[Meta] Some Personal Thoughts on Furiosa

[Original Tumblr Post]

Watching MMFR for the first time I felt an instant connection to Furiosa. I hate the word “empowering” (because what does that even mean?) but I don’t have a better way to describe how I felt watching the movie. I felt stronger and happier and BETTER after having seen Furiosa fight and rage and tear off the patriarchy’s metaphorical face and WIN.

I tend to be angry a lot. Like a LOT. I get mad easily, sometimes over worthy things (the wage gap, police shootings, gun control) and sometimes over less-righteous things (traffic, silly internet arguments, people being dumb). No matter how justified or irrational my feelings, I’ve spent my whole life learning to swallow up and clamp down and redirect my anger because it’s not professional or appropriate or feminine. As a child my mother would often ask “why do you get so frustrated?” but I didn’t know why or how to stop it or that the real word for what I was feeling was “angry.” I only knew I had to put a lid on it fast or get in trouble.

These days, I’m better at managing my anger. I try not to direct it at specific people since that’s not very healthy or productive. I try to save anger for systems and patterns, rather than individuals, but the truth is that it’s still so very easy for me to feel rage and hate. But I manage. I’ve learned to be a professional and deal calmly with all kinds of shit, from minor irritations to misogynist slights. I’ve managed to work on a daily basis with people I absolutely loath without letting it interfere with my ability to cooperate with them and get the job done. I save my rage for private moments or for rants with friends.

All this is to say, it felt so good to see a woman getting to be incandescent with ugly rage and USE IT. Furiosa’s anger is pointed and directed and rational. It’s her armor, and her weapon, and her inoculation against Joe’s virulent philosophy. It helps her survive 7000 days of horror without losing her soul. It helps her stay focused on her goal and claw her way to power because power means driving the war rig and that means escape. It helps her take the huge risk of leaving and make it even riskier by taking Joe’s “wives” with her. Her anger even helps her tell herself that she’s only taking them as a final FUCK YOU because admitting anything else is too hard.

It helps her find her people again and it helps her survive learning that the Green Place is gone. It helps her drive straight back to face Joe’s army and risk everything all over again. It helps her keep driving the war rig after being stabbed. It helps her climb out of the cab to kill Joe (who she hates SO MUCH it’s like another knife lodged inside her). It helps her free herself and the other women (and men) trapped in the same shitty awful system.

It helps her create a new better world that maybe won’t require quite so much rage to survive.