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LAST UPDATE | 21 Feb 2024
WHEN GWYNETH PALTROW recently revealed she likes to smash things with a plastic bat when she feels angry, it didn’t strike me as that odd.
Unlike her other outlandish wellness claims about steaming her vagina or using bee stings for skincare, this seemed quite rational. In fact, as I stood at the countertop rage cleaning the surfaces for the umpteenth time that day, I wondered if hitting things with a plastic bat might in fact be a healthier way to express my pent-up frustration and anger?
Expressing rage as a woman is a minefield. Most of us are taught from a young age that anger is not a desirable female emotion, so we learn to channel it in other ways. Many women grow up directing these emotions inward and have them manifest as stress, worry and anxiety. “These are often perceived as more digestible emotions,” explains Cady Walker Psychotherapist and founder of Mynd. “It can take time to remove the layers to allow someone to be angry and this is why it can be confusing and complex.”
These days, I seem to express anger by passive aggressively rage cleaning. For the uninitiated, I scrub the surfaces, or the sink, or get out the black bags and do a ruthless toy clear out, much to the protestations of my four- and seven-year-olds, who cannot fathom me throwing out that broken hot wheels car with no wheels they haven’t played with in about six months.
Diverting anger has become second nature for many women and on those rare occasions when you do let it out, you’re often labelled as ‘hysterical’ or ‘crazy’.
Historically, an angry woman was perceived as an out of control or even dangerous woman. Not so for the men. Anger is often a quality to be admired in men. In fact, studies show that angry men gain influence, while angry women lose it. A point well illustrated in political debates, such as those between Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump in 2016. Despite Trump’s questionable behaviour, if Clinton had lost her temper, it would have been game over for her on the spot.
The rebranding of female rage begins in childhood. Soraya Chemaly, the author of Rage Becomes Her, sums the phenomenon up perfectly in her 2018 Ted Talk. Little girls who do express anger are often called spoilt.
As a teenage girl, you’re not angry, you’re just hormonal. As a woman in your early twenties or thirties, if you’re angry, you are high maintenance or difficult.
When you reach middle age, you’re just angry because you’re menopausal and beyond that, you’re a bitter old hag. It often feels like there has been a consistent effort to delegitimise women’s anger and turn it into a negative.
This might be changing, however. “There has been a shift with gender norms,” says Cady, “but we still have a long way to go in society when it comes to stereotypes, this can be from our unconscious bias to belief systems.”
Still, collective female anger can lead to major social change. The #MeToo movement, the anger over the death of Savita Halappanavar and the effect it had on the repeal of the Eight Amendment in Ireland and more recently the demonstrations against gender-based violence after the murder of Ashling Murphy.
There is growing a sense that younger women are feeling more comfortable outwardly expressing their anger. Maybe Beyonce triumphantly smashing cars in her Lemonade video is more empowering than redirecting or internalising rage.
My relationship with anger remains complicated. When I was younger, I played a lot of physical sports, like rugby and horse riding which helped me release frustrations when they arose. Fast forward to today, and I’m a 41-year-old mum of two. I’m often tired and mentally overloaded most of the time. I’ve got one eye on perimenopause over in the corner, while I try to keep too many plates spinning in the air.
“As a woman a lot of emphasis is still on being the caring, compassionate and sensitive person,” explains Cady. “This leaves no room for anger or rage, especially when it comes to motherhood or the workplace.”
My life is fairly typical of many women my age, but I feel as though I’m getting angrier. According to a BBC analysis of 10 years of data from the Gallup World Poll, it’s not just me. Women all over the world are getting angrier. Anger, sadness, stress and worry are among the feelings reported much more frequently than men.
“Let’s also not forget, a lot of middle-aged women are going through a hormonal shift,” says Cady. “As this happens, anger can be one of the emotions that is triggered and can be confusing. If we talk about it, remove the stigma, and help support women in knowing it is okay to be angry or even normal, it shifts and allows for a healthy connection to it, to understand what is going on for the individual.”
So, after a decade or so of diverting my anger, I reckoned it was about time I put down the rage cleaning sponge and took a leaf out of Gwyneth’s book. To be honest, I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought of this before.
During Covid, like a lot of women, I faced extra pressure and demands, and I occasionally fantasised about bashing the hell out of a spike protein shaped piñata with a bat. I never did it though. That would be ‘crazy,’ right? As it turns out, not really. In fact, there is now a growing boom in rage rooms where customers can go, suit up and bash inanimate objects.
I visited Rage Room Ireland to see if I could release my anger. Owner Lukas, who opened the room a few months ago says business is booming. “It’s 90 per cent women,” he explains. “‘It’s usually groups who come in together, put on some music, dance about and have a laugh,” he says.
I was given a boiler suit, a riot style safety hat, and gloves. Inside the room, there was an old-fashioned printer on a table and a box full of glass jars. On the wall, there was an array of weapons, like a bat, a crowbar, a hammer and a mallet.
I won’t lie. It felt a little odd; sort of like a scene from the Hostel movies, only my victim was an inanimate object. I’d asked for AC/DC to blare over the sound system and before I knew it, I was swinging at the printer with pieces flying off into the air. It was very surreal. I felt like I was breaking all the rules, but after a few minutes, it felt quite fun.
To be honest, I wasn’t thinking angry thoughts or feeling enraged, in fact, it felt like some sort of new high-octane gym glass.
As my session ended, I looked around the room and had this weird urge to tidy up. Embarrassingly, I put a few of the bigger pieces back on the table and then stopped myself.
Did it help release some anger? I’m not sure. What it showed me was the power of physical activity and sport in helping to release and regulate emotions and perhaps women in my busy stage of life could do with making that more of a priority for themselves.
I’m not sure I’ll be able to fully retire the rage cleaning sponge just yet, but it’s certainly made me think twice about how I recognise and communicate my feelings around rage and anger in the future.
Niamh O’Reilly is a freelance writer and wrangler of two small boys, who is winging her way through motherhood, her forties and her eyeliner.
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My two sisters and my friend died that night, I barely got out with my own life, I was told at a meeting in the Dept of Justice building in March 2003, I was told by an official in the Dept of Justice, “that what I experienced I imagined because it was not in the Keane Tribunal book”. At the same meeting this official threathened to take Geraldine Foy to the High Court for defaming the Keane Report and the experts who assisted Keane, to which Geraldine Foy replied and I will always remember her strength, she told the official, “I welcome your invitation to the High Court, please take me, because when I sit in the box, I will ask the judge to whom am I defaming when none of those experts Sean you refer to have any conclusion drawn in their report”. Sean had no answer for her and they never took her to the High Court. In October 2004, she went to Scotland and brought back the professor David Rasbash full boxes of archives, of his advise as an adviser to the Keane Tribunal, by November Justice had got word of this and called an immediate meeting with the families, Sean Awlyard secretary General of the Dept of Justice told us families “we were only in that room because we lost somebody in that fire, we should go off home now and get over it we got the justice we deserved, to which deputy tommy broughan replied “sean how can you speak to these families like that ” and geraldine Foy gave Sean the tribunal book and said unless you find the basement evidence Keane is botched and they did not get the justice they deserved, they got the justice the state decided they deserved to which Noel Synott went for geraldine foy s throat and he had to be restrained by Sean Awlyard, tommy broughan has since commented on the dail record about this meeting. Geraldine Foy has never darkened the dept of Justice door since the Minister is lucky she is prepared to do this because we families had to talk her around, she is responsible for the smiles of the families of the unidentified kids, she wrote to new york twin towers, dr. drintz who wrote a letter to her giving details of the up to date dna testing to encourage the governmentbto this, it took the coroner 2 years to give her the five files of the unidentified, these families lived and breathed fresh air cause it took Geraldine Foy within one hour to identify one of those lads she rang the solicitor and told him and the kavanagh family were informed, michael mc dowell asked her did she find the dentist at the meeting which she replied no, but I am the first person to read the files since the five lads died. Bertie Ahern and Brian Cowen wanted to honour her bill, but the dept of justice would not pay it. Government kept saying we dont want to set a precidient in law by re opening the tribual, the dept of justice kept denying, denying and denying us our rights and thought we were mad because our memory and experiences of the stardust were not in the keane report. The solicitor rang Ger Foy, because Bertie said they were going to say no to an inquiry this was un Nov 2006; so Ger foy said she was writing a letter for the Dept of Justice that they would have to address and they wont like it, she wrote a letter looking for a photo of the water filled basement and the two store rooms and if they can produce them the families will accept the justice they deserved, bertie ahern went into the dail 22nd nov 2006 thinking he could be vindicated at not having an inquiry on the advise of the dept of justice, i guess he was shocked when the dept of justice could not produce these items so the taoiseach decided to have an independent examination for a renewed inquiry, geraldine foy since the coffey report took the case to the ECHR, to which they said Paul Coffey was not legal and he was not a fire expert other factors are there are 2 coffey reports with 70 alterations between them ger foy knows who altered the report cause paul coffey told her, She is only prepared to meet Minister Fitzgerald cause she is an admirer of Minister Fitzgeralds husband s work for the aspherbergerf victims, ger foy will not accept any inquiry until she sits with the chief justice to explain legal ramifications at the hands of the dept of justice to deny 48 victims their right to life and justice.
Let us hope that at the very least Minister of Justice and her department will be openminded, and see through all the obstacles previous MOJ’s and their departments have put in our way of finding the truth and Justice we deserve. Geraldine deserves to be listened to, and action must be taken on her and Robin Knox’s years of research . #JusticeForTheStardust48
You are lucky you met this person with such strength. The families had no chance of exposing the scull duggery and cover up. Wow she needs to be made a hero for giving you a voice to shout back “tell us the truth”. To contradict a survivors experience of a disaster event to protect a botched inquiry is a first for any country through out the world.
The current government through Alan Shatter as minister of Justice went to the European Court of Human rights to respond back and protect the perjury , frame up and preverting the course of justice evidence. Still to deny the right of the dead to have their right to life vindicated and validated with an effective investigation.
Disgraceful I am in support of Geraldine Foy not attending this meeting with a minister of justice from our current government. She is right she should just meet with the Chief Justice Susan . You families were denied your rights long enough. Mrs Fitzgerald might not have the same mind set as her husband had for the Asbergers victims. I dont believe Frances Fitzgerald will change the mind set of her department.
I believe the police will eventually force there hand with their current investigation.
One has to question if Frances Fitzgerald, Enda Kenny, Alan Shatter had lost their child in this fire, would they be happy to shake the blood off their hands and discard the truth? The parents and families of those children deserve justice. If the government could give their time and attention to Garth Brooks and his concerts, why can’t the lives of 48 young people and their families be afforded the same courtesy and get justice?
Geraldine has been a godsend to the Stardust committee He work rate and attention to detail had to be commended by all. The fact that she uncovered a piece of evidence in her research overlooked by the tribunal and the Gardai in their investigations that helped identify one of the unknown lost in the tragedy speaks volumes . I truly hope this minister has the sincerity to listen to the committee and the courage to follow through on what rightfully needs to be done. Justice for the 48.
Philip I will be very surprised considering this Government under Alan Shatter went to the European Court of Human rights to defend the states ineffective investigation based on perjury and frame up evidence to deny the truth, the ECHR stated Coffey was not legal and this government have stood to protect all that corruption.
It is clear this Geraldine knows the case and is talking, the only other person to know this case is the owner Eamon Butterly and he won’t talk. The dead cannot speak but Geraldine was sent by them to do this work for them. I wish her luck with this shower in power at the moment. Blind eyed government!
I think we’re on the same page Robin. My heart holds hope but my head says don’t raise your hopes. It’s not only this government whom have let the Stardust committee and the affected families down. It is successive governments since the tragedy. However, one can’t give up hope and like the Hillsborough disaster we can only hope those events can be replicated here for the 48. If not we keep on trying, campaigning and hoping. One day it will happen.
When I say the Hillsborough disaster I mean the events that unfolded to expose the truth behind the lies and corruption.
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