4 Girl Mindsets Speech Transcript
4 Girl Mindsets For Ending
4 Cultural Themes Of Betrayal
Paula M. Kramer
Paris, France
March 9, 2021
To all the women in my audience, what is your first memory of another girl betraying you?
What is your first memory of you betraying another girl?
The first girl l remember betraying me was Nancy. Nancy and I were best friends for years until 8th grade in elementary school when she suddenly decided she no longer wanted to be my friend. I remember watching her walking and laughing with other girls. We never talked again.
The first girl I remember betraying was my older sister. We were on a road trip, and we had stopped by a wayside for lunch. My older sister and I were climbing a low hill near the wayside when my mother called us back to the car. I was ahead of my sister and ahead of me my sister saw some blue stones on the ground. She asked me to pick up some stones for her, then turned back to the car.
I looked at those stones on the ground. My mother was cruel to me throughout my childhood. She told me I could have something I wanted, or do something I wanted to do, then take it away from me at the last minute. I decided to be cruel to my sister. I left those stones on the ground.
When I got back to the car, my sister asked me if I had picked up some stones for her. I said no. She immediately turned to look out the window in pain and disappointment.
I don’t know if Nancy ever regretted cutting me out of her life, but I instantly regretted betraying my sister and leaving those stones on the ground.
That regret did not stop me from betraying Judy.
In my early 20s, I became friends with Judy through a program that connected people with mild cognitive difficulties to ordinary people like me. Judy and I became great friends. I had wonderful times with her, lots of fun. When I decided to get married and leave Chicago and move to Wisconsin, I told Judy she could visit. I moved to Wisconsin, we picked a date, we made plans. Shortly before Judy was supposed to visit, I wrote her a letter and said it wasn’t going to work out, and apologized. I wrote repeat letters with repeat apologies. Judy never responded. More regret.
Debbie and I met when I was renting the second floor of a house. She and her boyfriend were still living with their parents. Since I had 2 bedrooms, she asked if they could spend weekends at my house. I said yes. I had a single bed in my room and there was a double bed in the room they used. One night during the week, I brought a man home and we used the double bed in the spare room. I neglected to wash the sheets, Debbie’s sheets. You can imagine the betrayal Debbie felt. More regret.
But that regret didn’t stop me from betraying Karen. Karen and I became friends and then roommates. We both failed as roommates, but I failed worse than Karen did. After we stopped living together, I sent Karen a nasty letter. To emphasize my nastiness, I underlined particular words and sentences. I enjoyed my nastiness, until the regret started.
But that regret didn’t stop me from betraying again.
This time I had my own daughter, and I betrayed a young girl. She was in the park, near my house. My daughter wasn’t there that day, she was elsewhere. The girl was in the park with a few boys and they were playing. Something went wrong in the park, I forget what. I immediately said something to the girl blaming her for what went wrong. It didn’t take me long to admit to myself that the girl couldn’t possibly have been responsible for what went wrong. More regret.
But that regret didn’t stop me from betraying my own daughter. I’m a single parent because my husband died when our daughter was a baby. While my daughter was young we agreed that if we had anything negative to say to each other, we would say it in private. We both kept to that agreement until I knowingly violated it and said something negative to her in front of other people. Severe regret.
I finally started coming to terms with my betraying words and actions after watching a television talk show host betray a female guest on her show.
The topic of the episode was bad reputations. People brought on friends and family members who had bad reputations so they could get advice from experts and fix their bad reputations. A woman brought on her friend Desiree. She said Desiree’s bad reputation was coming on to every man she talked to.
The host asked Desiree what she had to say for herself. Desiree said she was a friendly person. She said she was friendly to men or women, it didn’t matter.
Desiree was a heavier woman, so she had larger breasts. She wore a silk looking blouse, a nice skirt, and she had a musical speaking voice. I could have listened to Desiree speak for hours.
The host was heavy herself so she also had larger breasts. She talked about being stereotyped as always wanting sex because has larger breasts. She then turned to the male image expert so he could give Desiree his advice. He told Desiree to change the way she talked, the way she dressed, and the color of her hair so she would stop coming on to every man she talked to.
I was horrified. If Desiree didn’t change the way she talked or the way she dressed or the color of her hair and got raped, it would be her fault because the expert by intent and the host be default made Desiree responsible for men’s thoughts and feelings.
When I decided to go to grad school, I decided to write about women as television talks (show hosts) for my thesis topic. It took my 5 years to finish grad school. I started watching every talk show I could find hosted by a woman. For 2 years, I watched 5 talk shows a day. I no longer watch talk shows.
As I watched each show I wrote down the topic of the show and the guests on the show. When I was ready to start writing my thesis, I started reading through those lists. I quickly recognized 4 repeating topics. I now call them the 4 cultural themes of betrayal. You don’t have to take notes during my speech because I have all the pertinent information on my website. I’ll give my website address at the end of my speech.
The 4 cultural themes of betrayal are:
Women as Mothers
Women and their Appearance
Women as Deviants
Teenage Girls as Threats to Society
At age 45 I realized I had grown up with a betrayal mindset. I was no better than the host who betrayed Desiree on her show. I finally understood why my regrets never ended my betrayals. The only way to end my betrayals was to give myself an equality mindset.
That was the beginning of my first girl mindset, Girl Grit.
The courage to create equality for all girls and women,
including girls and women who create inequality for you
My 2nd girl mindset is Girl Goodwill.
Approaching all encounters involving other girls and women
with sincere approval and support for their positive words and actions
My 3rd girl mindset is Girl Gumption.
The wisdom to admit that men deny equality to women
who see men as inferior
My 4th girl mindset is Girl Gems.
Positive words supporting girls and women
by putting shine on their skills and accomplishments
Men can hear what we say about other women. The words we put into men’s ears can come out of their mouths about us and determine how they treat us. I have an example.
Transformation and success coach, speaker, podcaster, and author Bernadette Boas used to be a corporate bitch. She wrote about her bitchiness in her book Shedding the Corporate Bitch: Shifting Your Bitches to Riches in Life and Business. A quote from her book reveals how men treat…react to bitchy women.
“Today, large and small businesses engage me to help them find a solution to
breaking the glass ceiling for the women in their organization. On one particular call,
a man who headed up a large medical practice explained to me how the two women
on his Board of Directors, both eligible to replace the CEO, were going to be overlooked,
because, he stated, “They’re bitches.” The women were qualified and deserving of the
position, but no one would vote them in because of their attitudes.”
Bitches have betrayal mindsets.
Men block women with betrayal mindsets.
Note that the man called Bernadette for help in breaking the glass ceilings in his practice. He considered both women qualified ‘qualified and deserving’ of the CEO position.
I have more evidence that men want women to be leaders. Women’s Empowerment Coach Andrea Johnson is an optimism expert. I heard her as a guest on a podcast and I copied this quote from Andrea.
“You are the answer. You are the future. Because I’m talking to women here, right?
I mean what’s interesting is that the most people that share my podcast are men,
but it is 100% geared toward and presented to women. It’s all about women’s leadership.
But one of the things I say in there is you are role models for the future generations.”
Men support women who have equality mindsets.
Where can we create role models for the future generations?
Through all girl schools as long as they end betrayal mindset and teach equality mindsets.
My older sister and I attended an all girl Catholic high school. We both hated our high school. My sister hated it so much that she made sure to disappear from the alumnae list after she graduated. I stayed on the alumnae list because I wanted to stay in contact with the classmates I’d been friendly with. Many of those classmates never appeared on the alumnae list. They made the same choice my sister made.
Because I hated my high school, I of course ignored all of their letters asking for donations. A few decades after graduating, I received yet another letter asking for money. This letter happened to be written by one of my classmates.
My classmate revealed that when the school approached donating organizations asking for money, the donating organizations wanted to know what percentage of alumnae donated money to the school. My classmate revealed that 3% of alumnae donated money to the school. That means I’m one of 97% of alumnae who refuse to donate money to a school we hate.
Why do 97% of us hate our school?
We had to wear physical uniforms, which is typical for an all girl Catholic school, but the school also expected us to wear mental and emotional uniforms. We were supposed to think what they wanted us to think and feel what they wanted us to feel.
Four years after graduating, I ran into the woman who had been my best friend in high school. I told her it took me 2 years to figure out all the lies the school told us about the world outside of school. My friend said that she had had the same experience.
Even though I hated the mental and emotional uniforms the school expected us to wear, I was able to use my Girl Grit mindset with the order of nuns that runs the school.
Creating equality for all girls and women,
including girls and women who create inequality for you.
While reading a book, I discovered that the order of nuns running my school had been pioneers on a particular social issue in the 1970s. I quoted the passage to the closed group Facebook page for my class. My high school liked my post. Many of the classmates who saw my post liked it as well. At that time only about a sixth of my class was in the closed Facebook group, so not so many people saw it, but most of the ones who saw it liked it.
Because of a childhood spinal injury that medical professionals misdiagnosed for 33 years, I was late to achieving the kind of success I always wanted. I became an international bestselling author in a cooperative book for the first time 4 days after turning 70 years old.
I posted about my success in the closed group page for my class. My high school saw my post, but did not like it. Most of the classmates who saw my post did not like it. Only one of my classmates bought my international bestselling book.
My high school’s website includes these words:
true self
unconditional acceptance and support
celebrate incremental progress as well as big wins
culture of diversity and inclusion
My all girl high school did not and does not unconditionally accept and support my true self.
My all girl high school did not and does not celebrate my international bestselling author big win.
My all girl high school refuses to include me because it rejects diversity of thought and feeling.
When I switched Facebook accounts, my high school excluded me from both the closed group for my high school and the closed group for my class.
My high school judged me as deviant for being one of the 97% of alumnae who refuse to donate money to a school that betrayed us. My high school is teaching girls to become women men block instead of women men support. Pretending otherwise, my high school also has this on its website:
“We know that our students will be the leaders of tomorrow. According to research
from the National Coalition of Girls Schools, 93% of girls’ school grads say they were
offered greater leadership opportunities than peers at coed schools, and 80% have held
leadership positions since graduating from high school.
Let’s go back to the quote from Bernadette Boas. The two women on the board of directors were leaders, so they could be considered successes. But they both lost out on the tip top position of CEO because they were the kind of women men block.
Only 8.2% of fortune CEOs in the United States are women (2022 statistic). If all girl schools are so good at putting women into leadership positions, why is the number of CEOs who are women still under 10% in the United States?
How many of the alumnae from my school never reach the tip top position they want because they learned to be the kind of women men block? You don’t have to be a bitch to betray other women. I’m not a bitch, and I betrayed several girls and women.
Some all girl schools do teach equality mindsets. In 2015, Christine Fruechte wrote a blog post with this title: Launching Leaders: The Power of All-Girl Schools”. Christine wrote about generosity:
“A generous spirit is one of the most important attributes of an effective leader.
You have to share your time, talents and insight to mentor future leaders, and to
build successful teams and organizations. At an all-female school I gave my time
and talents without any gender concerns. I learned how to support other women
and was encouraged to give my time and become a leader.”
My research and the quotes from Bernadette Boas and Andrea Johnson tell me that Christine Fruechte became CEO because men saw her supporting both women and men.
To transform the future for girls and women, we need all girl schools that teach equality mindsets and end betrayal mindsets. This can seem daunting given high schools like mine that are determined to continue the cultural themes of betrayal.
But research shows that only 3.5% of all girl schools teaching equality mindsets can transform the world for the majority of women.
Erica Chenoweth is a political scientist. She researched more than 300 political movements over 100 years. She found that nonviolent movements were twice as likely to be successful as violent movements. The nonviolent movements became successful when they reached 3.5% participation from the population.
Let’s consider this in terms of women’s equality. The nonviolent movements were successful when the 3.5% of the population participated in a sustained manner. Equality mindsets mean repeated words and actions for equality. The sustained participation is automatic. Plus, many women enter workplaces where men want women to be leaders.
Creating equality for women is not as difficult as it often seems. We hold ourselves back when we continue the cultural themes of betrayal.
An easy way to move into equality mindsets is to celebrate other women’s successes. Every time we celebrate another woman’s success, we invite them to celebrate our successes, and we invite the men who hear us to celebrate our successes.
All celebration invitations must be sincere. You lose credibility if your celebration invitations are insincere. Who wants an insincere leader?
The connections we make through this conference offer multiple opportunities to hand out multiple celebration invitations. I challenge every woman listening to me to handout a celebration invitation at your next opportunity.
For your own sake, go out and celebrate.
Thank you for listening.
© Paula M. Kramer, 2022 to the present.
All rights reserved.
