![]() Traditions ancient and modern, architecture a kaleidoscopic free-for-all of every era known to mankind. I remember his initial reaction, “You’re going to hate it.” He was, of course, partially right in the end, but I’ll never admit it. ![]() I told my father just two weeks before my departure, hoping to dodge his scathing disapproval. It was a last-minute discovery, an opportunity to teach kindergarten for an ESL agency in the spring semester of 2011. Perhaps you can only feel at ease with those who will hear your honest opinions and still love you?īut family wouldn’t satiate forever and at 23, I left my open-hearted, liberally opinionated crib of New Jersey for Istanbul. The ties of argument formed an inexplicable mesh. So much passion in one unit could cause destruction, but it never seemed to break us. My entire family thrived on serious debate, and all the cousins knew to keep their heads down when the Democrats and Republicans delved deep and meaningfully while cutting the turkey at Thanksgiving. Whether it was at our political or scientific Q&A every evening around the dinner table or through temper-topping screaming matches, the man knew the importance of an argument. It was my father, the outsider of this clan, who taught me to raise my voice. This may seem like a feminist’s dream, but imagine yourself as not only the second daughter to a mother who was the fifth daughter herself (and twin to the first son), but then also falling somewhere toward the middle of dozens of female cousins. Making yourself heard in such a world is daunting, especially if over 75 percent of that population is female. Even excluding major religious and national holidays, the birthdays, christenings, confirmations, and graduations of my 30 cousins kept family reunions of my mother’s boisterous eight siblings at a regular pace for the entirety of my childhood and adolescence. I was raised in an often intrusive Sicilian Catholic family, a realm where one might become a master of this particular art. Named for its often overlooked natural beauty, New Jersey is home to another treasure much of the population holds dear: the art of argument. While growing up in New Jersey is thought of as a curse by many, those of us with the sacred Garden State in our blood know better. But we know women who speak their minds to be strong, and sometimes, it’s where we come from that gives us our voice. This gaslighting term, used in one form or another around the world, often acts as a quick phrase meant to brush off women’s ideas and opinions, and reduce them to irrational hysterics. Women who argue with men are often told to “calm down” simply because they’re expressing themselves.
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