Pregnancy diminishes women whose identity is anchored in erotic desirability

Evidence

In contrast are women who are very flirtatious, who grasp themselves essentially as erotic objects, who love themselves in the beauty of their bodies, and who suffer from seeing themselves deformed, ungainly, incapable of arousing desire. Pregnancy does not at all appear to them as a celebration or an enrichment, but as a diminishing of their self. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1477

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Beauvoir’s later chapter on the woman in love and to the girl’s body-alienation themes; also echoes the lesson from my silence/body reading about how perceived self-image can be overridden by circumstance. — connects to: Pregnancy and breastfeeding trigger derogation of women when death and animality are salient — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core: On the Role of…, 603; Pregnancy grants women a socially sanctioned justification for self-absorption and exemption from effort — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1465; Motherhood converts the erotic breast into a sacred one — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1449

Broader Connections

• Pregnancy and breastfeeding trigger derogation of women when death and animality are salient #complicates (0.80) — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core, 603
• Pregnancy grants women a socially sanctioned justification for self-absorption and exemption from effort #complicates (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1465