When I see the word “Alone Time”, I think of the times when one can reach for their favourite vibrator as they please, releasing the necessary endorphins; all without the need for another party to accomplish. There is something so empowering about not being dependent on someone else to satisfy the most intimate of needs. However, such self-sufficiency did not come about easily. Its origins date back to the 1800s when the first electromechanical vibrator, known as the “percuteur” was invented. The British Physician who invented it, Joseph Mortimer Grandville, thought that “vibration powered the nervous system” and sought the percuteur as a medical device to alleviate ailing nerves in women that arise from hysteria.
It is amazing that we now live in a time where we are able to enjoy such liberty and privilege to enjoy various forms of pleasure. Imagine living in a time before the vibrator was made and women were mostly subjected to the whims and fancies of the patriarchy. (Ironically, even the creation of the vibrator was initially designed to reduce the need for manual work for the predominantly male physicians.) So much free will to do as one pleases was mostly unavailable to women in the past.
Hence, there is so much independence in women not needing men as a necessary figure in their lives. Traditionally, men were viewed as the provider or sole breadwinner in the nuclear family unit. Even today, they are looked to as more dominant and superior; who were most likely chosen to be bred for success and given the privilege to be educated, especially in developing societies.
Who knew that there would be a day where women would be able to have the time of day to do as they pleased. Or even to partake in activities that might have been in their subconscious. Things that they so desperately wanted, not to mention needed. Acts of novelty away from raising children, to the mundane stuff such as maintaining the household. It did not help that they were being subjected as a cog in the patriarchal system.
Now, women are free to live as they please. Be it in singlehood, or in a partnership. Women are increasingly adopting more masculine and dominant roles in society. It can come in the form of being an accomplished career woman. At the same time, they are able to maintain their femininity (if they wished) in different aspects of their lives: as a mother, wife, or even in just how they present themselves to the world.
As the “weaker” sex we were once mostly dependent on men. There was a time where we were truly vulnerable and powerless — subjected to having to be submissive to the patriarchy and their rules in order to survive. What we can say for sure is that it is definitely less prevalent in modern society. The dark parts of history and the past is a time where most people want to forget. But we shouldn’t dismiss the discrimination that happened so casually in the past. Being in a time where we are awarded freedom, an often forgotten precious privilege, it would be unthinkable to imagine how women in the past had to obey a set of rules of how one should or should not behave. With the advent of change and awareness, women are then granted solidarity and the privacy to do as they please in progressive cultures.
We are so fortunate to live in a time where many women are given the power to take the necessary steps to make themselves independent, self-sustaining beings, unlike our predecessors in history who were very much dependent on men and subjected to being a secondary character in their own lives — unable to prioritise themselves at the forefront of their own lives.
You see, the significance of the usage of vibrators in modern times, is symbolic of female emancipation. How a simple object comes to represent decades of progress in women’s history – how we have transcended in terms of self-sufficiency.
So, feel empowered every time you pick up your vibrator.