After writing my Diary of Uncertainties I became intrigued by the oppositional relationship between Love and abuse, and how it goes beyond the individual realm, shaping our material reality and societal power dynamics. In this line, I was also left to wonder whether assimilated romanticization of colonialism reinforces machista culture in the Latin-American context. Reading bell hook’s All About Love has been extremely eye-opening in my approach to these issues, as she understands love as ‘‘the will to extend one’s self to nurture our own and another’s spiritual growth’[1] , thus making our normalization of “abusive love” impossible. Hook’s writings also enabled me to see how powerful love can actually be, despite the persistence of certain structures (mostly patriarchal) to undermine it. This made me come the conclusion that we need to regenerate Love/ our approach to loving in order to overthrow systematic abuse. But, how can Love be used?
As a being, I tend to fluctuate a lot. So prior to any further research, I decided to reflect and ask myself: What is the change I want to see? Although at this point my ideas are broad, I figured it would be helpful as a starting point.
At this stage, my main aims are:
1. To encourage young girls and queers not to conform to/ assimilate situations of abuse in the name of Love.
2. To redeem the idea of “the *Feminine” as weaker/ lesser.
3. To encourage young people to question power structures around them.
As well, I will be using a Latinx lense most of the time since it is what is most familiar to me.
*I must clarify that I approach the so called “feminine” as a myth, a patriarchal construct to justify oppression and abuse of power on the basis of gender superiority. This goes in line with Simone De Beauvoir’s idea of “eternal feminine”, as disclosed in The Second Sex, which she classifies as a myth created by patriarchal society in order to treat women as ‘the other’. That being said, I do not think of “the feminine” as something bad at all, as I am a firm believer that femininity should be reclaimed by women, men and everyone else outside the binary. In this sense, I am more aligned with Judith Butler’s ideas and believe that the binary between feminine and masculine should be blurred. I can only hope that in the future those characteristics attributed to “the feminine” become just core values of humanity.
Keeping these premises in mind, I decided to go through some of Foucault’s theoretical writings on Power, since I believe that a good understanding of how power dynamics work in modern society is crucial in order to approach love and abuse.
Foucault’s conception of the subject is decentred. In line with Marx and Freud, there is no longer a privileging of the subject as the centre of discourse, as an active agent who determines everything and shapes reality, but rather the subject is simply a social and historical construct. For instance, in The History of Sexuality he identifies sexuality as ‘not an innate or natural quality of the body , but rather the effect of historically specific power relations’[2], which to me is key as to be critical of essentialism and binarism. For Foucault there are two meanings of the word subject: 1. subject to someone else by control and dependence, and 2. ties to his own identity by a conscience of self-knowledge. In both meanings a form of power is implied. But Foucault also remarks that the exercise of power is ‘paralleled by the production of apparatuses of knowledge’, knowledge and power becoming two sides of the same coin. In a more personal level, I realised that my misinformation about Love (and, inevitably, about myself) led me to surrender my power to an abusive system (in the personal, but also in the social), becoming a cycle experienced by many others like me. Who shapes our knowledge? Who has that power? These questions are now part of my daily routine.
One of the points in which I agree most with Foucault is his critique of disciplinary power. With the disciplinary power of correctional institutions such as prisons, hospitals, psychiatrics, factories and some schools, it seems as though everyone is a prisoner in modern society as the system of internalization of rules inside these correctional institutions has been extended to the entire society. This is what propels the functioning of the system of domination. In this sense, I see how binaries are also crucial for the preservation of the system of domination, and how shame and judgement are main tools used for the reinforcement of systematic abuse.
Women who enjoy sharing gossip with each other are called chismosas.
However, Foucault had little faith in the possibility of change. Although I agree with the idea that power is complex and dispersed and therefore resistance should be multicentre and diverse, I also believe that this approach (on its own) could end up being rather divisive and individualistic. I think that Love, as understood by hook’s, can work as a unifying medium for resistance, and in practice can also demonstrate to be truly revolutionary. The other day I came across a podcast conversation called Love Kills Capitalism, where they discussed the raise of violence against women during and after the pandemic:
‘We have a lot of voices in the media saying things like “this is just how men are” or “this is because of particular religions / culture”. This is an outgrowth of Capitalist patriarchy. Capitalism as an economic system, because of the exploitation of labour and the alienation that many people feel from themselves, really dehumanises people. These people are not only feeling alienated from their labour, but also from their emotions, their attentions and affections as capitalism also exploits us in an affective level.’
I was surprised to hear that as I think we don’t talk enough about this dehumanisation. This cannot be treated as an individual problem, but a larger structural one where factors such as class and race are crucial and often intersect. I believe capitalism not only makes us more detached from the other, but also from our emotional side, our so called “feminine” side, which translates into dehumanisation in the long term. During the podcast they also remarked the importance of kinship relations. This really resonated with my personal experience as a half-Cuban child with divorced parents, because despite my mom being an only child I have more than 12 tias and tios (aunts and uncles) with whom I may not share blood but I certainly share love. In this line they remarked how in a more equitable society individual romantic relationships have less pressure because you have a much wider network of friends and colleagues that support you.
We should spend more time nurturing our relationships with friends. Perhaps real revolutionary change does not come from big theoretical endeavours. Perhaps getting to know ‘the other’ proofs to be as powerful. Perhaps one might even find themself.
Perhaps…
[1] bell hooks, All About Love (William Morrow edition, 2000), p.6
[2] “Foucault and Feminism: Power, Gender and the Self”, Lois McNay (Polity Press 1992), p.3.