I know that sexual shaming is rampant universally, but through my work I often come into contact with how women – feeling threatened by male desire – so often shame men, sometimes overtly, but often unconsciously.
I know many of us have been victims to men’s desire when it has been transgressive and felt disrespectful or abusive, but when we chronically and toxically shame something, it ultimately perpetuates it. There is a time and a place for naming and shaming, but also just as importantly, a need to look at our self-responsibility.
What if as women, when we experience a man’s desire for us, even if it’s a ‘sleazy’ catcall on the street, we remember just for one instant, that underneath, the sacred force of eros: the cosmic connecting and creative force of life, is at play?
What if we recognized the same force in ourself, that may also been suppressed and shamed?
What if we recognised that the more we surpress something in ourselves, the more it will trigger us when expressed in others – and that the more ease we have with our own desire, the less threatened we feel when we experience desire towards us by another.