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That's the question, isn't it, much more general than just the fertility topic. Every young woman is relentlessly reminded that she is a Qween who Slaaaaayyys, and anything countering that narrative is absolutely haram. But where is her dominion? What does she slay?
Consider this pop hit. #13 on Billboard, on the chart for half a year. If the men do all the work of enthroning the women, then the women will do their part by consuming luxuries and dancing. This is what passes for "female empowerment".
Gosh, people are writing pop songs that are power fantasies! Sometimes they even write them about women. What is the world coming to?
Come on, there's no substance here.
Every man implicitly knows that to obtain the power fantasy he has to get on the sigma grindset. Think of rap songs, they might potray the power fantasy of endless 'money,bitches and clout' to a young black man, but he knows that he would have to 'hustle' his way there. No man is under the impression that they can be James Bond just by being male.
Whilst female power fantasies are targeted at the modal female, and there is no pretense that the power has to be acquired or that not everyone can have it. It's just girl power, because girl.
I've been shilling TLP a lot lately, but once again he is on the mark. https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2013/01/no_self-respecting_woman_would.html
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Power fantasies are not good for the soul, male or female. They poison the mind.
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That's exactly the point. The power fantasy leaves "vapid" in the dust to dwell firmly in the realm of "hilariously fucking stupid", and there's no counter-balancing, reality-checking criticism because Women Are Wonderful, and any such efforts code as mean. This seems to result in a situation where middle school power fantasies are normalized and "respectable" for women in a way that they aren't for men. In the real world, we mock mall ninjas and weaboos, and some of them manage to get the message and grow up a little. Imagine if every pop song, social media outlet, movie and TV show was hammering young men with the message that they were Sons of Heaven and they should just Dragonball Z scream to unleash their warrior spirits at the school marms who oppress their divinely-blessed existence. Somehow, I don't think that would help them become sane, pro-social, reality-based members of society, I think it would foster mental illness, delusion and severely arrested development.
Male power fantasies in fiction are still very common, I think you'll find. There's an entire section of literary criticism in which the ur-narrative is The Hero's Journey. Being the Son of Heaven or some other kind of Chosen One comes standard.
Reality is, ultimately, its own check on these things, I think. Most women know they aren't actually queen of very much. Time comes for us all, and most of us grow. Some of us still like to imagine being Batman now and then while we're at it, and that's okay.
I think it might actually be harder to mock women for not being powerful just because, unlike men, we're not failing in our gender role by lacking power. Which isn't fair to men, that they should be mocked for not aligning with a gender role, but I think some of the difference that you are seeing actually comes from there.
That is generally considered good writing because it involves character growth. The hero's journey is easily contrasted with the more common female iteration being the Mary Sue, who has no journey, just an endless parade of successes.
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This is actually the initial inspiration for this insight, the difference in how defensive people get about male power fantasy fiction versus female power fantasy fiction. The women tend to get far more upset about their Mary Sues being criticized than the men do when their comparable fiction is criticized. And this ties into the gender roles you mentioned. When men get mocked for identifying too much with Goku or Captain America, most of them seem to eventually learn to sheepishly roll with it, and maybe if they're lucky and earnest they take some enduring inspiration about the value of hard training and hard virtue. Men enact their gender role by doing, and all but the most obstinate or gifted will eventually figure out that they're not the Main Character because their actions provide tangible feedback that they're not cracking home runs every at-bat, or clearly the strongest fighter at the gym. At a certain point they accept that they shouldn't expect to stumble into a fortuitous encounter that radically changes their destiny.
This is also a more developed genre, with stronger conventions about how to justify the fantasy, and a longer track record of subverting it. Even in the 80's, Eddings was mocking his own Chosen One for being a meathead who needs to shut the fuck up and just do what The Prophecy tells him. The breakout from the 90's, Wheel of Time, is about how being the Chosen One is an insane nightmare of relentless suffering. I'm unaware of any of the women's stuff subverting itself even now. AIUI, it's still blank-slate-but-sassy 17 year old world famous assassins immediately captivating the billionaire were-faerie Prince, played totally straight, and the fans of that genre get extremely upset when someone notices that this stuff is on the level of the schlockiest old comic books.
Conversely, women's gender role is more along the lines of being recognized for enduring general value/importance. This allows much less in the way of feedback, because having low-grade people/competitors fail to recognize that value before someone much higher status comes along to see it is a mainstay element of the fantasy. And so I observe women in their 30's getting more defensive than middle school boys when their power fantasy schlock is criticized for being schlock.
End result is that I think by 30, there are many more women who still think they might get swept off their feet by a handsome millionaire if they just have the right Maid in Manhattan encounter, compared to the men who still think they're going to be a rockstar who does MMA and invents new tech on the side.
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The power fantasy of being a "king" is about having agency. If a man fails at it, that sucks for him. Maybe he can recapture a bit of the spark doing home repairs, splitting wood, or building some cabinets.
The power fantasy of being a "queen" is about having a king, who's kingdom you've hijacked to fulfill your hedonism. If the woman fails at it... it usually still sucks for the man she's settled for. She recaptures a bit of the spark by relentless riding her poor man for more gibs.
But I'm sure you have a different interpretation. Women experience themselves a lot different than how others experience them.
Everyone experiences themselves differently than how others experience them. I've yet to notice any difference in the amount of self-delusion or self-rationalizing between men and women honestly. We're excellent at both as a species (arguably an adaptive trait, which might explain why its so common in everyone).
But that not withstanding, your point logically applies flipped. Women will experience men much differently than men experience themselves.
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