How to Drive Men Wild: Keep Talking, Keep Laughing

Every time a woman opens her mouth and something other than a cooing noise comes out, a misogynist loses his mind.

If there's a man in your life who doesn't like the sound of your laughter or who likes to be the only one to tell the funny story, you're choosing to be an audience member, a back-up singer, a cheerleader, and a bystander for the rest of your life.

Real love celebrates shared laughter, the joyful noise, the moment of togetherness as meaningful as an embrace.

This has become obvious since Kamala Harris's laughter unleashed a backlash of women-fearing, antifeminist rhetoric. While the diatribes against Harris's powerful presence on the podium and in the public eye are often nothing more than an inarticulate howl made of word-salad tantrums about how white men don't have the power they once did because women and people of color now have the right to vote, it's still awe-inspiring to witness the weird fury of some men and some women when a human being stands up for her rights and her community.

It's as if women were meant to be obscene and known to be absurd, as if we should sit down, shut up, and let the boys have a good ol' time until there was something they wanted from us. And if a woman was crazy or nuts enough to express her opinion, then they'd just mad-woman-in-the-attic her, gaslight her, lock her up, or gag her.

Think about the word "gag" for a minute: it's a joke that's played on an unwitting victim. It's also a way to shut somebody up. It's also a word for when you choke because you can't tolerate what you've been trying to swallow, when you can't hold it in anymore.

When humor is used to silence somebody, to make somebody feel awful, to make somebody feel that they have no right to speak, to make them feel as if they are displaced out of the conversation, then that’s gagging.

Women's laughter, Kamala Harris's laughter, is the sound that you hear when the gag is removed.

Laughter is the sound you make when you're free, when you're strong, when you are mighty, and when you have authority over your own responses. This is not the giggle of the uncomfortable little girl or the rictus grin of the professional joker.

The woman who is authentically laughing is one who is on the top of the world. It's a world she embraces and a world that can share in her joy.

That's why she's dangerous—the laughing female figure is dangerous across cultures and across time. She's powerful because she is not trying to please. She is herself pleased.

A woman who is not trying to please in order to make changes but insisting that changes will happen because she will herself be the agent of that change terrifies the status quo. If she dares to do this, what else will she dare?

Will she dare to say "no" when being told to do something she would prefer not to? Will she say "yes" when she is asked if she'd be willing to join in the good fight, even if it means forgoing the path mapped out for her by her family? Will she "you bet!" when asked if she can make her own decisions? Will she move forward in her life, accepting triumph and well as defeat, without apologizing?

Mark Twain wrote "Against the assault of laughter, tyranny cannot stand." When any woman's laugh rings throughout the land, unnerving those who cannot bear the sound of a woman who knows her own mind, the rest of us should keep talking, finding humor, expressing ourselves—without apology.

A person who will enjoy your delight in this with you? That guy is a keeper.