Hysterical Quotes

“Frye noted that, when it comes women’s anger, ‘Attention is turned not to what we are angry about but to the project of calming us down and to the topic of our mental stability.’ She wrote this almost forty years ago, but it might well have been yesterday. Even today, women’s testimony about their own experiences are seen as invalid and unreliable. When the root of their anger is not seen as valid, or is deemed unintelligible, it is easier to dismiss the anger as unjustified.3”
― Pragya Agarwal, Hysterical: Exploding the Myth of Gendered Emotions

“Jeroen Jansz from the University of Amsterdam defines the traditional cultural model of masculinity for a white western man as comprising four parameters: autonomy (I stand alone); achievement (I need to achieve and provide); aggression (I am tough and can be aggressive if need be); and stoicism (I am strong, I do not share pain and grief openly, I do not have warm feelings).58 Men’s emotionality is determined by what they see around them from a young age. This is how a man should be, young boys are told by their fathers, uncles and grandfathers, and also by the men depicted in media, in films and in books. Video games sometimes offer an alternative world, a way, particularly for young people who are still creating their identity, to confront emotions that are linked to masculine identity (such as anger), and other emotions that are seen as not so masculine, such as fear.”
― Pragya Agarwal, Hysterical: Exploding the Myth of Gendered Emotions

“But as we know, men and women/male and female bodies are not built to specific templates. It isn’t that all men have higher testosterone than women and all women have higher prolactin. That is just not the case. But the media keeps hyping up these differences as if they are set in stone. Women cry more, is the message that we hear again and again, because they are hormonal, and because they just can’t help it. In the same way that women are more nurturing, they are more passive, they are better parents, they are more caring, they are more empathetic. All generalised stereotypes. And if you read this and think that this is rightly so, do reflect on why it is so. Is it because women have been told that they should be like this, because this is a sign of femininity, because this is what makes them better women and better mothers? Is it because we are afraid of not conforming to these behaviours, that we feel threatened that we wouldn’t live up to our ideals of womanhood, and our own and others’ expectations?”
― Pragya Agarwal, Hysterical: Exploding the Myth of Gendered Emotions