Blog

Book: 'The Second Sex'

Author.

Genre: Essay

Genre: sociology, philosophy, history

Score (1 to 6): 6

Another book I want to talk to you about, especially with Women's Day coming up, is The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir. It's a universe book. Unfortunately, I can't cover all aspects with a social media post and it was one of the first books I thought I couldn't wait to write about when we decided to create this blog.

The book is a huge philosophical-historical-sociological essay about women - since the world began. It covers the history of women from tribal times, to the 20th century when it was written. The author comments on the historical characteristics of the female part of society that have come down to us through various sources. Examines in detail the portrayal of women in literature, from Shakespeare's times, to her own.

I would dare to call it - a kind of textbook on women's history.

The power of this treatise, however, comes full circle when it succeeds in inspiring the philosophical movement of early feminism. It is thus the foundation of modern society, of global emancipation, without many of us having a clue, without Simone herself being here to see how we distort its pure idea. One that speaks of the utopian equality of the sexes, with, of course, each dominating the other a little in various aspects of life, without one being lower in the social hierarchy than the other.

Simone-Hernestin-Lucie-Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 in Paris into a family of high social standing and Catholic affiliation. She developed intellectually from an early age, graduating with a degree in philosophy, coming second in the graduation exam, and first beating Jean-Paul Sartre. At 21, she was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. The two remained linked for life.

But let's go back to "The Second Sex" and the role of the book, on the modern world. Aside from being an extremely rich source of historical information and probably one of the most detailed sources where one can read a summarized form of almost everything written about and by "women" ever, this book inspired the beginning of the feminist movement, thanks to which we modern women are living in perhaps the best times (so far) for women.

With all this in mind, however, we should note one crucial detail: in her analysis of all the facts about the centuries of women's oppression, Simone stresses her desire and hope to live in a world where both sexes are equal in rights, where their duties and tasks complement and help each other. A world where men do not dominate women in their entire existence and definitely vice versa, but both sexes "dominate" and complement each other in different spheres of life, depending on their competence. And not just genders, but individuals. One is stronger physically and has an advantage to be noted, another understands math, a third music, a fourth can write. They all "dominate" and complement each other in their respective fields according to competence, not the givenness of gender.

Sadly, today we are seeing a process where we are trying to reverse the ladder, in our desire for equality we are suppressing the "first" gender and imperceptibly (I hope it is imperceptible at least) we are taking a path that will lead us to swap the two roles and the meaning of equality will be lost again.

We humans regularly resort to such an ugly distortion of ideas - Hitler taking Nietzsche's superman (which elevates the individual) and using it to elevate one nation above the rest. Stalin takes Marx's idea of equality between classes and uses it to build a stark "socialism". And we take the path of equality between the sexes, between races and nations, again to elevate one above the other.