The First Bride

[naamah_darling]

Theodora Goss on the true lesson of Bluebeard, and living as a woman.

When I teach my class on fairy tales, I ask students about the moral of “Bluebeard.” Charles Perrault gives us a moral, clearly marked “moral,” at the end of the tale: “Curiosity, in spite of its appeal, often leads to deep regret. To the displeasure of many a maiden, its

Comments

[dark_phoenix54]

Brilliant as always. I wish all girls could be taught this very, very young, rather than having to learn it the hard way.

[naamah_darling]

Hard or soft, we almost always do learn. And I am perpetually surprised that we are strong enough to bear it as well as we do.

We need to teach boys, though. Boys won't learn, unless things change drastically, or we make them go look in that room and explain that the bloody key and their key are on the same chain, and nobody can tell by looking which key goes to which room.

[dark_phoenix54]

Yes, absolutely. We shouldn't have to be on our guard all the time; men should act decently. I should add that the men I hang out with *are* decent and wouldn't do that kind of shit. My ex, though was another matter. His mother brought him up like a little prince and he didn't see why he had to cater to anyone. Parents need to stop idolizing their sons.

[naamah_darling]

Most of the men I know are decent, too. The exceptions have been rare, and short-lived, as I try to cut the association off as completely as possible as soon as I discover that they are not trustworthy. But most have been decent folks. Most of my female friends have not been as lucky as I have, though, and that's fucking tragic. Even if each woman meets only ONE MAN who fucks her shit up completely, that's seriously WAY TOO MANY. There's a LOT of exes on that list.

[windy_nocturne]

Huzzah.

[mt_straycat]

Many times, maybe most times, they just hide it very, very well.

I can tell you from personal experience that this is often the case. To everyone on the outside, they appear friendly, charming, funny, helpful... It's behind closed doors that the mask comes off. And of course no one wants to believe that such a nice guy would really do such things, he's always great with them, therefore the woman must be a lying bitch.

Many of them are smart enough to know they can't get away with that behavior at large. If they treated their friends or coworkers the way they treat their wives or girlfriends, they'd wind up with a punch in the nose at the very least, all the way up to jail or hospital time. So they... reserve it for when they know they can get away with it.

[naamah_darling]

YES. EXACTLY THAT.

I get to hear stories about these assholes from way too many of my girlfriends.

[flameelf]

Well, you KNOW all women are 'psycho' and since we don't know what we REALLY want, Men have to TELL us/SHOW us/MAKE us do "...what 'we' want..." *shakes head*

Grey :)

[hollowdoll]

YES. This so hard. I wish LJ had an upvote button.

[ashbet]

You are amazing. Full stop.

[labelleizzy]

I am linking.

thank you for this.