The Gravitational Pull of Male Approval

“Oh, don’t laugh at me for this, for being a woman who says this to you. I hear myself speak.” 

These are the beginning words from the unnamed narrator in Irish writer Megan Nolan’s debut novel, Acts of Desperation. Writing to her audience directly, we see a young woman in her twenties navigating her identity. Most of this is done by tracing the story of the narrator and Ciaran, a man she becomes obsessively entangled with, and readers watch a rotting love affair that reveals itself, slowly, to not be much about love at all. 

It is true that this story centers around a toxic relationship, and readers should be forewarned that Ciaran’s emotional and physical abuse and our narrator’s gained Stockholm Syndrome make it an uncomfortable read. As readers, we spend much of the narrative in palpable unease, waiting for the ball to drop, which it does time and time again. 

And yet, it’s not “love” that is pulling the strings of this narrative. Instead, it is an effective capsule for the social pressures of women, mainly, the ways in which they both unconsciously and consciously center themselves around men. 

Our narrator is guilty of this, trying desperately to hold onto Ciaran through any means necessary. Nowhere near a “perfect feminist,” if there ever was one, our protagonist often sizes herself against other women, tuning herself to be the perfect “final girl” for her man. At one point, she even pictures brutally killing Ciaran’s ex, Freya, by bashing her head against the wall. 

At the same time, she is soberingly attuned to the differences in her social experience as a woman in a way that is frustrating to read in the context of her other decisions. 

“I would love to have one moment of want in my life when I am sure what I’m feeling is all my own and nothing to do with men, with what has happened with men in the past, with what they have said about me and my body, what thoughts they have put in my head without me even knowing (Page 165).” 

This dichotomy becomes a stark portrait of many modern women. Though intellectually aligned with feminist ideals, many remain tethered to the gravitational pull of male approval.

In a culture of “girls girls” and the “pick me” phenomenon, it’s fair to say that we are more realized than ever towards male-influence in women’s lives. I also think it’s fair to say that these terms will ultimately leave women feeling more divided than ever, especially when the problem traces back to men. 

In terms of our protagonist, she occupies a frustratingly gray space, one that reflects a difficult truth: whether we like to admit it or not, many of us do not live within the clean black-and-white certainties of feminism. Megan Nolan’s decision to make the narrator nameless seems to be for our benefit, to more clearly see the ways in which we ourselves are frustratingly gray. 

While yes, I think Acts of Desperation asks readers to question the phantom power women often give men in their lives, I also think it also challenges women to unite, even those late to the party. If the goal is to de-center men, we must understand the ways in which our culture has taken steps toward this goal and the ways we are still gridlocked. 

There is a strange limbo in living in a world that posits itself as free from patriarchal constraints, yet daily life often feels the opposite. Yes, women in the US are outnumbering men in both the workforce and higher education, and yet the rise of red-pill male ideology is rampant. It feels like the world is simultaneously giving us the keys to the city then stabbing us in the back. 

Yet if we look at culture now, we are more equipped to have this conversation than ever before. With the recent trends of Vogue articles calling boyfriends "embarrassing," as well as the declining marriage and birth rates, we can see the ways in which women are distancing themselves from traditional expectations.  

However,  Nolan reminds us that cultural shifts do not automatically rewire internal desire. And to be clear: it is not anti-feminist to date or marry a man; we should not be interested in policing women’s decisions, seeing as the foundation of feminism is a woman’s freedom to choose her own life free from patriarchal constraints. 

But these constraints, though less visible, still exist, even in small ways. Megan Nolan’s novel, Acts of Desperation, can help us put ourselves in the position to interrogate these unconscious biases. Above all, though, it should encourage us to empathize with women who are afraid to make these choices due to circumstances, to hold space for them fully and always.