Wednesday, December 01, 2004
Feminism was ALWAYS a lie
I posted a comment today on the Taken In Hand website. I was responding to a post by DeeMarie, who mentions that the site provides a forum for women to speak up for submissive female sexuality. She was recounting how she had been a feminist in her youth because she thought it was important to fight for political equality, but that feminism had gone beyond this legitimate end by demanding the same roles for men and women in personal relationships, thereby narrowing rather than broadening the scope of what are seen to be legitimate choices for women. I agree with her rejection of personal-relationship feminism, but can't agree with her support for political feminism. Women won political equality in 1920. NONE of the purposes of modern feminism were ever legitimate. Here is my comment:
I agree completely with DeeMarie's understanding of sexuality. When I watch the idiot-box, where advance to intimacy is always initiated by the female, I think: "You dumb slut. Any real man would just push you aside and not look back." She's not feminine. She's not ATTRACTIVE. Then the boy lies on his back and the girl climbs on top and I think "the girly-men who write this crap don't even know what sex is." It's the man who opens the present, not vice versa.
As for Dee's suggestion that there used to real barriers that needed to be broken down, and a need for a feminist movement, I think that is total bullshit. As soon as women wanted to enter any field, they were able to do it. There were no barriers. Look at the women 'pioneers' in any field. They did not fight resistance. They were helped by numerous men, every step of the way. The prima facie evidence is the astounding rapidity with which women moved into every field. As soon as they started wanting to enter careers at near the same rate as men, they did, everywhere.
Why would men welcome women? Because men love women, and have always been chivalrous towards women. I saw this in graduate school. In a male dominated department, the few women were treated like queens. Are you kidding? We were starved! A ladyfriend of mine who is a doctor, and an ideological feminist, was spouting about the hurdles women face and I said "No way. Medicine is a male-dominated field, and men are very solicitous towards women. A woman will be helped every step of the way." She admitted that she was indeed cherished by her male co-workers, and had been helped every step of her career by one powerful man after another. Of course I already knew that. She was a friend of mine. I knew her story. But it didn't stop her from reflexively spouting the feminist drivel.
Another friend of mine, a gorgeous now-ex-girlfriend, complained that she was treated unfairly in that every job she had ever gotten she had gotten because of her looks. She was smart, in a technical field, and her claim to mistreatment was that she was consistently promoted ahead of her ability. It's like Stanford University nero-surgeon Frances Conley who charged sexual harassment because male surgical teams were engaging in such bad behavior as telling dirty jokes in her presence. I have another lady-friend who is a nurse at Stanford who says that the uncensored humor is the best thing about surgery. If the male docs had censored themselves around Conley, she probably would have claimed harassment for being shut out.
My theory is that, having generally occupied submissive roles, women have evolved to find their power in making manipulative appeals to power. It is very likely that throughout our evolution, women did not have a lot of personal power, but had to convince men to exercise power for them. In this environment, women who were good at making manipulative appeals would have a selective advantage. Such a talent certainly seems to be manifest in the free-form seeking of claims to victimization that characterizes women's issues. If the men tell jokes, there is an opportunity for the woman to see herself as a victim. If the men don't tell jokes, there is an opportunity for the woman to see herself as a victim.
The answer? Cut off this avenue to power. Bullshit claims should be slapped down hard, by exposing and harshly judging their perfidy. Men in particular need to set aside their chivalry when women make bullshit claims and stop giving women a pass for their moral incompetence. When that happens, bullshit claims will cost power rather than gain it and the female instinct for manipulative advantage will not flow there. [Looking around the Taken in Hand website, I am pleased to see that the need for men to respond to female pissiness with a firm hand is recognized and supported.]
Feminism, which made a movement out of bullshit claims from day one, should have been exposed and reviled by every honest person from day one. Feminism has NEVER been anything but a bitch brigade. I am glad you outgrew it Dee. Now you need to stop making excuses for why you ever embraced it.
