CUNT: THE RECLAMATION

C-U-N-T

Whether used as an insult hurled like a fastball straight for your head or the way parishioners of the patriarch use the word to describe the lady who lives down stairs, these four letters seemingly hold so much power over us, women. Our own programming leaves us exasperated when this word, that refers to women’s genitalia, harshly rolls off someone's tongue. Even with the last 100 years marking great strides by women in their rebellion towards equality, the male architects of this masculine-centric society refuse to relinquish their control over women. From our incompetent figurehead, Donald “Grab ‘Em By the Pussy” Trump to the “boys will be boys,” motif that exonerates men from their actions, the patriarchal oppressors’ perspective of language attempts to define our womanhood. It has come to represent either a sense of inferiority that permeates shame or by fetishizing our sexuality into a multi-billion dollar industry that gives the illusion of women empowerment. All while companies like OnlyFans and Pornhub, the latter who even profits off the exploitation of children trafficked into the sex industry, are owned and operated by men, who have pimped us out at the click of a button.

The four-letter, monosyllabic word “cunt” maintains its position as one of the most offensive words in western hemisphere. Feminists efforts to dismantle the patriarchy have been futile in restoring the power of this word that was once an honorable descriptor for goddesses. Today, any utterance of “cunt” will manifest shock as the misconstrued definition evokes a sense of vulgarity and an urge for censorship. Yet should we be so inclined to keep this word under lock and key, inside a tabooed cage of cursed words, that demonstrates the patriarchal devotion to male domination over our bodies and minds? Will a continued acceptance of this mutilated meaning of the word erase the rich history of respect it once resonated towards women? Should we act in defiance against a system designed to characterize us as mere property of the patriarch by reclaiming the word as our own? We are presented with a fork in the road on how to push forward ‒ to either abolish the word entirely from our vocabulary or to liberate it from the clutches of the patriarchy. Yet the path that will best secure the restoration of womanhood cannot not be determined without understanding the history which has birthed the modern conception of cunt.

In the 1998 feminist book, “Cunt: A Declaration of Independence,” Inga Muscio asserts that reclaiming the world will reconnect us to the lost Chinese, Egyptian, Indian and Roman histories where socities called female priestesses and witches by various linguistics variations of the word. A history that can be traced back to the Hindu Goddess Kunti, also known as the “Yoni of the Universe.” In Mahābhārata, a historical Hindu text believed to have been written between 200 and 400 BC, Kunti represents the beauty and power of the female body. Kunti led a powerful matriarchy and her name became symbolic for life itself. She was known as the goddess of fertility and wisdom and was worshiped all across the ancient Eastern world.

There’s also Egyptian connections to the term that go as far back as the 25 BC. Kunti was found in the writings of Ptah-Hotep, an Egyptian vizier, who appeared to use it as a term of respect. The Egyptian word for mother “k’at” meant “the body of her,” and showed that referencing a woman’s body could apply to even the first woman in a person’s life, their mother. In both instances, the history that derived the modern form of the word cunt, were actually synonymous with the importance of women’s role in the stability and balance of a society.

Then came humanity domestication by agriculture, where we traded our ancient nomadic lifestyle for the earliest incarnation of settled societies that saw men take dominion over the entire world. Our polyamorous nature where men and women had multiple sexual partners didn’t suit the succession of land ownership, as men now desired to know who their children were. A thirst to wield power even beyond their own mortality through the concept of the heir apparent to the throne of their lands, their capital and their control. Women, and women only, were subjected to the rule of monogamy, where their sexual liberation was no longer considered acceptable behavior. 

The idea of our sexual enjoyment, especially that of women, became sin as Christian clergymen propagated this to be a grave danger to our morality. They preached that women’s genitals were a potent source of evil and through the increased “otherings” of women’s sexuality, cunt transformed from a Hindu goddess to a misogynistic slur throughout the western world without exception. Unsurprising, this is just the first chapter in a long tale of making female-gendered words in the English language negative over time. Many of the slurs used for women have completely innocuous roots. The words to describe a promiscuous woman, of which there are so many and yet no legitimate male equivalents. Hussy, for example, is derived from the same roots as the word housewife. A similar trajectory happened with the word slut, from slovenly and messy to the sex-shamy word it is today. Cunt, which was initially used by Anglo-Saxons an anatomical term for the vulva, also fits into this pattern.

What makes the demonization of the word cunt so interesting is that it’s actually a necessary term that is now essentially off-limits. While vagina describes the interior sexual organ, and vulva constitutes the exterior, the word cunt is the only word that encompasses the whole thing. It includes the labia, vulva, pudendum, vagina, and clitoris. Unlike the word vagina, it accounts for the clitoris, the “mythical” source of female stimulation. And if women enjoying sex is deemed to be a danger and vilified as evil then it makes sense, why a word that encompasses our sexual gratification would be morally repugnant. 

We must then ask ourselves, when someone calls us the dreaded c-word, why is it so upsetting? Is it because we’re getting reduced to our body parts and objectified yet again (which is not only dehumanizing but also erases the experiences of anyone who is not cis-gendered)? Or is it because turning cunt into an insult equates a deeply feminine and sexual part of ourselves with something that is inherently wrong?  The short answer is yes. By making the word cunt so offensive, western society has made it easy for anyone to weaponize our bodies against us. When a term that refers to our own anatomy, and specifically the sexual gratification piece of the equation, is so damning, how can we ever feel ownership over our sexual selves? When we can’t say things out loud, they are forced into the shadows and turn into sources of shame and humiliation. 

I’m reclaiming the word (and my own) cunt. Words have power and this one has so much of it. For too long, we’ve been kept separate from a long and empowering history. By reclaiming cunt, we rebuild ties to mothers and goddesses that came over two thousand years before us, women who were celebrated for their feminine power. 

Saying the word out loud, C-U-N-T, will make people uncomfortable, but what do we lose by not taking ownership of it? I no longer accept taking one of the most fascinating, life-affirming parts of the female body and turning it into something that denotes weakness and shame. Our cunts give us sexual ecstasy, bring life into the world, and have a powerful history tied to ancient goddesses. Why would we ever be ashamed to say that out loud?