Review: Rage Becomes Her

(Image credit to Goodreads)

(TW: Mention of sexual assault, sexual harassment, and rape)

Anger has always been associated as something negative in my life. Learning from my childhood, expressing anger was seen so frequently that I vowed to never be like that. I learned to suppress my anger, my rage, my frustrations. Of course, while I was learning how to do that, I would have explosive episodes of rage that would end destructively. I could not see anger as anything else other than negative and something to bury deep down inside myself.

Rage Becomes Her* has opened my eyes to how inherently sexist it is to suppress my anger in the ways I learned to. Keeping myself quiet, demure, and pleasable to society plays on the stereotypes that women are weak. Self-silencing my anger and frustrations from situations around me harms ultimately one person, me. The book noted women who suppress their anger find themselves reporting higher blood pressure, future heart issues, and the feeling of daily unmanageable stress. While I am still young, I can absolutely attest to the last one being a problem I suffer. My stress feels constant, daily, and something I cannot control. Reframing my thoughts about my anger can help me feel better mentally and physically by removing those problems happening down the line. These ideas really brought anger into a new light for me.

A section in the book that truly had a deep impact on me was the chapter on sexual harassment, assault, and rape. As someone who has experienced all three before 18, this chapter was eye-opening to something I had suppressed within myself long ago. I am very aware that all three of those are ways to control and silence women. I know that first-hand. I didn't know how impactful they are to how women view anger as well. As any woman who has experienced either of these, we learn to live with it sadly. We are taught that this is normal, this is what men do to us, and we need to do our best to prevent it by not walking alone, carefully de-escalating situations, and other avoidance strategies we have been taught since youth. While I know how despicable it is that we as women have to face this on a daily basis, I too was trapped in the mode we all settle into to protect ourselves from this and found myself relying on avoidance strategies I learned. What I forgot was the absolute rage and anger I feel that I even have to do this when the solution should be to teach boys not to act harmfully towards girls. The rage I feel when I am harassed for my gender, when I think back to what happened to me when I was 8 years old, and all the other incidents I have endured in my life. I have learned to suppress those incidents for my own sanity, but I think finding a healthy embrace of them is more beneficial. Using the rage to speak out against injustices that you or other women experiences is a very positive way. Using social media, donating money to women's centered causes, and volunteering your time are perfect ways to hone that rage into something that challenges society's view of women. That rage shows society you are not willing to back down, even though you may face a bombardment of mockery and further harassment.

Overall, I found this book extremely enlightening. I have never been ashamed to call myself feminist and I do my best to research topics centering around it. This, however, brought a new light into an emotion I viewed as only negative. It brought up my own self-silencing and self-policing I did with my anger. Learning more about the effects of doing that to myself and how to positively use anger has become a lesson I will not forget. To apply these lessons, I have set up recurring donations to Planned Parenthood, vowed to express my anger and frustrations at work as well as in my relationships, and I feel more likely to express anger online when I am able to speak out against injustice. Rage Becomes Her is an extremely valuable book for all women and I highly recommend men read this as well to better understand the world we live in. Discussing the topics with men and having them understand our world helps them become better allies. If men are open to listening and learning about the subjects described in the book, they will be better partners, better allies, and better men. I highly recommend sharing this book with all your friends and encouraging people to embrace their anger in positive ways.

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