Who Needs Feminism When You Have Femininity?

Have you ever watched Beauty and the Beast? One of the many Disney tales as old as time. Tales which tend to have this repetitive theme which includes telling young girls that if they are pretty and carry princess qualities there is surely some lad coming to save them. The archetypal modern woman’s beliefs tend to align with feminist theory would disagree with this narrative by far, but just as feminism has rose in popularity so have its contrasting stances. One example being the idea of embracing femininity. Enhancing your feminine charm is thought to ‘reap more benefits than masculating yourself in the name of equality between the sexes’. The subreddit group titled RedPillWomen are a group of women who believe in many traditionalist conservative views. Which tend to be labeled as anti-feminist, misogynist, and sexist. By sharing the analysis of the RedPillWomen subreddit it may hopefully help create a greater understanding can be made of the rhetoric shared between the group’s members.

RedPillWomen’s reddit interface is pink and white. Its icon being a pink pill which references to the red pill community’s common association with men. The creator describes the group as: a place for women to discuss sexual strategy. Claiming that all theories that would be useful to the members of the group are expected to take a traditional, evolutionary psychological, or anti-feminist foundation. The group focuses on long term relationships, marriage and building families. These guidelines made it clear that the blog only cares to push and talk about their

narrative. It seems they are uninterested in acknowledging anything in opposition. RPW’s approach to sharing their narrative through advice forums and think pieces appears informative on the surface but it also lacks a solid base necessary for argument sake. RedPillWomen’s sidebar lacks any scientific backing behind why their concepts and strategies are full proof. Small details like this amount to a big difference when attempting to recruit people to stand with your point of view. Members of the group would deny the credibility of this study and pull up some evolutionary psychology articles which support women being subservient to men. So, let’s see what the men who share the same beliefs as the members desire in a woman.

Despite what the subreddit’s name hints at, members of the subreddit are not looking to pair with men who are also followers of Red Pill theory. They disassociate from the manosphere aspect of the online community entirely. I find this interesting. You would think that these women would want to be paired with men who carry similar stature as them, but they believe that men are not attracted to women based off their intellectual background. Many women believe that men desire subservient women that need guidance. Explaining that if a man can lead his women his ego will be pleased and that the feeling would act as a positive reinforcement for him to keep engaging with her. Although this sounds plausible in theory, if you’re a believer in gender roles, a study conducted in 2014 found that 87% of men said they would date a woman who was more intellectual than they were, who was better educated, and who made considerably more money than they did, while 86% said they were in search of a woman who was confident and self-assured.

One of the many figureheads for the men’s Red Pill community is Rollo Tomassi. He is seen as one of the leading voices in the globally growing, male-focused online consortium known as the “Manosphere”. Tomassi has a blog under the name of therationalmale.com. Most

of his blog posts are directed for men, but he recently released a blog directed for women who are also fans of his work. In the post Tomassi tells women about their hypergamous nature and gives them a list of skills which they should consider cultivating so they can bring more value to the men they wish to pursue. Advising women to maintain a thin figure, prepare to be efficient homemakers, and get a job (but specifically not a career). Funny enough RPW agrees with almost all these points except not following through with a career. Tomassi says career women are inherently masculine, but RPW says if you cultivate your femininity a real man will admire you. I guess the real question here is: Would Tomassi would approve of the women RPW is attempting to create?

The subreddit has a lot of required readings, which are recommended to be read prior to posting any content on the reddit forum, and introductory think-pieces. One of which is meant to explain to newcomers how they would benefit from applying the ‘red pill’ concepts into their daily lives. The post’s author describes how her adoption of the red pill concepts assisted her coming to age experience. She describes how accepting the world from a blue pill perspective, which is described as living life without a complete understanding of its meaning and often associated with liberalism, she felt a lot of uncertainty and confusion about how to approach her daily life. She explains how seeing exactly what her role is in society through the lens of TRP’s acceptance of traditional gender roles calmed her anxiety. By ignoring the range of diversity in the world and placing everyone on the planet in two gender-specific roles her understanding of the world becomes easier to digest. Now this is undeniably useful while coming to age and it is quite normal to oversimplify many of the complicated aspects to feel more comfortable about adulthood. Yet to subscribe to this narrative for the rest of your life denies many of the complex layers of life since everyone can’t fit into this traditional formation of the world.

I am sure the rhetoric used in the RedPillWomen subreddit were useful at some point of time. Many of the ideologies that are no longer accepted as resourceful once were. But when you cannot find resonance with the modern ways of the world you should not fixate on the past. As it does not hold all of life’s answers. The women in the subreddit obviously do not resonate with pop-culture’s expression of feminism. This phenomenon is not uncommon as one in five young women would self-identify as a feminist. Yet swinging to the extreme opposite may not be the proper way to tackle these differing beliefs. I think the shift in views may simply be a case of grass is greener syndrome. Women think traditional gender roles may improve their quality of life when in reality adopting these beliefs just encourage a different set of issues.

References

Match.com, “Singles in America: Match Releases Its Fifth Annual Comprehensive Study on the Single Population,” news release, Feb. 4, 2016, http://www.multivu.com/players/English/7433451-match-singles-in-america/.

Tomassi, R. (2019, October 31). An Essay for Women. Retrieved from https://therationalmale.com/2019/10/31/an-essay-for-women/.i

Publications. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://genforwardsurvey.com/reports/.