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.