And in radical menstruation news:

I suspect sharp-eyed readers can guess where this is going.

Readers may wish to ponder whether listing special sex-based requirements – taking time off work, every month, for days, and still expecting to be paid, for instance – is the ideal basis for asserting the obviousness of workplace gender equality.

I’m also unclear on how gender equality, a term used many times, is bolstered by the belief that menstruating women may in fact be men – and the implication that men can also become women and can therefore barge into previously female-only spaces.

The crucial signal, I’d suggest, is that the author, Meaghan Furlano, is willing to pretend that menstruating women are somehow not women and are in fact men. One might call that lying. And referring to women as “menstruators,” as if this were a breakthrough and a basis for applause, does not immediately evoke equality or respect.

A shocking twist. How very daring.

Who are all women. Hence the menstruation.

What those “hetero-sexist beliefs” might be remains, rather oddly, a thing of mystery. Few details are forthcoming. They are, however, “deeply concerning.” And I’m inclined to wonder whose responsibility it should be, if not the adult woman concerned, to manage menstruation.

Ms Furlano, a PhD Sociology student at Western University, and “a scholar of feminist media,” goes on to list the special things that must be done by all employers in order to accommodate “menstruating workers.” These menstruating workers who aren’t necessarily women, remember, and while stressing the importance of gender equality, including the equality of made-up genders, and while expressing dissatisfaction with efforts to comply:

I don’t know about taboo. Indeed, menstruation seems a loudly aired fixation of, for instance, scholars of feminist media. It’s practically a credential, a merit badge, all but obligatory. As for shameful and secretive, I can only suggest that most of us probably don’t care to know in any great detail about how you’re bleeding from your genitals.

All well and good, I suppose. But none of this seems obviously supportive of some unassailable claim of gender equality. It’s a list of costs and possible inconveniences.

No laughing at the back. The P-word was inevitable. Also, menstruators.

Ah, educational correction. Another cost.

And it seems to me a little odd to bemoan the idea that menstruation may, for some, have medical connotations while simultaneously expecting days off work, every month, due to being disabled by the very same phenomenon. Those “painful menstrual cycle-related symptoms or illnesses,” to which Ms Furlano refers. If periods leave a woman agonised and unable to work, for days, every month, this may signal some underlying issue – say, endometriosis or some auto-immune disorder. And a visit to the doctor may be in order.

Again, and let me stress this, most of us don’t want to know about the stains in your underwear. It’s not the kind of information that many of us crave. And at risk of being damned for my “hetero-sexist beliefs,” I suspect that many women are quite happy not to draw attention to their menstrual status. Also known as the expulsion of waste product. It being, for the most part, no other bugger’s business.

I can’t recall ever being offended by the visibility of a box of tampons, and these repeated claims of some egregious, crushing stigma seem to be teetering on a pinhead. The customary expectation of some minimal discretion – analogous to not announcing every bowel movement – does not strike me as a Big Ask, or a basis for victimhood.

Or for “a powerful feminist intervention,” “a radical transformation and physical restructuring of workplaces,” with continual monitoring and “interrogation,” as Ms Furlano demands.

Via Jonathan Kay.

Apparently, it’s outdated and oppressive for a young woman to be walked down the aisle at her wedding by her father. And so she can insult him and embarrass him by taking away that role. But of course it’s not outdated or oppressive for that same father to be expected to pay all of the bills for the wedding at which he’s being so pointedly sidelined and insulted:

Millennial girl wants dad to pay for wedding, but refuses to walk down the aisle with him.
Also mad her dad talked to friends to solicit opinions.
Dad’s not paying, girl now realizes she can’t afford it- now soliciting opinions from tik-tok.
My kids are going to trade school. pic.twitter.com/OC6Q7FRKhF

— Jason “Storm Chaser” Nelson (@RealJasonNelson) January 14, 2024

She’s “an independent thinker,” you see.

Update, via the comments:

It’s not, I think, hard to see how being very publicly dispensed with as outmoded or embarrassing – as a symbol of oppression and wickedness – might hurt the feelings of a father you supposedly care about.

And yet the above.

Little Madam concedes – albeit as somehow “unrelated” – that her parents do not, in fact, treat her as “property” – a term she uses repeatedly – and have seemingly never done so. Yet this imagined connotation must nonetheless, in her mind, be avoided at all costs. Lest The Patriarchy be empowered. As if it would otherwise occur to everyone else present and shape how they see the wedding. Which strikes me as a little odd.

Over the years I’ve been to several weddings and at no point during any of them did I regard the proud father as someone handing over his property. As if he were reluctantly, under duress, giving away his car. That’s not an idea that popped into my head – or, so far as I can tell, the heads of anyone else present at the ceremonies.

Something precious, yes. But not property.

And so, in order to ostentatiously reject a construal that no-one at her wedding is likely to arrive at anyway, Little Madam has alienated her parents and needlessly jeopardised the wedding in question. That happy day. And now she wants strangers on the internet to back her up and pin the blame on someone else.

Also, filming yourself putting on make-up while being a vain, monstrous bitch is probably not a look to go for.

Also, open thread.

And in lofty academic news:

Because victimhood is currency and status, and therefore terribly competitive.

The particulars of that “interconnected nature” are, sadly, not disclosed. Instead, the word “intersectionality” is deployed as some self-explanatory justification, both for the expansion of the museum and, one assumes, the additional funding.

The Museum of Sexist Objects is, it seems, a triumph in every possible way, according to those paid to curate its wonders, and to generally look busy while nobody cares. With Ferris State history professor Tracy Busch adding that the museum “has accomplished its vision by increasing awareness of the damage that sexism causes to not only women and girls, but also to men and the LGBTQ+ community.” Though, again, specifics on these points are not articulated.

Other priorities, however, are made clear:

Objects deemed sexist and reprehensible – sorry, “artefacts of intolerance” – include a child’s ironing playset, a set of false eyelashes, a joke sign about beer being better than women, a glamour calendar featuring pneumatic ladies in minimal lingerie, a “Hillary Sucks” poster, and, bizarrely, a signed publicity photograph of Dr Condoleezza Rice.

Other morally corrupting artefacts include a Condoleezza Rice promotional bobble-head doll – “Condi 2008” – which is somehow sexist and oppressive, unlike the near-identical promotional bobble-head dolls of male politicians.

Oh, and a 1997 novelty foodstuff by the name of Pasta Boobs.

Needless to say, the corresponding novelty pasta for ladies’ hen parties – shaped as you’d imagine – was not deemed worthy of inclusion.

Readers who feel an urge to tut about such things, and to generally disapprove, can do so, thanks to the museum’s website, which can be found here.

In the comments, Mr Muldoon steers us to the latest mental rumblings of Ms Laurie Penny:

Ms Penny is, I think, referring to fellow feminist Julie Bindel, whose review of Laurie’s latest book is not entirely positive, and who chose not to refer to its author as a suddenly ungendered being. But the broader claim is perhaps worth exploring.

I can’t say that my own views on modish pronoun stipulation make me feel “cool and edgy.” If anything, they seem fairly self-evident and unremarkable, not the stuff of obvious scandal or sudden intakes of breath. And I doubt that anyone here is likely to feel “threatened… by the ideas of a more progressive generation.” Though Ms Penny’s tendency to self-flatter – her inevitable trajectory – does catch the eye.

Regarding rudeness, I’m generally polite by default, at least in person, and don’t go out of my way to needlessly put a kink in someone else’s day. I’ve had perfectly civil chats with people who regard themselves as transgender or gender-non-conforming or whatever. Nobody got upset. But what is often being asked – or demanded – is not a small thing, not in its implications.

Taken broadly, we are being asked to affirm, wholesale, a bundle of phenomena that includes not only actual gender dysphoria, whether the result of developmental anomalies or childhood molestation, but also autogynephilia, serious personality disorders, adolescent pretension, and assorted exhibitionist and unsavoury compulsions. The expectation seems to be that we should take these different phenomena, with very different moral connotations, as being one and the same thing, and then defer to them, habitually and uncritically. Which is asking rather more than can readily be agreed to.

Noah Carl ponders wokeness and women: 

So, why would the influx of women into academia have contributed to its leftward shift, and to the rise of woke activism in particular? As the psychologist Cory Clark notes, women are consistently less supportive of free speech than men, and consistently more supportive of censorship. Compared to men, they’re more likely to say: that hate speech is violence; that it’s acceptable to shout down a speaker; that controversial scientific findings should be censored; that people need to be more careful about the language they use; and that it should be illegal to say offensive things about minorities…

Women are disproportionately represented in Grievance Studies (i.e., disciplines like Gender Studies and Critical Race Theory), which are often little more than a vehicle for left-wing activism… Almost 80% of bachelor’s degrees in “Ethnic, Gender, and Cultural Studies” are awarded to women… [Academia’s left-wing skew] appears to be greater among female academics than among male ones. In a 2016 paper, Mitchell Langbert and colleagues analysed voter registration data on approximately 4,000 US academics. As the table below indicates, the ratio of Democrats to Republicans was “only” 9:1 among men, but it was almost 25:1 among women.

Thanks to Mark Horowitz and colleagues, we also have detailed surveys from two of the most left-leaning disciplines: sociology and anthropology. The table below shows the proportion of male versus female sociologists (from a sample of 479) who agreed and disagreed with various items. Compared to men, women were more likely to say that “Sociology should be both a scientific and moral enterprise,” and that “Sociology should analyse and transcend oppression.” They were less likely to say that “More political conservatives would benefit [the] discipline,” and that “Advocacy and research should be separate for objectivity.”

Needless to say, there are links and charts aplenty.

Update, via the comments, which you’re reading of course: 

Some ladies of the left aren’t happy about Mr Carl’s article. Apparently, he could only have written it because he’s “intimidated by intelligent women.” At least, according to a woman who seemingly didn’t find it necessary to read the piece that she’s dismissing, or to rebut any of its particulars, even in passing. As intelligent women do, of course. I’ve yet to see a substantive reply. So far, there’s been lots of glib, self-flattering toss about how noticing certain things can only be explained by a fear of women, or a hatred of them, some rather dishonest attempts at reputational sabotage, and rumblings about the alleged “fragility” of the “straight white male.”

In the pages of Scary Mommy, where progressive ladies roar, Elaine Roth wishes us to know about her mental health problems:

There’s a running monologue whispering in the back of my mind. Maybe it’s whispering in the back of your mind, too. 

Place your bets. 

My running monologue isn’t unique to me. Countless women across the country — maybe across the globe — experience a similar monologue. It results from a shared trauma, and it’s got a name: Patriarchy Stress Disorder, or PSD.

I fear woo may be incoming.

PSD is the idea that the mental, physical, and emotional impact of gender inequality is a trauma that impacts woman and builds over time, and over generations. 

It is, we’re assured, a “collective intergenerational trauma,” and “genetically transmitted,” “passed down in our genes” – albeit in ways left entirely mysterious.

PSD can impact anyone, including nonbinary people and men. Still, few people have heard of patriarchy stress disorder,

You see, you haven’t heard of it, this new and modish ailment, for which no convincing definition is offered, beyond unspecified “systems of inequality” and repeating the word patriarchy many, many times. And yet apparently, simultaneously, we’re assured that said ailment – and its purported transmission – is the obvious go-to explanation for why “high-achieving women” – ladies much like Ms Roth – have so often failed “to have it all and thrive,” despite the promises of feminism. Why supposedly empowered ladies fail to “own their own shine.”

We’re told that the term patriarchy stress disorder was coined by “Dr Valerie Rein, Ph.D.,” and that Dr Rein – allegedly a “women’s mental health expert” – “learned that trauma could be genetically transmitted.” A link is provided, introducing us to “Dr Valerie” – though, again, no explanation or evidence of this alleged genetic transmission is included. We’re merely told that “trauma lives in our nervous system.” Which, as you can imagine, is immensely helpful. A second link, written by the expert in question, supposedly explaining Patriarchy Stress Disorder and its transmission, does no such thing. A third link, to the pages of Good Housekeeping, is similarly mysterious and short on particulars.

From academia’s Clown Quarter, rumblings of radical import:

Gender and Women’s Studies Professor Sami Schalk suggested she may cease wearing a bra to work, citing, among other things, male “policing” of women’s bodies. “I don’t want to wear a bra to work,” Schalk said on Twitter. “It’s harder on my body & expensive AF.”

Nothing signals gravitas quite like a juvenile abbreviation for the words as fuck.

“All so [sic] some students think my tits don’t sag or don’t know I have nipples? Why?! As person with large breasts my body has always been heavily policed bc of how other people, mostly men, respond to it.”

An educator, remember. A shaper of young minds.

Schalk has gained notoriety on the UW-Madison campus for her outspoken opinions ranging from twerking to anti-police rioting. In 2019, wearing a cape that declared “I AM 100% THAT BITCH,” Schalk twerked with rapper Lizzo at a Madison show. In a column at Vox, she declared it “an act of political defiance.”

And a grown woman.

The event in question, this act of political defiance, and preparations for it, can be witnessed here. 

“When Lizzo joined in, booty to booty — my butt blessed — it was pure Black Girl Magic,” she recalled.

When not exulting in her blessed buttocks and their magic blackness, or sharing boudoir photoshoots, or referring to the police as “fucking pigs,” Dr Schalk offers snacks and advice to rioters and arsonists, including reminders not to video each other while indulging in said rioting and acts of arson, as this may be incriminating and result in consequences, and subsequently harsh the buzz of being so terribly radical.

Recently, Schalk has focused on her right to be freed from the constraints of clothing and undergarments. When one Twitter [user] counselled that it was okay to occasionally “show some ass,” Schalk heartily agreed. “My ass is great,” she responded. “Sometimes I like to share it with the world.”

American readers will doubtless find comfort in this use of their tax dollars. $102,000 per year, or thereabouts.

But hey, bras are expensive as fuck.

For newcomers and the nostalgic, more items from the archives:

Please Update Your Files And Lifestyles Accordingly.

Natan Last is a “fitful poet,” a Brooklynite, and a graduate of Columbia. Also, he will save us. 

The world of woke crossword-puzzlers – because that’s a thing that exists – is one in which enthusiasts, via social media, grumble about white men, bemoan the insufficient prominence of “queer or POC colloquialisms,” share “off-colour jokes about hypothetical titles for a Melania Trump memoir,” and fret about the exact ratio of male and female names used as clues. Because a lack of “gender parity” in crossword puzzle clues constitutes one of “the systemic forces that threaten women.” Crossword puzzles can do that, apparently.

She Feels Unclean. 

A woe is invented. A solution is discovered.

Gratuitous drama and “drenching guilt” aside, I’m not entirely sure why hiring a cleaner should obviously be more fraught than hiring, say, a gardener or roofer… But for the kind of middle-class feminist who as recreation writes for the Observer, life is apparently an endless moral torture inflicted by minor, everyday events, or at least an exhausting theatre of pretending to be tortured by minor, everyday events. Which of the two constitutes a more harrowing and nightmarish existence, I leave to the reader. 

And somewhat related,

Telepathy Not A Thing, Women Hardest Hit. 

Feminist titan Gemma Hartley bemoans the chore of getting her multiple bathrooms cleaned by someone else.

For newcomers and the nostalgic, more items from the archives:

Imagine The Picnics.

Emily Zak wants us to know that fresh air and countryside are, like everything else, terribly oppressive.

Naturally, Ms Zak has an extensive, at times bewildering list of excuses for why any outdoors recreation should be tinged with guilt and wretchedness. From the claim that, “our society leverages natural spaces as a tool for capitalism and colonialism,” to the “toxic binary expectations we have about gender.” To spare you the tedium, I’ll summarise: If you can’t borrow a tent or don’t have a pair of suitable shoes, and if you don’t see enough adverts featuring gay people kayaking, and kayaking in a discernibly gay-affirming manner, it turns out you’re being oppressed by society.

Pantomime.

A balding, middle-aged transvestite, a sociology lecturer, wishes to confuse your children.

Dr Cremin doesn’t seem to grasp, or isn’t willing to admit, that his craving for public transgression – to, as he puts it, “sow gender confusion in kids” – by which he means young people over whom he has leverage – reveals quite a lot about his character. And his fitness to teach. I hate to sound prim, but if I were – God help me – a sociology student, I doubt I’d be reassured by the fact that my lecturer felt entitled to use the classroom as a venue for his transvestite fetish. It does rather suggest a pathological level of self-involvement and raises a suspicion that students may find themselves playing captive audience to – or being reluctant participants in – some personal psychodrama. A kind of power game. Some variation of, “I can do this and you can’t stop me without being accused of bigotry.”

They Come To Teach Us.

Polite man encounters Mao-lings. Mao-lings lose their minds, scream abuse, then assault him.

Mr Bob Chipman, a woke scold, avowed feminist, and film reviewer – in pretty much that order these days – shares his deep, uplifting philosophy. The dynamic may not be entirely unfamiliar.

Mr Chipman is an enthusiast of socialism (albeit, it seems, for others) and a man entranced by his own allegedly vast intelligence, which he mentions frequently. He is, he assures us, “an American of intelligence,” unlike people who are insufficiently leftwing, whom he views as “not redeemable” and indeed subhuman. His favoured terms for those who would dare to vote differently include “obsolete trash,” “backward people,” “obsolete whites” and “Nazi motherfuckers.” These lively definitions would most likely be applied to the readers of this blog, its host, and presumably our friends and families.

When not sharing his eugenic fantasies of a world forcibly depopulated of people who disagree with him, Mr Chipman suggests that his fellow leftists pleasure themselves by finding a non-leftwing person, any non-leftwing person, and making their “day/week/life a little bit miserable.”

Mr Chipman appears to have difficulty being happy and struggles to understand why anyone might dislike him.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.