Or put another way,

The patriarchal race to colonise Mars is just another example of male entitlement. The presumed right to use and abuse something and then walk away to conquer something new is a hallmark of colonialism.

No, really. It says so here. The author, Marcie Bianco, is quite adamant on this point. One might almost say feverish:  

The desire to colonise [space] — to have unquestioned, unchallenged and automatic access to something, to any type of body, and to use it at will — is a patriarchal one… It is the same instinctual and cultural force that teaches men that everything — and everyone — in their line of vision is theirs for the taking. You know, just like walking up to a woman and grabbing her by the pussy.

Apparently, and for reasons that aren’t shared, exploring space is not about ambition, curiosity or survival, or even a hope of distant profit; it’s all about “gendered power structures” and “men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed.”

Naturally, Ms Bianco has a degree in Women’s Studies and has taught “social justice courses” at Rutgers University and John Jay College.

Update, via the comments:

It’s odd how articles of this kind, by self-declared feminists, seem determined to, as it were, erase and marginalise the choices and agency of other, more accomplished women. Are we to believe that Gwynne Shotwell, the President of SpaceX, is a mere dupe of The Patriarchy? According to Ms Bianco, our “queer public intellectual,” yes. 

And what about these ladies here? Are their minds not their own? And has anyone told them this, to their faces? I wonder how that would go down. But this is a standard pattern for dogmatic feminism. Just as Ms Bianco acknowledges only “the menz” who complain about her writing and its laughable conceits, while ignoring the numerous women who also find her article insulting, incoherent and absurd.

And so a question comes to mind. If you were a young woman in search of role models, who might be more likely to inspire? Carolyn Porco, a planetary scientist who worked on the ground-breaking Voyager missions and was Head of Imaging Science for Cassini, and who speaks enthusiastically about exploring – and colonising – other planets? Or Marcie Bianco, a third-rate scold with a Women’s Studies degree?

Answers on a postcard, please.

Mary Katharine Ham on woke scolds and public pushback: 

Here’s how the removal of the [painting, Hylas and the Nymphs] went down — in the most eye-rollingly woke, modern-art-professor way possible. A professor and five members of a “drag collective” walk into an art gallery to talk about viewing art in a non-binary way. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.

Amy Wax on sinking standards and The New Unsayable: 

An open letter published in the Daily Pennsylvanian and signed by 33 of my colleagues… condemned and categorically rejected all of my views [on the importance of bourgeois values]. It then invited students, in effect, to monitor me and to report any “stereotyping and bias” they might experience or perceive. This letter contained no argument, no substance, no reasoning, no explanation whatsoever as to how our op-ed was in error… To students and citizens alike I say: Don’t follow their lead by condemning people for their views without providing a reasoned argument. Reject their example. Not only are they failing to teach you the practice of civil discourse —the sine qua non of liberal education and democracy— they are sending the message that civil discourse is unnecessary. 

This, remember, is the University of Pennsylvania Law School. For background, see the first items here and here. 

And Andy Ngo on the “social justice” Sturmabteilung: 

In The Baffler, Jessa Crispin writes: 

His desire for stockings and earrings and a flattering skirt did not change his critical stance against capitalism, but it did complicate his view of what socialism or communism could be. “Will there be lipstick under communism?” Yes, [sociology lecturer, Colin] Cremin writes in a new book, Man-Made Woman — but only if men are wearing it, too… A truly progressive man, then, would be one who rejects the social and economic advantages that come from hegemonic masculinity and patriarchal conformity. A “feminine flourish,” as Cremin puts it, of perfume or lipstick or a silk blouse, would undercut a man’s power immediately in both the workplace and on the sexual market. 

Via Ben Sixsmith, in a thread where it’s noted that when many men favoured stockings and beauty spots, this didn’t immediately result in communism or a toppling of “hegemonic masculinity.”

Dr Cremin, of course, has been noted here before. 

Katherine Kersten on “social justice” education and its pernicious, all-pervasive racial dogmatism: 

Like students, the district’s faculty and staff must submit to racial equity re-education. One such mandatory session for school bus drivers is illustrative… The training session was entitled “Edina School District Equity and Racial Justice Training: Moving from a Diversity to a Social Justice Lens.” In it, trainers instructed bus drivers that “dismantling white privilege” is “the core of our work as white folks,” and that working for the Edina schools requires “a major paradigm shift in the thinking of white people.” Drivers were exhorted to confess their racial guilt, and embrace the district’s “equity” ideology.

The result of all of this? Four years into the Edina schools’ equity crusade, black students’ test scores continue to disappoint… Math scores for black students in 11th grade at Edina Senior High dropped from 31 percent proficiency in 2014 to 14.6 percent in 2017. In reading, scores for black students in 10th grade at Edina Senior High dropped from 51.7 percent proficiency in 2014 to 40 percent in 2017.

And what parents want, obviously, is for their children to be taught how to become racially fixated leftwing activists, albeit illiterate ones who struggle with basic arithmetic, but who’ve learned the important things, such as how to confess or denounce “white privilege,” and “how to embrace ancestry, genetic code and melanin.” At some point, perhaps quite soon, the words foolish and dogmatic will seem an inadequate response, and the description that comes to mind may be something like evil.

Further to the recent, eye-widening exchange between Jordan Peterson and Cathy Newman, Conor Friedersdorf on scandalous paraphrasing: 

In the interview, Newman relies on this technique [of perverse rephrasing] to a remarkable extent, making it a useful illustration of a much broader pernicious trend. Peterson was not evasive or unwilling to be clear about his meaning. And Newman’s exaggerated restatements of his views mostly led viewers astray, not closer to the truth… One of the most important things this interview illustrates — one reason it is worth noting at length — is how Newman repeatedly poses as if she is holding a controversialist accountable, when in fact, for the duration of the interview, it is she that is “stirring things up” and “whipping people into a state of anger.”

Fabian Tassano on “critical thinking”: 

It is interesting that the scholars feel able to announce in advance, on behalf of their own students, and the students of other history tutors at Oxford, a decision on whether students will engage with the [Ethics and Empire] project. One might think that the ability to “think critically” would include openness to ideas from heterodox perspectives, as well as the capacity to decide for oneself, independently of one’s tutors, whether a source of information is worthy of consideration. One has to remember, however, that the word “critical” may have a special technical meaning in the context of the humanities.

Via Claire Lehmann, Kerryn Pholi on Aboriginal taboos: 

Those who mourn the demise of Aboriginal culture almost always regard things from the viewpoint of the men, who were indeed dispossessed of their land, and subsequently their traditions and status. Land wasn’t the only item of property they lost, however. They also lost or traded their women to the settlers, and this absorption – along with frontier warfare and disease – rapidly eroded tribal structures and doomed Aboriginal traditions to obsolescence. The settlers arrived with a wealth of goods and a shortage of females, and they were generally less enthusiastic about beating women than was customary in Aboriginal culture… The men lost a lot in the invasion, while the women had little to lose and plenty to gain.

And Joe Katzman on leftism as a never-ending status game: 

Do you have any doubt about the left’s hatred for those who will not stay in their assigned status? Have you noticed their quickness to turn on their own allies? Fail to follow the latest fad, and your status is demoted. Perhaps you’ve noticed that endlessly callous virtue signalling is the identifying badge of our modern try-hard Striver Class. Maybe that’s because American public education is now a 20-year Milgram Experiment, where the meta-message inside political correctness is to override your own judgement, in favour of deliberately-shifting judgements from people with higher status. These aren’t accidents. They’re clues.

Very much related, the second item here. 

As usual, feel free to share your own links and snippets, on any subject, in the comments.