GONE WITH THE WIND & TOXIC FEMININITY
When adjusted for inflation, Gone With The Wind is the highest-grossing movie of all time. If released today, it would rake in over 4 billion. Avatar comes in at just 2.9.
Gone With The Wind is a story that sank its teeth deep into our psyche. Something about it rang true. It said something about all of us. About good and evil, right and wrong, honor and dishonor. War and peace.
Men and women.
And it holds some of the most quoted lines of all time:
“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
“As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”
A spoiled, conniving rich girl deals with a civil war while hunting a married man. I imagine that watching Kim Kardashian picking cotton instead of selling us underwear with fake nipples would have the same appeal. But it was more than just that.
Scarlett O’Hara never lets go of her impossible dream—Ashley.
Ashley.
Ashley.
But Ashley is not an available man. He is an idea. An illusion. A fantasy that ruins her life.
She wants him, and only him… but also lots and lots of money.
By never letting go of this fantasy, she destroys the possibility of happiness that life and her doting husband, Rhett Butler, have given her. She ruins the hope of a clear conscience in her friendship with a great woman, Melanie, Ashley’s wife.
In the final moments of the film, after Melanie dies, Scarlett suddenly realises this and rushes after Rhett, the loving man she never cared for… but it’s too late.
Frankly, he doesn’t give a damn.
Suddenly, sorry doesn’t work anymore.
I watched this film with my husband a few days ago and felt a sense of foreboding for womenkind.
Have we gone too far with third-wave feminism?
Have we lost the good man, the protective masculine, in our obsession with the impossible, elusive dream of angelic Ashley?
Scarlett’s famous declaration—"As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again."—was about power, not love.
She was willing to claw her way to wealth and status, but emotional hunger? That was the starvation she never anticipated.
In chasing independence, did she trade love for power? Did she—like many modern women—reject happiness for the illusion of control?
At the midpoint of no return, Rhett the opportunist, who at the beginning of the film only believed in Rhett Butler, decides to join the war. He moves into the divine masculine. Ready to sacrifice himself for something bigger.
“I've always had a weakness for lost causes, once they're really lost. Or maybe, maybe I'm ashamed of myself. Who knows?”
Before he leaves he says…
“Here's a soldier of the South who loves you, Scarlett. Wants to feel your arms around him, wants to carry the memory of your kisses into battle with him. Never mind about loving me; you're a woman sending a soldier to his death with a beautiful memory. Scarlett! Kiss me! Kiss me... once.”
Butler states clearly here that Scarlet should bend to the divine masculine, but she refuses, she refuses time and time again. She even later marries him with a large dollop of resentment. But he is her perfect match, even helping her build a sense of integrity and character by forcing her to face the music when the community discovers she has been coveting Ashley, a married, family man.
For years, Rhett recognizes Scarlett’s manipulations but indulges her anyway, up until his breaking point after the loss of their child and any hope for their relationship to have truth and beauty.
“Scarlett, I tried everything. If you'd only met me half way.”
Do men today feel like the imperfect but willing Rhett—devoted, indulgent, but ultimately discarded? Have they had enough of a feminism that demands power, not partnership?
In Spain, my country of residence, men are demonised because a woman a week is murdered. But 52 male murderers is just 0.00026% of the male population. We’re hammered with women’s abortion rights, their right to choose whether or not to be a mother, but we never discuss whether a man should have the right to choose fatherhood. I don’t hear a single feminist fighting for women to work in construction to join the 750 men who died last year in that industry.
Modern feminism, which has become what I would call toxic femininity, is consumed with our power, not our love, not our need for emotional connection with the opposite sex. We are consumed with our Ashley, our ideals, as we ignore the needs and feelings of men who fill our very real lives.
In my conversations with women I’m feeling this sudden and shocking awakening. Has Rhett Butler, has the divine protective masculine left the building after too many years of toxic femininity? After #metoo, and #whitemen #cismen #checkyourprivilege #equalrightsforwomen and #transwomenarewomen.
Do our divine masculine men…frankly no longer give a damn?
As God is our witness, are we women starving for the imperfect yet good men we forgot to love.
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Thank you for this article—it was a pleasure to read. Not only do I share your love for the film, but your ideas also resonate with me. In our pursuit of power, we may actually deprive ourselves of the kind of men who could truly fulfill us and be a good match. What’s even more disheartening, I think, is that the feminist movement, in some ways, limits our choices, as men like Rhett Butler are becoming increasingly rare.
Don't be too hard on yourselves, us men have done our fair share of damage. Only Jesus can change our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. We all need to get better at forgiveness.