A Ship (3 of 5?): Singleness.

From the same, pp. 145-147:

It seemed to me that women were nearly apologizing when they described themselves this way, as if being one-whole instead of one-half were not legitimate or healthy, but instead something one hoped soon to recover from. It was as if they were not really living but simply on hold until they plugged into someone else, became one-half of a couple, and turned on their lives again. I knew they would never think to call themselves "single" if they didn't accept coupledom as the natural and therefore more desirable state - a state I now dubbed "coupledumb."

We are taught to accept the menstream assumption that one-half is better than one-whole because two is necessary for oppression...

I think men took our worthy and natural desires and, in a truly diabolical way, turned them against us - making us, under threat of death, do to one another in the name of love what most of us would be too merciful to do to someone we hated.

It is phallocracy that insures our obedience by lying, "When you have a wonderful moment with someone, you must quickly capture and own her so that you can be assured of having more such moments. If you don't get possession of her, someone else will, and you will be left with no one to touch and hold and love you." It is the fathers who continue to misname these feelings of powerlessness, scarcity, and desperation "love".

Realizing this, coupling began to look not merely dumb but deadly: CoupleDoom.

. . .