The Last Dirty Word: ‘Dependence’

We think we’re fully human when we’re independent of other people. We couldn’t be more wrong, says Leah Libresco Sargeant.

Is dependence taboo?

We may be happy to lend a hand to others, but we probably squirm at the idea of asking for help ourselves. In a world that prizes autonomy and independence, it feels almost shameful to be dependent.

Which is partly why Leah Libresco Sargeant got pushback from her publisher about putting the ‘d’ word – dependence – in the title of her book The Dignity of Dependence: A Feminist Manifesto. (Actually, as she tells Life & Faith, every word in that title proved controversial).

The word ‘dependence’ was especially tricky, says Sargeant, because we resist the idea of someone ‘taking from someone else’ without being able to pay them back.

But this is the very idea Sargeant, a Catholic thinker and author, is trying to defend: ‘There are periods of our lives where we receive from others and where we can’t pay back, and that’s a normal period of a human life’.

Sargeant points out that when we operate with a faulty anthropology – a false picture of the human – then the world only works for those who conform to that false image. If we believe that a full human life is an independent one, we’ll stigmatise dependence.

But this is untrue, since every human begins life completely dependent on others. It also leaves out vast swathes of people – including women who, for a variety of reasons, are more exposed to the need of others. Which is partly why our conversation begins with the striking claim Sargeant makes on the first page of her book: ‘The world is the wrong shape for women’.

Explore

The Dignity of Dependence: A Feminist Manifesto

Leah Libresco Sargeant’s Other Feminisms Substack newsletter

Interview featuring Leah Libresco Sargeant in conversation with Helen Andrews on Ross Douthat’s podcast Interesting Times