September 20, 2012

"I'm drawing my own conclusions... My job is to notice echoes and notice resonances.... Scientists are not supposed to do the same thing that cultural critics do."

Quotes from Naomi Wolf — author of that tome about the vagina — introduced by NYT writer Lauren Sandler with the hilarious sentence: "Looking at her bookshelves stacked with works by Abbie Hoffman, Jane Fonda and John Stuart Mill, she defended her research."

I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing.

Another Wolfism:
“This is a time in which everybody is on the verge of a global awakening from a certain kind of torpor,” she said, eyes sparkling. “That’s why there’s this doubling down on the power struggle over the vagina. But this is a moment for women. We are going to have to reclaim the vagina as central to everything.”
Eyes sparkling... you just know Sandler wants you picturing that Norma-Desmond-slithering-down-the-staircase look of madness. Ready for my closeup. Closeup on my vagina!

It's central to everything!

110 comments:

Shouting Thomas said...

Meet the new Madame Blavatsky. Same as the old Madame Blavatsky.

Paging Crack!

Nonapod said...

Power struggle over the vagina? I assume this is supposed to be some kind of distillation of the War on Women theme, but it's likely I'm too simple minded to comprehend such airy metaphors.

Smilin' Jack said...

I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing.

Well, that's what it does when I'm finished with it.

gerry said...

I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing

Just how big is that sucker?

Shouting Thomas said...

Jewish girls can't get laid just because they're horny as hell and they're dying to fuck their brains out.

They need a really complicated intellectual theory to help them out.

Believe me, I've done my research.

Sigivald said...

What the hell is wrong with her?

Beta Rube said...

Never in my life have I felt this bad about not having a vagina.

Thanks, Ann.

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...

Words mean things, and the English language is rich in choices, so I think the proper word to use regarding Naomi Wolf is cunt, not vagina.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

In physics, resonance is the tendency of a system to oscillate at a greater amplitude at some frequencies than at others. Frequencies at which the response amplitude is a relative maximum are known as the system's resonant frequencies, or resonance frequencies. At these frequencies, even small periodic driving forces can produce large amplitude oscillations, because the system stores vibrational energy.

In chemistry, resonance or mesomerism [1] is a way of describing delocalized electrons within certain molecules or polyatomic ions where the bonding cannot be expressed by one single Lewis formula. A molecule or ion with such delocalized electrons is represented by several contributing structures [2] (also called resonance structures or canonical forms).


In Feminism... its a religion.

PeterJ said...

We should all be thankful that men's movement guys don't keep talking about their penises. Or do they?...

chickelit said...

gerry said...
I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing

Just how big is that sucker?


Wolf Trap Theater big?

bagoh20 said...

Vaginas are actually only marginally, metaphorically, on the periphery of my horizon right now, which probably is the center of someone's universe.

Can't you find some women who consider the penis the center of everything? Are all women such one dimensional pussy gazers.

Anonymous said...

Then she fully aligns with the chastity movement, I suppose.

Because she's clarly advocating planned scarcity in an age of unprecedented abundance.

CJinPA said...

Ready for my closeup. Closeup on my vagina!

Ha. It helps sometimes that this blog is written by a woman.

Rumpletweezer said...

If you help me find my Harley, we can ride out.

Shouting Thomas said...

We should all be thankful that men's movement guys don't keep talking about their penises. Or do they?...

They hold services for their foreskins.

Circumcision is a big issue.

YoungHegelian said...

@ST,

Blavatsky was a much better educated & interesting kind of loon than Wolf.

You know, the Ivy Leagues sure have got a lot to answer for recently. I mean, Abby Hoffman, really? What was she reading: Steal this Pussy?

Shouting Thomas said...

YH, you might be right.

The loony cult scene in Woodstock has been sliding progressively downhill in terms of quality over the past few decades.

I loved the Rajneeshees. They believed in enlightenment via orgy. They were dominant back in the 70s.

Now, we've got a bunch of shame ridden penance cults, like the Animal Farm Sanctuary that lecture us about eating meat and murdering the poor farm animals.

jungatheart said...

"Here is my secret. It is very simple: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

Get off your high horse, Althouse, and treat this subject with the seriousness it deserves. I need laid like a cheap carpet and long to be filled with the concrete poetry of tender manhood. Use your first-in-her-NYU-law-class smarts to say something useful instead of playing to the cheap seats, wouldja?

Shouting Thomas said...

Yeah, for Christ sake, Althouse, get off your high horse and talk about your vagina!

How's it doing?

lgv said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
lgv said...

Someone trying to be profound being interviewed by someone trying to be profound with the resulting failure of both parties.

Making Paglia seem smarter with each sentence Wolf utters.

Bob Ellison said...

"My job is to notice echoes and notice resonances..."

It's a tough row to ho.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

If Wolfs vagina moved back and forth and there was nobody listening... How would we know that it really vibrated?

Shouting Thomas said...

I need laid like a cheap carpet and long to be filled with the concrete poetry of tender manhood.

Hey! I can help you out!

I got the cheap carpet. My manhood is about as tender as you can get, and it recites poetry.

trumpetdaddy said...

More First World problems. Every time I'm tempted to think America is going over the cliff I see articles like this one. What a privilege to live in a society where people have the luxury to obsess over such things.

I mean that with utter sincerity. We truly have won life's lottery being born in this country.

Darrell said...

deborah = shiloh?

They both use lower case. And they both say nothing useful--only criticize the host(ess). Is this a Sybil thing? Is shiloh even aware? Is there a byroh ready to come here and squawk about box wine?

Nomennovum said...

"We are going to have to reclaim the vagina as central to everything.”

Well ... all I can say is, if it weren't for the vagina, most men would have no real use for women.

So, does that mean I agree that statement of hers or am I repulsed by its nauseating narcissism?

It probably means she would think I am a misogynist and a jerk. So, I'll double down: The vagina is central to everything in a woman."

Wince said...

"My job is to notice echoes and notice resonances.... Scientists are not supposed to do the same thing that cultural critics do."

I thought transvaginal ultrasound was part of "the war on women"?

chickelit said...

deborah said...
...the concrete poetry of tender manhood.

Teh gays found a concrete work-around for that one, deborah: link

jungatheart said...

Paglia has the right idea about the worship of the female as the provider-goddess of the ultimate, sex, and the giver of life, but Christ what a motormouth. She drones on and on in a tone that conveys that she finds herself fascinating.

chickelit said...

Darrell accused...
deborah = shiloh?

Hardly. Have you any concrete evidence?

blessings, take care


Smilin' Jack said...

“This is a time in which everybody is on the verge of a global awakening from a certain kind of torpor,” she said, eyes sparkling. “That’s why there’s this doubling down on the power struggle over the vagina. But this is a moment for women. We are going to have to reclaim the vagina as central to everything.”

It's sad the lengths to which some women are driven by their penis envy. Well, maybe not sad in this case, just kinda boring.

Darrell said...

Hardly. Have you any concrete evidence?

After that link, I would make myself scarce, lest anyone ask how I found it.

jungatheart said...

Chick, Aunt Debbie doesn't like that sort of link. Go stand in the corner.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

A concrete case of the rectum was delivered without incident.

lol.

Valentine Smith said...

Haute Bourgeois—feminism in a nutshell.

The biggest crisis of Wolf's life was to become vaginally anorgasmic. This she extrapolates into a global awakening out of a powerless torpor.

And they talk about men thinking with their dicks.

Jeez.

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...

From the article:

Sales figures are not yet available in the United States, where this year State Representative Lisa Brown, a Democrat, was censored for saying “vagina” in the Michigan House of Representatives[...]"

Censored? Probably "censured." Damn, is the NYT economizing by laying off copy editors? They'd do better laying off writers.

Darrell said...

A Chinese emporess was said to have required a kiss to said structure upon a supplicant's arrival.

What ever happened to that ritual? Has Naomi revived it, or is she just talk? My only contribution to YouTube covers this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNM6MHMerSM

rhhardin said...

"This is a time in which everybody is on the verge of a global awakening from a certain kind of torpor"

I think verge is anatomic-talk. yes..

The vaginal opening is separated from the anal verge by the perineum.

An eye opens.

Imus, discussing with McCord some news story involving the perineum and surgery gone wrong, identified it as a chin rest.

traditionalguy said...

This is a deep subject.

Amartel said...

"I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing."

That's the sound of John Stuart Mill screaming for help.

Strelnikov said...

I think we should heed her advice. After all, she advised Al Gore in 2000 and look where he is.

Anonymous said...

"My vagina is big. It's the penises that got small."

Nomennovum said...

"What a privilege to live in a society where people have the luxury to obsess over such things." -- Trumpetdaddy

That's just what Romulus Augustulus said.

"Honestum est quod vivimus hodie, Romani."

jungatheart said...

http://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=srtuQU20QXA

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

...echoes and notice resonances...

Amartel said...

What is she even talking about?

“This is a time in which everybody is on the verge of a global awakening from a certain kind of torpor,” she said, eyes sparkling. “That’s why there’s this doubling down on the power struggle over the vagina. But this is a moment for women. We are going to have to reclaim the vagina as central to everything.”

WTF does this even MEAN????
Is that too sciencey a question? Too specific?
What torpor? Who is awakening?
What's this "power struggle over the vagina"? Who's struggling? Over what? When, if ever, was the vagina 'central to everything' that it needs to be reclaimed as such and what does being 'central to everything" even mean?

It's all just so much logorrhea.

chickelit said...

Paul Zrimsek said...
"My vagina is big. It's the penises that got small."

Threadwinner!

Nomennovum said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Nomennovum said...

"WTF does this even MEAN????"

It means she has a book to sell and needs to generate some buzz. Do you think it's working?

SteveR said...

Vaginas have been central to my life since birth, with a few off years until puberty kicked in. We only need them for a few minutes every so often and are otherwise quite willing to let them be a a centering focus for women.

DADvocate said...

If your vagina is echoing and resonating, you need to see a doctor.

Reminds me of a verse in an old sailing song:

The first old maiden,
she upped and said,
mines as big as the sea,
the ship sail in,
the ship sail out,
and never even bother me.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

A cavernous vagina with an echo presupposes a concrete like wall.

Chip.. this tread is just vibrating for a visual.

Synova said...

In other words, cultural critics get to make stuff up.

So her "research" isn't like what scientists do.

traditionalguy said...

They say Princess Kate's photos were merely topless. So she is not fully supportive of the women's latest and greatest war for freedom.

All vaginas are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights...unless they are created on Chaz Bono.

Eric said...

I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing

If your vagina resonates and echos you probably ought to see your doctor.

Carol said...

Making Paglia seem smarter with each sentence Wolf utters.

Funny, I was just recently trying to slog through Sexual Personae. All I got out of it is that the vagina used to be the center of the universe, but that it was something to be left behind. Or something.

But I got tired of all the mythos stuff and took it back to the libray.

Temujin said...

She's been fucking nuts for years. If I can say that.

Shouting Thomas said...

She's been fucking nuts for years. If I can say that.

Whose nuts has she been fucking?

She is kinda cute for an old broad. Wonder if she's available?

jungatheart said...

Armatel, the idea is that the vagina has been seen as unclean, a rank hole that emits blood, but tempts men. A hygeine problem. Every proudly free-swingin' dick knows that.

jungatheart said...

She's solidly gay, ST.

Chip Ahoy said...

Center of the universe.

I too have a center of the universe. We could bump uglies and universes collide.

You know what happens when universes collide? Have you ever seen those computer simulation galaxy dots? It's like a ballet, schwing, depending on how they collide. If they just clip they affect each other and swirl, or they can commingle. Which is a word that looks better with one m.

Shouting Thomas said...

Armatel, the idea is that the vagina has been seen as unclean, a rank hole that emits blood, but tempts men. A hygeine problem.

That's precisely what I like about them.

Shouting Thomas said...

She's solidly gay, ST.

The article says she used to be married to a man.

So, apparently, she's a little wobbly.

jungatheart said...

She finds men threatening, or somesuch.

chickelit said...

deborah said...
Chick, Aunt Debbie doesn't like that sort of link. Go stand in the corner.

Tough shit. I fully expect to be subjected to the "Rectum Monologs" one day.

We used to get them from Titus, remember?

jungatheart said...

Tough shit, INDEED.

edutcher said...

All of this reminds me of the Gee-your-girl-has-a-big-pussy joke in "Predator".

Ann Althouse said...

Ready for my closeup. Closeup on my vagina!

Is it studded?

Jeweled?

Tattooed?

Full-flavored?

jungatheart said...

Breaker breaker, Ed has screwed the pooch.

David said...

I knew the vagina monologued, but I wasn't really thinking about it resonating and echoing.

It's an amplification device. The right input will create all kinds of noise.

ricpic said...

...the power struggle over the vagina...

The Austrian School doesn't stand a chance against Bernanke's open ended stimulus. Of course the world will have been lost. But the vagina won! And in the final analysis...

chickelit said...

David said...

It's an amplification device. The right input will create all kinds of noise.

A squelching device

William said...

Philip Roth's reputation as a writer became entwined with and perhaps overshadowed by his notoriety as a masturbator. It sold books, but who wants to go through life being known as a jerk off artist. I predict a similar problem will now stalk Naomi. Her vagina has achieved celebrity status while her writings are now just an afterthought. It will sell books, but she has presented her vagina in a way that is more conducive to ridicule than reverence. Who wants their vagina to be a laughing stock? I have frequently suffered ridicule because of my oddly shaped and somewhat luridly colored penis so I can tell Naomi that it's no joke having your procreative organs mocked. I sympathize with her, but the bet here is that her next three books will be about how unfairly she's been treated for her vaginal affirmations.

Synova said...

"The article says she used to be married to a man."

I'm not going to go back and skim/read it over again but I *thought* that it said she was dating some guy with a yacht who gave her fabulous orgasms.

I wasn't reading closely, so it may be that my brain was embellishing the horrors.

Anonymous said...

Wolf seems to represent the worst of current literature: she puts postmodern and feminism often above artistry and talent (the personal is political). What's sad is there are good writers, some of whom are women, worth reading.

She comes at the end of a long period of confessional lit and poetry, where the Western individual is a figure outside of society, but has turned inward for meaning, which has led to introspection and navel-gazing and much theory in service only to itself, not even the art.

She finds meaning in shameless self-promotion, laughably postmodern appropriation of science, and the feminist retaking-of the-twat crusade in vulgar fashion. Is the writing even any good?

She's made herself into a kind of clueless, twat-centered, postmodern art installation.

Maybe there's some artistry in that.

William said...

If Philip Roth got a bikini wax, could the waxer be described as someone who waxed roth.

ricpic said...

Like A Fish Needs A Bycicle

Vagina swallows penis
Then gobbles penis up
Then circles the arena
Rid of the loch in kop.

ricpic said...

Oops, bicycle.

edutcher said...

deborah, do you know what full-flavored in this context means?

jungatheart said...

"She's made herself into a kind of clueless, twat-centered, postmodern art installation.

Maybe there's some artistry in that."

Reminiscent of _Eat, Pray, Love_, a paean to self-centered introspection and self-gratification. The Me generation has hit its stride.

ricpic said...

Yeah, but at least Roth was semi-laughing at himself all the way; not so the terribly important terribly serious Naomi.

ricpic said...

Hey William, I'm guessing purple. No answer required...or desired for that matter.

Nomennovum said...

There once was a bra burner who spoke
And made her vagina a joke.
And to men with a beef
It would respond with a queef:
“Please give this old cunny a poke!”

jungatheart said...

I've read enough of Peter's predelictions as to what state a woman's nether regions should be, so yes.

Ken Green said...

There's a joke from Predator having to do with vaginae that echo:

"Billy. Billy! The other day, I was going down on my girlfriend, I said to her, "Jeez you got a big pussy. Jeez you got a big pussy."

She said, "Why did you say that twice?" I said, "I didn't."

[Billy stares blankly]

Hawkins: See, cuz of the echo."

jungatheart said...

(Ed, I was only kidding, anyway.)

wef said...

she should be in a burqa

and why is anyone than algore paying any attention to her at all?



jungatheart said...

(apologies in advance)


Self-Portrait
From Loveroot

She was not a slender woman,
but her skin was milk
mixed in with strawberry jam
& between her legs the word purple was born
& her hair was the color of wheat & yellow butter.

Her eyes were dark as the North Atlantic sea.

She learned the untranslatable words of dawn.
She studied her own fear & wrote its verses.
She used the hole in her heart to play wind-music.
She built her book-houses over her empty cellar.

She nursed on the muse at first,
then became her own mother.
-Erica Jong

rcocean said...

"Looking at her bookshelves stacked with works by Abbie Hoffman, Jane Fonda and John Stuart Mill, she defended her research."

LoL! The reporter didn't mention the J.S. Mill is still unopened.

Amartel said...

edutcher said
"Is it studded?
Jeweled?
Tattooed?
Full-flavored?"

Bangled, tangled, spangled, and spaghettied?


Dante said...

We are going to have to reclaim the vagina as central to everything.

No doubt the Vagina is a pretty amazing organ, and is central to human reproduction. It holds great sway over male and female emotions, and causes us humans to do the nasty. Same with male sexuality, and it takes two (but please, not a village). Extrapolating from an evolutionary perspective, the Vagina (and the penis too) are symbols of our slavery to our genes, no more.

To worship the vagina as central to all things is a retreat to primitive deity worship, in this case, worship of the enslaving God of reproduction.

Those women who pursue Vagina worship, are in danger that others will take them up on it. Us semi-enlightened men realize you worship your vagina, in fact define it as central to you. We may not be so stupid, but you go ahead and build your life around your vagina, and do the reproducing, while we men go off to cocktail hour.

jungatheart said...

http://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=C4MLssRM7LM

jungatheart said...

Dante, at the risk of repeating myself, it is not about vagina worship, but stressing that just because the penis is exterior and non-gooey does not establish that the interior gooey vagina is inferior.

Dante said...

Dante, at the risk of repeating myself, it is not about vagina worship, but stressing that just because the penis is exterior and non-gooey does not establish that the interior gooey vagina is inferior.

Reading your stuff, that's all fine. But you must realize the vagina is embedded deeply in the psyches of all males. And "gooey" does sound horrid. I prefer "slippery when wet."

Meanwhile, there is a big gap you have to traverse from "vagina central to all things" Naomi Wolf and your defense of the poor, bleeding, stinky, gooey vagina as not being a bad thing. (Heck, I suspect everyone of us here is pretty grateful we made it through that tunnel of nastiness alive and without too much infection).

jungatheart said...

lol you bastard.

Yes, the vagina is the comforting conduit welcoming the beloved rod of delight; the vagina's centrality being but half the equation. The center of the universe lies in the joining.

madAsHell said...

Yeah.....ya' hav' to be an in-ta-lechwel to understan dit!

ricpic said...

The center of the universe lies in the joining.

Though the whole universe lie around us
It cannot be found but in the joining,
When the lost vector that is male
Finds the lost target that is female.
There will they find and be found
And never be lost again,
There, in the center.

Dante said...

Yes, the vagina is the comforting conduit welcoming the beloved rod of delight; the vagina's centrality being but half the equation

Oh, I was referring to childbirth.

From that perspective, it's "Staff of Life," not "Rod of Delight."

Hah! Think about that, Naomi.

deborah said...

The risk of loss
Raises the stakes.

deborah said...

The Staff of Life is bread.

Dante said...

The Staff of Life is bread.

Bread for the Vagina? The vagina does look like a mouth. In fact, I have an idea for a porn film, with the title "Pussy Mouth," that Naomi might like.

In it, the vagina becomes more powerful, and hungry. A poor sailor, near dead, is washed ashore on some uncharted Island. Upon awakening, he sees a thin man running away for fear of his life from a gorgeous woman in pursuit. The man later discovers the reason is the pussies have become very demanding, and sometimes even angry when they are not fed properly. And that can lead to nipping, and even biting.

Our poor castaway goes from feeling his every wish has been granted, to a drained, exhausted, hunted man cursing himself for ever having wanted women to have sex drives as strong as men.

The story, while set to a porn background, is actually a tribute to the centrality of the vagina in male thought, the recognition of the centrality of the vagina to all things. At the end of the movie, the island is revealed to be shaped as a vagina, and the men finally find a deep hole in the center of the island in which they can hide, like some nasty bacteria, clinging in cracks and crevices.

deborah said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
deborah said...

I think you're making that up, Dante.

Chip S. said...

Naomi may be the world's first vulviloquist.

FKACato said...

"I had no idea that my relationship to the vagina was gonna be cleaning shit out of a tiny one several times a day?"

- Louis C.K.

Unknown said...

Well, he’s finally done it! Say hello to the Gray Lady’s newest, jazziest, absolutely moistest staff writer! After years of surreptitious sex – blowjobs in the freight elevator, DP while bent backwards over the collating copier, S&M sessions in Pinch’s secret 13th floor dungeon I’ve finally landed my dear job! Watch for my searing op-eds starting any minute now.
XXX
Eureen

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
DEEBEE said...

OMG we will all be vulavanized. Resistance is futile.

vet66 said...

Don't these women have gynecologists? How many of them go to male OBGYM's? Is the speculum some sort of rape device devised by men to plunder the vagina? The world we live in does not revolve around the vagina. How do they square the circle with the false drama of a vagina centric universe? They protest too much.