they would always lead to the same conclusions. In defining woman, +each writer defines his general ethic and the singular idea he has of himself: +it is also in her that he often registers the distance between his view of the +world and his egotistical dreams. [...] [In all cases, woman] as other still +plays a role inasmuch as even to transcend himself, each man still needs to take +consciousness of himself."]]) + [263 265]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Certainly fidelity is necessary for sexual love, since the two lovers' desire +encompasses their singularity; they do not want it contested by outside +experiences, they want to be irreplaceable for each other; but this fidelity has +meaning only as long as it is spontaneous; and spontaneously, erotic magic +dissolves rather quickly. The miracle is that it gives to each of the lovers, in +the instant and in their carnal presence, a being whose existence is an +unlimited transcendence: and " [:em "possession"] " of this being is undoubtedly +impossible, but at least each of them is reached in a privileged and poignant +way. But when individuals no longer want to reach each other because of +hostility, disgust, or indifference between them, erotic attraction disappears; +and it dies almost as surely in esteem and friendship; two human beings who come +together in the very moment of their transcendence through the world and their +common projects no longer need carnal union; and further, because this union +has lost its union, they are repelled by it [...] Eroticism is a movement toward +the " [:em "Other"] ", and this is its essential character; but within the couple, spouses +become, for each other, the " [:em "Same"] "; no exchange is possible between them +anymore, no giving, no conquest."]) + [466 467]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Throughout her childhood, the little girl was bullied and mutilated; but she +nonetheless grasped herself as an autonomous individual; in her relations with +her family and friends, in her studies and games, she saw herself in the present +as a transcendence: her future passivity was something she only imagined. Once +she enters puberty, the future not only moves closer: it settles into her body; +it becomes the most concrete reality. It retains the fateful quality it always +had; while the adolescent boy is actively routed toward adulthood, the girl +looks forward to the opening of this new and unforeseeable period where the plot +is already hatched and toward which time is drawing her. As she is already +detached from her childhood past, the present is for her only a transition; she +sees no valid end in it, only occupations. In a more or less disguised way, her +youth is consumed by waiting. She is waiting for Man."]) + [341]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "At about thirteen, boys serve a veritable apprenticeship in violence, +developing their aggressiveness, their will for power, and their taste for +competition; it is exactly at this moment that the little girl renounces rough +games. [...] [The] attitude of defiance, so important for boys, is unknown to +them; true, women compare themselves with each other, but defiance is something +other than these passive confrontations: two freedoms confront each other as +having a hold on the world whose limits they intend to push; climbing higher +than a friend or getting the better in arm wrestling is affirming one's +sovereignty over the world. These conquering actions are not permitted to the +girl, and violence in particular is not permitted to her. [...] The male has +recourse to his fists and fighting when he encounters any affront or attempt to +reduce him to an object: he does not let himself be transcended by others; he +finds himself again in the heart of his subjectivity. [...] In the South of the +United states, it is strictly impossible for a black person to use violence +against whites; this rule is the key to the mysterious \"black soul\"; the way +the black experiences himself in the white world, his behavior in adjusting to +it, the compensations he seeks, his whole way of feeling and acting, are +explained on the basis of the passivity to which he is condemned. [...] In the +same way, for the adolescent boy who is allowed to manifest himself imperiously, +the universe has a totally different face from what it has for the adolescent +girl whose feelings are deprived of immediate effectiveness; the former +ceaselessly calls the world into question, he can at every instance revolt +against the given and thus has the impression of actively confirming it when he +accepts it; the latter only submits to it; the world is defined without her, and +its face is immutable. This lack of physical power expresses itself as a more +general timidity: she does not believe in a force she has not felt in her body, +she does not dare to be enterprising, to revolt, to invent; doomed to docility, +to resignation, she can only accept a place that society has already made for +her. She accepts the order of things as a given."]) + [343 344]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "There is an obscene paradox in the superimposing of a pompous ceremony on a +brutally real animal function. The wedding presents its universal and abstract +meaning: a man and a woman are united publicly according to symbolic rites; but +in the secrecy of the bed it is concrete and singular individuals who confront +each other face-to-face, and all gazes turn away from their embraces. [...] It +is stupid and barbaric to want to put it all into one night; it is absurd to +transform an operation as difficult as the first coitus into a duty. The woman +is all the more terrorized by the fact that the strange operation she is +subjected to is sacred; and that society, religion, family, and friends +delivered her solemnly to the husband as to a master; and in addition, that the +act seems to engage her whole future, because marriage still has a definitive +character. This is when she feels truly revealed in the absolute: this man to +whom she is pledged to the end of time embodies all of Man in her eyes; and he +is revealed to her, too, as a figure she has not heretofore known, which is of +immense importance since he will be her lifelong companion. However, the man +himself is anguished by the duty weighing on him; he has his own difficulties +and his own complexes that make him shy and clumsy or on the contrary brutal; +many men are impotent on their wedding night because of the very solemnity of +marriage. [...] Too much impetuousness frightens the virgin, too much respect +humiliates her; women forever hate the man who has taken his pleasure at the +expense of their suffering; but they feel an eternal resentment against the one +who seems to disdain them, and often against the one who has not attempted to +deflower them the first night or who was unable to do it. [...] The \"wedding +night\" transforms the erotic experience into an ordeal that neither partner is +able to surmount, too involved with personal problems to think generously of +each other; it is invested with a solemnity that makes it formidable; and it is +not surprising that it often dooms the woman to frigidity forever. The difficult +problem facing the husband is this: if he \"titillates his wife too +lasciviously,\" she might be scandalized or outraged; it seems this fear +paralyzes American husbands, among others, especially in college-educated +couples, says the Kinsey Report, because wives, more conscious of themselves, +are more deeply inhibited. But if he \"respects\" her, he fails to waken her +sensuality. This dilemma is created by the ambiguity of the feminine attitude: +the young woman both wants and rejects pleasure; she demands a delicateness from +which she suffers."]) + [458 462]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:<> + [:p + "A normal man considers objects around him as instruments; he arranges them +according to the purpose for which they are intended; his \"order\"–where woman +will often see disorder–is to have his cigarettes, his papers, and his tools +within reach. [...] But to find a home in oneself, one must first have realized +oneself in works or acts. Man has only a middling interest in his domestic +interior because he has access to the entire universe and because he can affirm +himself in his projects. Woman, instead, is locked into the conjugal community: +she has to change this prison into a kingdom. Her attitude to her home is +dictated by this same dialectic that generally defines her condition: she takes +by becoming prey, she liberates by abdicating; by renouncing the world, she +means to conquer a world."] + [:p " She regrets closing the doors of her home behind +herself; as a young girl, the whole world was her kingdom; the forests belonged +to her. Now she is confined to a restricted space; Nature is reduced to the size +of a geranium pot. [...] But she is going to make every attempt to refuse this +limitation. She encloses faraway countries and past times within her four walls +in the form of more or less expensive earthly flora and fauna; she encloses her +husband, who personifies human society for her, and the child who gives her the +whole future in a portable form. [...] Especially at evening time, when the +shutters are closed, woman feels like a queen; the light shed at noon by the +universal sun disturbs her; at night she is no longer dispossessed, because she +does away with that which she does not possess; from under the lamp shade she +sees a light that is her own and that illuminates her abode alone: nothing else +exists."]]) + [470 471]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Logic in masculine hands is often violence. Chardonne explained this kind of +sly oppression well in " [:em "Epithalaminum"] ". Older, more cultivated, and more +educated than Berthe, Albert uses this pretext to deny any value to opinions of +his wife that he does not share; he untiringly " [:em "proves"] " he is right; for her +part she becomes adamant and refuses to accept that there is any substance in +her husband's reasoning: he persists in his ideas, and that is the end of it. +Thus a serious misunderstanding deepens between them. He does not try to +understand feelings or deep-rooted reactions she cannot justify; she does not +understand what lives behind her husband's pedantic and overwhelming logic. He +even goes so far as to become irritated by the ignorance she never hid from him, +and challenges her with questions about astronomy; he is flattered nonetheless, +to tell her what to read, to find in her a listener he can easily dominate. In a +struggle where her intellectual shortcomings condemn her to losing every time, +the young wife has no defense other than silence, or tears, or violence."]) + [498]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:<> + [:p + "Many young couples give the impression of perfect equality. But as long as the +man has economic responsibility for the couple, it is just an illusion. He is +the one who determines the conjugal domicile according to the demands of his +job: she " [:em "follows"] " him from the provinces to Paris, from Paris to the provinces, +the colonies, abroad; the standard of living is fixed according to his income; +the rhythm of the days, the weeks, and the year is organized on the basis of his +occupations; relations and friendships most often depend on his profession. +Being more positively integrated than his wife into society, he leads the couple +in intellectual, political, and moral areas. Divorce is only an abstract +possibility for the wife, if she does not have the means to earn her own living: +while alimony in America is a heavy burden for the husband, in France the lot of +the wife and mother abandoned with a derisory pension is scandalous. But the +deep inequality stems from the fact that the husband finds concrete +accomplishment in work or action while for the wife in her role as a wife, +freedom has only a negative form. [...]"] + [:p " It is also true that the man is more +defenseless than previously against this despotism; he recognizes his wife's +abstract rights, and he understands that she can concretize them only through +him: it is at his own expense that he will compensate for the powerlessness and +the sterility the wife is condemned to; to realize an apparent equality in their +association, he has to give her more because he possesses more. But precisely +because she receives, takes, and demands, she is the poorer. The dialectic of +the master and slave has its most concrete application here: in oppressing, one +becomes oppressed. Males are chains by their very sovereignty; it is because +they alone earn money that the wife demands checks, because men alone practice a +profession that the wife demands that they succeed, because they alone embody +transcendence that the wife wants to steal it from them by taking over their +projects and successes. [...]"] + [:p " The situation has to be changed in their common +interest by prohibiting marriage as a \"career\" for the woman. Men who declare +themselves antifeminist with the excuse that \"women are already annoying enough +as it is\" are not very logical: it precisely because marriage makes them +\"praying mantises,\" \"bloodsuckers,\" and \"poison\" that marriage has to be +changed and, as a consequence, the feminine condition in general. woman weighs +so heavily on man because she is forbidden to rely on herself; he will free +himself by freeing her, that is, by giving her something " [:em "to do"] " in this world."]]) + [522 523]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Very often the kept woman interiorizes her dependence; subjected to public +opinion, she accepts its values; she admires the \"fashionable world\" and +adopts its customs; she wants to be regarded according to bourgeois standards. +She is a parasite of the rich bourgeoisie, and she adheres to its ideas; she is +\"right thinking\"; in former times she would readily send her daughters to a +convent school, and as she got older, she even went to Mass and openly +converted. She is on the conservative's side. She is too proud to have made her +place in this world to want to change. The struggle she wages to \"arrive\" does +not dispose her to feelings of brotherhood and human solidarity; she paid for +success with too much slavish compliance to sincerly wish for universal freedom. +615"]) + [615]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "In the United States, the influence of venerated \"Moms\" is strong; this is +explained by the leisure time their parasitic existence leaves them; and this is +why it is harmful. \"Knowing nothing about medicine, art, science, religion, +law, sanitation\", says Philip Wylie, speaking of the American Mom, \"she +seldom has any especial interest in " [:em "what"] ", exactly, she is doing as a member of +any of these endless organizations, so long as it is _something.\" Their effort +is not integrated into a coherent and constructive plan, it does not aim at +objective ends: imperiously, it tends only to show their tastes and prejudices +or to serve their interests. They play a considerable role in the domain of +culture, for example: it is they who buy the most books; but they read as one +plays a game of solitaire; literature takes its meaning and dignity when it is +addressed to individuals committed to projects, when it helps them surpass +themselves toward greater horizons; it must be integrated into the movement of +human transcendence. [...] Not being specialized in politics or economics or any +technical discipline, old women have no concrete hold on society; they are +unaware of the problems action poses; they are incapable of elaborating a +constructive program. Their morality is abstract and formal, like Kant's +imperatives; they issue prohibitions instead of trying to discover the paths of +progress; they do not positively try to create new situations; they attack what +already exists in order to do away with the evil in it; this explains why they +are always forming coalitions against something–against alcohol, prostitution, +or pornography–they do not understand that a purely negative effort is doomed to +be unsuccesssful, as evidenced by the failure of prohibition in America or the +law in France voted by Marthe Richard. As long as woman remains a parasite, she +cannot effectively participate in the building of a better world."]) + [635 636]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "The \"feminine world\" is sometimes contrasted with masculine universe, but it +must be reiterated that women have never formed an autonomous and closed +society; they are integrated into the group governed by males, where they occupy +a subordinate position; they are united by a mechanical solidarity only insofar +as they are similar: they do not share that organic solidarity upon which any +unified community is founded; they have always endeavored–in the period of the +Eleusinian mysteries just like today in clubs, salons, and recreation rooms–to +band together to assert a \"counter-universe,\" but it is still within the +masculine universe that they frame it. "]) + [638]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:<> + [:p + "The notion of miracle differs from the idea of magic: from within a rationally +determined world a miracle posits the radical discontinuity of an event without +cause against which any thinking shatters, whereas magic phenomena are united by +secret forces of which a docile consciousness can embrace the continuous +becoming–without understanding it. The newborn is miraculous for the demigod +father, magic for the mother who has undergone the ripening in her womb. Man's +experience is intelligible but full of holes; that of the wife is, in its own +limits, obscure but complete. This opacity weighs her down; the male is light in +his relations with her: he has the lightness of dictators, generals, judges, +bureaucrats, codes, and abstract principles. This is undoubtedly what the +housewife meant when, shrugging her shoulders, she murmured: \"Men, they don't +think!\" Women also say: \"Men, they don't know; they don't know life.\" As a +contrast to the myth of the praying mantis, they juxtapose the symbol of the +frivolous and importunate bumblebee."] + + [:p "It is understandable why, from this +perspective, woman objects to masculine logic. Not only does it not have bearing +on her experience, but she also knows that in men's hands reason becomes an +insidious form of violence; their peremptory affirmations are intended to +mystify her. They want to confine her in a dilemma: either you agree or you +don't; she has to agree in the name of the whole system of accepted principles: +in refusing to agree, she rejects the whole system; she cannot allow herself +such a dramatic move; she does not have the means to create another society: yet +she does not agree with this one. Halfway between revolt and slavery, she +unwillingly resigns herself to masculine authority. He continuously uses force +to make her shoulder the consequences of her reluctant submission. He pursues +the chimera of a freely enslaved companion: he wants her to yield to him as +yielding to the proof of a theorem; but she knows he himself has chosen the +postulates on which his vigorous deductions are hung; as long as she avoids +questioning them, he will easily silence her; nevertheless, he will not convince +her, because she senses their arbitrariness. Thus will he accuse her, with +stubborn irritation, of being illogical: she refuses to play the game because +she knows the dice are loaded."] + + [:p " The woman does not positively think that the +truth is " [:em "other"] " than what men claim: rather, she holds that there " [:em "is"] " no +truth. It is not only life's becoming that makes her suspicious of the principle +of identity, nor the magic phenomena surrounding her that ruin the notion of +causality: it is at the heart of the masculine world itself, it is in her as +belonging to this world, that she grasps the ambiguity of all principles, of all +values, of all that exists. "]]) + [650 651]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "There is a justification, a supreme compensation, that society has always +been bent on dispensing to woman: religion. There must be religion for women as +for the people, for exactly the same reasons: when a sex or a class is condemned +to immanence, the mirage of transcendence must be offered to it. It is to man's +total advantage to have God endorse the codes he creates: and specifically +because he exercises sovereign authority over the woman, it is only right that +this authority be conferred on him by the soverign being. [...] Woman adopts an +attitude of respect and faith before the masculine universe: God in his heaven +seems barely farther from her than a government minister, and the mystery of +Genesis matches that of an electrical power station. But more important, if she +throws herself so willingly into religion, it is because religion fills a +profound need. In modern civilization, where freedom plays an important +role–even for the woman–religion becomes less of an instrument of constraint than +of mystification. The woman is less often asked to accept her inferiority in the +name of God than to believe, thanks to him, that she is equal to the male lord; +even the temptation to revolt is avoided by pretending to overcome injustice. +The woman is no longer robbed of her transcendence, since she will dedicate her +immanence to God; souls' merits are judged only in heaven and not according to +their terrestrial accomplishments; here below, as Dostoevsky would have said, +they are never more than occupations: shining shoes or building a bridge is the +same vanity; over and above social discriminations, equality of the sexes is +reestablished."]) + [659]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "An authentic love should take on the other's contingence, that is, his +lacks, limitations, and originary gratuitousness; it would claim to be not a +salvation but an inter-human relation. Idolatrous love confers an absolute value +on the loved one: this is the first lie strikingly apparent to all outsiders: +\"" [:em "He"] " doesn't deserve so much love,\" people whisper around the woman in love; +posterity smiles pityingly when evoking the pale figure of Count Guibert. It is +a heartrending disappointment for the woman to discover her idol's weaknesses +and mediocrity. [...] Even if the chosen one is worthy of the deepest +attachment, his truth is earthbound: it is not he whom the woman kneeling before +existence; her bad faith erects barriers between her and the one she worships. +She flatters him, she bows down before him, but she is not a friend for him, +since she does not realize he is in danger in the world, that his projects and +finalities are as fragile as he himself is; considering him the Law and Truth, +she misunderstands his freedom, which is hesitation and anguish. This refusal to +apply a human measure to the lover explains many feminine paradoxes. The woman +demands a favor from the lover, he grants it: he is generous rich, magnificent, +he is royal, he is divine; if he refuses, he is suddenly stingy, mean and cruel, +he is a devilish being or bestial. One might be tempted to counter: If a yes is +understood as a superb extravagance, why should one be surprised by a no? If the +no manifests such an abject egotism, why admire the yes so much? Between the +superhuman and the inhuman is there not room for the human? "]) + [694 695]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "[...] The woman will be able to find her joy in this enrichment she + brings to her loved one; she is not All for him: but she will try to + believe herself indispensable; there are no degrees in necessity. If he + cannot \"get along without her,\" she considers herself the foundation of + his precious existence, and she derives her own worth from that. her joy + is to serve him: but he must gratefully recognize this service; giving + becomes demand according to the customary dialectic of devotion. And a + woman of scrupulous mind asks herself: Is it really " [:em "me"] " he needs? The + man cherishes her, desires her with singular tenderness and desire: But + would he not have just as singular feelings for another? Many women in + love let themselves be deluded; they want to ignore the fact that the + general is enveloped in the particular, and the man facilitates this + illusion because he shares it at first; there is often in his desire a + passion that seems to defy time; at the moment he desires this woman, he + desires her with passion, he wants only her: and certainly the moment is + an absolute, but a momentary absolute. Duped, the woman passes into the + eternal. Deified by the embrace of the master, she believes she has + always been divine and destined for the god: she alone. But male desire + is as fleeting as it is imperious; once satisfied, it dies rather + quickly, while it is most often after love that the woman becomes his + prisoner."]) + [699]) + [:hr] + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Authentic love must be founded on reciprocal recognition of two + freedoms; each lover would then experience himself as himself and as the + other; neither would abdicate his transcendence; they would not mutilate + themselves; together they would both reveal values and end in the world. + For each of them, love would be the revelation of self through the gift + of self and the enrichment of the universe."]) + [706]) + [:hr] + #_(blockquote + [:<> + "Antifeminists draw two contradictory arguments from examining history: (1) +women have never created anything grand; (2) woman's situation has never +prevented great women personalities from blossoming. There is bad faith in both +of these assertions; the successes of some few privileged women neither +compensate for nor excuses the systematic degrading of the collective level; and +the very fact that these successes are so rare and limited is proof of their +unfavorable circumstances."] []) + (blockquote + (html + [:p + "Women–except in certain abstract gatherings such as conferences–do not use +\"we\"; men say \"women\", and women adopt this word to refer to themselves; but +they do not posit themselves authentically as Subjects. [...] Women's actions +have never been more than symbolic agitation; they have won only what men have +been willing to concede to them; they have taken nothing; they have received. It +is that they lack the concrete means to organize themselves into a unit that +could posit itself in opposition. they have no past, no history, no religion of +their own; and unlike the proletariat, they have no solidarity of labor or +interests; they even lack their own space that makes communities of American +blacks, the Jews in ghettos, or the workers in Saint-Denis or Renault factories. +They live dispersed among men, tied by homes, work economic interests, and +social conditions to certain men–fathers or husbands–more closely than to other +women. As bourgeois women, they are in solidarity with bourgeois men and not +with women proletarians; as white women, they are in solidarity with white men +and not with black women. The proletariat could plan to massacre the whole +ruling class; a fanatic Jew or black could dream of seizing the secret of the +atomic bomb and turning all of humanity entirely Jewish or entirely black: but a +woman could not even dream of exterminating males. The tie that binds her to her +oppressors is unlike any other. The division of the sexes is a biological given, +not a moment in history. [...] The couple is a fundamental unit with the two +halves riveted to each other: cleavage of society by sex is not possible. This +is the fundamental characteristic of women: she is the Other at the heart of a +whole whose two components are necessary to each other. "]) + [8 9]) + [:hr] + [:p "Other bookmarked pages, mostly for my own memory: 109, 137, 160, 254, 257, 365, 405, 412, 514-515, 564, 568, 612-613, 630, 661-662, 674, 693, 731, 739, and 742-743."]]))) diff --git a/server/server.nix b/server/server.nix index f751083..e214b51 100644 --- a/server/server.nix +++ b/server/server.nix @@ -32,6 +32,7 @@ systemd.tmpfiles.rules = [ "d /var/git 0750 git git -" "Z /var/git - git git -" + "d /var/www/html 0755 git nginx -" ]; sops = { @@ -74,6 +75,21 @@ enableACME = true; forceSSL = true; }; + + virtualHosts."jakezerrer.com" = { + enableACME = true; + forceSSL = true; + globalRedirect = "www.jakezerrer.com"; + }; + + virtualHosts."www.jakezerrer.com" = { + enableACME = true; + forceSSL = true; + root = "/var/www/html"; + locations."/" = { + index = "index.html"; + }; + }; }; security.acme = { diff --git a/src/components.clj b/src/components.clj deleted file mode 100644 index ed0444d..0000000 --- a/src/components.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,50 +0,0 @@ -(ns components - (:require [borkdude.html :refer [html]] - [highlight :refer [highlight-styles]])) - -(defn template [body] - (html - [:html - {:style {:font-family "monospace"}} - [:head - [:style - [:$ - (str - (highlight-styles :code "default") - (highlight-styles :output "default") - "li { line-height: 1.6; }" - "p { line-height: 1.6; font-family: Palatino; }" - ".page-body p { max-width: 44em; }" - ".page-body blockquote { max-width: 44em; }" - ".highlight { padding: 1px; padding-left: 6px; }")]] - [:meta {:charset "UTF-8"}]] - [:body - [:<> body] - [:footer - [:br] - [:br] - [:p "---"] - [:span - [:a {:href "https://github.com/telekid/jakezerrer"} "page src"] - " | " - [:a {:href "mailto:contact@jakezerrer.com?subject=Blog post"} "contact me"]]]]])) - -(defn page [body] - (template - (html - [:<> - [:p [:a {:href "/"} "< home"]] - [:div {:class "page-body"} - body]]))) - -(defn blockquote [body [from to]] - (html - [:figure - {:style {:margin-left "0" :margin-bottom "2"}} - [:blockquote - body] - [:figcaption - (html - (if (nil? to) - (html [:<> (str "p. " from)]) - (html [:<> (str "pp. " from "-" to)])))]])) diff --git a/src/core.clj b/src/core.clj deleted file mode 100644 index b8ba344..0000000 --- a/src/core.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,27 +0,0 @@ -(ns core - (:require [clojure.java.io :as io] - [pages :refer [pages e-404]])) - -(defn clean [] - (let [target-dir (io/file "target")] - (when (.exists target-dir) - (doseq [file (file-seq target-dir) - :when (.isFile file)] - (io/delete-file file)) - (doseq [dir (reverse (filter #(.isDirectory %) (file-seq target-dir))) - :when (not= dir target-dir)] - (.delete dir))))) - -(defn build [] - (doseq [[path page-fn] (pages)] - (let [target-path (if (= path "/") - "target/html/index.html" - (str "target/html" path "/index.html")) - target-file (io/file target-path)] - (io/make-parents target-file) - (spit target-file (str (page-fn))))) - (spit (io/file "404.html") (str (e-404)))) - -(defn -main [] - (clean) - (build)) diff --git a/src/highlight.clj b/src/highlight.clj deleted file mode 100644 index f229b1a..0000000 --- a/src/highlight.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,50 +0,0 @@ -(ns highlight - (:require [clojure.java.shell :as shell] - [borkdude.html :refer [html]] - [zprint.core :as zp] - [clojure.string :refer [join]])) - -(defn highlight [lang src] - (let [result (shell/sh "pygmentize" "-l" lang "-f" "html" :in src)] - (:out result))) - -(defn code [style v] - (html - (let [s style] - [:div - {:class s} - v]))) - -(defmacro highlight-clj [& body] - (let [out (atom []) - _res ;; return value of final form; currently unused - (let [prev-ns *ns* - t #(swap! out conj %)] - (ns example) - (add-tap (bound-fn* t)) - (let [res - (last (map eval body))] - (remove-tap (bound-fn* t)) - (in-ns (ns-name prev-ns)) - res)) - code - (join "\n\n" (map zp/zprint-str body)) - tap-out (join "\n" (map zp/zprint-str @out {:style :backtranslate})) - joined (apply str - (concat code))] - `(html - [:div - {:style {:border-left "5px solid #ddd"}} - [:div {:class "code"} - [:$ - (highlight "clojure" - ~joined)]] - [:p {:style {:padding-left "6px"}} "tap contents:"] - [:div {:class "output"} - [:$ - (highlight "clojure" - ~tap-out)]]]))) - -(defn highlight-styles [k style] - (let [result (shell/sh "pygmentize" "-S" style "-f" "html" "-a" (str "." (name k)))] - (:out result))) diff --git a/src/pages.clj b/src/pages.clj deleted file mode 100644 index a793fd3..0000000 --- a/src/pages.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,79 +0,0 @@ -(ns pages - (:require [borkdude.html :refer [html]] - #_ - [pages.missionary :refer [missionary]] - [pages.second-sex :refer [second-sex]] - [components :refer [template page]])) - -(def home-uri "/") -(def books-2025-uri "/books-2025") -(def second-sex-uri "/second-sex-quotes") -(def past-work-uri "/past-work") -#_ -(def missionary-uri "/code/missionary") - -(defn home [] - (template - (html - [:<> - [:p "Hello."] - [:p "My name is Jake Zerrer. This is where I keep things online. Look around."] - [:ul - (map - (fn [[uri name]] - (html - [:li [:a {:href (str uri)} name]])) - [[books-2025-uri "Selected reading list, 2025"] - [second-sex-uri "The Second Sex: Selected Excerpts"] - [past-work-uri "Past work"]])]]))) - -(defn books-2025 - [] - (page - (html - [:<> - [:h1 "Selected reading list, 2025"] - [:ul - [:li "The Second Sex (Simone de Beauvior)"] - [:li "The Places in Between (Rory Stewart)"] - [:li "Either/Or: A Fragment of Life (Søren Kierkegaard)"] - [:li "The Philosophy of History (G. W. F. Hegel)"] - [:li "This Life: Secular Faith and Spiritual Freedom (Martin Hägglund)"] - [:li "The Power Broker (Robert Caro)"] - [:li "Mating (Normal Rush)"]]]))) - -(defn past-work - [] - (page - (html - [:<> - [:h1 "Past work"] - [:p "I have spent most of my professional life working as a software engineer:"] - [:ul - [:li "In 2024, I ran product engineering at Normal Computing"] - [:li "In the summer of 2023, I traveled and prototyped a devex tool called refuge"] - [:li "From 2018 to 2023, I worked as a software engineer at Flexport"] - [:li "From 2014 to 2017, I worked as a software engineer at a small startup"]] - [:p "I had a previous career as a theatrical sound designer in New York City."]]))) - -(defn e-404 [] - (page - (html - [:<> - [:h1 "404 Oh, be some other path!"] - [:p "What's in a path? That which we call a page" - [:br] - "by any other path would fail to load"]]))) - -(defn pages [] - {home-uri home - books-2025-uri books-2025 - past-work-uri past-work - #_#_ - missionary-uri missionary - second-sex-uri second-sex}) - -(comment - (require '[repl :refer [restart build]]) - (restart) - (build)) diff --git a/src/pages/missionary.clj b/src/pages/missionary.clj deleted file mode 100644 index 2bb06de..0000000 --- a/src/pages/missionary.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,151 +0,0 @@ -(ns pages.missionary - (:require [components :refer [page]] - [borkdude.html :refer [html]] - [highlight :refer [highlight-clj]])) - -(defn missionary [] - (page - (html - [:<> - [:h1 "FRP in Clojure with Missionary"] - [:h3 "August 2025"] - [:p "I've been working in Clojure on and off for nearly a decade now. In -that time, I've spent thousands of hours working in other languages -professionally: Python, Ruby, TypeScript / Flow / JavaScript, Kotlin, and Java. -I've experimented with many more, to varying degrees: Zig, Janet, Prolog, and -Factor, to name a few. At the end of the day, though, I always find myself -coming back to Clojure."] - [:p "Though it's hard to pin down exactly why I find myself so drawn by -the language, it seems to have something to do with the relatively high incidence -of exposure to new, mind-expanding ideas that I've experienced while working -in Clojure and its ecosystem."] - [:p "For one reason or another, Clojure seems to attract a high density of -smart people who are experimenting with fairly radical ways of solving hard -problems. Something about the combination of the language's simple macro system, -data orientation, reasonable performance, and practical approach to -functional programming make it a great foundation for building more complicated -experimental language constructs."] - [:p "It is via Clojure that I first came to be exposed to datalog, for example, -which helped me begin to be able to articulate why I struggled with SQL's -relativel lack of expressivity. From there, I discovered prolog and the world of -\"search programming\", which gave me an entirely different way to frame -certain problems."] - [:p "Similarly, I first learned of Datomic through Clojure, which blew my -mind the first time I encountered it. The idea of treating your entire database -as a single, immutable value would never have occurred to me on my own; -once I encountered it, however, the alternative seemed patently absurd."] - [:p "The Clojure library " [:span.inline-code "meander"] " showed me that term rewriting systems -could be used for data transformation. (Did you know that term rewriting systems -have the full power of turing machines?) The folks over at Hyperfiddle -have proven that you can effectively abstract away the network connection that -sits between a client and a server, and they have credited Clojure for that -accomplishment. Similarly, my experience so far with Rama, from Red Planet Labs, -have made it hard for me to go back to \"traditional backend programming\". -(I could write a whole series of posts on that topic. Reach out if you'd find -that interesting.) They, too, credit Clojure for their progress."] - [:p "In this post, I want to use the FRP library " [:span.inline-code "missionary"] " to give an -example of what it means to embed an entirely new concept within an existing -programming language. On the one hand, missionary is simply a library. On the -other hand, it differs significantly from the kind of library that you might -find in other programming languages because it introduces its own syntax and -semantics that integrate seamlessly with the host language, Clojure. (This is -the old \"promise of the DSL\" that lisps are famous for.)"] - [:p "First, though: what is missionary? At a high level, missionary -seeks to make it easier to write correct asynchronous (and concurrent) programs -correctly, efficently (meaning that it makes effective use of available CPU -resources), and in a manner that will feel comfortable to functional programmers. -To accomplish that, missionary draws inspiration from a number of interesting -programming ideas and diciplines:"] - [:ul - [:li "Functional Reactive Programming, or FRP"] - [:li "Process supervision"] - [:li "Structured concurrency"] - [:li "Ambiguous programming"] - [:li "TKTK"]] - [:p "To start our journey, I want to show you the equivelant of a \"hello, world!\" -program, written with missionary. This program captures the current time, in milliseconds; -it sleeps for one second; and then it captures the current time again."] - (highlight-clj - (require '[missionary.core :as m]) - - (def run - (m/ap (tap> [:a (System/currentTimeMillis)]) - (m/? (m/sleep 1000)) - (tap> [:b (System/currentTimeMillis)]))) - - (m/? (m/reduce {} nil run))) - [:p "(In these examples, you'll note my use of the " [:span.inline-code "(tap> ...)"] " function. This -function appends the value of its argument to a list. After the program runs, -I print the contents of that list to the \"tap contents:\" box below the code.)"] - - [:p "TKTK Note, however, that " [:span.inline-code "run"] " doesn't actually execute until we feed it -to the " [:span.inline-code "reduce"] " function. It's too early to explain how " [:span.inline-code "reduce"] " has anything -to do with running a program – we'll have to build some other intuition first. -For now, when you see " [:span.inline-code "reduce"] ", just think \"run a sequence of operations.\""] - - [:p "You might be thinking: " - [:em "I could write this code just as easily without missionary. -What's the point? "] - "Great question. We should go ahead and do that. Let's write this program once -without missionary, and then again with missionary but with a bit of additional -debugging thrown in:"] - - (highlight-clj - (defn log - "Emit `v` to `tap>`, capturing the current time and active thread along the way." - [v] - (tap> [v (System/currentTimeMillis) (.getName (Thread/currentThread))])) - (defn run-native [] - (log :native-a) - (Thread/sleep 1000) - (log :native-b)) - - (tap> (-> (run-native) - (time) - (with-out-str))) - - (def run-missionary - (m/ap (log :missionary-a) - (m/? (m/sleep 1000)) - (log :missionary-b))) - - (tap> (-> (m/reduce {} nil run-missionary) - (m/?) - (time) - (with-out-str)))) - ;; TODO: Fix bug where second log doesn't - ;; always print! - - [:p "A few things might jump out immediately."] - [:p "First, both " - [:span.inline-code "run-native"] " and " - [:span.inline-code "run-missionary"] - " block during their evaluation. Notice that the runtime - for each is approximately 1000ms."] - [:p "Second, " - [:span.inline-code "run-native"] - " evaluates the entire expression on the repl's main thread.i By contrast, " - [:span.inline-code "run-missionary"] - " seems to move the - form after the sleep expression to some kind of background thread. What's - that about?"] [:p "Oh, by the way. At the beginning of this post, I made - it clear that Clojure has had a major impact on the way I think about - programming, in large part because the language has facilities that make it - particularly attractive for experimentation. While I believe that to be - true, I know that Clojure is hardly alone in its expressiveness. If you are - a Haskeller, an OCameler, a Common Lisper, an APLer, or even a C - programmer, and you're thinking to yourself \"Clojure isn't special in this - regard\", well, I'm sure you're right! Shoot me an email with your - thoughts, I'd love to learn more about why your language of choice is - unique in this regard. I'll update this post with your contribution."] - [:h2 "References"] - [:ul - [:li "TODO flow spec"] - [:li "TODO task spec"] - [:li "TODO process supervision"] - [:li - [:a {:href "https://github.com/leonoel/missionary"} "Missionary"]] - [:li [:a {:href "https://github.com/hyperfiddle/electric"} "Electric Clojure"]] - [:li [:a {:href "https://github.com/noprompt/meander"} "Meander"]] - [:li [:a {:href "https://jimmyhmiller.com/meander-rewriting"} - "Introduction to Term Rewriting with Meander"]]]]))) diff --git a/src/pages/second_sex.clj b/src/pages/second_sex.clj deleted file mode 100644 index 97b7602..0000000 --- a/src/pages/second_sex.clj +++ /dev/null @@ -1,696 +0,0 @@ -(ns pages.second-sex - (:require [components :refer [page blockquote]] - [borkdude.html :refer [html]])) - -(defn second-sex [] - (page - (html - [:<> - [:h1 "The Second Sex: Select Excerpts"] - [:p "One of my goals for 2025 was to finally crack the spine on Simone de -Beauvoir's " [:em "The Second Sex"] ". Having now achieved that goal, I can say -that it is without a doubt one of the most transformative books I have ever -read." [:p "This page includes various excerpts that spoke to me for one reason -or another, taken from the 2011 edition translated by Constance Borde and -Sheila Malovany-Chevallier. (Note: I transcribed these by hand; please shoot me -a note if you find any errors.)"]] - [:p "I have decided to publish this snippet of my personal marginalia mostly to -encourage others to pick up her masterpiece and give it a read. It is a challenging -book that asks a lot of its reader, but I promise it is worth the effort. As my partner -pointed out to me, " [:em "The Second Sex"] " can be understood as the first major -effort to build a comprehensive history and philosophy of women's place in the -world. Particularly in an era of regressive politics, " [:em "The Second Sex"] - " serves as an important reminder of just how oppressive women's condition -was prior to the sexual revolution. I fear that many of today's conservative -voices are pushing an antifeminist narrative on young women who may not -understand just how much they have to lose."] - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Insofar as woman is concerned the absolute Other, that is–whatever magic -powers she has–as the inessential, it is precisely impossible to regard her as -another subject. Women have thus never constituted a separate group that posited -itself " [:em "for-itself"] " before a male group; they have never had a direct or -autonomous relationship with men. \"The relationship of reciprocity which is the -basis of marriage is not established between men and women, but between men by -means of women, who are merely the occasion of this relationship\", said -Lévi-Strauss. Woman's concrete condition is not affected by the type of lineage -that prevails in the society to which she belongs; whether the regime is -patrilineal, matrilineal, bilateral, or undifferentiated (undifferentiation -never being precise), she is always under men's guardianship; the only question -is if, after marriage, she is still subjected to the authority of her father or -her oldest brother–authority that will also extend to her children– or of her -husband. In any case: \"The woman is never anything more than the symbol of her -lineage. Matrilineal descent is the authority of the woman's father or brother -extended to the brother-in-law's village.\" She only mediates the law; she does -not possess it. In fact, it is the relationship of two masculine groups that is -defined by the system of filiation, and not the relation of the two sexes."]) - [80 81]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Here is an important fact that recurs throughout history: abstract rights -cannot sufficiently define the concrete situation of woman; this situation -depends in great part on the economic role she plays; and very often, abstract -freedom and concrete powers vary inversely."]) - [100]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "\"Woman is a possession acquired by contract; she is personal property, and the -possession of her is as good as a security–indeed, properly speaking, woman is -only man's annexe.\" Here [Balzac] is speaking for the bourgeoisie, which -intensified its antifeminism in reaction to eighteenth-century license and -threatening progressive ideas. Having brilliantly presented the idea at the -beginning of " [:em "They Physiology of Marriage"] " that this loveless institution -forcibly leads the wife to adultry, Balzac exhorts husbands to rein in wives to -total subjugation if they want to avoid the ridicule of dishonor. They must be -denied training and culture, forbidden to develop their individuality, forced to -wear uncomfortable clothing, and encouraged to follow a debilitating dietary -regime. The bourgeoisie follows this program exactly, confining women to the -kitchen and to housework, jealously watching their behavior; they are enclosed -in daily life rituals that hindered all attempts at independence. In return, they -are honored and endowed with the most exquisite respect. \"The married woman is -a slave who must be seated on a throne,\" says Balzac; of course men must give -in to women in all irrelevant circumstances, yielding them first place; women -must not carry heavy burdens as in primitive societies; they are readily spared -all painful tasks and worries: at the same time this relieves them of all -responsibility. It is hoped that, thus duped, seduced by the ease of the -condition, they will accept the role of mother and housewife to which they are -being confined. And in fact, most bourgeois women capitulate. As their education -and their parasitic situation makes them dependent on men, they never date to -voice their claims: those who do are hardly heard. It is easier to put people in -chains than to remove them if the chains bring prestige, said George Bernard -Shaw. The bourgeois woman clings to the chains because she clings to her class -privileges. It is drilled into her and she believes that women's liberation -would weaken bourgeois society; liberated from the male, she would be condemned -to work; while she might regret having her rights to private property -subordinated to her husband's, she would deplore even more having this property -be abolished; she feels no solidarity with working-class women; she feels closer -to her husband than to a woman textile worker. She makes his interests her own."]) - [129 130]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Abortion was officially recognized, but only for a short time, in Germany -before Nazism and in the Soviet Union before 1936. But in spite of religion and -laws, it has been practiced in all countries to a large extent. In France, every -year 800,000 to 1 million abortions are performed–as many as births–and -two-thirds of the women are married, many already having one or two children. In -spite of the prejudices, resistance, and an outdated morality, unregulated -fertility has given way to fertility controlled by the state or individuals. -Progress in obstetrics has considerably decreased the dangers of childbirth; -childbirth pain is disappearing; at this time–March 1949–legislation has been -passed in England requiring the use of certain anesthetic methods; they are -already generally applied in the United States and are beginning to spread in -France. With artificial insemination, the evolution that will permit humanity to -master the reproductive function comes to completion. These changes have -tremendous importance for woman in particular; she can reduce the number of -pregnancies and rationally integrate them into her life, instead of being their -slave. During the nineteenth century, woman in her turn is freed from nature; -she wins control of her body. Relieved of a great number of reproductive -servitudes, she can take on the economic roles open to her, roles that would -ensure her control over her own person."]) - [138 139]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:<> - [:p - "[Of man:] But he does not like difficulty; he is afraid of danger. He has -contradictory aspirations to both life and rest, existence and being; he knows -very well that \"a restless spirit\" is the ransom for his development, that his -distance from the object is the ransom for his being present to himself; but he -dreams of restfulness in restlessness and of an opaque plenitude that his -consciousness would nevertheless still inhabit. This embodied dream is, -precisely, woman; she is the perfect intermediary between nature that is foreign -to man and the peer who is too identical to him. She pits neither the hostile -silence of nature nor the hard demand of a reciprocal recognition against him; -by a unique privilege she is a consciousness, and yet it seems possible to -possess her in the flesh. Thanks to her, there is a way to escape the inexorable -dialectic of the master and the slave that springs from the reciprocity of -freedoms."] - [:p - "[...] [Woman] emerged as the inessential who never returned to the -essential, as the absolute Other, without reciprocity. [...] She is nature raised -to the transparency of consciousness; she is a naturally submissive -consciousness. And therein lies the marvelous hope that man has often placed in -woman: he hopes to accomplish himself as being through carnally possessing a being -while making confirmed in his freedom by a docile freedom. No man would consent -to being a woman, but all want there to be women. [...] Appearing as the Other, -woman appears at the same time as a plenitude of being by opposition to the -nothingness of existence that man experiences in itself; the Other, posited as -object in the subject's eyes, is posited as in-itself, thus as being. Woman -embodies positively the lack the existent carries in his heart, and man hopes to -realize himself by finding himself through her."]]) - [160 161]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "The apologue of the caterpillars provides the key to this attitude: whatever -his hidden intention, hit is significant in itself. Pissing on caterpillars, -Montherlant takes pleasure in sparing some and exterminating others; he takes a -laughing pity on those that are determined to live and generally lets them off; -he is delighted by this game. Without the caterpillars, the urinary stream would -have been just an excretion; it becomes an instrument of life and death; in -front of the crawling insect, man relieves himself and experiences God's -despotic solitude, without running the risk of reciprocity. Likewise, faced with -female animals, the male, from the top of his pedestal, sometimes cruel, -sometimes tender, sometimes fair, sometimes unpredictable, gives, takes back, -satisfies, pities, or gets irritated; he defers to nothing but his own pleasure; -he is soverign, free, and unique. But these animals must not be anything but -animals; they would be chosen on purpose, their weaknesses would be flattered; -they would be treated as animals with such determination that they would end up -accepting their condition. In similar faction, the blacks' petty robberies and -lies charmed the whites of Louisiana and Georgia, confirming the superiority of -their own skin color; and if one of these Negroes persists in being honest, he -is treated even worse. In similar fashion, the debasement of man was -systematically practiced in the concentration camps; the ruling race found proof -in this abjection that it was of superhuman essence."]) - [222 223]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:<> - [:p - "As for Stendhal, we saw that woman barely takes on a mythical value for him: he -considers her also being a transcendence; for this humanist, it is in their -reciprocal relations that freedoms are accomplished; and it is sufficient that -the " [:em "Other"] " is simply another for life to have, according to him, a little spice; -he does not seek a stellar equilibrium, he does not nourish himself with the -bread of disgust; he does not expect miracles; he wishes to concern himself not -with the cosmos or poetry but with freedoms."] - - [:p "That is, he also experiences -himself as a translucent freedom. The others–and this is one of the most -important points–posit themselves as transcendents but feel they are prisoners -of an opaque presence in their own hearts: they project onto woman this -\"unbreakable core of night\". In Montherlant there is an Alderian complex where -heavy bad faith is born: these pretensions and fears are what he incarnates in -woman; the disgust he feels for her is what he fears to feel for himself; he -intends to trample in her the ever possible proof of his insufficiency; he asks -scorn to save him; woman is the ditch in which he throws all the monsters that -inhabit him. Lawrence's life shows us that he suffered from an analogous complex -but more purely sexual: woman in his work has the value of a compensatory myth; -through her is found an exalted virility of which the write was not very sure; -when he describes Kate at Don Cipriano's feet, he believes he has won a male -triumph over Frieda; nor does he accept that his female companion challenges -him: if she contested his aims, he would probably lose confidence in them; her -role is to reassure him. He asks for peace, rest, and faith from her, just as -Montherlant asks for the certitude of his superiority; they demand what they -lack. Self-confidence is not lacking in Claudel: if he is shy, it is only the -secret of God. Thus, there is no trace of the battle of the sexes. Man bravely -takes on the weight of woman: she is the possibility of temptation or of -salvation. For Breton it seems that man is only true through the mystery that -inhabits him; it pleases him that Nadja sees that star he is going toward and -that is like a \"heartless flower\"; his dreams, intuitions, and the spontaneous -unfolding of his inner language: it is in these activities that are out of the -control of the will and reason that he recognizes himself: woman is the tangible -figure of this veiled presence infinitely more essential than her conscious -personality."] - - [:p - " As for Stendhal, he quietly coincides with himself; but he needs -woman as she does him so that his dispersed existence is gathered in the unity -of a figure and a destiny; it is as for-another that the human being reaches -being; but another still has to lend him his consciousness: other men are too -indifferent to their peers; only the woman in love opens her heart to her lover -and shelters in its entirety. Except for Claudel, who finds a perfect witness in -God, all the writers we have considered expect, in Malraux's words, woman to -cherish in them this \"incomparable monster\" known to themselves alone. In -collaboration or combat, men will come up against each other in their -generality. Montherlant, for his peers, is a writer, Lawrence a doctrinaire, -Breton a leader of a school, Stendhal a diplomat or a man of wit; it is women -who reveal in one a magnificent and cruel prince, in another a disturbing -animal, in still another a god or a sun or a being \"black and cold...like a man -struck by lightning, lying at the feet of ths Sphinx,\" and in the other a -seducer, a charmer, a lover. "] - - [:p - "For each of them, the ideal woman will be she -who embodies the most exactly the " [:em "Other"] " able to reveal him to himself. [...] -[The] only earthly destiny reserved to the woman equal, child-woman, sould -sister, woman-sex, and female animale is always man. Regardless of the ego -looking for itself through her, it can only attain itself if she consents to be -his crucible. In any case, what is demanded of her is self-forgetting and love. -[...] Feminine devotion is demanded as a duty by Montherlant and Lawrence; less -arrogant, Claudel, Breton, and Stendhal admire it as a generous choice; they -desire it without claiming to deserve it; but–except for the astonishing -" [:em "Lamiel"] "–all their works show they expect from woman this altruism that Comte -admired in and imposed on her, and which, according to him, also constituted -both a flagrant inferiority and an equal superiority."] - - [:p - " We could find many more -examples: they would always lead to the same conclusions. In defining woman, -each writer defines his general ethic and the singular idea he has of himself: -it is also in her that he often registers the distance between his view of the -world and his egotistical dreams. [...] [In all cases, woman] as other still -plays a role inasmuch as even to transcend himself, each man still needs to take -consciousness of himself."]]) - [263 265]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Certainly fidelity is necessary for sexual love, since the two lovers' desire -encompasses their singularity; they do not want it contested by outside -experiences, they want to be irreplaceable for each other; but this fidelity has -meaning only as long as it is spontaneous; and spontaneously, erotic magic -dissolves rather quickly. The miracle is that it gives to each of the lovers, in -the instant and in their carnal presence, a being whose existence is an -unlimited transcendence: and " [:em "possession"] " of this being is undoubtedly -impossible, but at least each of them is reached in a privileged and poignant -way. But when individuals no longer want to reach each other because of -hostility, disgust, or indifference between them, erotic attraction disappears; -and it dies almost as surely in esteem and friendship; two human beings who come -together in the very moment of their transcendence through the world and their -common projects no longer need carnal union; and further, because this union -has lost its union, they are repelled by it [...] Eroticism is a movement toward -the " [:em "Other"] ", and this is its essential character; but within the couple, spouses -become, for each other, the " [:em "Same"] "; no exchange is possible between them -anymore, no giving, no conquest."]) - [466 467]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Throughout her childhood, the little girl was bullied and mutilated; but she -nonetheless grasped herself as an autonomous individual; in her relations with -her family and friends, in her studies and games, she saw herself in the present -as a transcendence: her future passivity was something she only imagined. Once -she enters puberty, the future not only moves closer: it settles into her body; -it becomes the most concrete reality. It retains the fateful quality it always -had; while the adolescent boy is actively routed toward adulthood, the girl -looks forward to the opening of this new and unforeseeable period where the plot -is already hatched and toward which time is drawing her. As she is already -detached from her childhood past, the present is for her only a transition; she -sees no valid end in it, only occupations. In a more or less disguised way, her -youth is consumed by waiting. She is waiting for Man."]) - [341]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "At about thirteen, boys serve a veritable apprenticeship in violence, -developing their aggressiveness, their will for power, and their taste for -competition; it is exactly at this moment that the little girl renounces rough -games. [...] [The] attitude of defiance, so important for boys, is unknown to -them; true, women compare themselves with each other, but defiance is something -other than these passive confrontations: two freedoms confront each other as -having a hold on the world whose limits they intend to push; climbing higher -than a friend or getting the better in arm wrestling is affirming one's -sovereignty over the world. These conquering actions are not permitted to the -girl, and violence in particular is not permitted to her. [...] The male has -recourse to his fists and fighting when he encounters any affront or attempt to -reduce him to an object: he does not let himself be transcended by others; he -finds himself again in the heart of his subjectivity. [...] In the South of the -United states, it is strictly impossible for a black person to use violence -against whites; this rule is the key to the mysterious \"black soul\"; the way -the black experiences himself in the white world, his behavior in adjusting to -it, the compensations he seeks, his whole way of feeling and acting, are -explained on the basis of the passivity to which he is condemned. [...] In the -same way, for the adolescent boy who is allowed to manifest himself imperiously, -the universe has a totally different face from what it has for the adolescent -girl whose feelings are deprived of immediate effectiveness; the former -ceaselessly calls the world into question, he can at every instance revolt -against the given and thus has the impression of actively confirming it when he -accepts it; the latter only submits to it; the world is defined without her, and -its face is immutable. This lack of physical power expresses itself as a more -general timidity: she does not believe in a force she has not felt in her body, -she does not dare to be enterprising, to revolt, to invent; doomed to docility, -to resignation, she can only accept a place that society has already made for -her. She accepts the order of things as a given."]) - [343 344]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "There is an obscene paradox in the superimposing of a pompous ceremony on a -brutally real animal function. The wedding presents its universal and abstract -meaning: a man and a woman are united publicly according to symbolic rites; but -in the secrecy of the bed it is concrete and singular individuals who confront -each other face-to-face, and all gazes turn away from their embraces. [...] It -is stupid and barbaric to want to put it all into one night; it is absurd to -transform an operation as difficult as the first coitus into a duty. The woman -is all the more terrorized by the fact that the strange operation she is -subjected to is sacred; and that society, religion, family, and friends -delivered her solemnly to the husband as to a master; and in addition, that the -act seems to engage her whole future, because marriage still has a definitive -character. This is when she feels truly revealed in the absolute: this man to -whom she is pledged to the end of time embodies all of Man in her eyes; and he -is revealed to her, too, as a figure she has not heretofore known, which is of -immense importance since he will be her lifelong companion. However, the man -himself is anguished by the duty weighing on him; he has his own difficulties -and his own complexes that make him shy and clumsy or on the contrary brutal; -many men are impotent on their wedding night because of the very solemnity of -marriage. [...] Too much impetuousness frightens the virgin, too much respect -humiliates her; women forever hate the man who has taken his pleasure at the -expense of their suffering; but they feel an eternal resentment against the one -who seems to disdain them, and often against the one who has not attempted to -deflower them the first night or who was unable to do it. [...] The \"wedding -night\" transforms the erotic experience into an ordeal that neither partner is -able to surmount, too involved with personal problems to think generously of -each other; it is invested with a solemnity that makes it formidable; and it is -not surprising that it often dooms the woman to frigidity forever. The difficult -problem facing the husband is this: if he \"titillates his wife too -lasciviously,\" she might be scandalized or outraged; it seems this fear -paralyzes American husbands, among others, especially in college-educated -couples, says the Kinsey Report, because wives, more conscious of themselves, -are more deeply inhibited. But if he \"respects\" her, he fails to waken her -sensuality. This dilemma is created by the ambiguity of the feminine attitude: -the young woman both wants and rejects pleasure; she demands a delicateness from -which she suffers."]) - [458 462]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:<> - [:p - "A normal man considers objects around him as instruments; he arranges them -according to the purpose for which they are intended; his \"order\"–where woman -will often see disorder–is to have his cigarettes, his papers, and his tools -within reach. [...] But to find a home in oneself, one must first have realized -oneself in works or acts. Man has only a middling interest in his domestic -interior because he has access to the entire universe and because he can affirm -himself in his projects. Woman, instead, is locked into the conjugal community: -she has to change this prison into a kingdom. Her attitude to her home is -dictated by this same dialectic that generally defines her condition: she takes -by becoming prey, she liberates by abdicating; by renouncing the world, she -means to conquer a world."] - [:p " She regrets closing the doors of her home behind -herself; as a young girl, the whole world was her kingdom; the forests belonged -to her. Now she is confined to a restricted space; Nature is reduced to the size -of a geranium pot. [...] But she is going to make every attempt to refuse this -limitation. She encloses faraway countries and past times within her four walls -in the form of more or less expensive earthly flora and fauna; she encloses her -husband, who personifies human society for her, and the child who gives her the -whole future in a portable form. [...] Especially at evening time, when the -shutters are closed, woman feels like a queen; the light shed at noon by the -universal sun disturbs her; at night she is no longer dispossessed, because she -does away with that which she does not possess; from under the lamp shade she -sees a light that is her own and that illuminates her abode alone: nothing else -exists."]]) - [470 471]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Logic in masculine hands is often violence. Chardonne explained this kind of -sly oppression well in " [:em "Epithalaminum"] ". Older, more cultivated, and more -educated than Berthe, Albert uses this pretext to deny any value to opinions of -his wife that he does not share; he untiringly " [:em "proves"] " he is right; for her -part she becomes adamant and refuses to accept that there is any substance in -her husband's reasoning: he persists in his ideas, and that is the end of it. -Thus a serious misunderstanding deepens between them. He does not try to -understand feelings or deep-rooted reactions she cannot justify; she does not -understand what lives behind her husband's pedantic and overwhelming logic. He -even goes so far as to become irritated by the ignorance she never hid from him, -and challenges her with questions about astronomy; he is flattered nonetheless, -to tell her what to read, to find in her a listener he can easily dominate. In a -struggle where her intellectual shortcomings condemn her to losing every time, -the young wife has no defense other than silence, or tears, or violence."]) - [498]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:<> - [:p - "Many young couples give the impression of perfect equality. But as long as the -man has economic responsibility for the couple, it is just an illusion. He is -the one who determines the conjugal domicile according to the demands of his -job: she " [:em "follows"] " him from the provinces to Paris, from Paris to the provinces, -the colonies, abroad; the standard of living is fixed according to his income; -the rhythm of the days, the weeks, and the year is organized on the basis of his -occupations; relations and friendships most often depend on his profession. -Being more positively integrated than his wife into society, he leads the couple -in intellectual, political, and moral areas. Divorce is only an abstract -possibility for the wife, if she does not have the means to earn her own living: -while alimony in America is a heavy burden for the husband, in France the lot of -the wife and mother abandoned with a derisory pension is scandalous. But the -deep inequality stems from the fact that the husband finds concrete -accomplishment in work or action while for the wife in her role as a wife, -freedom has only a negative form. [...]"] - [:p " It is also true that the man is more -defenseless than previously against this despotism; he recognizes his wife's -abstract rights, and he understands that she can concretize them only through -him: it is at his own expense that he will compensate for the powerlessness and -the sterility the wife is condemned to; to realize an apparent equality in their -association, he has to give her more because he possesses more. But precisely -because she receives, takes, and demands, she is the poorer. The dialectic of -the master and slave has its most concrete application here: in oppressing, one -becomes oppressed. Males are chains by their very sovereignty; it is because -they alone earn money that the wife demands checks, because men alone practice a -profession that the wife demands that they succeed, because they alone embody -transcendence that the wife wants to steal it from them by taking over their -projects and successes. [...]"] - [:p " The situation has to be changed in their common -interest by prohibiting marriage as a \"career\" for the woman. Men who declare -themselves antifeminist with the excuse that \"women are already annoying enough -as it is\" are not very logical: it precisely because marriage makes them -\"praying mantises,\" \"bloodsuckers,\" and \"poison\" that marriage has to be -changed and, as a consequence, the feminine condition in general. woman weighs -so heavily on man because she is forbidden to rely on herself; he will free -himself by freeing her, that is, by giving her something " [:em "to do"] " in this world."]]) - [522 523]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Very often the kept woman interiorizes her dependence; subjected to public -opinion, she accepts its values; she admires the \"fashionable world\" and -adopts its customs; she wants to be regarded according to bourgeois standards. -She is a parasite of the rich bourgeoisie, and she adheres to its ideas; she is -\"right thinking\"; in former times she would readily send her daughters to a -convent school, and as she got older, she even went to Mass and openly -converted. She is on the conservative's side. She is too proud to have made her -place in this world to want to change. The struggle she wages to \"arrive\" does -not dispose her to feelings of brotherhood and human solidarity; she paid for -success with too much slavish compliance to sincerly wish for universal freedom. -615"]) - [615]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "In the United States, the influence of venerated \"Moms\" is strong; this is -explained by the leisure time their parasitic existence leaves them; and this is -why it is harmful. \"Knowing nothing about medicine, art, science, religion, -law, sanitation\", says Philip Wylie, speaking of the American Mom, \"she -seldom has any especial interest in " [:em "what"] ", exactly, she is doing as a member of -any of these endless organizations, so long as it is _something.\" Their effort -is not integrated into a coherent and constructive plan, it does not aim at -objective ends: imperiously, it tends only to show their tastes and prejudices -or to serve their interests. They play a considerable role in the domain of -culture, for example: it is they who buy the most books; but they read as one -plays a game of solitaire; literature takes its meaning and dignity when it is -addressed to individuals committed to projects, when it helps them surpass -themselves toward greater horizons; it must be integrated into the movement of -human transcendence. [...] Not being specialized in politics or economics or any -technical discipline, old women have no concrete hold on society; they are -unaware of the problems action poses; they are incapable of elaborating a -constructive program. Their morality is abstract and formal, like Kant's -imperatives; they issue prohibitions instead of trying to discover the paths of -progress; they do not positively try to create new situations; they attack what -already exists in order to do away with the evil in it; this explains why they -are always forming coalitions against something–against alcohol, prostitution, -or pornography–they do not understand that a purely negative effort is doomed to -be unsuccesssful, as evidenced by the failure of prohibition in America or the -law in France voted by Marthe Richard. As long as woman remains a parasite, she -cannot effectively participate in the building of a better world."]) - [635 636]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "The \"feminine world\" is sometimes contrasted with masculine universe, but it -must be reiterated that women have never formed an autonomous and closed -society; they are integrated into the group governed by males, where they occupy -a subordinate position; they are united by a mechanical solidarity only insofar -as they are similar: they do not share that organic solidarity upon which any -unified community is founded; they have always endeavored–in the period of the -Eleusinian mysteries just like today in clubs, salons, and recreation rooms–to -band together to assert a \"counter-universe,\" but it is still within the -masculine universe that they frame it. "]) - [638]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:<> - [:p - "The notion of miracle differs from the idea of magic: from within a rationally -determined world a miracle posits the radical discontinuity of an event without -cause against which any thinking shatters, whereas magic phenomena are united by -secret forces of which a docile consciousness can embrace the continuous -becoming–without understanding it. The newborn is miraculous for the demigod -father, magic for the mother who has undergone the ripening in her womb. Man's -experience is intelligible but full of holes; that of the wife is, in its own -limits, obscure but complete. This opacity weighs her down; the male is light in -his relations with her: he has the lightness of dictators, generals, judges, -bureaucrats, codes, and abstract principles. This is undoubtedly what the -housewife meant when, shrugging her shoulders, she murmured: \"Men, they don't -think!\" Women also say: \"Men, they don't know; they don't know life.\" As a -contrast to the myth of the praying mantis, they juxtapose the symbol of the -frivolous and importunate bumblebee."] - - [:p "It is understandable why, from this -perspective, woman objects to masculine logic. Not only does it not have bearing -on her experience, but she also knows that in men's hands reason becomes an -insidious form of violence; their peremptory affirmations are intended to -mystify her. They want to confine her in a dilemma: either you agree or you -don't; she has to agree in the name of the whole system of accepted principles: -in refusing to agree, she rejects the whole system; she cannot allow herself -such a dramatic move; she does not have the means to create another society: yet -she does not agree with this one. Halfway between revolt and slavery, she -unwillingly resigns herself to masculine authority. He continuously uses force -to make her shoulder the consequences of her reluctant submission. He pursues -the chimera of a freely enslaved companion: he wants her to yield to him as -yielding to the proof of a theorem; but she knows he himself has chosen the -postulates on which his vigorous deductions are hung; as long as she avoids -questioning them, he will easily silence her; nevertheless, he will not convince -her, because she senses their arbitrariness. Thus will he accuse her, with -stubborn irritation, of being illogical: she refuses to play the game because -she knows the dice are loaded."] - - [:p " The woman does not positively think that the -truth is " [:em "other"] " than what men claim: rather, she holds that there " [:em "is"] " no -truth. It is not only life's becoming that makes her suspicious of the principle -of identity, nor the magic phenomena surrounding her that ruin the notion of -causality: it is at the heart of the masculine world itself, it is in her as -belonging to this world, that she grasps the ambiguity of all principles, of all -values, of all that exists. "]]) - [650 651]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "There is a justification, a supreme compensation, that society has always -been bent on dispensing to woman: religion. There must be religion for women as -for the people, for exactly the same reasons: when a sex or a class is condemned -to immanence, the mirage of transcendence must be offered to it. It is to man's -total advantage to have God endorse the codes he creates: and specifically -because he exercises sovereign authority over the woman, it is only right that -this authority be conferred on him by the soverign being. [...] Woman adopts an -attitude of respect and faith before the masculine universe: God in his heaven -seems barely farther from her than a government minister, and the mystery of -Genesis matches that of an electrical power station. But more important, if she -throws herself so willingly into religion, it is because religion fills a -profound need. In modern civilization, where freedom plays an important -role–even for the woman–religion becomes less of an instrument of constraint than -of mystification. The woman is less often asked to accept her inferiority in the -name of God than to believe, thanks to him, that she is equal to the male lord; -even the temptation to revolt is avoided by pretending to overcome injustice. -The woman is no longer robbed of her transcendence, since she will dedicate her -immanence to God; souls' merits are judged only in heaven and not according to -their terrestrial accomplishments; here below, as Dostoevsky would have said, -they are never more than occupations: shining shoes or building a bridge is the -same vanity; over and above social discriminations, equality of the sexes is -reestablished."]) - [659]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "An authentic love should take on the other's contingence, that is, his -lacks, limitations, and originary gratuitousness; it would claim to be not a -salvation but an inter-human relation. Idolatrous love confers an absolute value -on the loved one: this is the first lie strikingly apparent to all outsiders: -\"" [:em "He"] " doesn't deserve so much love,\" people whisper around the woman in love; -posterity smiles pityingly when evoking the pale figure of Count Guibert. It is -a heartrending disappointment for the woman to discover her idol's weaknesses -and mediocrity. [...] Even if the chosen one is worthy of the deepest -attachment, his truth is earthbound: it is not he whom the woman kneeling before -existence; her bad faith erects barriers between her and the one she worships. -She flatters him, she bows down before him, but she is not a friend for him, -since she does not realize he is in danger in the world, that his projects and -finalities are as fragile as he himself is; considering him the Law and Truth, -she misunderstands his freedom, which is hesitation and anguish. This refusal to -apply a human measure to the lover explains many feminine paradoxes. The woman -demands a favor from the lover, he grants it: he is generous rich, magnificent, -he is royal, he is divine; if he refuses, he is suddenly stingy, mean and cruel, -he is a devilish being or bestial. One might be tempted to counter: If a yes is -understood as a superb extravagance, why should one be surprised by a no? If the -no manifests such an abject egotism, why admire the yes so much? Between the -superhuman and the inhuman is there not room for the human? "]) - [694 695]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "[...] The woman will be able to find her joy in this enrichment she - brings to her loved one; she is not All for him: but she will try to - believe herself indispensable; there are no degrees in necessity. If he - cannot \"get along without her,\" she considers herself the foundation of - his precious existence, and she derives her own worth from that. her joy - is to serve him: but he must gratefully recognize this service; giving - becomes demand according to the customary dialectic of devotion. And a - woman of scrupulous mind asks herself: Is it really " [:em "me"] " he needs? The - man cherishes her, desires her with singular tenderness and desire: But - would he not have just as singular feelings for another? Many women in - love let themselves be deluded; they want to ignore the fact that the - general is enveloped in the particular, and the man facilitates this - illusion because he shares it at first; there is often in his desire a - passion that seems to defy time; at the moment he desires this woman, he - desires her with passion, he wants only her: and certainly the moment is - an absolute, but a momentary absolute. Duped, the woman passes into the - eternal. Deified by the embrace of the master, she believes she has - always been divine and destined for the god: she alone. But male desire - is as fleeting as it is imperious; once satisfied, it dies rather - quickly, while it is most often after love that the woman becomes his - prisoner."]) - [699]) - [:hr] - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Authentic love must be founded on reciprocal recognition of two - freedoms; each lover would then experience himself as himself and as the - other; neither would abdicate his transcendence; they would not mutilate - themselves; together they would both reveal values and end in the world. - For each of them, love would be the revelation of self through the gift - of self and the enrichment of the universe."]) - [706]) - [:hr] - #_(blockquote - [:<> - "Antifeminists draw two contradictory arguments from examining history: (1) -women have never created anything grand; (2) woman's situation has never -prevented great women personalities from blossoming. There is bad faith in both -of these assertions; the successes of some few privileged women neither -compensate for nor excuses the systematic degrading of the collective level; and -the very fact that these successes are so rare and limited is proof of their -unfavorable circumstances."] []) - (blockquote - (html - [:p - "Women–except in certain abstract gatherings such as conferences–do not use -\"we\"; men say \"women\", and women adopt this word to refer to themselves; but -they do not posit themselves authentically as Subjects. [...] Women's actions -have never been more than symbolic agitation; they have won only what men have -been willing to concede to them; they have taken nothing; they have received. It -is that they lack the concrete means to organize themselves into a unit that -could posit itself in opposition. they have no past, no history, no religion of -their own; and unlike the proletariat, they have no solidarity of labor or -interests; they even lack their own space that makes communities of American -blacks, the Jews in ghettos, or the workers in Saint-Denis or Renault factories. -They live dispersed among men, tied by homes, work economic interests, and -social conditions to certain men–fathers or husbands–more closely than to other -women. As bourgeois women, they are in solidarity with bourgeois men and not -with women proletarians; as white women, they are in solidarity with white men -and not with black women. The proletariat could plan to massacre the whole -ruling class; a fanatic Jew or black could dream of seizing the secret of the -atomic bomb and turning all of humanity entirely Jewish or entirely black: but a -woman could not even dream of exterminating males. The tie that binds her to her -oppressors is unlike any other. The division of the sexes is a biological given, -not a moment in history. [...] The couple is a fundamental unit with the two -halves riveted to each other: cleavage of society by sex is not possible. This -is the fundamental characteristic of women: she is the Other at the heart of a -whole whose two components are necessary to each other. "]) - [8 9]) - [:hr] - [:p "Other bookmarked pages, mostly for my own memory: 109, 137, 160, 254, 257, 365, 405, 412, 514-515, 564, 568, 612-613, 630, 661-662, 674, 693, 731, 739, and 742-743."]]))) -- cgit v1.2.3