2. The Foolishness Of Political Correctness
3. Political Correctness And Better-Construed Feminism
4. What Do You Mean By Equality?
5. Inner Beauty And Outer Beauty
6. "Sex Objects" And "Sex Predators"
7. The Errors Of Third Wave Feminists
9. “Strong Black Sisters” And Feminism-Influenced Women
10. Female Establishments: Coercion toward Loserhood
11. "Stereotypes" and "Generalizations"
12. The Task For Contemporary Intellectual
I have written at great length about the intellectual abomination known as political correctness. At this point I am addressing their main claims.
Claim: The Western civilization is the root of oppression of women.
Answer: In the non-Western Muslim civilization, the situation is far worse than it has ever been in the West.
Claim: Western literary and cultural legacy is patriarchial / racist.
Answer: You obviously haven't read Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Mary Shelley, Marina Tsvetayeva, Dorothy Parker, Walt Whitman or Mark Twain.
Claim: Men see women as sex objects.
Answer: Some men do. As someone said on the Internet, women see men as success objects. I see no reason to see either one as better than the other.
Claim: Sexual industry is the root of exploitation and disrespectful treatment of women.
Answer: Afghanistan, Congo and Bosnia during the war did not have sex industry, but they've had mass rapes. Women have it much better in Netherlands or San Francisco than they do in these places.
Claim: Social or personal problems are rooted in low self-esteem.
Answer: If that had been true, then for the bulk of recorded history, in which self-esteem was not encouraged, nothing good could have happened. Many good things happened in all societies, whether or not they believed in self-esteem. As was once told me by a woman from World War II generation, self-esteem used to be called conceit, and her generation was in no way a failure.
Claim: Abuse of women is committed by men with personality disorders.
Answer: In most of the world - and in much of America - abuse of women is the social norm. It is not committed by "sociopaths" or "borderlines" or "narcissists"; it is committed by your average Joe, Igor, Abdul, Praveem or Jamaal who believes that real men beat women, or that love is for sissies, or that he owes it to God or to other men to keep women down.
Claim: Beauty is only relative or culturally dependent.
Answer: In a study that was conducted by an American woman - Judith Langlois - it was found that a face with a particular set of proportions was regarded as beautiful by everyone. Actual beauty - such as the Sistine Chapel or the Burmese stupas or the works of Anna Akhmatova - takes talent and effort to produce and deserves respect.
Claim: Physical beauty and inner beauty are incompatible with each other.
Answer: I see no reason at all why attractiveness and being a good person would correlate one way or another. There will be people possessing of both, either or neither. This idea allows the women who have neither to attack and abuse women who have either or both.
Claim: Beauty is a patriarchial institution that destroys women's self-esteem.
Answer: That some people are stupid does not mean that people can't be intelligent, and that some people are poor does not mean that people can't be wealthy. We are all endowed with different gifts, and we do different things by way of developing or not developing them.
Claim: Love is a patriarchial racket.
Answer: Many of the people who championed love in the West - and in any number of other places - were women, and not stupid or weak ones either. A man who champions love is far less likely to be ugly to his woman than either a traditional man who believes that real men beat women, or the "rational" man who believes that anything with emotions is an inferior form of life.
Claim: Love is narcissism.
Answer: Love worked out for many people in World War II generation. The World War II generation - unlike the baby boomers - have not been accused of generational narcissism. It has been practiced successfully by people who were in no way narcissistic, so it is not narcissism.
Claim: Relationships should be about equality.
Answer: I see no reason why they should be. Most relationships are not about equality nor will they be about equality, however much you seek to put human nature under a Marxist mold.
Claim: Anyone who takes objection to political correctness is a misogynist.
Answer: Crying wolf discredits you when the real wolf appears. The Ayatollah is a misogynist. I am not.
Claim: Anyone who takes objection to political correctness is a sociopath.
Answer: This is a Soviet trick. They too diagnosed with untreatable disorders people who disagreed with their party line.
Claim: "Sociopaths" and "perverts" are evil and can only be evil whatever they do.
Answer: This contradicts most basic reason. If people are responsible for their actions then anyone, including a "sociopath,"can act rightfully; and if some people cannot act rightfully then people are not responsible for their actions.
Claim: Male perspective is by nature destructive.
Answer: Tell that to Mohandas Gandhi.
Claim: Women who are pretty or nice are sellouts to men.
Answer: Gender war is not the solution, gender war is the problem. The solution is for men to be good to women and for women to be good to men. I am not a sellout to women because I refuse to let Michael Murphy speak for me.
This should pretty much cover most of it. Feel free to comment anytime.
2. The Foolishness Of Political Correctness
The proponents of political correctness like to portray anyone who takes objection to political correctness as a bigot or a neanderthal. Any expression containing even a hint of anger brings on that response. I am responding now to political correctness in a manner that is fully reasoned and that cannot be portrayed credibly as any such thing.
Political correctness not only fails to achieve its stated goals of tolerance and respect; it prevents them from being made possible at all. In order to actually respect or tolerate the next person I need to understand their perspective. For me to do so the next person will have to be able to tell me their honest opinions however offensive these may be. And if the next person cannot tell me their honest opinions because someone may find them offensive, then I will never understand the next person's perspective, and I would not know whether or not to extend to that person actual tolerance or actual respect.
What is achieved this way is nothing close to tolerance or respect. What is achieved this way is suffocating insincerity. And insincerity is a horrible thing to inflict upon a population. It makes Americans look to everyone else like scammers. Even I, who have fought this state of affairs ever since I knew what it was, could not escape this stereotype when I went to Australia.
Now there have been many arguments by conservatives that 1960s and 1970s liberalism degraded national character. Political correctness does that much more. People having sex and doing drugs does not necessarily make people worse human beings. Being taught to be insincere, however, very much does make people worse human beings. And that degrades national character for real.
Before political correctness in America, there were similar attitudes in Japan. According to their beliefs you get what you send out; so you cannot say or even think anything negative. But there are many situations in which you do have to say things that are negative. When a nuclear reactor explodes you have to tell people what actually has taken place. Doing anything else is not enlightenment, it is lying.
Similar themes have been tried in a fair country formerly known as Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia was widely regarded as a civilized country, indeed the best country in the Communist bloc. The government preached something similar to political correctness, and it made sure that people conformed to it. Because people were not allowed to express their feelings, they could not move beyond their suppressed ethnic hatreds, which is what they had been feeling all along. The fair country called Yugoslavia was replaced with mass graves and rapes of every female aged 4 to 70. This was not accidental; it was a logical outcome of the politically correct policies that the Tito government had put into place.
I am from Russia, and Russians are generally regarded as the rudest people in the world. I have encountered in any number of places – especially the American South – the attitude that politeness is the same thing as respect; but a credible case can be made that rudeness is actually more respectable than politeness. When you are rude I know where you are standing, whereas when you are polite I am left guessing. If you think that Russians, or Jews, or myself personally, are evil, then I would rather hear that than to see you pretending to be nice to me while waiting to stab me in the back. That way I know what I am dealing with, and I can find workable ways to deal with it.
Now I do not necessarily advocate unchecked rudeness, as that can be off-putting to people and often deter useful input. But that outcome is far more reliably accomplished by the attitude that no opinion that anyone can consider offensive should be expressed. The outcome of the preceding, once again, is nothing close to tolerance or respect. The outcome of the preceding is suffocating insincerity. And that, once again, is very bad for the country. It makes everyone dishonest, and as such it degrades national character.
Besides, once again, making all but impossible its stated goals of achieving tolerance and respect.
Of course the participants in political correctness do not begin to follow their own stated claims of respect or tolerance. I have been viciously misrepresented by these people as everything that I am not. A sociopath, a racist, a misogynist, you name it. I have even been slandered ridiculously as a pedophile. Yet very few of these people have done anything to help women at the receiving end of real abuses such as severe brutality, death threats or corrupt courts taking away their children. Very few of these people have maintained close, lasting, serious friendships with people who were black, or people who were poor, or people who are socially ostracized. Very few of these people have done anything to confront real misogyny such as that of Eminem or Michael Murphy. I have done all of the above.
The same people who call themselves feminists have been abetting the most viciously misogynistic ideology on the planet – Jihadist Islam. The same people who call themselves feminists have been excusing inner city thugs in their crimes against women. Of course they do not see the outcome of their policies; however the people who fund them and vote for them do.
At this point the participants in this abominable movement will want to portray me as a dangerous person. I certainly hope to be dangerous to them; I hope that more people be dangerous to them, both on the Left and the Right. These people have inflicted a very real form of fascism upon countries that are intended to be free; and if America's founders were alive today they would see them for how gravely they have violated the constitutional intent.
As well as, once again, degrading the national character.
As well as, once again, making all but impossible their own stated goals of tolerance and respect.
I have close friendships with a number of classical liberals, including some with major personal achievements, and none of them have any use for political correctness. One statement I've heard from a young Jewish lady is that political correctness is an embarrassment to liberalism; and that it is indeed. Liberalism was never meant to be the same thing as fascism, and liberalism was never meant to be the same thing as forced insincerity.
A person who actually seeks to achieve things such as respect and tolerance will not be telling people to not say anything that somebody may consider offensive. He will allow people to say exactly what they are feeling and thinking, however offensive these things may be. Then people will understand one another's actual perspectives; and then they will know whether or not to tolerate or respect one another.
Political correctness makes this outcome impossible. And that means that it is the biggest thing that stands in the way of the commendable goal of achieving tolerance and respect.
For a long time, political correctness has dominated academia and the media, pushing aggressive and heavy-handed party line in a manner quite reminiscent of fascism and Communism. It is time that there be a real challenge to political correctness - a challenge that is intellectually valid and that addresses their arguments at the core.
One core claim of political correctness is that beauty is in all cases a product of social norms. Want to know how to strike a body blow to this argument? It is as follows. In a recent experiment, a psychologist named Judith Langlois - a woman - showed that a face with certain proportions will be regarded as beautiful by people from all around the world. What this shows is that there is such a thing as beauty that is not culturally relative or taste-dependent and that all "beholders" recognize as beauty. Which not only refutes the politically correct claims on the subject but also supports a strong argument that true beauty is universal to all humanity, possibly even to all of life.
Another refutation of the political correct claims on this subject is the behavior of the politically correct. If beauty really were relative, then they would be attacking all women, however attractive or unattractive they happen to be. And yet the politically correct attack beautiful women and leave unattractive women alone or enlist them as their soldiers. What this shows is that the politically correct, like everyone else, know what beauty is and what it isn't. And their claims on the subject is inconsistent with their own behavior, which makes them hypocrites.
Another core claim of political correctness is that sex is exploitation of women or degradation of women. By that standard, all economic activity is exploitative; yet none of them are advocating unemployment. By that standard, the practicioners of political correctness themselves owe their lives to exploitation and degradation of their mothers; yet none of them are committing suicide.
A further claim of political correctness is that there are no inherent differences between men and women. This is where they confuse two concepts: Similitude and equality. Equality does not mean being the same, it means having equal rights and equal powers. And in pushing similitude with the worst of men as key to personal advancement, the practicioners of political correctness destroy good and valuable qualities - such as compassion, warmth, beauty, and ability to produce and nurture life - that are more common to women than they are to man (or, in case of ability to produce life, uniquely feminine). The result is womanhood eviscerated and robbed of the wonderful qualities that are distinctly feminine and pressed into behaving like the worst of men. This does not benefit women, and it doesn't help women to get ahead. This makes the women who have believed political correctness the worst women to be found.
Perhaps the most outrageous claim to have come out of political correctness has been the idea that the politically correct speak for women, and that anyone who argues with any of their claims is a misogynist or a chauvenist. There are two main problems with this argument. One is that other women have not voted for the practicioners of political correctness to speak for them, and their claims that they do is a vast and illegitimate grab for power. Another is that the practicioners of political correctness are the worst women in known history, and the worst elements of a type have no right to speak for the type. A good woman will want to be good to men in her life, in the same way that a good man will want to be good to women in his. Both the politically correct women, who preach nastiness, and the fathers' movement, which preaches violence and oppression, are the worst elements in their gender; and in each case 50% of humanity is ill-served through representation by such elements.
It is wrong for political correctness to claim that it speaks for women's advancement, or social progress, or anything along the same line. What we see here is a product of an academic groupthink in which a bunch of cold, mean-spirited, hateful harpies have decided that they speak for all women without other women having voted for them as their spokespeople. It's not progress, it is a digression. It's not women's empowerment, it's harpies' empowerment. Women, for the most part, have not benefited one bit from political correctness, and many have lost much as a result of it as they were robbed of their right to be beautiful, their right to be warm and loving, and their right to be loved by a man.
Most demonstrative of the wrongness of political correctness has been the fact that in countries where women actually hold advanced status - such as Sweden and France - the women are not under pressure to be ugly, mean or asexual. Women there are free to be the best of what they are; and they also have rights and powers that in most cases exceed those of the American women. Political correctness is not women's rights, and it's not social progress. Political correctness is a historical error; and it has only gotten as far as it has because not enough people have had the intellectual courage to confront it.
With many men howling that women should obey them and that they should have right to batter them, clearly there is a need for feminism; but it has to be a better construed feminism. It has to be a feminism that recognizes that women have qualities that are different from those of men, and that many of these qualities are good. It has to be a feminism that recognizes that equality is not sameness, and that a cat does not need to be a dog in order to have an equal value with the dog. It has to be a feminism that accepts and values beauty, love, romance and sexuality and allows these beautiful qualities to live and grow. And it has to be a feminism that is represented by the best among women and not by the worst women in history.
Feminism, as such, is a rightful, even a noble, cause, and one that should have the support of people of goodwill and people of intellect in both genders. But required on the part of feminism itself is movement away from grievous errors, such as ones I've described. Women benefit from thought that affirms instead of negating the feminine, and they also benefit from better representation than is afforded them by political correctness. Moving toward feminism that allows the woman to be the woman while protecting her from ill-treatment would actually benefit the lot of women in the world.
There are any number of women who say that they want equality. They however fail to state what equality means.
If they want equality of power, they have always had it. I have heard it said by a feminist graduate student that women in “traditional” cultures had more power than do women now, as they were in control of reproduction and sex. I have heard it said by a feminist University of Chicago professor that women have always been the stronger gender. I have heard it said by a highly intelligent women that women have men by the nuts psychologically, since they are their mothers. As a Chinese leader once said, “There have been always mothers, and mothers have sons.”
If they want equality of value, then they also have it already, especially in the West. There was a conservative Christian priest in a church I attended who said that men and women are “equal in value, different in roles.” I have a daughter; but I value her as much – if not more – than I would value a son.
If they want equality in relationships, in many cases that would work against them. If a man is in love with a woman, she has more power in the relationship than does he. I have had a fairly equal relationship with my former wife, but that is not the relationship that I remember the most. The relationship that I do remember the most was one in which I completely loved the woman, and she had all the real power. She was a very good woman, and she used it for right things. I have known similar situations in which the woman was not such a good woman and used that power for wrong things.
If they want economic and political equality, they will need to understand what that means. Men aren't all that good to one another, and a woman who wants economic or political equality with men will have to deal with a lot of crap. She will have to endure market competition. She will have to deal with all sorts of scumbags. In some cases, she will have to go to war.
If they want equality in treatment, they will also need to understand the implications. Treatment is based upon a person's qualities. With equal treatment, people – both men and women – would treat others – both men and women – based on who they are. It would then make sense to be good to people – women and men – because they are good people. It would make no sense at all to be good to Third Wave feminists, who by and large are horrible human beings – much worse so than most men, especially the liberal men they like to attack the most.
A still bigger problem with the idea of equality in treatment is that, by its own logic, it justifies violence against women. If a man comes up to another man talking trash, the usual response is punching him in the face. Which means that a woman who talks trash to a man - and wants equality at the same time - stands to be beaten. I doubt that this is a conclusion with which feminists are going to be comfortable. Nor is this a state of affairs that stands to benefit women.
A popular sticker in 1990s was “feminism is a radical idea that women are human beings.” What it fails to specify is what that means. There was a human being named Joseph Stalin who treated other 60 million human beings by killing them. Expect to be treated like a human being. Expect to be killed.
I have known any number of women who are successful professionals, and even many of them take objection to Third Wave feminism. What they say, again and again, is that feminism has gone too far. They accept the parts of feminism that give them the right to work, but they reject the parts of feminism that tells them that they can't have children or families or that they can't be kind and pretty. Many of these women are strong and intelligent people. If a feminist would not take this from me, she should take it from them. Most of them are stronger than the feminists, but they are too gentle to confront them. At which point the task falls to less gentle people like me.
There are any number of other women who have no use for feminism period. They would rather be with a working man and stay at home with children. If feminists really believe in women's rights, they will respect these women's rights to their choices. These are choices made in an informed way. And if they do not respect these women's rights to their choices, then they can't claim to be in favor of women's rights.
I will anticipate different women choosing to act in a different manner. Some will want careers; some will want family life; some will want both. All should have the right to either choice. This is the true meaning of liberty. And a person who actually believes in liberty – conservative, liberal or libertarian – will accept the right of women, including ones in their families or their communities, to either choice.
I have no idea which path my daughter will want to choose, and I neither push nor discourage her in either direction. I however will seek to protect her from – or teach her to fight – the villains on either side. I do not want her to end up a punching bag for some idiot. Nor do I want her to get abused by Third Wave feminists in the academia or the marketplace for being kind and pretty. Instead I will prepare her to deal with both sets of scoundrels, so that she can know how to protect herself from both sides in the gender war. In the meanwhile I will do what is in my power to reduce the influence of both sides in the gender war in society. I recommend that other loving parents – both men and women – do the same.
She did not choose this set of conditions, and I did not choose this set of conditions. Nastiness, stupidity and worse among both women and men have created the gender war. There are however workable solutions. The most workable solution of all is for men and women to come together in goodwill and create good relationships and a family life. This will refute the claim made by both sides in the gender war – that either women or men are evil, or that a woman who is good to a man is selling out fellow women, or that a man who is good to a woman is not being a real man. It will disempower the scoundrels among both women and men who take legitimate sentiments and turn them into hideousness. It will show the leaders on both sides of the gender war that, no, they do not speak for 50% of humanity, nor do they have the right to claim that they speak for 50% of humanity. And it will empower the rest of us: the men – and the women – who are willing to treat their partners right.
I would not dream of attempting to stand in the way of the choice of a woman to either lifestyle. However she will have to make that choice knowingly. There are dangers in both situations. A woman who is economically dependent on a man may be in a bad way if the man chooses to act like a bastard. However she would likewise be dealing with many bastards if she were to have a career.
If feminism really seeks to benefit women, it would work to make both career life and family life a better experience for women. It would fight potentials for abuses both at home and at work. There are potentials for both; there always will be potentials for both. A woman who chooses either one – or both – will have to do so knowingly. And the world in general, and feminists in particular, will have to respect that choice.
In “Beauty And The Beast,” an enchantress says that beauty is within. In “Liar Liar,” Jim Carrey says to his son, when he says this, “That’s just something that ugly people say.”
Both are wrong.
We are dealing here with two completely different and completely unrelated things. On one side we see physical attractiveness. On the other side we see goodness of character. I see no reason why the two should relate to one another at all. Some people will have both, some people will have one or the other, and some will have neither.
We see many claim such things as that physical beauty is somehow incompatible with spirituality or intelligence or personal strength. They obviously haven’t met many Russian women. The people who have such beliefs have no business claiming to be spiritual or intelligent. They are driven by greed and hatred. And their effect on society is poisonous.
I have loved a number of women who were both beautiful and good people. I stick up for them as a labour of love. Their concerns become my concerns, and their battles become my battles.
When I was writing in defense of beauty I was told that I was thinking with my penis and that I was a sham. I have no sexual feelings for women in my family, but they are all beautiful. They are also good people. Most of them are also spiritually developed. They, like many women from Russia, are a refutation by counterexample of this claim.
If the point is that people should pay more attention to people’s character, then that claim is correct. If the claim is that there is something incompatible between inner beauty and outer beauty, then that claim is completely wrong. I see no reason why the two should have a relationship, either a positive one or a negative one. We are dealing with two completely different things. See both for what they are and act accordingly.
One concept that deserves to be shot is that of "a sex object." Apparently there is something wrong with being recognized for one's body. My response is that everyone - both men and women - have bodies, and bodies are objects. I am a man, and I have a fairly good physique. I find it flattering when people appreciate my body. That is even the case with people to whom I am not attracted, such as much older women and gay men.
Furthermore, there is nothing at all contradictory between being regarded sexually and other good forms of attention. It is possible to respect someone and be attracted to them at the same time. It is possible to appreciate someone both physically and mentally. In better relationships, there are both forms of attraction and appreciation. One can value the other personally and one can be attracted to them as well.
Another concept - one that has some merit, but that keeps getting misapplied - is that of the sexual predator. Apparently a man with supposed psychological problems seeking a relationship with a woman is a predator, and a woman with supposed psychological problems is a victim. In fact both are in the same boat. They are both people who have been branded, rightfully or wrongfully, with psychological problems. Neither is the predator, and neither is the victim.
Probably the only people who actually are sex predators are men who go after children and men who go for women who are more vulnerable than they are themselves. But if say a man with bipolar diagnosis goes after a woman with a bipolar diagnosis, there is no predation being perpetrated. One equal goes after another equal; which is exactly what is supposed to be happening in relationships.
Sexuality will always exist, as will romantic attraction. The solution is to work to make such things the best experience that they can be. The first step toward that is clearing up misconceptions on the subject; and I hope that any number of others do more toward that effect.
A fairly long time ago, I was with a very beautiful older woman who was a devout Christian. I was talking to her about the wrongs done in the name of feminism, and she told me to the effect of that one shouldn't fight hatred with hatred but with love.
Now I do not pretend to love these women – certainly not in the way in which I loved her – but I have made an effort to understand them; and it appears that they do in fact come from an understandable place. These women were either not valued or treated badly, and they got angry at that – in many cases rightfully so. However what they did with it was wrong.
They made several major errors. In matters of beauty and love, they confused value with misuses of value. That stupid teenagers attack girls whom they don't consider attractive, or that unscrupulous plastic surgeons exploit women's insecurities to make a buck, is not the fault of beauty; it is the fault of the stupid teenagers and the unscrupulous plastic surgeons. That some player types pretend to love women but actually don't love anyone except themselves is not the fault of love; it is the fault of the players. To damn love and beauty because they have been misused that way by ignorant or unethical people is to give these people far more credit than they deserve. Both beauty and love existed before these people existed; they will continue existing long after they are gone.
What do I mean by confusing value with misuses of value? Simply that anything that is good will have someone wanting to use it for wrong. Some people see this misuse and blame the value. They are wrong. They should be blaming the person doing the misuse. Intelligence can be used for wrong things; that does not mean that intelligence is bad. Money can be used for wrong things; that does not mean that money is bad. Patriotism, altruism, justice, you name it. That Hitler appealed to patriotism to start the Second World War does not damn patriotism; it damns Hitler. That Stalin appealed to altruism to create a brutal totalitarian state does not damn altruism; it damns Stalin. That there are people who think that justice means slaughtering the propertied class or relentlessly persecuting people they do not know does not mean that justice is for pinkos and weenies. Once again, there is the value, and there are the misuses of the value. It is wrong to damn the value because someone has been misusing it. Doing that gives the person doing such a thing far too much credit, while devaluing all the many other people who use the value for things that are right.
This means the following: That it's wrong to attack women who are beautiful and males who love those women. They, once again, are not responsible for the actions of ignorant teenagers and unscrupulous plastic surgeons. Neither are Michelangelo or John Keats. Confront the people who misuse the value. Do not attack people who contribute to the value. And most certainly do not attack people who use the value for rightful things.
Another major error that they have made has been perpetrating the worst hysteria in the history of the United States. They have decided that a class of people is evil and can only be evil whatever they do. This of course contradicts the most basic reason. If people are responsible for their actions then anyone, including “sociopaths” and “perverts,” can choose to act rightfully; and if some people are evil and can only be evil whatever they do then people are not responsible for their actions. What we see here is irrational, it is cruel, and it is wrong. It is fascism in the name of feminism. And this is the main reason why women who have partaken in this witch hunt are termed Femi-Nazis.
Finally they have been influencing women, especially young women on college campuses, to be paranoid and mean. They have been attacking of course precisely the wrong males. The males whom they attack are the males nearest the liberal centers of learning and culture, who are the least misogynistic men out there. Then the real misogynists and the real abusers take these women's venal behavior and say to other men, “See, we told you, women are evil, we have to keep them down.” The malicious behavior of the Third Wave feminists feeds real misogyny even more reliably than did the promiscuity of the baby boomer women whom they regarded as “sluts” and “breeders.” The feminists in the academia do not see the results of this. All sorts of innocent women do.
Now many of the women who have taken part in this movement did so from understandable considerations; but then again so have many men who have formed the reaction. These women were angry at men who had treated them badly, and they were angry at women who treated them badly. The biggest problem with both movements has been that it is precisely the wrong men and the wrong women who suffered. The men who suffered from this movement were the men nearest the liberal centers of learning and culture who were the least misogynistic men to be found. And the women who suffered from the reaction were women in right-wing or Muslim or inner city communities who were the least likely to be involved in militant feminism.
So there we have it: A horrible movement that begat another horrible movement. And in both cases precisely the wrong people suffered and precisely the wrong people got ahead. So now there are all sorts of innocent women who suffer for the sins of the Third Wave feminists, as the men who form the reaction are equating them with the venal conduct of the people within this movement. The good women suffer, while the self-proclaimed leaders of feminism enjoy successful careers. This teaches everyone – both men and women – that it pays to be a jerk and does not pay to be a good person. And that makes the world worse for everyone.
Thank you Andrea Dworkin. Thank you Michael Murphy.
It is time for men and women of goodwill to stand up to both abominations and say that enough is enough.
I have heard it said that love is the most confusing concept that mortals deal with. I seek to correct some misconceptions on this issue.
A former friend of mine, who is a brilliant writer and thinker, wrote that “love is beautiful and hatred is ugly, and never the twain shall meet.” In fact there are many situations in which the twain do meet. There are many people who both love and hate their partners. There are many people who love their country and hate their neighbors. There are many people who love God and hate Satan. In all of these situations, the twain do meet.
Then there are people who see some kind of incompatibility between love and anger. This is also very wrong. If you love your child, you would be angry at someone who hurts your child. Expecting anything else is not enlightenment. It is foolishness.
I have also heard it said that love is the most powerful force in the universe. In fact love is quite fragile. I have known of many situations – and had one in my life – in which someone would deeply love someone else, only to have some Iago tell them a pack of lies and poison them against their partner. In all of those situations, love gets destroyed. This would not happen if love was the most powerful force in the universe.
I said that love is fragile. I did not say that it is worthless. Its value is its beauty, not its power. Flowers are fragile as well. That does not make them any less beautiful. The solution is to value the beauty and to use whatever power one has to protect it, and in so doing preserve its value. Do not expect things to be powerful that aren't. Value them for what they are and use whatever power you do have to defend them.
I have also heard it said that love is something that one should generalize on the whole of humanity, even on all sentient beings. The correct response to that is, What do you mean by love? I cannot be expected to love every person the way I love Michelle or Julia. Nor can I be expected to love every child the way I love my daughter. It could be valid to expect me to extend to others goodwill and compassion; it is not valid to expect me to extend to them passion or partiality.
An input upon this subject comes from W. H. Auden. He stated that “the error made in bone of every women and every man... not universal love, but to be loved alone.” I do not see how that is error at all. If you are married to someone, it is rightful to expect that they love you alone. I would not expect anyone else to act in any other way.
Another claim I have heard is that romantic love creates attachments, and that attachments are always painful. That may very well be the case; but maybe avoiding pain is not what it's all about. I would rather have beauty in my life even if it is painful than not have beauty in my life at all.
Then of course there is the claim that there is some kind of incompatibility between love and ego, or between “flesh” and spirituality. That is also totally wrong. Romantic love is both physical and spiritual. There is the meeting of spirits, and often there is also physical attraction. There is no incompatibility between such things; they work together.
Even if there is some kind of a self-interested component in love, that does not damn it either. The current political and economic system is based on self-interest and protection of people's rights. If you think it selfish to want to be loved, you will have to also see the same in your living in comfort until age 70 in a democracy instead of tilling a two-acre plot of land, living till age of 30, and having your sons drafted into the military and your daughters into domestic servitude.
With psychological explanations, most are dead wrong. Freud mistook the memories of childhood sexual abuse for erotic fantasy and, as a result of this wrong core analysis, came to a number of completely wrong conclusions, including his most grievous error – that love is transference from a parent. Nor is it anything like “narcissism”; it worked very well for the World War II generation that has never been accused of any such thing. It has nothing to do with “self-esteem” or any other such thing; it happens regardless of how you see yourself. All of these explanations are absolutely wrong.
Then there is the claim that it is about “external validation.” It is not about any kind of validation at all. It is not about what you feel about yourself; it is about what you feel about the other person. I can validate myself all day long. That does not reduce the love that I have for Michelle or Julia.
Nor is it, as some in feminism claim, a “patriarchial racket” or any kind of a racket. Playing women is a racket; love is not. I am not a player. I love whom I love genuinely. I seek their well-being even if it is not the same as my own, and I've proven that when my former wife left me to be with another man.
A useful idea on this matter comes from a very unlikely source – Ayn Rand. She said that love is passionate approval of the other person with your whole being. This is certainly a better explanation than any of the preceding; but it's not only about approval. There is a lot more to it. You also seek their well-being even if it is not in your own immediate personal interest – a concept of course which is alien to Ayn Rand.
Then there is the claim that the concept of love was invented by Greeks, who used it to have sexual relations with boys. The people who make such a claim have obviously not read the works that were formative to the Greek civilization. There are many epics and plays, preceding Plato, that feature love between men and women. Plato used the concept of love for wrongdoing. That does not damn love; it damns Plato.
Even in the Indian civilization, in which marriages are arranged, love came to be through the works of a woman poet named Murabai. Here is a society that has done its darnedest to get rid of love, and even there it came to exist. Murabai was not a man pulling a racket. Murabai was a strong and courageous woman. She has far more the right to the title than any Third Wave feminist.
These are the main misconceptions that I have encountered, though I am sure there are many others. In “A Beautiful Mind,” the mathematician John Nash stated that he had found the greatest truth in “equations of love.” This is a person who was not irrational in any manner; he was better at reasoning than just about anyone. There is no incompatibility between love and reason. Nor is there incompatibility between love and spirituality, or between soul and flesh. Love is not the most powerful force in the universe; its value is not its power but its beauty. See things for their actual value and avoid misconceptions that anyone else may create.
9. “Strong Black Sisters” And Feminism-Influenced Women
I used to attend a poetry reading in DC that was lead by some brilliant young black folks. One recurring skit consisted of two young men rapping “What I want is a strong black sister, the only thing for me is a strong black sister,” and there was a young woman walking around playing the part.
I have known any number of black sisters of all ages, and all of them were strong. Most however did not have an in-your-face attitude. At that poetry reading, there was another black sister. She was a complete sweetheart, but when someone tried to mess with her boy did he get it. I can respect that kind of strength a lot more.
Every sister I've known from India was strong; but most did not have an attitude. Every sister in my family is strong; but most are kind. Was that sister strong? Maybe. But I don't think she could have been stronger than Russian and Jewish sisters who've lived through the Second World War.
There are many women, especially in America, who mistake attitude for strength and gentleness for weakness. They think that they are the only strong women in the world. Quite simply, they need to get out more. The world is full of women who are genuinely strong. And most of those women do not have an attitude.
One major premise of martial arts is cultivation of strength in order to keep the peace. The person is taught real strength, and he is also taught to control it and only use it when necessary. As is said in a movie, “Fight not good, but if you do fight, win.” American third-wave feminism has created a bunch of aggressive, malicious, mean-spirited women who think that they are strong and that all other women are weak. I would like to see them go up in an argument against an older Russian woman, or against an older Southern woman, or against a woman from India or Saudi Arabia or Tanzania. These women will show them who is really strong.
Some people find strength in themselves. Others find it in other things. The person who finds strength in Christianity, or in Hinduism, or in family, or in patriotism, or in service, is often stronger than the person whose only source of strength is herself. Women who've been mistreated are often taught to be strong in themselves and only in themselves; and that is a very wrong approach. There are bigger and better sources of strength than oneself, and many women – and men – find greater strength in such things than they do in their immediate selves.
Should people be strong in themselves? If that rocks their boat, fine. But let's not be mistaken enough to think that the self is the only, or the best, source of strength. It is neither. A person whose source of strength is himself will be less willing to do actually brave things than someone whose source of strength is patriotism, service or Christianity. Self-esteem does not win wars. Real strength does.
I have heard it said by a woman who works at the University of Chicago that women have always been the stronger gender. I have heard it said by a Lesbian feminist graduate student in Maryland that in “traditional” societies women had more power than they do now in America, because they were in control of reproduction and sex, whereas contemporary women are under control of male-dominated business culture. I have heard it said by a number of women that feminism fails to represent women, as many women would much rather stay at home with children than pursue careers. I hear it said repeatedly by women – strong, successful women – that feminism has gone too far. I did not invent these ideas, nor did I get them from the “patriarchy.” Strong, intelligent women told me these things.
Is it rightful to teach women strength? Yes. But it is not rightful to instead teach attitude and arrogance and mistake these things for strength. They are not strength; they are stupidity. A woman who wants to be strong stands to learn a lot more from “traditional” women than she does from the feminists. The feminists are not the only strong women in the world; in any number of meaningful senses many of them are the weakest. Wrong qualities are being taught, and women suffer as a result.
I've known many women, working in female-run establishments, who kept getting attacked by their female bosses and co-workers for being either hard-working, intelligent or attractive. This kind of behavior can only be a disaster for the women and their attempts at advancement in society.
In male-run establishments, the people look up to the winner. Hard work, knowing what one is doing, and qualities such as confidence and self-assurance, are respected and admired. This results in a coercion upon men to develop winning habits and attitude. Whereas the attack on similar virtues among women in female-run establishments creates a coercion upon women to become losers.
Who is going to win: The people who prevail upon one another to be winners or the people who prevail upon one another to be losers and attack whatever winning qualities some among them may possess? This is a way in which women screw themselves over bigtime. If one group encourages winning behaviors and the other group attacks winning behaviors, which group is going to win?
The white man was not born the ruler of the planet. He had to work at it, and not only to work hard but also to work smart. Attacking positive qualities such as hard work and intelligence prevents smart work from being accomplished. And the more the women are under pressure to hide or suppress their good qualities, the more they are removed from being winners.
So it's about time that the women who are a part of such establishments get their heads out of their behinds. You attack strengthening qualities, you create a coercion toward degeneration. You attack winning qualities, you create a coercion toward loserhood. You attack the better minds in your gender, you create a coercion on your gender to be dumb. Neither of these are the keys to achieving equality with men.
I say this because I care. I want women to do well; but that does not mean that I will accept things done by women that are clearly wrongful. Hard work, intelligence and beauty are all positive qualities and should be rewarded rather than attacked.
And only when women are willing to do that that they can have any kind of a chance at equality.
One constant refrain I hear from partially educated people is that one should avoid stereotypes and generalizations. They may find it unbelievable, but I actually have an informed response to this claim. When something exists at a rate greater than chance, there is going to be a reason for it; although it may be a completely different reason from what you would expect.
Most stereotypes and generalizations have roots in reality. The explanations that are given however are typically wrong. Instead of addressing these wrong explanations, the academia seeks to shame them; which then reinforces the claim by conservatives that the academia is forcing a party line down people's throats instead of giving them actual education.
A person would say something about one or another group. The academic will say, "No, this is a stereotype" or "No, this is a generalization." The person would look again and say, "No, this definitely is going on." So then the person would decide that the academic is full of crap. This would reinforce him in his - typically - wrong explanations.
Then he would teach his explanations to other people. On one side we see bigotry; on the other side we see artificial blindness. The two reinforce and strengthen one another.
The solution is not doing away with “stereotypes” or “generalizations.” The solution is finding out the actual reasons for these things. Once again: If something exists at a rate greater than chance, there will be a reason for it; and the academics should not dismiss such things but use them as grounds for more research.
Has Africa been, as many people claim, a mess? Yes. The reason is not racial inferiority but history. These countries had been governed by alien powers for centuries, and they did not know how to govern themselves. They are getting better at it, and the world's highest rates of economic growth in the last decade and a half have been recorded by African countries.
Is Israel, as many people claim, full of fascists? Yes. The reason is not that the Jews are evil but that they have learned their lessons from Second World War too well. If you have had your ancestors espouse liberal pacifism and work hard and peacefully to better other countries only to wind up in gas chambers, you would want your own country as well, and you would want to make sure that nobody can destroy it. They have taken a legitimate sentiment too far, to the point that they use the military for all sorts of things that can be better solved through trade or diplomacy. The reason is not any kind of an ethnic evil but a legitimate sentiment taken too far.
Is Europe, as many people claim, full of gutless people? Yes. The reason once again is a lesson from Second World War being learned too well. If you've had your continent run over by a bunch of homicidal maniacs in the name of nationalism, you would hate war and nationalism as well. The Europeans became pacifistic – for a legitimate reason – to the point of being accommodating to regimes that should not be accommodated. The reason is not moral corruption on the part of the Europeans; the reason, again, is a lesson learned too well.
In all of these places, there are people who take objection to the main thrust of their cultures, or try to. These people find themselves in the middle of a war. They rightfully see the wrong in their cultures, but they have no knowledge or experience of any other way. This sets them up for failure. If they fail in any manner, it reinforces the claim by everyone around them that their way is the right way. And if they succeed, they are seen by the people around them as infidels, traitors or dangerous antisocial individuals.
The solution is neither false bigoted explanations nor deliberate blindness. The solution is finding the correct cause.
If the academia seeks greater credibility in society, it will not teach artificial blindness. It will look for real explanations for social phenomena. These will solve two complementary problems – bigoted beliefs and artificial blindness posing as intelligence and education – at the same time.
It will also return the academia to its original purpose: As a place where people learn thinking habits and knowledge, not a place where they are being taught a party line. Conservatives are right to regard political correctness as fascism masquerading as tolerance. In a democracy, wrong ideas are meant to be met with better ideas rather than with censorship.
But the academics and the intellectuals have become lazy. They have decided to teach artificial blindness instead of thinking skills. This has vastly reduced their credibility. The American anti-intellectual climate is not only a result of demagoguery. It is a result of the fact that the folks in the academia are failing to speak to them.
There is in fact a legitimate task for the contemporary intellectuals and academics. It is to confront wrong explanations with right ones. It is to explain rightfully why some things exist at a greater rate than chance, that beget correct stereotypes but not correct explanations.
That will get rid of bigotry for real. And it will restore the academics and intellectuals to their rightful standing in society.
For a long time, the infrastructure of political correctness suppressed people's real thoughts and feelings. As this infrastructure is being challenged from many directions, a lot is coming out. And some of it is butt-ugly.
It is neither possible nor desirable to suppress such sentiments. Rather they need to be met with solid and effective refutation. This is what is supposed to happen in a democracy; and I for one have been putting a lot of mental energy into doing just that.
Just what are these sentiments? One is anti-Semitism and neo-Nazism. These are no longer limited to obvious morons and have attracted some people with brainpower. Which means that it will take more people with brainpower to stand up to refute these abominations.
We have seen Eminem; we have seen Alex Jones and Glen Beck. And now we are seeing Donald Trump wanting to exile Mexicans and Muslims. Political correctness is powerless against these things. Real intelligence however is not.
Political correctness is simply wrong. The West is not the bogeyman. By the standards of liberalism the Muslim world is much worse. A person who simply attacks the West leaves open the door for groups like ISIS. Political correctness is powerless against them. Once again, real intelligence is not.
Now is therefore the time for real intelligence. If you are of an intellectual bent, this is your time. This time demands lots of brainwork to refute destructive ideologies. Whether you are in the academia, or in psychology, or on the Internet, there is work to do. And much will be decided by how well this work is done.