Robert Stacy McCain on feminism’s mainstreaming of extremists:
Any honest person who undertakes an in-depth study of modern feminism, from its inception inside the 1960s New Left to its institutionalisation within Women’s Studies departments at universities, will understand that without the influence of radicals — militant haters of capitalism and Christianity, angry lesbians who view all males as a sort of malignant disease, deranged women who can’t distinguish between political grievances and their own mental illnesses — there probably never would have been a feminist movement at all…
Once we go beyond simplistic sloganeering about “equality” and “choice” to examine feminism as political philosophy — the theoretical understanding to which Ph.Ds devote their academic careers — we discover a worldview in which men and women are assumed to be implacable antagonists, where males are oppressors and women are their victims, and where heterosexuality is specifically condemned as the means by which this male-dominated system operates.
As noted previously, when it comes to identity politics, the boundaries between mainstream and delusional aren’t as clear as one might wish.
And Thomas Sowell on cultural inequalities:
While cultural leadership has changed hands many times, that leadership has been real at given times, and much of what was achieved in the process has contributed enormously to our well-being and opportunities today. Cultural competition is not a zero-sum game. It is what advances the human race. Cultures are living, changing ways of doing all the things that have to be done in life. Every culture discards over time the things which no longer do the job or which don’t do the job as well as things borrowed from other cultures… Spanish as spoken in Spain includes words taken from Arabic, and Spanish as spoken in Argentina has Italian words taken from the large Italian immigrant population there. People eat Kentucky Fried Chicken in Singapore and stay in Hilton hotels in Cairo.
This is not what some of the advocates of “diversity” have in mind. They seem to want to preserve cultures in their purity, almost like butterflies preserved in amber. Decisions about change, if any, seem to be regarded as collective decisions, political decisions. But that is not how any cultures have arrived where they are… No culture has grown great in isolation — but a number of cultures have made historic and even astonishing advances when their isolation was ended, usually by events beyond their control.
At which point readers may recall the Guardian’s Emer O’Toole, a “postcolonial theorist” and assistant professor of Irish Performance Studies, for whom all cultures past and present are equally vibrant and noble, except of course the culture in which she currently flourishes, on which opprobrium must be heaped ostentatiously and often.
Ms O’Toole famously bemoaned the colonial propagation of Shakespeare, whose works she denounced as “full of classism, sexism, racism and defunct social mores.” And worse, “a powerful tool of empire, transported to foreign climes along with the doctrine of European cultural superiority.” The possibility that at any given time one set of values and insights might be preferable to another, even objectively better, bothers her quite a bit.
Her article was accompanied by a photograph of New Zealand’s Ngakau Toa theatre company performing Troilus and Cressida in a distinctively Maori style. To me, it looked fun and worth the price of a ticket. But this cross-cultural fusion saddened Ms O’Toole, who dismissed notions of the Bard’s universality as “uncomfortably colonial.” She then presumed to take umbrage on behalf of all past colonial subjects, whose own views on Shakespeare and literature she chose not to relate. She did, however, get quite upset about “our sense of cultural superiority” – a sense of superiority that, she insisted, has long been “disavowed by all but the crazies.”
It may be a tad indelicate, even improper, but I can’t help wondering how Ms O’Toole might have felt had she been among the 19th century English colonists who encountered a Maori culture that was all but prehistoric, with no discernible literature or science, in which the average lifespan was about thirty years or so, and where cannibalism was not unknown. Faced with such things, I’m sure Ms O’Toole would have resisted the wicked urge to think herself a little more culturally advanced.
When not romanticising the cultural purity of others from a safe distance, Ms O’Toole prides herself on denouncing those more primitive than herself – say, women who choose to shave their armpits. In Ms O’Toole’s moral universe, cultivating armpit hair is “the necessary and important work of challenging stupid, arbitrary, gendered bullshit.” And our right-thinking Guardianista tells us, several times, that her boyfriends have thought her “brave” for daring not to shave.
As usual, feel free to share your own links and snippets in the comments.
And I’m glad you’ve finally admitted the oppressive patriarchy was a figment of your imagination all along! Drinks all round!
I don’t think I have mentioned the patriarchy, oppressive or otherwise. But if women’s opportunities have transformed it is because women forced the change, not because the obstacles were imaginary. Still, I’ll have a drink. Something fruity with an umbrella for me.
I don’t think I have mentioned the patriarchy, oppressive or otherwise.
Now there’s a coincidence, because I never mentioned any triumphs of feminism.
Or it could be that your profession is still largely populated with men like you who hold primitive attitudes about female workers that make it an uncomfortable place for them to be.
Puh-leeze.
STEMs are populated with Aspies. Aspies aren’t Neanderthals. They’re not construction workers. They haven’t got the socials skills for sexual harassment.
The chess club is dead chuffed when a woman joins. It’s the closest contact most of them get with the opposite sex. STEMs are some of the most pliant, agreeable chaps on the planet. If a woman beats them at their game they just up their game.
Perhaps you could, you know, talk to women in these actual professions and ask whether there’s a hostile work environment towards women.
Because those women will say that there isn’t. Women like me.
Remember how Jews just seemed attracted to money lending, lacking, apparently the inclination for nobler pursuits?
That’s a bullshit analogy if I’ve ever heard one.
The laws against Jews owning land were on the damned books for all to see, as was the express social bigotry against Jews. Nobody thought Jews were incapable of “nobler pursuits”; the Christians just didn’t want them going mainstream or gaining any more power than they had or intermingling with them.
“Girls are incapable of X” is different from “Girls shouldn’t do X” or “We don’t want girls doing X.”
Most of women’s advances are the result of technology, which results in more occupations that don’t require brute strength, which permits us to make a living without a husband, as I have done.
Maybe it is, let’s see how things pan out.
Things have panned out. Women outnumber men 60/40 in earning college degrees.
Or perhaps you would like to address the near monopoly of females in primary education? There used to be a higher proportion of men than there are now. Could there be misandry afoot?
Sez Minnow: “I haven’t got the energy.” and then belies that fact by Trotting out a relentless sequence of cod-Marxoid bollocks. Any time I venture into this neck of the woods and see comments in triple figures I know what to expect.
[Minnow:] Or it could be that your profession is still largely populated with men like you who hold primitive attitudes about female workers that make it an uncomfortable place for them to be.
And my attitude towards female workers is?
(Direct quotes, please.)
[Tim Newman:] What is it about the left and their inability to read?
☑
[Minnow:] It might be, but it is too early to tell. This thread shows that there is still a lot of anti-woman prejudice in some professions and it seems implausible to me that that has had no effect.
Where, exactly? Direct quotes please. You do rather give the impression of making up bovine excreta.
[Minnow:] Bullshit. Factory hooters and fog-horns are not high-pitched, precisely because they want to convey a different message.
Bullshit.
Foghorns have very low pitches because sounds with low pitches have a long wavelength. This is important because a long wavelength means that the sound wave can pass around barriers, like rocks, easily. This property of a wave is called diffraction. Diffraction describes the ability of a wave to pass around a barrier. The longer the wave’s length the easier it is for the wave to do this.
Regarding female surgeons: my aunt qualified as a surgeon in the late 1940s (Melbourne, Australia). I once asked her if it was difficult to enter such a male dominated profession, and she said no, everyone thought it was great having a woman in training.
“This is not what some of the advocates of “diversity” have in mind. They seem to want to preserve cultures in their purity, almost like butterflies preserved in amber.”
To which end, presumably, Queensland academic Stewart Riddle declared a couple of weeks ago that it was wrong to teach Aboriginal children English. Fortunately a few respected indigenous leaders came down hard on this idiotic burbling.