Femophobia: How Women Have Become Men - On the Fear of Fat, Fear of the Feminine and the Collapse of Society

Femophobia

How Women Have Become Men

On the Fear of Fat

Fear of the Feminine

and the Collapse of Society

Tovi Browning, N.D.,D.O.

Femophobia - How Women Have Become Men

Tovi Browning

ISBN: 965-90523-1-6

Copyright © 2005 Tovi Browning

New Edition 2016

Thanks to Hadas Kadmiel for re-designing of cover, 2016

Distributed by Smashwords

Ebook formatting by www.ebooklaunch.com

No part of this book is to be reproduced in any way, whether in printed, electronic, pictorial, photocopy forms or others, unless prior permission for short quotations has been provided in writing by the author. Any breach of this copyright will be enforced by international law.

1. Self actualization (Psychology)

For all information, contact:

Tovi Browning International Center

Email: rakut@holistic-pulsing.com

www.holistic-pulsing.com

Copies of this book and of The Power of softness - Holistic Pulsing by Tovi Browning, and information on Holistic Pulsing may be obtained from the above address.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Note to the reader

1. Readers Reveals

2. How Equality Became Identicality Liberation or Masculinization?

3. Femophobia - Fear of The Feminine

4. Femophobia And The Terror of Softness

5. Femophobia And The Love of Force

6. Matter over Mind

7. Femophobia And The Fear of Power

8. Femophobia and Menstruation

9. Recovering From Femophobia - Tools for Moving Towards Balance

Bibliography

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many thanks to: Caroline Pond, Barry Long, Dr. Michel Odent, Cindy Crawford, Ann Moir and David Jessel, Oprah Winfrey, Prof. Peter Beumont of Sydney University, Kerry O’Brien, Jennifer Rowe, Prof. David Ben-Tovim of Adelaid Weight Disorder Unit, Dr. Robert Fisher, Katharine Gilday, Prof. Peter Herman, Prof. Janet Polivy, Kathy Lette, Paul Sussman, Robert A. Johnson, Dale Wasserman, Rosemary Stanton, Marcia Germaine Huchinson, Susan Kano, David Concar, Wendy Harmer, Mark Edwards, Prof. McNeill Alexander, John Forrest, John Diamond, Julia Grice, Kate Fischer, Kate Llewellyn, Gloria Steinem, Jane Meredith, Prof. Philip Tierno Jr., Dr. Lynette Dumble of the University of Melbourne, Esther Rome, Tamara Slayton, Mariane Van Eyk McCaine, Sylvia Brinton Perera, Elizabeth Davis, Helen Colton, Dr. David Bresler.

INTRODUCTION

This is a provocative book. No doubt you will experience some extreme feelings as you read it. However, on reading it through to the end, you will, like many before you, come out a changed person. Those who have read it more than once have realized how much they have changed with each read.

This book demonstrates that the contemporary euphoria over a flourishing liberation of women is an illusion. Women today appear to be liberated, yet in effect they oppress themselves. When we understand that all humans possess both opposites of Masculine and Feminine within them, we begin to perceive that it is possible for women to seemingly liberate themselves, whilst simultaneously taking up the oppression of the Feminine - that vital component essential to life. Indeed, it is becoming increasingly apparent that more readily than liberating the feared Feminine, women have progressively espoused and personified the Masculine. Man’s world, far from growing more gender balanced as we like to believe, has stealthily become the internal reality for all and as a result we, men and women alike, suffer.

We have created a surreptitious, universal disability that on the whole manages to escape our awareness. It is the fear of the Feminine, or femophobia (the terms are interchangeable in the text). This fear is the indiscernible, clandestine root cause motivating the global rejection of the Feminine. The resounding ovation for the growing equality of the sexes masks the bitter reality that the Feminine is all but dead in this world, and as a consequence every one of us is in danger, while the critical state of mother planet herself mirrors our own human malaise. Now more than ever it is imperative that we allow the Feminine back into the frantic race our lives have become, so as to halt the escalation of our distress symptoms and restore our lost balance.

Hyper-masculine - in contrast to the essential Masculine and its respective gifts - is a term used within this book to describe our precarious condition whereby the vital equilibrium between feminine and masculine elements is disturbed, with a lack of the former and excess of the latter. This is both our personal and societal condition at present. Individual pathology, people’s daily stress, as well as the ills of society and indeed the current state of health or disease of planet Earth, all reflect the hyper-masculine imbalance.

For the sake of our children and the future of this planet, we must wake up to the universal imbalance which stems from femophobia - the fear of the Feminine. The book unearths and alerts us to the numerous forms that fear of the Feminine assumes today: from the current masculinization of women, to their intense hostility towards their bodies; the vendetta against fat and the medical secrets it holds; the fear of softness; society’s psycho-physiological love affair with the Masculine, with force and hardness in every shape; the reign of testosterone in matter and manner; how Vagina became Penis in disguise; femophobia and tattoos, body-piercing, body-building and sport; the biochemical war of the sexes; the spermic speed of modern life and its price; the exaltation of mind in the fight against the body; body parts and tissue chauvinism; the conquest of menstruation; the masculinization of our very senses, of our perception, of sex; the penetration of violence into the mind of every adult and child; the inner misogyny - women against themselves; how equality succumbed to identicality; the fear of true power; the pain and war addicts we have become.

The Feminine is dying, and unless we awaken to this, so may we. Eating disorders, sweeping addictions, escalating crime, overflowing prisons and orphanages, an avalanche of divorce, broken homes and relationships, mounting fear and anger, mushrooming eruption of the life-threatening diseases which plague us and their ecological reflections, are her warnings. We have little choice but to awaken, so that we may choose life and relish its gifts.

A lifeline is provided in this book, by helping us awaken to our insidious fear of the Feminine. The reader becomes aware of the ways in which we bolster the flammable instability of our hyper-masculine living, and is given the tools to bring about real and positive change.

This is a survival handbook.

Note to the reader

It is highly recommended you read this book in sequence as written, since it is constructed in such a way as to afford the reader an actual journey from the Masculine to the Feminine. The first chapters are represented in a harsh, sharp and cutting masculine manner. Then gradually the experience becomes rounder, softer, more feminine, and the circle is completed.

Within this book you will find explorational exercises that you can carry out by yourself, with a friend, or in groups. Even on first reading important information about yourself will surface - pay attention to it and you will be enriched. These explorations will enhance self discovery and growth, bringing about a fundamental change for the better in the way you relate to life, to yourself and your body. You may choose to keep a journal of the ensuing insights. When carried out in groups, the experience is inevitably amplified for all.

It is recommended that you read the book more than once. You will find that with each reading you discover elements of which you had previously been unaware, and which are of particular significance for you at the time. The process of reading this book in itself is a step towards the healing of oneself and society.

Chapter 1

Readers Reveal

For seven years I researched and wrote this book, not knowing if it would echo with anyone, nor how it would be received. When it was finally published, one academic paper wrote about it: One of the best and most daring books ever to have been published… Another newspaper wrote of it: New-age babble with too many exclamation marks… Somewhere between the two extremes lay what mattered most - humans, ordinary women and men who read the book and consequently underwent profound changes, which often surprised them and were too intimate to speak of. Nevertheless, they wrote about it, and still do. Below you will find a small collection of the brave and inspiring wealth of testimonies, which prove once more the great human potential for positive change, and for creating a better world for ourselves and our children.

* My strongest experience as a result of reading this book occurred on meeting my intimate friend. He caressed me in places I had never before allowed. This time I did not prevent him from touching my ‘fat areas’, and I even enjoyed it. I now look at my body with different eyes - despite its ‘flaws’ it is strong, it has kept me well, and I am privileged to have it!

* As a man, this book shook and amazed me. It confirmed my bemusement at women’s obsession with diets. Nearly all the women I know are thin, and in any case, not fat. Yet they all think they must lose more weight. It always makes me laugh to see women who should put on a few pounds, claim they must diet and workout punishingly at the gym. There is not one woman in my workplace who is fat, nevertheless they all attempt to diet and workout although they despise it. When I look at a woman, I too am undoubtedly affected by the images of all those thin models, but it has frequently happened that a woman who looked just fine to me complained about being too fat, or having a nose that is too long, or being too hairy (when frankly I would need a magnifying glass to see that). After all the most important thing is the joy of life, which brings out true beauty.

* When I read your own personal experience with cancer, I was very moved by your courage and determination to go the whole hog. The more I read, the more I saw how I allow the outside world affect my inner reality; how harshly I judge myself in life. I could see my own imbalance between the Masculine and Feminine. After finishing the book, I suddenly had the urge to eat. A simple act I usually fight. So I did! I no longer have to constantly fight myself. And lo and behold! Since I stopped fighting, I unexpectedly found a new balance, and instead of putting on weight I lost it naturally. More important than anything, I now know that my body is healthy and that I love every part of it.

* I grew up with the message that you don’t talk about emotions, that emotions are childish and inferior. For many years I walked around feeling inferior and over-emotional. There was a clear bias towards all that was masculine in my home, I too fought my mother and refused to do any ‘feminine’ chores in the house. I agonized over not being a boy. I tried to please my father, going against my own wishes, yet never pleasing him. I was at constant war, especially against myself and my body. I never liked it. Standing in front of the mirror was a torture of criticism about the tummy being too big, the nose too crooked, and so on. I crash dieted since a very young age and developed eating disorders, as well as using drugs, alcohol, and smoking cigarettes. At the age of 12, the school nurse came and told me that according to the tables I was too tall and therefore too heavy. This marked the beginning of my struggle to re-mould my body so that it would fit in with the other smaller girls, those who were actually under-developed. I would inevitably lose that battle. If I only knew these were just signs of puberty, that a rounding tummy and hips was normal and called for celebration rather than a fight to stay a little girl! But nobody explained these things to me; instead I got the message that my body growing and maturing was wrong. This book for me was one big sigh of relief.

* I read somewhere at the beginning that we must not be surprised if the journey throughout the book may be horrible at times, evoking our resistance, and I laughed to myself - who’s resisting? Ever since I heard the name of the book I knew it was for me and I have been waiting to read it. And indeed I enjoyed it greatly until… Chapter 5 when I could not take it any more. The graphic description of the movies, the child killers, all of it hit me right in the stomach, which actually hurt for two whole days. Enough! Enough! I resisted, calling the writing aggressive, impatient, speedy, uncompromising - yes, masculine! I was very angry, enraged, and I loved you for getting me right in my soft stomach, right on the point, and awakening in me the desire to become aware and change myself and the world around me. I read and feel great pride in my mother, who taught me to take responsibility about men and life in general, after all, it’s so boring to blame others. I loved all the research you present in your book, because frankly, as soon as I heard the name of the book I was afraid you were going to be hanged! I am glad to discover that you are not alone, that others have started questioning accepted beliefs - it seems each item of research highlighted another aspect, all of which you connect holistically.

* When I first read the book and discovered I had no period pains that month, I put it down to coincidence. Time went by and the pains and discomfort returned. On re-reading the book, period pains disappeared again. This is when I realized the close connection between menstrual pain and the cry of The Feminine. I realized it was her way to signal she was dying. The book ignited in me the desire to investigate menstruation and its meanings. I discovered that when listening to the slower pace of menstruation, life is easier, some days are inspired with creativity, others call for stopping to re-organize. Since reading the book I started calling The Feminine, asking for guidance in various areas. I also asked her help in connecting the conscious and the unconscious, and since then I began remembering my dreams! I have become more creative and flowing with ideas. I read the book again recently when I needed some laughter in my life, and found so many funny parts I had not noticed on first read.

* When I read the chapter on the fear of power, I realized that I too excuse my fear of realizing my potential, with: I don’t look good enough yet, not thin enough, not toned enough, and so on, as if being perfect I would not fear realizing my power. I felt a wave of excitement as I read, it was as though my mother who has denied me for years, now recognized me and caressed me, saying, ‘You’re OK as you are!’ Since this book and with the help of Holistic Pulsing - The Power of Softness, I am clean for over a year from the Bulimia that haunted me my entire adult life.

* I am reading and crying… Here at last is the way home; here is the salvation for the soul of my sister who feared her femininity to death, literally, having died from anorexia. All the pieces of the puzzle are coming together…

* As I read and delve deeper into the book I feel I delve deeper into myself. Reading it evokes powerful feelings in me, memories which are not always easy, but with them there is a new passion. Now I understand the process I had undergone for 35 years, the sexual abuse I had undergone at the hands of the closest person to me, who was supposed to protect me - my father. It was a betrayal that led me to disconnect from myself and my feelings. In fact, without knowing it then, I have disconnected from The Feminine within me and became a ‘sperm’, acting outwardly alone. Today I know how much courage it has taken for me to open up such a secret after 35 years, and how much strength this gives me to progress inside too, not only outside. Feelings are coming back to me, sensations, balance, and it’s all real, no more pretence. How fortunate that you have brought us The Power of Softness - Holistic Pulsing, and this book, providing me with the courage to see, let go and continue on with my life. I do the exercises in the book gradually. With Exercise 8 I cry and laugh and become stronger each time, clearer as to where I am going. It’s a great way to live. Thank you!

* When I finished the book, I could not touch meat. There is nothing in the book about eating meat, yet for three whole months now I am a total vegetarian, me the meat lover! So, what is it about this book which penetrates so deep? It puts a mirror to your face: ‘This is the way you live, this is the way we live, look, we can do it differently!’ And it’s not easy getting away from this mirror. I felt myself being pulled to it like Alice in Wonderland, and it was my wonderland, she is writing about me in this book, she is talking about me, she is talking to me! And it hurts, and is releasing at once. There is no doubt this book was written out of love for women, for men, for life. Amongst others, the book talks of tampons. I used tampons for 14 years. I suffered pain, vomiting, overflows, shame and disgust during my periods. It did not occur to me that it could be any other way. Since I stopped ‘corking’ my womb (1st anniversary soon,) I’ve had no pain, my period has become regular, the flow has relaxed, and my womb has felt quiet and clean. And now, after my husband and I have tried to conceive for a long while, a miracle! I am pregnant! Out came the cork, in came The Feminine!

* As a child I learnt that I had to be ‘macho’ super-man, the strong hero of a man who never cries nor fears, and is always in control. I always pretended to be that super-man, hiding my fears and anxieties inside of me. I never allowed any room or expression for the soft sensitive part. Now that I have read this book, I realize that when I do allow these sensitive parts space, I am actually brave and much more whole.

* "This book definitely has a mystical influence over me. My mind says, ‘I read it once and got the idea.’ But every time I re-read it, my body responds with significant changes. The duration of my period has shortened, and unlike its elusive start and finish I had known, it now starts decisively every 28 days and finishes in the same way! A new gift is that my sexual sensitivity has gone up. Also I started using the image of an all-encompassing ovum when I need to relax my over-working mind and sleep!"

* Reading the book I connected to my feminine, and with it to my sexuality. After reading Chapter 8, I started talking to my grandmother about menstruation. She recollected getting her period in Morocco, where she was born, and being celebrated for it and allowed to lick honey all day! She said menstruating girls were not allowed to take part in the Synagogue activity, but she would sneak in anyway, rascal! It was such fun sharing with her. We sat in her bedroom and I rocked her gently as the delightful stories poured out of her.

* I found a charming little, cheap restaurant, where you can get fantastic food. I go there often, delighting in the smells, tastes and sights. It is arranged so that everyone helps themselves to the food. Again and again I see women asking for a plate the size of a saucer, in which to collect their lunch, which includes a spoon of rice and green salad. My heart aches for them each time. Here we have the best of the land, pies, fish, stews in all flavours and hues, and repeatedly their choice is lettuce! Since reading this book I can more easily identify the disease, which had also been my own until recently. From such a point of physical deprivation, how is it possible to manifest power and realize our potential?

* I am a woman of 21. I am nearly finishing your book and I cannot hold back from writing to tell you how incredible I find its revelations. With every passing day I feel that I learn to accept and love myself more. I am 163 cm tall (5ft5in), weighing 58 kilos (9st2lb ) and looking great by all accounts. But before discovering this book I used to fight my body and especially my belly, and did hundreds of sit-ups daily. Since I stopped fighting I stopped counting calories and began to accept myself. However, I was at the doctor’s today. He asked my height and weight, and announced that I must lose 7 kilos (over a stone)! I recommended this book to him, and he wrote it down, but I went out shocked and humiliated. It’s lucky I have no anorexic tendencies! I returned home utterly insulted, grabbed your book and searched for the place which talks of the great importance fat bears on our health. I intend to read it several times. Thank you for being there for women through your books and work. Had I not had this book, I would have no doubt gone back to obsessive dieting and compulsive exercising. It simply depresses me that a woman has to be 100 per cent sure of herself so as not to allow others to sow self doubts in her. It is so hurtful when even doctors tell you to keep down to models’ weight! So, if I have no one around me to tell me, ‘You’re right, the doctor was wrong. You look great and you’re not fat,’ then at least I have your book!

* I had got the message that being fat means being lazy, ugly, frumpy. Even today I believe these things, although I myself am very fat - still I find it difficult accepting fat people, strange isn’t it? Because I would love to be accepted despite my size. But the book helps me understand that my feelings of repulsion originate in not accepting myself.

* There is so much power and healing in this book, which contains endless torches that light up the way home. But as in all legends, here too, you must pass through every dark corner first. I must admit reading it was not easy for me, and neither is the reality in which we live and which it mirrors so sharply. The book is intense and authentic, often difficult to digest and contain, just like life itself. Nevertheless, I found myself craving to choose life and returned again and again to drink the bitter truths it brings, only to find myself softening and healing with each read. At first I had moments of rage and despair - how is it possible to change anything in this world, isn’t the situation hopeless? But there were many moments of excitement, of laughing, crying and feeling that returning home and healing is possible for me too. I have no doubt the book is revolutionary and will help us back to balance. The sharp pain expressed in it, the great love for mother Earth and all its creatures, the compassion - all of these will leave no one indifferent.

* I now realize the miracle of menstruation, which I had loved as a young girl. But hearing my friends despising this curse, I learnt to join in just to be accepted. I suffered painful and irregular periods, and only today I can see how I negated myself and mistrusted my inner feelings. The cycle of menstruation is one of the miracles of creation and I do not intend to miss this miracle any longer. I’m also so glad that my daughter has decided to follow in my footsteps and stopped blocking, or corking, her periods.

* There were times during the reading of this book that the truth was too painful for me to face. When I read the chapter covering violent films and our related addiction, it was doubly painful - I suddenly realized it was not written just about me, but about an entire culture, and that our addiction to violence is not only expressed in watching violent films, but in the media as a whole and in the visual messages enveloping us. I let my tummy ache for a few days, then I carried on reading, when I realized the uniqueness of this book, which does not leave you on your own with the truth, bleeding on the floor, but rather shows you that another reality is possible, not only theoretically, but very practically with exercises you can do yourself and with others. These exercises make you fall in love with femininity and with masculinity, and reconnect the two. For me these exercises were sheer delight.

* "In 40 years of life I have practiced what humanity has practiced for thousands of years. I too denied my mother and idealized my father. He was like God, awesome, sharp tongued, intimidating, while my mother was merely a side figure, responsible for our cleanliness