Science may still be divided over whether gender differences are rooted in biology or culture, but many of Sweden’s government-funded preschools are doing what they can to deconstruct them. State curriculum urges teachers and principals to embrace their role as social engineers, requiring them to “counteract traditional gender roles and gender patterns.”

“Their role as social engineers.” And so, 

Two schools rolled out what was called a compensatory gender strategy. Boys and girls at the preschools were separated for part of the day and coached in traits associated with the other gender. Boys massaged each other’s feet. Girls were led in barefoot walks in the snow, and told to throw open the window and scream.

Yes, it’s faintly absurd and veering towards comedy. But if you read the whole thing, you may well be struck by the eye-widening arrogance and vanity of the educators, who, as self-appointed “social engineers,” feel entitled to “counteract” normative gender differences, along with the preferences of parents, some of whom have complained about their children’s subsequent behaviour.

Via Ben Sixsmith. 

A North Carolina State University sociology instructor contends that vegan and vegetarian men are guilty of “upholding the gender binary” and perpetuating “white masculinity.”

Imagine my surprise. 

Meatless Meals and Masculinity was written by Mari Mycek, a doctoral candidate and teaching assistant in the NCSU sociology department, who argues that vegan and vegetarian men have reclaimed their “previously-stigmatised consumption identity” to wield power over women by framing their lifestyle as a rational, rather than emotional, choice.

It seems like an awful lot of trouble to go to, personally. But as we’ve seen so many times, the contrived agonising must never end. Especially for woke sociology lecturers who wish to remind the world of their own Brahmin status in the progressive pecking order.  

Update:

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.

Attention, all white women. You and your “whiteness” are “causing real harm and violence.” You are, to put it bluntly, “a perpetrator of harm.”

And so, obviously, what you need is a workshop, where you can “confront your participation in the oppression of others,” which is to say, “confront white womanhood,” and thereby be in “true solidarity” with beings of colour, who are flawless, downtrodden and inherently more noble. Given your own vile and corrupting nature, interaction with beings of colour must only be attempted after following the guidance of suitably enlightened instructors. Instructors who will bestow intersectional epiphanies by steering you to the works of these lofty, selfless warriors, and also to articles published in that high-minded journal for troubled women, Everyday Feminism. 

For a mere $20, you could be stewing in the wisdom of, among others, “artist and activist” Heather Marie Scholl, who was famously interviewed by Gavin McInnes, and whose creative efforts “examine white women’s roles in the establishment and maintenance of white supremacy through… embroidery techniques.” When not toppling the patriarchy with unattractive needlework, or “approaching social justice issues with a productive emotionality,” Ms Scholl boasts of her “BA from The Evergreen State College in Race, Gender and Sexuality.”

So, ladies. Sunday March 4 is the date for your diary. Book early. 

“Men are trash” is a “positive observation.” And full of hope. According to Laurie Penny.

Because modern masculinity – whether yours or mine, or your husband’s or brother’s – “wounds everyone” and is “grounded in sexual violence.”

Via Tim Newman, who adds some thoughts of his own.