Vulnerability
Plus, our upcoming café on epistemic injustice, a collaboration with Philosophers for Humanity, a contribution from co-moderator Eirini Martsoukaki, suggested readings, and more.
Introduction
It is often assumed that to be vulnerable is to be susceptible to physical or emotional harm. Consequently, portrayals and descriptions of vulnerability both in our day-to-day lives and in the media we consume tend to be reductively negative, equating it with weakness, dependency, powerlessness, and passivity, among other things. At the same time, vulnerability is also perceived by many to be an essential ingredient to strength and human connection. At our latest Curiosity Café, led by returning guest co-moderator Eirini Martsoukaki and our very own Sofia Panasiuk, we explored these and various other presumptions about vulnerability in a collaborative (and often personal) discussion. But first:
Featured Content:
Curiosity Café Recap: Vulnerability
“Rethinking Vulnerability: Power, Performativity, and Resistance” by Eirini Martsoukaki
Upcoming Events
What Can Philosophy Do for Humanity? A panel and guided discussion in support of WoodGreen Charity
Curiosity Café on Epistemic Injustice
Readings & Resources
Curiosity Café Recap: Vulnerability
By Sophia Whicher and Adrian Ma
The first half of our Vulnerability Café was guided by the question(s), “What is vulnerability, and how do you experience it?” We used the following questions to guide our exploration:
How do we define and recognize vulnerability in our lives?
What do we mean when we say “so and so have their walls up” or “so and so overshared”?
We often treat vulnerability as a distinctively social practice: we are vulnerable with someone else. Do you think there’s such a thing as being vulnerable with oneself?
What fears or difficulties prevent you from being vulnerable? How do you navigate these challenges?
Can vulnerability be empowering? In what ways does embracing vulnerability allow you to grow?
Here’s what some of you had to say:
We usually filter the ways we show up in the world through a kind of internal approval process, to ensure that we’re acting in a manner that those around us will accept (if not also approve of). Vulnerability involves removing this internal filter. To be completely vulnerable with someone is to be able to engage with them without thinking beforehand about how one is showing up; to be vulnerable involves realizing myself as I am being, rather than before.
Vulnerability involves risk-taking: when I choose to be vulnerable with someone, I risk the possibility that they might reject me. If the things I shared were guaranteed to be accepted, understood, or embraced, vulnerability would not be required.
Perhaps not all instances of vulnerability involve risk-taking. I can show vulnerability even by sharing intimate thoughts and feelings with people I know will be supportive, like my parents or my closest friends. Maybe all that vulnerability requires is that I bring these thoughts and feelings out of my body.
Vulnerability involves unhiding or unmasking parts of myself that I feel more comfortable, or perhaps safer, keeping hidden.
I can be vulnerable with myself, as well as with others, by recognizing parts of myself I might be avoiding confrontation with.
Showing vulnerability is not a sign of weakness, but a sign of confidence–a sign that I am not afraid of the consequences that may result from my being honest about my feelings, needs, or whatever else I reveal about myself.
We are often afraid of showing vulnerability because the transparency it requires demands that we stake out a definite position (“This is how I feel,” “This is what I think”) that opens up our experience or perspective for scrutiny and debate. Remaining secretive, noncommittal, or ambiguous in our communication affords a layer of protection that we lose when we honestly communicate our true thoughts and feelings.
Although showing vulnerability can be good for us, it is important to be mindful of the burden we are placing on the other party or parties in doing so. In showing vulnerability, I am imposing a responsibility onto someone else, who may not always know how to respond to what I share. Although showing vulnerability can be good for us, it is important to be mindful of the burden we are placing on the other party or parties in doing so.
The apparent responsibility to receive someone else’s vulnerability appropriately would feel like less of a burden if society valued vulnerability enough to equip us with the relational skills we need to respond to others’ communication of their feelings, needs, and experiences.
Boundaries are that distance at which you can optimally love yourself and another person. “Over-sharing,” or being too vulnerable, is a problem because it involves crossing the receiver’s boundaries.
Relationships with others can involve a boundary-attunement period, where we figure out what this optimal distance is. This attunement period will vary in length and work required depending on various factors, like the cultural backgrounds of the people in the relationship.
The feeling of vulnerability can be dulled by repetition: often, when we have shared the same story multiple times, we slip into a kind of autopilot mode, in which it feels like we are merely reading off a script instead of engaging in a courageous act of self-disclosure. It would be wrong to call such expressions of vulnerability “fake”-- even if the feeling of vulnerability was most pronounced when I was sharing these things for the first time.
In the second half of our café, we pivoted to examining the following overarching questions: What are the social norms about vulnerability? What effects do these social norms have? In small groups, and then all together, our moderators provided us with the following prompts to guide our exploration:
Think about the different spaces and situations you navigate in your daily life. For example, you might break your day up into going to work, seeing a friend, and going on a date. Do you exhibit vulnerability differently in these spaces and situations? If so, how?
Have you ever felt like you were being too vulnerable or not vulnerable enough for the setting you were in? How did this make you feel?
In what contexts is vulnerability expected? In what contexts is it not? Why?
What are the consequences of having social norms or expectations around vulnerability?
Here’s what some of you had to say:
Are we ever entitled to someone else’s vulnerability? On the one hand, there seems to be something “off” about the claim that we can be entitled to someone else’s vulnerability. Vulnerability involves exposing myself, and no one is ever entitled to me doing so. In some cases, we can request that someone be vulnerable with us, but to frame the ask as a demand is going too far.
On the other hand, perhaps there are some situations in which we are entitled to someone’s vulnerability. In close relationships, sometimes it is important to demand someone else’s vulnerability. For example, if someone I love is acting differently than usual and “doesn’t want to talk about it” with anyone, it might be appropriate for me to demand that they tell me what’s going on, or at least, that they tell someone, for their own good.
Is it ever okay to demand someone else’s vulnerability for your own sake, or for the sake of your relationship with them?
Sometimes being vulnerable involves risking not that I might be seen by others accurately, but that I might be deeply misinterpreted. For example, admitting I have an ideal towards which I am working, or towards which I think we should work collectively, even while acknowledging and grappling with the current reality of my circumstances or the world-at-large, risks others dismissing me as “naive” (though this is not the case-- I am just really determined).
Sometimes, the standards of professionalism render vulnerability inappropriate. Imagine if your doctor came in, spent a few minutes venting their frustrations about their family, and then announced your test results!
But even when professional standards limit the forms of vulnerability it is acceptable to show, certain kinds of vulnerability may be entirely appropriate! A doctor, for example, can show vulnerability by candidly acknowledging the limits of their knowledge or the unreliability of the data surrounding the efficacy of a certain treatment – even if they have no business sharing the ins and outs of their family life with their patients.
Are there different rules for leaders and people in power when it comes to showing vulnerability? Do, say, CEOs and managers have a greater obligation to remain stoic?
Vulnerability can be weaponized through relational power dynamics. For example, my boss can reveal something about themselves to me without worrying about how doing so might impact their employment status. But the opposite is not the case; in fact, far too often what people reveal in moments of vulnerability is used against them in their employment setting.
Vulnerability doesn’t necessarily involve acts of overt communication; sometimes, for example, it can be exercised simply by showing an emotion, like sadness or excitement, instead of masking it.
There is a gendered component to our willingness and ability to show vulnerability. Men tend not to be socialized into expressing or talking about their emotions because doing so has been traditionally perceived as a sign of weakness. (Psst, peep our reading recommendations for more on this!)
Sometimes, when responding to an expression of vulnerability, it is better to avoid conforming to a social script and to allow the other party to decide what kind of response would best meet their needs. Do they need a guidance counsellor? A listening ear? An ally? A partner in crime?
Having to show vulnerability all the time can be exhausting, even within the context of our close relationships–sometimes, indulging in the superficial can be refreshing! We can strike a balance between sharing our deepest darkest secrets and talking about trivialities like the weather or the latest celebrity gossip.
Before wrapping up, Sofia posed one last question to the group: Has the internet and social media (e.g., Instagram, Reddit, X) enabled vulnerability to be shared and experienced in meaningfully different ways than before?
Here’s what some of you had to say:
The internet has allowed people to “curate” their vulnerability, to candidly share details about certain aspects of their lives while keeping others secret–something it is much harder to do when your audience is confined to people you know in real life.
Although the internet provides an abundance of spaces where people can be vulnerable, users who take advantage of these spaces also surrender a great deal of control over how their divulgences will be received. Think of the sheer variety of opinions and characters you often see in a Reddit thread or YouTube comments section!
Certain risks that were created or amplified by the growth of the internet, such as cancellation or doxxing, as well as the echo-chamber quality of many online spaces, may discourage people from showing vulnerability, or force them to curate or compartmentalize the things they are vulnerable about, such as to avoid alienating or being rejected by their audience.
In fact, online spaces can even change what feels most vulnerable to share. For instance, if I am part of an activism-oriented online space, it can feel more vulnerable to share that I sometimes enjoy listening to songs with misogynistic lyrics than it might in a different space.
Thank you for reading, and if you were there, thank you also for your contributions to this fruitful discussion, and for your willingness to show up to our café in the spirit of curiosity and collaboration, which in itself can require a whole lot of vulnerability.
Rethinking Vulnerability: Power, Performativity, and Resistance
By Eirini Martsoukaki
Mainstream definitions of vulnerability often frame it as a deficit, a state of being open to harm, weakness, or exposure. Vulnerability is something to overcome, protect against, or minimize. Traditional philosophical narratives similarly glorify independence, self-sufficiency, and rational control—ideals that erase the interdependence that defines our lives and are treated as contradictory to vulnerability.
Feminist thinkers have consistently challenged this nearsighted conception of vulnerability and have instead emphasized a conception of the self as distinctively relational; our capacities for rationality, care, moral agency and sociality cannot be cultivated in isolation but through connection with others. Rather than a mark of deficiency, then, vulnerability is a constitutive feature of our social and political existence.
Of course, this shift in perspective does not deny that vulnerability exposes us to harm. Even more, structural inequalities ensure that some are more exposed than others—those marginalized by gender, race, sexuality, or financial status, for example, are made systematically more vulnerable. But the answer is not to treat vulnerability itself as reductively negative; it is to transform the conditions that render its manifestations oppressive. If vulnerability is fundamental to being human, then the task is not to eliminate it but to rethink the systems that make it precarious for some while shielding others from its consequences.
This tension is especially visible in contemporary media where vulnerability is often commodified. Look at the landscape of entertainment, and you’ll see vulnerability marketed as a product. Netflix’s sprawling catalog of dating shows thrives on the promise of emotional exposure—contestants are urged to “open up,” “be vulnerable,” and “put themselves out there.” But these performances of vulnerability are more often than not tightly scripted, framed within marketable narratives that reward certain forms of exposure while punishing others. To be vulnerable in these contexts is not simply to be open but to be legible within the logics of entertainment and consumption. Similarly, social media platforms create economies of vulnerability, where curated confessions and carefully constructed disclosures circulate as currency. The injunction to be authentic and “real” is ever-present, but within boundaries that remain socially and algorithmically enforced. Performances of vulnerability that fit dominant scripts—relatable struggles, personal triumphs, sanitized disclosures—are celebrated, while those that transgress expectations are dismissed or penalized. This raises questions about who is allowed to be vulnerable, in what ways, and to what ends.
If we rethink vulnerability not as a deficit but as a site of relation, we can push beyond the idea that it is something to be managed or exploited. Instead of vulnerability as spectacle or brand, we might begin to reimagine vulnerability as resistance—an openness that refuses containment, a form of solidarity that disrupts the logic of individualism. To embrace vulnerability is not to resign oneself to harm but to recognize the deep entanglement of our lives with others. It is to insist on new ways of structuring care, responsibility, and power. Vulnerability, then, is not weakness. It is possibility.
Upcoming Events
What Can Philosophy Do for The World?
A panel and guided discussion in support of WoodGreen Charity
We’re co-hosting a panel and guided discussion with Philosophers for Humanity! Join us on Monday, February 24th from 6pm-8pm in the Ontario Institute for Education Building (right above St George Station!) room 5150, to explore the question “What Can Philosophy Do for Humanity?” with experts Duff Warring and Alexandra Gustafson!
The first half of this event will feature the insights of two esteemed philosophy experts, and the remaining half will involve an engaging discussion circle with our speakers! We will discuss philosophy’s role in our world and its potential pragmatic uses.
Each ticket can be purchased through your choice of donation (recommended amount: $10) and 100% of profits will go to WoodGreen charity! *If cost is a barrier to your attendance, please reach out to Being and Becoming’s Director of Community Programs, sophia@beingnbecoming.org, for a no-questions-asked free ticket, of which we have five total set aside.
Light refreshments will be provided.
If you have accessibility-related concerns, please visit our Eventbrite Page. In the event description, you will find some accessibility-related information about the venue and the event.
About the Speakers
Duff Warring is a professor of Philosophy at York University as well as a lawyer who specializes in mental health law. Professor Warring specializes in ethics and bioethics.
Alexandra Gustafson is the Director of Educational Programming at Being and Becoming: A Community for the Curious, and she holds a PhD in Philosophy from U of T. Gustafson is primarily interested in researching moral psychology and the philosophy of love.
Curiosity Café: Bi-Weekly on Tuesdays, tickets below!
About: For those of you who haven’t had the opportunity to join our Curiosity Cafés and are wondering what they’re all about: Every two weeks, we invite members of our community (that includes you, dear reader!) to come out to the Madison Avenue Pub to engage in a collaborative exploration of our chosen topic. Through these events, we aim to build our community of people who like to think deeply about life’s big questions, and provide each other with some philosophical tools to dig deeper into whatever it is we are most curious about. After our scheduled programming, we encourage attendees to stay and mingle over food and drinks.
We will be hosting our next Curiosity Café on Tuesday, February 18th, from 6:00 - 8:30 pm at the Madison Avenue Pub (14 Madison Ave, Toronto, ON M5R 2S1). Come and hang out with us, grab food, and read through our handout from 6:00 - 6:30 pm. Our structured discussion will run from 6:30 - 8:30 pm with a 10-minute break in the middle!
Please purchase a ticket using the button below the event description. If tickets* are sold out, please contact us via Instagram (@beingnbecomingorg) or email (sophia@beingnbecoming.org), and we will let you know if we can accommodate you.
The topic of our next café is: Epistemic Injustice
Have you ever…
Been in a situation where you felt like what you were saying wasn’t taken seriously for the wrong reasons? Have you ever gotten a sense that it had something to do with one or several of your visible, and perhaps historically marginalized, identity markers?
Not been able to find the right concepts to make sense of a particular experience (or set of experiences) you’ve had (maybe you’ve been left feeling a little ‘crazy’?)? Or have you ever been in a situation where you do have the right language, but the person you’re trying to communicate with isn’t familiar with it?
Felt like someone took you less seriously than they should because of how you framed or presented your ideas? Or have you ever been told that the way you’re framing your ideas isn’t “suitable”?
If any of these experiences resonate with you, you have probably experienced some form of epistemic injustice in your life. Philosopher Miranda Fricker defines epistemic injustice as “injustice done to us in our capacity as knowers”-- as beings who can generate, acquire, and pass on knowledge. In our next café, co-moderators Olivia Sun and Sophia Whicher will start by unpacking different kinds of epistemic injustice, paying particular attention to our own experiences or experiences of others that we’ve encountered. Then, we’ll move to considering what we can do, both individually and collectively, to mitigate epistemic injustice and its effects.
Want to know more about knowing? Get tickets below and join us at our next Curiosity Café!
If you have accessibility-related concerns, please visit our Eventbrite Page. In the event description, you will find some accessibility-related information about the venue and the event.
*We have five free tickets available for our attendees. If paying anything at all is not financially feasible for you, or our ticketing system presents some other barrier for you, please contact our Director of Community Programs, Sophia, at sophia@beingnbecoming.org. These tickets will be first come, first served, no questions asked! You can expect to hear back from her within 72 hours.
Readings & Resources
Zach’s Recommendation:
In The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love, bell hooks challenges the ways in which patriarchal culture discourages men from embracing emotional openness, instead conditioning them to suppress their vulnerability in a manner that not only harms them, but also fractures their relationships by preventing deeper connections with themselves and others. hooks explores how the socialization of boys into rigid definitions of masculinity that equate emotional detachment with strength stifles their ability to express pain, seek help, or fully engage in intimate relationships. A core idea that hooks emphasizes is how vulnerability is not weakness, but a necessary condition for love and personal transformation as she calls for a reimagining of masculinity—one that allows men to embrace tenderness, empathy, and healing without shame. This was a particularly eye-opening read for me, not because these points have never been articulated, but because hooks makes them unforgettable.
Sophia’s Recommendation:
One of my favourite thinkers, writers, and do-ers, Audre Lorde, wrote a lot about the importance and power of vulnerability. While I genuinely recommend you read any and all of her work, you might first check out Maria Popova’s piece, “Audre Lorde on the Vulnerability of Visibility and Our Responsibility, to Ourselves and Others, to Break Our Silences,” which references excerpts from Lorde’s famous short essay “The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action.”
Featured Quote
...you’re never really a whole person if you remain silent, because there’s always that one little piece inside you that wants to be spoken out, and if you keep ignoring it, it gets madder and madder and hotter and hotter, and if you don’t speak it out one day it will just up and punch you in the mouth from the inside.
- Audre Lorde, quoting her daughter
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