At some point in my torn and confusing university life, my best friend and also roommate, faced with yet another usual disappointment, I don’t remember if sentimental, existential or otherwise, offered me lean out the window to scream. According to her, it would be a good way to get rid of the discomfort. And maybe it would have been if we didn’t live on a three-meter street, and the neighbors were an inch from our nose. Our shouting was followed by lively protests and this was not in the days of Covid. shout from balconies this was not a common practice, but only a disturbance of the public peace. I remember an embarrassed retreat and a large pizza delivery order. Since then, recurring scenes in movies where friends join hands and scream in unison from a hilltop bring me back to one disastrous experience that I struggle to endure. However, there is general agreement that an outbreak of uncontrolled hoarseness is of great benefit..

Of course, she is convinced of this. Australian Gretchen Miller, a 54-year-old Sydney resident who has been battling a severe ailment (also renamed “permacrisis”) that has plagued her since the start of the pandemic, posted on her municipality’s Facebook group asking, “Anyone else want to scream?” She was probably surprised at first by the number of responses that came to her. “I want to scream about climate change and economic inequality,” wrote one woman. “I want to scream about real estate agents and homeowners,” said another, demonstrating that the rent crisis is global. “My fiancé has decided he doesn’t love me anymore and now I just want to scream,” reads another reply. Miller said he received more than 100 messages in just the first hour of posting. And out of this expressed common need in social networks something real and real was born, namely the group Cry Sister. One month afterscreaming sisters“They first met in a park in the city center (so far away from potential noise complaints) to shout out their frustrations as they plunged into the Australian night.

In recent months, Miller’s idea has spread around the world with great enthusiasm to become a driving force, and in a short time it has taken root so much that today The Guardian speaks of real fashion in the fashion world. Screaming bands. Strictly female-only like Miller’s I want to be an immediate and effective means of releasing, who knows, instantaneous or lasting, from frustration, pandemic exhaustion, and all kinds of pressures that arise in everyday life.. This, along with romantic disappointments and dangers, childhood trauma, are the most common reasons women say they are involved. Hoping for more immediate benefits than can be obtained from long and often burdensome psychotherapy. attracted by the idea of ​​being able to vent their anger without inhibitions. It’s a freedom that participants say is hard to find in a society that tends to have little understanding and much discomfort with female anger. “Women want to scream,” Miller told The Guardian. There are many places where men can scream. while we still don’t raise our voices too often, and even when we do, it’s easy to run into strong disapproval.” On the other hand, the axiom that if you scream, you have a tantrum, if a man screams, then everything is in order, is still quite in use.

So, on a Wednesday night in Sydney, women begin to appear one after another among the trees of one of the city parks, walking along different paths until they reach the agreed meeting point. Around, according to Australian journalist Samantha Serra, who followed Cry Sister (although I would choose as a name scream queens, quoting a series between Ryan Murphy’s horror, parody, and slasher) several joggers pass them as the college football team finishes practice and disperses through town. “After a week of hell I’ve had, I need a good shout out!” says Marianne Leah, 45, a self-described “screamer”, mother of four, and joking with a dozen or so strangers who have come together for the first time. The countdown prepares them and sets them in motion to scream. “Three two one!” Twelve unrestrained voices pierce the silence of the night, rumble over the hills and then disappear into the traffic below. They scream again. They grab their knees, some shake their hair, and some even howl at the moon: “I feel like some magic happened,” Miller says as the group lay down on the grass, gazing up at the stars. Leah agrees. “It’s the freedom to do something wild and fun… throw everything into one mighty roar.”

One of the first free scream groups to gain attention was born in the United States, in Boston, during the lockdown caused by the second wave of the 2021 pandemic. Sarah Harmon, a therapist, yoga teacher and mother of two, unfurled an invitation to join become free screamers after how she and a group of twenty women ended up at the local soccer field in Charlestown, screaming in the silent and aching air of one of those pandemic nights. In Asia, family gatherings are held. Deepika, 27, has mobilized a small but reluctant task force of women scattered across New Delhi who are especially vocal about their need to feel safe in the city and one of the countries battling the worst wave of violence against female. his history. “In India,” says Deepoka, “there is a desire to silence women,” she explains. “This is my little way of saying no to this: we are here, we exist, we have something to say, and they should listen to us.” Deepika says the group is helping girls challenge the notion that women’s anger should remain hidden. “Why is anger considered such a dangerous emotion for women?” he asked. “We have a lot to be angry about, but if we express it, we are considered crazy, hysterical or out of control.” His Free Shout group has about 150 members, and many of them gather in different places in the capital of India. “It’s therapeutic. It’s a kind of collective self-care,” says Deepika.

Dr Miriam Yates, an organizational psychologist and researcher at the Institute for Social Research at the University of Queensland, says that anger can still be viewed as unnatural by women. “We expect women to be kind, caring, loving and cooperative. Anger, or rather the expression of anger, does not live up to these expectations.”, she explains. Women have experienced additional stress and suffering “due to work, family and social demands in recent years,” Professor Yates adds. It is a morning ritual that begins in the dark and ends with a moment of meditation on the sand as soon as dawn breaks.Also for Scott in these moments between women “there is never condemnation, never shame to shout together towards the sea. “For a short time our prohibitions are forgotten , we are together, and everything is possible … and this is also a lot of fun.