Depressingly, misogyny is more and more rampant, even – or especially – among young people. In this, the 21st century, a lot of men are worse than cave-dwellers.
I heard a story (true, alledgedly and unbelievably) the other day that illustrates it.
Someone (who I suspect is a bit of a misogynist himself, judging by the tone in which he speaks to women but never to men – overbearing, occasionally shouting) was talking about genealogy and the DNA technology, and a friend of his, or a friend of a friend, had found out that the father he had always thought of as his father was not his biological father.
Having found out the name of my father’s biological father through generalogy and DNA tests myself, I am finding it amusing with all the skeletons falling out of the closets the world over with this software and the relatively new technology, but my heart goes out to women who not even a century ago were stigmatised due to their “illegitimate” children. A horrible concept which I did not think existed any longer, especially not in the minds of more recent generations.
Turns out I was wrong. Back to the story.
The grandchildren of the woman in the story were “not pleased” (oh dear …. I’m guessing they are male) – because up till then “they had idolised their grandmother”. (Indicating that now she had fallen from grace, due to having had a child without being married to the father of said child, a couple of generations ago).
The notion that THEY feel entitled to judge HER at this day and age is disappointing to put it mildly, and I am almost hoping that she is no longer alive to see history repeating itself through immature, bigoted descendants who really ought to have evolved, but clearly have not.
With family like that, who needs enemies?
I could not believe my own ears.
So not only was she stigmatised and shamed at the time, and suffered the indignity of the father of the child running off and away from his responsibilities (but that was considered OK, and still is) – and if the case was anything like so many other similar cases back then, her parents would have made it abundantly clear how mortally ashamed they were of her (the man’s parents, on the other hand, were not ashamed of him but rather felt mildly inconvenienced – in fact, people probably empathized with him for having been “lured” into such an unpleasant situation – oh, boohoo), and forced her to marry a man she might not have wanted to marry had it not been for her scandalous “illegitimate child”.
Not only that but now she is judged and shamed by her immature, judgemental, “holier-than-though” grandchildren – in the 21st century.
In the case of my grandmother, I suspect she found out that she did not like the father of her “illegitimate child” (my father). From what I have heard about him and his later biological children, that would certainly make sense, and I am grateful that my father only inherited is good sides.
Perhaps that was also the case in the original story here – he was just not a desirable life partner – and these descendants take after him.
