12 Comments
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Lola's avatar

Your use of words is beautiful and nuanced. Your breadth of topics deeply considered and thought-provoking. May you never stop writing, you’re doing important work. Bought your book for my husband and can’t wait to read it after!

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Jordan Stephens's avatar

Thank you, Lola!! This means a lot. I hope to grow a community on here to expand the conversation. Big love

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Andre Chow's avatar

I love that one. Never thought of us all being made of half man and half woman. I’m gonna use that myself if you don’t mind :)

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Jordan Stephens's avatar

Please!

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Corinne Peacock's avatar

Always thought provoking. Always extending my vocabulary. Thank you for sharing.

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Donna Lancaster's avatar

Another corker Jordan. Thank you for writing and sharing this piece. So much to absorb and digest. Love it and love you xxxx

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Andrew Whalan's avatar

Yes the best definition of compassion (not mine) was to find and prevent the worst thing that happened to you and then for everyone else. This is what I heard.

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Kay Stratton's avatar

When I feel defeated and all but given up on thinking things might improve, and exhausted from women doing the heavy lifting in these discussions, I read your words. Thank you. You’ve restored a tiny bit of faith. 🙏🏼

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Sharna Waid's avatar

Your brain, your words. Never stop writing and fighting for the greater good. I hope more people see this 👏🏽

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Ros Barber's avatar

Thank you, Jordan. This is the message. Healing misogyny will heal everyone. And making sure kids are not damaged by an absence of love in those first 7 years.

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Susan Coyne's avatar

I appreciate your words. Thank you. I agree that with misogynists, they definitely hate and are disconnected from half of themselves.

But I’d like to gently bring forth some other things to consider. Many female children are *also* traumatized in the first six years of their lives (abuse is actually more frequent for female children than male children, and sexual abuse is a few times more likely for girls).

Many women grow up to be destructive in their own ways that we do need to acknowledge. However: things like spiking drinks and being sociopathic at work and chasing wealth and status as the be-all-end-all to the detriment of the earth and other humans? We need to note that we live in systems that encourage and enable this for men. I’m mentioning this because misogynists I know are very quick to talk about childhood trauma for boys (only), and leave the conversation there.

But if we don’t talk about social and economic structures and how they are built and endure, the conversation suffers. We need to take a wider lens here, to more fully encapsulate that *systems*, from the family to the corporation, aid and abet what we would call sociopathic behavior from boys and men. Even those who are *not* traumatized or hateful by nature are encouraged to act in destructive ways (and many earn lots of money by doing so, many more managers out there than CEOs).

I haven’t been met with much consideration when I’ve tried to share my wisdom with men, so I hope you welcome a perspective from someone who knows this stuff intimately, has thought about and witnessed it deeply, and as a woman (outside witness to harmful systems) has a lot to share.

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Jortzinho's avatar

Another heater, love the way your brain works mans.

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