Wednesday, May 05, 2010

A wrong way to praise women

There's some discussion at Laura Wood's excellent site about a comment sent in by one of her readers. The reader wished to praise women but did it in a way that I consider wrong. The reader wrote:

... women have the much harder row to hoe. Women are 95 percent of the equation responsible for the continuation of our species. There is not a man on the face of the planet that could handle the pain I witnessed from my wife during two of our three children ... Women are historically responsible for holding a household together, and in the unfortunate situation where the husband is unemployed and the wife has to work ... the man still does not help out. In my case my wife is the primary educator. My kids have attended a church school since middle school, so they have loads of homework. I have tried to help in the tutelage, but seem to either be unable because of patience or attention span, while my wife charges ahead when my head would explode ...

I personally believe the disparity in maturity between women and men is between 10-15 years at the age of 18, and with any luck starts to normalize somewhere in the 40’s ... This is the single most important difference between men and women. If it were not for this disparity there is nothing that would provide the patience required to tolerate, and in many cases train a man to be worthy of the marriage a woman so gracefully entered into ... To you ladies I tip my hat, not once, but every day in gratitude for all you do. You are the foundation upon which we all build our futures, and for that we (men & children) love and respect you.

Women might be from Venus, but men are from Uranus, and that’s a long way from Mars.

This is extraordinarily self-deprecating. We are supposed to accept that men are only 5% responsible for the continuation of the species. That no man could handle the pain of childbirth. That it is women who hold together the household. That men are too stupid and impatient to help with homework. That men aren't as mature as women until some time in our 40s. That we should consider women "graceful" for patiently training men to be worthy of them in marriage.

This pushes things in exactly the wrong direction. We need men who are conscious of their civilising role. We need men who are confident in their own abilities and strengths. We need men who will take up a leadership role in their families and communities, rather than abdicating their responsibilities in favour of a "superior" womanhood.

Why would a man speak about women in such a self-subordinating way? My own theory is that it has to do with a shift in the culture of relationships that occurred during the nineteenth century.

Up until the 1800s, the primary consideration in relationships was marriage. Of course, people still had sexual and romantic feelings. However, these were disciplined to the end of family formation.

However, during the 1800s the balance shifted. What mattered increasingly were romantic feelings. And, as I've written previously,

Men who grow up in a culture of romantic love will tend to idealise women and be focused on feminine beauty and goodness.

An example here might help. I've been reading The Moon Seems Upside Down, a collection of letters from an Australian soldier, Arthur Alan Mitchell, to his girlfriend Eileen during WWII. There's a lot to like about Mitchell. He was not at all your modern, alienated type. He had a love of nature, he appreciated literature, he loved his family, his country and his mates and, as you might expect of a young man of the time, he had a well-developed romantic nature. The letters are full of declarations of romantic love for his girlfriend at home:

One thing has not altered, Darling. That is my love for you ... You are outstandingly beautiful, Eileen, but it was not only because of your beauty that I fell madly in love with you, it was your character, your nature, your sweetness, kindness & consideration to me ... even now, away from the captivating spell of your eyes & hair & voice and laughter, I can, for those reasons, say 'I love you'.

Note the emphasis on feminine beauty and goodness. That is the ideal that inspired feelings of romantic love in Arthur Mitchell. It is the ideal that inspired a lot of Western art. It is a normal expression of "connectedness" in men. But it has a potential downside: women can become idealised to the point that men, in an intensely romantic culture, begin to defer morally to women (because the women are idealised into being morally good and pure). From another letter to Eileen:

Eileen, my Life, where my heart beats within yours, you are my guiding star. My inner soul has set you firmly on that high pedestal and forever looking up to you for guidance you have steered me from thousands of miles away, never letting me do an act for which I would be ashamed or regret later. If I possess any character, any manliness, my thoughts of chivalry for the weaker sex then I owe it to you, for you have carried on my spiritual guidance along the same path as my dear Mother led me.

As the sun burns eternally in the sky, so burns my love for you ... To walk upon the same earth, to breathe the same air, to look at the same sun & moon & stars, to exist during the same era as you live in is a joy & a privilege for which I am grateful.

It is the women in Arthur Mitchell's life who became his moral and spiritual guides. I can understand how this works: a man who recognises the feminine ideal in women can be inspired by it to pursue his own masculine ideal. But there's a catch: the more that men hand over the baton of moral guidance to women, the less likely it is that women will act in a way that inspires moral admiration.

Men need to keep a hold of that baton. We need to re-emphasise what men do to establish moral standards in society. Men should not morally defer, no matter how much we are inspired by a romantic ideal of feminine goodness. It was an historical error of the Victorians to defer and this created a vulnerability in Western culture.

When men do self-deprecate, when we do defer, it is a sign that the culture of relationships has become unbalanced, that the romantic instincts are not balanced by an awareness of what is required from men to maintain a successful system of marriage and family life.

58 comments:

  1. "that the romantic instincts are not balanced by an awareness of what is required from men to maintain a successful system of marriage and family life"

    The romance and idealisation which you describe are forms of idolatry in which men worship the creation rather than the creator. Thus romance in the 19th century West supplanted religion as the primary focus of mankind and society. And religious impulses were displaced by romantic ones. Romantic love is the surrogate and false religion of the contemporary West and like most false religions, is has brought social destruction in its place. For at its core, romance is self centred and narcissistic.

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  2. Romance is another name for Utilitarianism: Life lived according to happy feelings.

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  3. I must agree with Anonymous that when men place women, either as a group, or as individuals, onto a pedestal they are indeed engaging in idolatry. No good can come of this for men or women. We are all sinners in our own way.

    Feminism, being the modest proposition that only women/wymmin/wimmin/etc. are human have a clear and hypocritical attitude towards being placed upon a pedestal. When it serves the purposes of women, for example by restraining them from drinking large amounts of alcohol and having sexual intercourse with as many men as show up at the party, the feminist decries pedestalization. But on the other hand, when it comes to abrogating the wedding contract, taking property from a family member, demanding full custody of any children, demanding that all work environments be "friendly" rather than "hostile", demanding equal pay for less work, equating any numerical difference in any walk of life with discrimination...ah, then things change. Then women/wymin/wimmin/etc. become pure angelic beings who would never cause any harm to any living thing, creatures of pure energy that live on rainbows and cavort with unicorns.

    Which proves that feminists are huge hypocrites, something that has been obvious to any thinking human for, oh, 35 years now.

    But returning to pedestalizing: when men do that, they automatically make themselves lesser beings. They automatically cede moral authority to women, or perhaps a woman. This is a grave mistake. As we can see from the slut culture that rules modern US college campuses, it is simply insane to grant any moral authority to any woman at any time.

    Of course, given the groupie status of "men" who write to "The Thinking Housewife", such groveling before a mommy-surrogate should not surprise. Disgust, yes, but not surprise.

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  4. Interesting post. I love the idea of woman but cringe when I hear men self flagellating this way. It's a display of total character-implosion. Reading this guy, I can't help but feel that he may be "adorable" to his mother, but impossible to respect by his wife (irrespective of what she may claim).

    But there are a few things that I will need Mr. Richardson to clarify:

    MR: "[T]he more that men hand over the baton of moral guidance to women, the less likely it is that women will act in a way that inspires moral admiration."

    ... and:

    MR: "It was an historical error of the Victorians to defer and this created a vulnerability in Western culture."

    Are you implying that when men "defer" to women in terms of morality, that they ultimately give women the role of public leadership, and that since this role isn't suited to women due to their psychological dispositions (eg, deciding on resource distribution according to criteria of need and not what an individual deserves) that this leads to societal enfeeblement? I'm just trying to tease this out...

    Also, I'm reminded of what I recently heard (though I can't remember where) that the adage that women civilise men is bunk: women domesticate men, not civilise them.

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  5. "I must agree with Anonymous that when men place women, either as a group, or as individuals, onto a pedestal they are indeed engaging in idolatry. No good can come of this for men or women. We are all sinners in our own way."

    And idolatry is a sign that the Word of God has been lost and the individual has retreated into a world of fantasy and unreality. This is reflected in the Western divorce rate of almost 50%, a rate matched by no other civilisation. In the schools of the West, there is no religious instruction but plenty of instruction on sexual education, contraception and sexual perversion. Sex and romance are the true religons of the contemporary West.

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  6. "But returning to pedestalizing: when men do that, they automatically make themselves lesser beings. They automatically cede moral authority to women, or perhaps a woman"

    Pedestalizing does not make men cede moral authority to women. It just makes them become controlled sexually and emotionally by women which weakens the authority of men and leads to social and economic collapse.

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  7. "Eileen, my Life, where my heart beats within yours, you are my guiding star. My inner soul has set you firmly on that high pedestal and forever looking up to you for guidance you have steered me from thousands of miles away, never letting me do an act for which I would be ashamed or regret later. If I possess any character, any manliness, my thoughts of chivalry for the weaker sex then I owe it to you, for you have carried on my spiritual guidance along the same path as my dear Mother led me.

    As the sun burns eternally in the sky, so burns my love for you ... To walk upon the same earth, to breathe the same air, to look at the same sun & moon & stars, to exist during the same era as you live in is a joy & a privilege for which I am grateful."

    A man's guiding star ought to be God and not another human being. The above paragraph would in earlier generations have been addressed to God as prayer. Instead this man has turned away from God and worships a woman in a wholly idealistic and irrational manner.

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  8. Thanks for the post, Mark. I appreciate it.

    I have to respectfully disagree wih your assessment of this man's words and of the sort of expressions of tenderness exhibited by Arthur Mitchell. You are mistaking social graces, the sort of verbal ornamentation that keeps marriage and relations between the sexes pleasant, for serious argument.

    The words of my reader were not meant to seriously claim that women do 95 percent of the work. I took it as a sort of love letter to his wife and the sort of woman she is. The Victorians were unusually good at this sort of thing and thus their relatively happy home lives. A culture which encourages men to verbally express tenderness to their wives is assured of family stability. Women tend to be more verbal and, well, romantic. Many mistake the silence of their husbands for indifference. It is not indifference, of course, but it confuses women.

    Winston Churchill was a typical product of this Victorian sensibility. Reading his letters to his wife, one is struck by how he went out of his way to eloquently express words of gratitude and appreciation. Certainly these were exaggerations. He said he could not keep all in place, he could not run the world, if it were not for her. Was he ceding moral authority to her? Of course not. In fact, as I recall, he did not favor the female suffrage, at least early in his career. There was a dividing line between the public and the private. Men and women understood that.

    If men see it as a sign of weakness to speak with exaggerated deference to women, what will women have for their romantic longings? Power and independence are poor compensations for tenderness.

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  9. "You are mistaking social graces, the sort of verbal ornamentation that keeps marriage and relations between the sexes pleasant, for serious argument."

    If this is the case, then the mistake your reader made is making these comments open to the public, especially in a forum where argumentation takes place.

    It is one thing to self-deprecate with your wife about how you are 15 years behind her on the maturity scale in private. It is a whole new beast to stake this claim in public.

    I've been following the discussion on your blog, and I must say that while I am suspicious of people who would conjure up terms such as "pedestalizing" and "white-knighting" in a derogatory spirit, I find myself deeply insulted by your reader's claim that men are 15 years behind the maturity curve and that we are from Uranus, not from Mars.

    Let him say that to the face of men who lied about their age in order to fight the Nazis or the Japanese in World War II.

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  10. Laura,

    Thanks for the comment.

    I have to disagree that we are talking here about social graces or verbal ornamentation. At some time during the nineteenth century men did cede moral authority to women.

    It was wrong for men to believe that they could rely on women to uphold a civilising influence on society. It may have seemed possible for a period of time, but it all came crashing down on the heads of my generation of men in the 1990s.

    And so the old talk, the talk I remember from my childhood and which your commenter recylced at your site, about lowly men being civilised by women, seems highly inappropriate today. It rings false and is likely to make younger men feel impatient with those uttering such sentiments.

    What does it mean when a man expresses the idea that women are 15 years more mature than he is? Or that men are incapable of fulfilling such basic tasks of fatherhood as helping their children with their education?

    This is an attitude which is blindly complacent to what has happened in society over the past generation. It is an attitude that has to be broken with, so that a more determined masculine leadership in society can re-emerge.

    You write at the end of your comment that men should speak with exaggerated deference to women in order to satisfy female romantic longings.

    It's not in my experience that women respond in the way you describe. Why would a woman want the man she loves and respects to belittle himself to her? It helps a great deal if the woman admires the man she is with and if he presents himself to her in a self-confident way.

    After all, if it is women who yield to men sexually and emotionally, then the man has to be someone a woman can look up to - it makes no sense to "yield" to an inferior. So it runs counter to the underlying dynamic of relationships for a man to present himself to a woman he is interested in as her inferior, let alone as a helpless incompetent.

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  11. Laura,

    I think that perhaps in the past you'd be right. Historically men would have written such things and not taken them entirely literally. Today, however, such expressions are commonplace by men and are frequently taken literally. It is an unfortunate debasing trend.

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  12. "If men see it as a sign of weakness to speak with exaggerated deference to women, what will women have for their romantic longings? Power and independence are poor compensations for tenderness"

    This comment shows an ignorance about the purpose of marriage which is about building a family, culture and nation and not about the satisfaction of narcissitic fantasies of romantic longings. This is a woman who seems to be deluded, living in a cyber world of unreality.

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  13. "The Victorians were unusually good at this sort of thing and thus their relatively happy home lives. A culture which encourages men to verbally express tenderness to their wives is assured of family stability"

    What utter drivel!

    Upper Class Victorians had arranged marriages based entirely upon social pedigree and economic/commercial ties. Romance was entertainment and not taken as a serious basis for family life. Tender words are just words. They can be uttered sincerely or insincerely but words alone can never assure family stability.

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  14. This is a woman who seems to be deluded, living in a cyber world of unreality.

    Anonymous, I have to step in here and defend Laura Wood. Laura Wood writes on a range of issues with much courage and insight. She is one of the most quotable writers I know and I unreservedly recommend her site as a source of commentary and discussion.

    Yes it's true that the romantic and sex instincts need to be tempered by considerations of family, culture and nation. We are suffering a great deal from our failure to do so. Family, culture and nation ought to be the predominant factors when it comes to relationships.

    But I don't think it's right to entirely dismiss romantic love. I do believe that a fully natured young man will experience romantic love as a positive, spiritual, "connected" aspect of his life.

    Nor should we be too dismissive of feminine emotions. The systems don't exist for themselves, there has to be a cultivation of a certain inner life, and feminine emotions will be a part of this.

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  15. I understand why you find it nauseating and in poor taste. When I first looked at it, I didn't say to myself, "Oh, this is wonderful! And so true!" I saw it as a sentimental greeting card. The idea that women do 95 percent of the work, or that the pain of childbirth is something men could not handle, strikes me as so absurd I see this as the verbal equivalent of tipping one's hat to a woman or a sugary card. I don't believe men should express affection with this level of exaggeration. But that's what affection often is: overblown emotion. The "I-could-not-live- without-you" is never factually true.

    I have strenuously acknowledged the climate of female idolization. I see that it increased with the romanticization of self and paved the way for feminism.

    These overblown words expressed to a traditional wife by a man who calls for an end to the female vote draw outrage at the power of women. I know where you're coming from. I see why it annoys you. But it saddens me given the context and the inferiority complex of traditional women, every much as entrenched as the inferiority foisted on men. We have been denigrated just as much. Sarah Palin has trashed everything traditional women stand for and every single day the power of aggressive women is glorified and motherhood is cheapened. But, I suppose given feminism's hold, men should never go overboard in assuring us we have their support. That day is over.

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  16. Anonymous writes:

    "If men see it as a sign of weakness to speak with exaggerated deference to women, what will women have for their romantic longings? Power and independence are poor compensations for tenderness"

    This comment shows an ignorance about the purpose of marriage which is about building a family, culture and nation and not about the satisfaction of narcissitic fantasies of romantic longings. This is a woman who seems to be deluded, living in a cyber world of unreality.

    (end of quote)


    This is factually untrue. The Victorians honored courtship and sentiment. Their domestic lives were unusually contented and highly civilized. I am speaking in regards to Christian marriage by the way. The highest meaning of marriage is love. Period. Yes, its purpose is procreation and civilization. But its meaning to the individual and to society is to lay a foundation of love. Anonymous may be too much of a materialist snob to acknowledge love and romance. Try to run your utopia without romance and with your contempt for feminine sentiment. Best of luck.

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  17. "This is factually untrue. The Victorians honored courtship and sentiment. Their domestic lives were unusually contented and highly civilized"

    Laura Wood evidently has no experience of the English ruling class or realistic understanding of the Victorian era. Victorians allowed limited and largey chaperoned courtship with suitors who had been vetted as "suitable" and romance was never their primary consideration. The English ruling class likes words and politeness and enjoys literature as fun and entertainment. But it is a grave mistake to take literary fiction as fact and consider them as emotional. They could never have ruled ruled the world if their hearts ruled their heads and they are in general a hard headed and resilient breed.

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  18. "I am speaking in regards to Christian marriage by the way. The highest meaning of marriage is love. Period. Yes, its purpose is procreation and civilization. But its meaning to the individual and to society is to lay a foundation of love. Anonymous may be too much of a materialist snob to acknowledge love and romance. Try to run your utopia without romance and with your contempt for feminine sentiment. Best of luck."

    Could you quote where the Bible says that the meaning of marriage is love? The Bible no where mentions romantic love. It states unequivocally that marriage is a covenantal love which is the basis of God's relatonship with his people and the model for the marital relationship. The Covenant is the basis of Christian and Jewish societies and covenantal love is directed towards the common good, whereas the romantic love which you exalt is narcissistic and self indulgent.If your claim that romance is essential, why is it that American society which places a higher value than any other on romance has the highest divorce rate in the world? And India which has the highest percentage of professional working women in the world has the lowest divorce rates in the world?
    It is evident that your reasoning is somewhat shallow and based more upon emotion than a rational and analytic world view.

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  19. Some women so hold the household together, act as the primary caregiver, keep the place clean et al, sometimes combining that with a full time job. That combination can be a heavy burden.

    It's not universal of course. Some women put their career first. Some don't do any housework and leave it to their husbands. Some don't do much childcare. A few are parasites and don't do anything much.

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  20. Winston Churchill's wife did not have the power to unilaterally end their marriage, taking half of his net worth and their children away forever in the process. Winston Churchill's wife did not have the power, merely by picking up the telephone, to have him driven out of his house at gunpoint and permanently prohibited from ever returning, or even coming within 100 meters of it. Winston Churchill's wife did not have the power to cuckold him and even bear another man's children should she choose to do so and require him, by law, to support her and the children in a separate domicile if she wished.

    To equate Churchill's wife, or any middle/upper class Victorian or Edwardian with the modern, empowered, entitled, hypergamous woman is simply absurd. It is out of touch with reality. It is ignorant.

    Every Western married man, including Laura Wood's husband, is two telephone calls and 48 hours away from disaster. Every married woman in the West knows, at some level, that she has the power to ruin her husband's life merely by loosing the hounds of the legal system against him, and there is nothing he can do about it.

    That is the context in which the groveling, shoe-licking, submissive, "I am a fece and you are a goddess" note in question at "The Thinking Housewife" resides. That is the reality in which the modern man lives. That is the overall environment in which women such as Laura Wood think it would be just grand for men to routinely abase themselves in public, groveling for approval from a Mommy-figure, proclaiming themselves to be mere excrement before the Goddess of their lives.

    Such actions will engender only contempt from the modern woman. That contempt may take the form of tittering and giggling, outright laughter, a flurry of tweets starting with OMG! OMG!, a series of texts describing in detail just how lame the man is, or other forms. But one thing is won't produce: any kind of reciprocation.

    How can anyone be so blind, so out of touch with the reality of modern women, and especially the reality of marriage ("marriage 2.0") as to ask why such lapdog behavior makes some men angry? I don't expect many people to understand why idolatry is wrong, and capable of leading to evil. But surely political and legal realities are not a secret?

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  21. "Yes it's true that the romantic and sex instincts need to be tempered by considerations of family, culture and nation. We are suffering a great deal from our failure to do so. Family, culture and nation ought to be the predominant factors when it comes to relationships.

    But I don't think it's right to entirely dismiss romantic love. I do believe that a fully natured young man will experience romantic love as a positive, spiritual, "connected" aspect of his life."

    To Mark:
    How do you propose to balance the two? Many men experience romantic love with women who are wholly unuitable for marriage and the social and financial disaster which this often inflicts on them and their families is entirely a consequence of their own folly. A society has to decide the primary and predominant basis for the contract of marriages - the preservation of social and economic status which leads to social stability, proper childrearing and long term happiness or the romantic/sexual infatuation which produces social and economic collapse and long term unhappiness. It is not possible to have both systems. The choice is social stability or social collapse.



    "Nor should we be too dismissive of feminine emotions. The systems don't exist for themselves, there has to be a cultivation of a certain inner life, and feminine emotions will be a part of this."

    The cultivation of an inner life is a natural and ongoing process of human development and is not dependent upon feminine romantic sentiment. An excessive reliance on emotion leads to an immaturity and stunting of the development of the mind. The latter process and the development of higher levels of civilistation are dependent upon emotional restraint. The over emphasis on emotionalism seen in current Western society has stunted its development and is without doubt responsible for much of its decline.

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  22. "To equate Churchill's wife, or any middle/upper class Victorian or Edwardian with the modern, empowered, entitled, hypergamous woman is simply absurd. It is out of touch with reality. It is ignorant."

    The reality of English upper class Victorian life is that in social and financial terms the husband's and wife's financial and social assets balanced. Marriages were aranged that way and parents often transferred assets to ensure that was the case (some still do). Hypergamy was controlled by the social class structure. Men did not marry outside their social class. There were no financial incentives to divorce because the wife had as much to lose. The same is true today with many of the elites like David Cameron the next UK PM whose wife is richer then he is by quite a few £million. The social networks also made divorce undesirable.

    Modern men who find themselves victims of divorce laws usually only have themselves to blame because they failed to properly evaluate their spouses and effectively arrange the social and economic side of the marriage. Fools who rush into legal contracts wihout regard to the consequences usually get shafted.

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  23. Anonymous wrote:
    Modern men who find themselves victims of divorce laws usually only have themselves to blame because they failed to properly evaluate their spouses and effectively arrange the social and economic side of the marriage. Fools who rush into legal contracts wihout regard to the consequences usually get shafted.

    While there is some truth to this, the fact of the matter is that marriage in the Western world is a one-sided contract. It can be broken at any time, by the woman, for no reason at all. In the process she and her attorney can, through the legal system, destroy a man's life in rather a short time.

    No pre-nuptual agreement can prevent this, although some of the damage can be mitigated. No amount of spousal evaluation can prevent it, either, because women's personalities change after pregnancy due to the surge of hormones involved. A demure, traditional young woman can very easily become a nagging, entitled, obnoxious harpy who dumps her now-no-longer-needed sperm donor once the youngest child reaches 3 to 4 years of age & therefore can be left at a daycare center. Because she can retain the sperm donor as an ATM while barring him from any access to the child or children, there is no real downside for her to unilateral, even capricious, abrogation of the marriage contract. Indeed, there are benefits, as she can return to the sex market as a "cougar", cheered on by her sisters.

    For any man under 30, the risks of marriage far outweigh any possible reward. Men over 40 have no idea at all what it is like to live in a world where 50% of all marriages fail, and 70% of those failures are caused by women. Putting it another way, of all the marriages in the US this year, 35% are doomed to end when the wife gets bored with her sperm donor/walking ATM. That's worse than 1/3 odds of losing half of net worth, including IRA/pension, being saddled with years of child support payments that are really alimony, legal fees, and other horrible things. And the worst case of all: a stay at home mother. Such a woman is guaranteed to obtain alimony for life, no matter how long she chose to put up with her sperm donor/walking ATM.

    This is marriage 2.0, this is reality. And in this kind of trap-laden environment, the "thinking housewife" has the temerity to demand that men should routinely abase themselves before women, proclaiming themselves to be feces, as a means to make women happy...

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  24. I unfortunately do not have time to respond to all the comments, but the idea that I equated Clementine Churchill with modern women in anything other than her sentimental needs is an absurd distortion of what I said. It shows deliberate hostility to something other than my actual words on that subject.

    For the commenter who said there is no mention of love in the Bible, I recommend the Song of Songs and the Book of Proverbs. However, I do not derive my definition of Christian marriage solely from the Bible.

    I could go on at length about the Victorian culture of courtship in rebuttal to Anonymous. I wish I had the time.

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  25. Laura Wood
    I unfortunately do not have time to respond to all the comments, but the idea that I equated Clementine Churchill with modern women in anything other than her sentimental needs is an absurd distortion of what I said.

    To assert that the modern empowered, arrogant, entitled woman has any sentimental needs equivalent to those of Clementine Churchill is do deny reality. Laura Wood needs to spend some time with women under the age of 30. Follow them bar-hopping, listen to their obnoxiously foul language, read their tweets/IM's/texts in which denunciation of men as animals will be found to be routine, normal, accepted. Observe them at work, bristling with hostility & always ready to cry "Discrimination!" or "Harassment!". Then she can report to us what sentimental needs the modern woman has: to have a doormanmat to wipe her feet upon, until he no longer amuses her.

    Or if that is too difficult, Laura Woods could spend time at the nearest Hallmark Store, and determine what the sentimental needs of women who buy the product ("Men: Can't live with them, can't hang all of them" ha! Hah! HAH!) are. Behold the deep, romantic sentiment displayed once again: that men are subhuman creatures to be used and discarded.

    It shows deliberate hostility to something other than my actual words on that subject.

    I have hostility to the notion that men should be doormats to women, routinely abasing themselves before them, worshipping women as goddesses, in a clear form of idolatry...a notion that was recently aired at the inaptly named "Thinking" Housewife, a site that refuses to accept the reality of life for men in the modern world.

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  26. Victorian culture, and most of Western (and other Christian) traditional (past) cultures allowed for choice within their strict settings. And certainly mutual love (or attraction)was an important factor. There may have been forced unions (I think royal families control more narrowly their offsprings' marriages, but many understood that entire nations depended on these unions). But ordinary couples certainly had a say in choosing their mates.

    Since families mingled with other similar families, deviancy and “strangeness” was easily vetted. This is when coercion (to prevent such unions) was strictly adhered to. When strangers did come in the midst, they were put under tight scrutiny. Daughters were often safeguarded, so they don’t leave the flock and fall in love with those “undesirables.” But, they wanted for nothing, since a whole display of characters was in their midst, from which they could choose. There is, at some point, someone for everyone, if the girl is clever enough to choose (and her mother and aunts will surely give her the briefs on that), and the man is courageous enough to ask.

    One of the strangest phenomenon of the modern world, is men’s inability to seal the deal, so to speak. Now people speak of feminism and super-aggressive women as the culprits. But also this is an era which has certainly produced feminized men, who are afraid of rejection. Their rejection rates may be higher, but I would think that would make them fight harder – don’t men love a challenge? I don’t think one can totally blame feminism and women. This strange complaining and whining is unbecoming of men.

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  27. Winston Churchill was a loser. He got people killed in the Boer war and was a skunk in Parliament in the 20's.

    If he wrote shit like that to his wife then I'm even more convinced I have Winston's personality correct.

    Written from a Woman.

    If my husband wrote some bullshitty letter to some Laura Wood well he certainly wouldn't be my husband.

    False, bullshitty deference is insulting. If someone complements me I want it to be real not b.s.

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  28. Kidst Paulos Asrat
    One of the strangest phenomenon of the modern world, is men’s inability to seal the deal, so to speak. Now people speak of feminism and super-aggressive women as the culprits. But also this is an era which has certainly produced feminized men, who are afraid of rejection. Their rejection rates may be higher, but I would think that would make them fight harder – don’t men love a challenge? I don’t think one can totally blame feminism and women. This strange complaining and whining is unbecoming of men.

    Evidently you have not bothered to read and understand anything written here. It is not rejection that a sensible young man fears. It is acceptance, marriage and children followed by a bored wife who has decided to "find herself" unilaterally tearing up the marriage contract and walking off with half of his net worth and any children, plus a permanent garnishment of all his future wages and likely a court order barring him from coming even within eyesight of their children. The only "challenge" in such a case is the challenge to remain sane, the challenge to avoid deep depression, the challenge to resist the temptation of suicide.

    Deferring to a woman in such an environment is painting a bullseye target on one's back. Complimenting a woman in public, in an age when any man can be arrested for harassment or even rape solely on the sayso of one or more women, is not only painting a bullseye but handing out loaded guns.

    And finally, paying self-abasing, "men are from Uranus, women are responsible for 95% of anything good in humanity" compliments to a modern woman is like offering raw meat to a hungry shark. It is downright stupid

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  29. I will continue to say this.....

    There is a big giant difference between the guy writing love letters in a wartime situation, when he is separated from his loved ones, family, watching his friends die, and facing death himselv. Even if he is using idolatry terms...he isn't being unmanly in my female opinion. Maybe idolatrous but in the situation it should be ignored.

    However, the guy sucking up to Laura Wood is just being an obnoxious liberal wussy.

    Laura Wood aren't you on some deep level kinda creeped out by what that guy wrote?

    My girlfriend dated this super creepy guy who asked her her ring finger size on the first date. To me that was a BIG red flag that something wasn't quite right with the man. She on the other hand thought he was romantic and wonderful...that was until two years into the relationship when he started hitting her.

    So you see....Weird Bizarre Deference to the point of insulting yourself is not normal or sweet. That guy is weird. Period.

    Sorry.

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  30. How do you propose to balance the two? Many men experience romantic love with women who are wholly unuitable for marriage and the social and financial disaster which this often inflicts on them and their families is entirely a consequence of their own folly.

    I don't have time to give a complete answer now. But I'll make one suggestion. Allowing society to settle and stabilise again would help. You would then find that certain rituals of courtship would re-emerge, in contrast to the free for all of today.

    I (sort of) have an upper middle-class background. Even today there is still a pattern or way of life that many upper middle-class Melbournians tenaciously hold to and reproduce. There are certain schools that you attend, certain suburbs you live in, certain seaside resorts you holiday at, and certain places that young people socialise at. The result is a high level of in group marriage.

    In other words, the expectations of reproducing a way of life are strong enough, and imparted by parents to their children earnestly enough, that the children tend to follow along as an established way of life.

    This kind of thing tends to emerge when patterns of life are allowed to stabilise within society.

    I repeat: this is not a complete answer, it's just one aspect of the situation that came to mind.

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  31. Quoting Laura Wood:

    "Women tend to be more verbal and, well, romantic"

    I disagree. It's not women who bring men flowers and candy - it's men who bring them to women. It wasn't a woman who wrote those letters in WWII - it was a man. Women may expect those things, wish for those things, really like those things, but more often than not, it's the man who actually does those things.

    I think if we women were such romantic creatures, we would do those things for men and not the other way around.

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  32. But, I suppose given feminism's hold, men should never go overboard in assuring us we have their support. That day is over.

    Mrs. Wood,

    I sympathize. But there are ways to compliment the traditional woman without making baseless and stupid assertions that you transpose unto the rest of the male population. I personally don't care if he says that he is 15 years less mature than his wife. I care that he says that I am too, along with everybody else in possession of a Y chromosome. (And considering that unless the woman is the Virgin Mary, she is not 95% responsible for the reproductive process either. How many genetic traits do you think a child gets from the father?)

    If your claim that romance is essential, why is it that American society which places a higher value than any other on romance has the highest divorce rate in the world?"

    Anonymous,

    I think you are wrong. The problem in the US is not that people place a high value on romance. it is that they place a high value on sex. At the heart of "irreconcilable differences" is not a lack of romance, but sexual boredom.

    And India which has the highest percentage of professional working women in the world has the lowest divorce rates in the world?

    Where do you base that assertion? And, where did you get the assumption that romance and "arranged marriage" are mutually exclusive?

    If I were you, I wouldn't be so quick to brag about my superior "rationality" when a lot of what I have to say rests on petty assumptions.

    I have hostility to the notion that men should be doormats to women, routinely abasing themselves before them, worshipping women as goddesses, in a clear form of idolatry.

    Anonymous Protestant,

    Maybe it is because of your Protestantism, but you seem to equate any chivalric act with "idolatry". This is an absurd premise with which to base our conduct regarding women. A man honoring the woman he loves is part of civilized male nature. That this is interpreted as mere grovelling by a debased modern culture does not make it any less the kindness it was meant to be; an extension of gentility from the stronger sex to the gentler one.

    You speak of the deranged women who populate the "under 30" age bracket. I am under 30 and am constantly exposed to such women. Not all of them are the crass parodies of masculinity that you report, and many are that way simply for lack of knowledge on how to be anybody else. The reason that these same women will glomp onto any man of decent looks who casts a hungry eye their way is that they crave and desire some form of affirmation. The "hang the men" sentimentality for most of this crowd is not anger at men, but sour-graping that none have picked them. (At least, none of those they are conditioned to like.)

    Many are delusional, yes. But few are downright malicious. If pure virtue by an entire set of people is the only criteria by which we are entitled to our places in society and family, then men will not deserve to be patriarchs just as women will not deserve to be honored.

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  33. Jonathon Wolfe :

    Anonymous Protestant,

    Maybe it is because of your Protestantism, but you seem to equate any chivalric act with "idolatry".

    Rubbish. I know you read the article I am replying to, because you object to some of the same nonsense that I did, such as "95%". You may well accept the notion that you are inherently inferior to women because you have, as you put it, a Y chromosome as a chivalric act, but if so I submit you know nothing of chivalry or common sense.

    This is an absurd premise with which to base our conduct regarding women. A man honoring the woman he loves is part of civilized male nature. That this is interpreted as mere grovelling by a debased modern culture does not make it any less the kindness it was meant to be; an extension of gentility from the stronger sex to the gentler one.

    Please explain how a man proclaiming that he is a fece ("Men are from Uranus") honors anyone, anyone at all. Detail what sort of kindness and gentility is involved in this statement. And please spare me the hogwash that women are "gentler" than men, I've seen with my own eyes the "gentle sex" at work and at play. Take all the time and space that you require for this exposition, I will be glad to wait.

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  34. Jonathan Wolfe:
    You speak of the deranged women who populate the "under 30" age bracket. I am under 30 and am constantly exposed to such women. Not all of them are the crass parodies of masculinity that you report, and many are that way simply for lack of knowledge on how to be anybody else.

    A large and growing number of women are exactly as I describe them, if not worse. And if anyone attempts to persuade them of the error of their ways, the rebuff will be swift, certain and generally obscene. They have made their bed, and demand that we all lie in it. I reject that. It seems that you demand that I reward them for bad behavior, is that correct, with politeness, honor and deference, no matter how crass, despicable and even evil their behavior?

    The reason that these same women will glomp onto any man of decent looks who casts a hungry eye their way is that they crave and desire some form of affirmation. The "hang the men" sentimentality for most of this crowd is not anger at men, but sour-graping that none have picked them. (At least, none of those they are conditioned to like.)

    The last sentence has a grain of truth. It also directly contradicts the first sentence. The fact of the matter is, women are hypergamous. They are constantly looking for a mate that has some sort of qualities to him that indicate dominance. That is why women seek to steal men from other women. In a bygone era, when it cost women to leave their men, it was thought that women were naturally monogamous. But the liberal/feminist invention of unilateral divorce proved that false. Women are constantly looking to "trade up", for a more desirable mate, and they will do so at the drop of a pair of panties.

    Since the modern woman is entitled, and empowered, she demands the best possible man for herself because, why, she deserves the best just for being her. Thus she spends her 20's hopping into the sack with any man whom she perceives as desirable, while rejecting any that do not measure up. Then after a few years, when her looks are beginning to fade, and her biological clock starts ticking louder, she may decide that she can "settle for less". But pity the man foolish enough to marry a fading princess. He'll pay, and pay, and pay for years to come.

    Now, you may find bedhopping, shallow, ignorant and even predatory women to be deserving of honor and respect. But I do not. And all the shaming language you can dream up will not change my opinion of freelance whores.

    Many are delusional, yes. But few are downright malicious.

    However, the many delusional and the malicious few can ruin the life of any man unfortunate enough to encounter them. Do you not understand that a single false accusation of rape, or even of "inappropriate touching" can land you in a lot of legal trouble, even prison?

    If pure virtue by an entire set of people is the only criteria by which we are entitled to our places in society and family, then men will not deserve to be patriarchs just as women will not deserve to be honored.

    As I pointed out much earlier, we are all sinners in this world. If you are a Christian, you should know what the word "repent" means. Unrepentant sinners, who wallow in their sin and declare it to be "empowering" and their "right" obviously do not get the same place in society as those who confess their sin, turn away from it, and live a new life.

    I see no repentance in the modern woman. I see wallowing in sin. You may find that deserving of respect and honor, but I do not.

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  35. Anonymous Protestant

    It is not rejection that a sensible young man fears. It is acceptance, marriage and children followed by a bored wife who has decided to "find herself" unilaterally tearing up the marriage contract

    I understand also that there is a major "commitmentphobia" going on, which has to do with inability to clinch the deal.

    I think Laura has talked about what you're describing at length on her website, so I won't repeat it, but I will say that the challenge is to find women who won't behave in those destructive ways.

    I just noticed a typo in my entry. It should be: One of the strangest phenomena, instead of phenomenon...

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  36. So guys get burned by an "alpha" or highly desirable women, who they go for because they think they can/should have anything. Then they take it out on a "beta" woman, who isn't a bitch and would like a guy to treat her well, because all women are bitchs/hypergamous?

    As was mentioned earlier some degree of poor female behavior can be put down to the fact that they've been burned in relationships too. The angry feminist usually isn't a knockout.

    On the point about modern marriage. Without essentially disagreeing with what's been said, you may not appreciate how difficult life could be for married women in the old days. I'm not saying they're 100% similar but you can see an echo of this in the developing world where women can be thrown out of the home destitute.

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  37. "Allowing society to settle and stabilise again would help. You would then find that certain rituals of courtship would re-emerge, in contrast to the free for all of today."

    Mark: thanks for your answer but it does not provide any realistic solutions. How would you propose to allow society to settle and stabilise? All the current evidence suggests that Western societies will become more socially and economically unstable in the years to come. There is virtually no prospect of stabilty. A large section of the upper middle class is becoming lower middle class in economic, social and cultural levels. It is becoming , for many, finacially impossible to maintain their lifestyle. The majority have lost the plot.

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  38. "Victorian culture, and most of Western (and other Christian) traditional (past) cultures allowed for choice within their strict settings. And certainly mutual love (or attraction)was an important factor. There may have been forced unions (I think royal families control more narrowly their offsprings' marriages, but many understood that entire nations depended on these unions). But ordinary couples certainly had a say in choosing their mates."

    Your views are grounded in fiction and not experience of reality. In theory there was choice of marital partners. In practice this existed only in the lower social classes who had no assets. The wealthy social classes limited and often eliminated choice. Many aristocratic women and upper middle class women are bargaining chips in their parent's and gradparent's power games. The consequences of disobeying their wishes/orders are severe.

    The Earl Spencer believed he had done his fatherly duty by arranging Diana's marriage to Charles. He had secured her the power and prestige of being the next Queen and the access to the vast wealth and power of the Royal Family. He knew that Charles was having an affair with Camilla and that there would be "three in the marriage" but he didn't tell Diana. He had got a good "deal" and Diana was expected to "play the game". Do you seriously believe that he was bothered about personal attraction between Charles and Diana? Do you believe the Queen was interested in this? As with most aristos, they don't give a damn as long as the show goes on and all the problems can be swept under the carpet. Legally Diana could have refused the marriage but the consequences of disobeying the Queen and the Earl would have been dire as she was later to discover. When Diana died she was excluded from her own social class.

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  39. Anonymous,

    I don't claim to be an expert on this, but I think the phrase "choice within strict settings" is not far from the truth.

    If you go back to the early 1800s in England, there were mechanisms for controlling who was able to be a suitor for young women.

    There was, for instance, the custom of "seasons" in which the upper classes would congregate in London during a time of the year for a series of balls. Women would arrange dance partners during these balls and from this the first steps to a marriage might be made.

    Also, an unknown man generally couldn't simply start speaking to an upper class woman. He needed to gain an introduction to the family first, which meant knowing someone within the social milieu.

    I was reading a biography the other day of a woman who lived in the early 1800s. She was on a holiday tour with her family and a young man took an interest in her. The young man asked her father permission to join their holiday party and was accepted. The attraction was mutual, but unfortunately he died before a marriage eventuated.

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  40. "I don't claim to be an expert on this, but I think the phrase "choice within strict settings" is not far from the truth.

    Mark - a lot of aristocratic and upper class families start planning their children's marriages from the time they are in their cribs. They cultivate the right people and negotiate. There are plenty of Old Etonians and Old Harrovians who are not too bright but well connected and offer introductions to contacts for fees. The concept of choice within stirct limits is often more theoretical than actual. Where there are titles and large sums of money at stake, the parents and grandparents are the decision makers. The preservation of wealth and titles is almost never left to the whims of youth.

    Your ideas seem very naive. The ruling class by and large regard romance as the basis of a short term liaison and not a long term investment.

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  41. Jesse_7
    So guys get burned by an "alpha" or highly desirable women, who they go for because they think they can/should have anything. Then they take it out on a "beta" woman, who isn't a bitch and would like a guy to treat her well, because all women are bitchs/hypergamous?

    Doesn't seem that way. More like the young "beta" entitled, empowered woman snubs the "beta" men in favor of hopping in the sack with "alpha" men. If that means sharing such a man with other women, that's not a problem. After a few years of this, and maybe some STD's & an abortion or two, their looks begin to fade and "settling for less" becomes a possibility. So then, having rejected ordinary guys for years, the empowered, entitled, independent, special not quite so young woman decides maybe they could be human after all. By then it's a bit late; you can't treat men like garbage for years and then decide overnight to be different. Years of the entitlement mindset don't go away very quickly, if at all.

    I doubt that all women are female dogs. But they all appear to be hypergamous to some extent; always ready to dump the current man for a better one.

    As was mentioned earlier some degree of poor female behavior can be put down to the fact that they've been burned in relationships too. The angry feminist usually isn't a knockout.

    A lot of bad behavior on the part of women can be put to their attitude of entitlement. Just by being female, they are entitled to a degree, a job, high pay and a "hawt" man. If they don't get any or all of those things, it's because of the evil men holding them back. And they sure don't want to waste time on any ordinary man, not until it's time to "settle"...

    But the angry, entitled, feminist darned sure knows that she doesn't have to put up with any boring Mr. Niceguy, not when there's always another BadBoy to hop in the sack with. Assuming she's sexually interested in men at all.

    On the point about modern marriage. Without essentially disagreeing with what's been said, you may not appreciate how difficult life could be for married women in the old days.

    Which "old days"? 500 years ago? 200 years ago? The dreaded, conformist "50's"? Be specific.


    I'm not saying they're 100% similar but you can see an echo of this in the developing world where women can be thrown out of the home destitute.

    Hey, in the developing world an army can come through and kill all the men and sell all the women and children into slavery, too. So what?

    Oh, I get it: because women 5,000 miles away can have bad things happen to them, it's ok to institutionalize hatred of men into American law, right?

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  42. Anonymous Protestant,

    "Which "old days"? 500 years ago? 200 years ago? The dreaded, conformist "50's"? Be specific."

    Ok fair enough I was vague. I haven't studied the history of marriage very closely and it seems that in the Western world marriage entailed some important protections for women which were importantly pushed by the church. The feminist critique of marriage though is that historically, so I suppose pre last century, the cards were heavily or importantly in favor of the male. I haven't studied it closely, so I can't give many examples, but it would involve matters of property rights. A feminist would say that in a society weighted towards men favorable treatment within marriage for men is inevitable. However, as was stated I believe marriage for western women in terms of security and property rights was favorable in many respects.

    The specific incidence I heard of was in Malaysia, so it was a Muslim country. A husband took up with another woman and when the wife complained threw her, and their kids, out of the home. Apparently this was legal although seen as dirty pool.

    I'm not in favor of the modern approach to marriage and a sense of injustice by women has often been overplayed and replaced by a sense of entitlement. I guess the point I was trying to make was that any sense of a feeling of injustice by men has to be put in a larger historical context. Again that doesn't mean modern marriage should be weighted too heavily to women.

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  43. "It is one thing to self-deprecate with your wife about how you are 15 years behind her on the maturity scale in private. It is a whole new beast to stake this claim in public."

    ... and to aver that it applies to all men.

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  44. MorningGlory: "I disagree [that women are more verbal and romantic than men] ... Women may expect those things, wish for those things, really like those things, but more often than not, it's the man who actually does those things."

    That matches my experience.

    It seems to me that when men "fall in love" (I've always hated that phrase) in that head-over-heels overboard manner, they tend to spiritualize the experience. ... And women, well, they tend to do something else.

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  45. I reject that. It seems that you demand that I reward them for bad behavior, is that correct, with politeness, honor and deference, no matter how crass, despicable and even evil their behavior?

    Anonymous Protestant,

    Chivalry is not a reward for bad behavior. You treat them with honor due to ideal woman for the same reason God treats fallen Man as if he were a potential saint. Its point is not to reinforce bad behavior, but to honor a certain dignity in all women, even those that have forgotten it. A hundred admonitions did not drive away sin in Man. It was a God who died for nothing in return.

    The last sentence has a grain of truth. It also directly contradicts the first sentence.

    How is it contradictory? I state in the first part of that paragraph that not all women are inherently crass parodies of masculinity and state in the second that much of their apparent resentment results in a manifestation of fallen human nature that would also infect men.

    However, the many delusional and the malicious few can ruin the life of any man unfortunate enough to encounter them.

    Since when did being chivalrous mean rolling over? Since when did being kind mean consenting to a position of inferiority? A man who tips his hat is not asking to be curb-stomped.

    Please....

    If you are a Christian, you should know what the word "repent" means. Unrepentant sinners, who wallow in their sin and declare it to be "empowering" and their "right" obviously do not get the same place in society as those who confess their sin, turn away from it, and live a new life.

    Since when is being chivalrous ever bout elevating sinful women? A gentleman who tips his hat at a prostitute is not tipping his hat at prostitution, no more than a man who forgives his assaulter consenting to be assaulted. In fact, since you do mention the obscenity by which a chivalrous act is greeted, wouldn't being a gentleman infuriate a malignant feminist the way throwing holy water would a demon? If you want to challenge feminism, do not be a one-man party of no. Feminism offers women a corrupted vision of themselves all wrapped in the glory of lies. The proper counter is to offer women another vision of themselves. You don't do that by simply decrying the harlot.

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  46. Rubbish. I know you read the article I am replying to, because you object to some of the same nonsense that I did, such as "95%". You may well accept the notion that you are inherently inferior to women because you have, as you put it, a Y chromosome as a chivalric act, but if so I submit you know nothing of chivalry or common sense.

    You obviously do not know much of chivalry if you think that it is an acceptance of a position of inferiority. This is part of what I hate about the nascent "men's movement". Just as feminism tried to rob women of their civilized femininity, these movement types seek to rob men of their civilized masculinity.

    There is a reason why feminist intellectuals decried chivalry as a form of rape. It is precisely because it is a tacit acceptance of the inherent strength of men, for chivalry is but the kindness the stronger sex extends to the gentler one. To be chivalrous implies the exact opposite of your inference.

    I only suspect it is your Protestantism because at the heart of your objection seemingly lies the same reasoning by which you guys think we Catholics worship statues. But slowly I am seeing more Nietzsche and less Luther.

    Please explain how a man proclaiming that he is a fece ("Men are from Uranus") honors anyone, anyone at all.

    In case you didn't notice, that was part of the statement made by Mrs. Wood's commenter that I wholeheartedly lambasted for its inapporpriateness. True chivalry is not an act of abject debasement. That is for milquetoasts. If you just took the time to read what I've written, you'll realize that I am not accepting her commenter's entire statement wholeheartedly.

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  47. Jonathan Wolfe said,

    "Chivalry is not a reward for bad behavior. You treat them with honor due to ideal woman for the same reason God treats fallen Man as if he were a potential saint. Its point is not to reinforce bad behavior, but to honor a certain dignity in all women, even those that have forgotten it. A hundred admonitions did not drive away sin in Man. It was a God who died for nothing in return."

    Beautifully expressed.

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  48. Jonathon Wolfe, we appear to be talking past each other. Please recall that this thread is not about whether to engage in basic politeness, it is about unconditional praise and compliments for women. Not some women, all women. That is what the 'thinking' housewife demands.

    When I stop on the highway to aid a lone woman in changing a tire, I am not going to enquire into her politics, her religion, her marital status, or anything else. All I care about is what her destination is, and whether the spare in her car is inflated or not. The destination matters because on a modern "donut" one can only drive so far, and so fast. That's chivalry.

    When I encounter a gaggle of modern women, on the other hand, I'm not inclined to go out of my way to compliment them. Although I suppose I could say something like this: "Wow, you are pretty good at vomiting up your Margaritas without getting any on your shoes", or "You sure are good at rudeness, sarcasm and obnoxiousness, I guess you must practice those things a lot". I'm sure that there are more intimate complements that could be given regarding bedroom skills, but I have no intention of ever being in any such position.

    I won't embrace, celebrate, compliment sin, and that is what the "thinking" housewife demands with her "women are starving for compliments" complaint. Why should I go out of my way to reinforce the modern woman in her sin? Why should I treat the entitled, pampered, spoiled brat modern princess the same way I would treat a demure, modest, chaste young woman who is dutiful about whatever work God has given to her, who teaches children at the church on Sunday and who isn't a barhopping slut?

    The modern woman is essentially trained to be an entitled office drone and an amateur courtesan. She spends her 20's hopping in the sack with any man that she chooses, while working at some most likely pointless job. Does she learn how to subordinate her will to another? No. Does she learn how to care for a helpless human with unconditional love? No. Does she learn how to put her own desires aside in order to build up others? No.

    So nothing the modern woman does when she is young in any way prepares her for marriage and children. Therefore, when her looks begin to fade and her biological clock ticks louder, if she is fortunate enough to marry some man whom she previously would have totally ignored, he's in for trouble. The first couple of years she'll be grateful to not be on the bar / party scene. If a child is born to her, then she'll find some fulfillment as a woman. But sooner or later, probably when the youngest child is 4 or so, she'll look back at her "bad boys" with nostalgia. Then she'll want out of the now-boring marriage. Maybe she'll cheat, or maybe just divorce, but either way the guy who married her is in for a thunderbolt: without warning, his child(ren) will be taken from him, he'll be thrown out of his own house, and half his assets will vanish. He'll be ordered to pay a substantial chunk of his money to his now ex wife, who can use it any way she wishes, even to shack up with a string of "boyfriends".

    You find this worthy of respect and compliment? Such a woman is one you wish to pay honor to?

    This is the sum of my objection: that the modern woman is not deserving of respect nor of compliment, no.

    (Your attempts to troll for religious disgreement I ignore, but I do note them for future reference. )

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  49. Jesse_7, it is simply not reasonable nor logical to attempt to defend, or even diminish, the disaster that marriage 2.0 is for men today by bringing up the past. That way leads to endless wrangling, along the lines of the racialist reparations movement in the US.

    If a social practice is wrong, it's wrong, regardless of who did what to whom 200 years ago. If a social practice was wrong 500 years ago, that doesn't justify wrongdoing today.

    Marxism has always been about destroying Western civilization, in the expectation that something better would be constructed upon the ruins. Feminism is a variation of Marxism, and it has always been about destroying the human family in the expectation that something better would be built upon the ruins. We've seen over and over again how Marxism destroys nations, and can even obliterate entire peoples. Now we are seeing how feminism can do the same thing.

    Modern marriage, marriage 2.0, is completely a construct of feminism. It is totally to the disadvantage of men, and to the advantage of women. Marriage 2.0 presents men with a no-win situation. Whatever they do, they are likely to suffer bad results, and the women they are involved with can always use the power of the state to their own benefit.

    The only hope is to roll back the feminist damage step by step. There are various places to start: mandatory shared custody of children, for example. If I could make one change to marriage 2.0 it would be in child custody: to mandate that in any divorce, the presumption would be to give custody to the father. If women knew they would lose their children by divorcing the father of them, that would likely cause a lot of second thoughts even in the modern, entitled, "memememe" woman, because of the biological imperatives most women undergo upon becoming a mother.

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  50. "Please recall that this thread is not about whether to engage in basic politeness, it is about unconditional praise and compliments for women. Not some women, all women. That is what the 'thinking' housewife demands."

    Anonymous, I think it's pretty clear you don't know what you're talking about.

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  51. Anonymous,

    "The modern woman is essentially trained to be an entitled office drone and an amateur courtesan."

    This was a nice choice of words. You can say though that the modern man is essentially an office drone who is an amateur lothario, although admittedly perhaps a little less entitled. There doesn't seem to be that much difference there. As often as not in the divorce courts you'll see two people who are as bad as each other rather than the decent guy who's been given the unfair shaft. Am I wrong on this?

    I do think though that the decent guy who has some faults can find himself in real trouble in the divorce courts. Society is far less forgiving of male failings, perceived or otherwise, than it is of women's. The internalized self castigation of men, as was seen in the origin comment that was universally condemned is sickening

    Anonymous Protestant,

    Yes marriage is a social construct but it is still something that is negotiated between a couple and not all are unhappy or tilted towards women. We are in real trouble when we have to rely on hefty laws and social practices to negotiate our relations with our loved ones and yes I do believe marriage should have an element of love involved however that is defined.

    Feminism 2.0 does do its work in the legal system and the divorce courts. It is at its base like marxism a confrontational doctrine in which the classes or the sexes are inherently incompatible and so will be at each other's throats and in power plays. I don't think we have to feed into this though by seeing women as the enemy who we have to keep our foot on the throat of.

    I agree that any past practice, right or wrong, cannot be used to justify wrongdoing today.

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  52. Jonathon Wolfe, we appear to be talking past each other. Please recall that this thread is not about whether to engage in basic politeness, it is about unconditional praise and compliments for women. Not some women, all women. That is what the 'thinking' housewife demands.

    If this is the case, then you are talking past her more than we are talking past each other.

    She is not demanding unconditional praise for all women. Read the post thread. Heck, read her blog. All she seems to be asking for is some spontaneous affirmation for the good women out there who have to labor thanklessly against the machinations of their supposed same-sex betters, as well as to mass of confused women out there who are struggling with how to identify themselves as women. Hearts and minds are not won by stoics and scolds.

    When I encounter a gaggle of modern women, on the other hand, I'm not inclined to go out of my way to compliment them. Although I suppose I could say something like this: "Wow, you are pretty good at vomiting up your Margaritas without getting any on your shoes", or "You sure are good at rudeness, sarcasm and obnoxiousness, I guess you must practice those things a lot". I'm sure that there are more intimate complements that could be given regarding bedroom skills, but I have no intention of ever being in any such position.

    Who says all compliments have to be verbal? Heck, opening a door for a stumbling bar-hopper is compliment enough. I remember how many dirty looks I get opening doors for women. But that one appreciative look is worth a hundred glares.

    Besides, when is it ever a good idea to talk to a drunk anybody?

    I won't embrace, celebrate, compliment sin, and that is what the "thinking" housewife demands with her "women are starving for compliments" complaint. Why should I go out of my way to reinforce the modern woman in her sin?

    Who in the world is asking you to compliment sin? I suspect you didn't even read her stuff.

    Furthermore, not everything you can compliment a woman on is related to sin.

    You find this worthy of respect and compliment? Such a woman is one you wish to pay honor to?

    Yeah, you make your case by drudging up the worst possible example.

    Please. Unless you can make the case that every.single.woman is like that (therefore justifying an assumption of inherent evil), drudging up the worst cases will not help you. As the saying goes, hard cases make bad law.

    Obviously, a man cannot compliment evil behavior. Once more, nobody is asking you to do that.

    A creature is lovable because it is loved; it is not the other way around. (The best lesson one can get from "Beauty and the Beast".)

    You accuse me of trolling for religious difference. What you are missing is that I am telling you that my objections to your mischaracterizations of chivalric behavior toward women is rooted in religious tradition. (And a pretty damn old one at that.)

    You compliment the potential good in every woman (and not their potential evil) for precisely the same reason even hardened killers are not denied Confession and Last Rites if they ask for them.

    For goodness sake, if we're just going by mankind alone, there is almost nothing to credit them with salvation. And yet here we are.

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  53. I wrote:
    "Please recall that this thread is not about whether to engage in basic politeness, it is about unconditional praise and compliments for women. Not some women, all women. That is what the 'thinking' housewife demands."

    Ilion:
    Anonymous, I think it's pretty clear you don't know what you're talking about.

    Ilion, perhaps you didn't read the original posting. The "thinking" housewife did not say that some women were in need of praise, or that traditionalist women were in need of praise. She said 'women' with no limitation, no qualification, and that means "all" in the English language. Thus the sorority grrlz who recently trashed a banquet facility (see "smoking gun" website) are clearly in need of compliments just as much as a group of demure young women engaging in Bible study.

    This is simply foolish. By refusing to discriminate between bad, even evil behavior, and good behavior we would surely reward the bad while cheapening any compliments to the good. Yet that is exactly what the "thinking" housewife demands, an unjustifiable, blanket wave of compliments for any adult female human.

    The "thinking" housewife's demand is no different than that of the most radical feminist: "Respect and compliment me because of what I am". That entitled attitude is a large part of the problem we find ourselves in.

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  54. Jesse_7 wrote:

    "The modern woman is essentially trained to be an entitled office drone and an amateur courtesan."

    This was a nice choice of words. You can say though that the modern man is essentially an office drone who is an amateur lothario, although admittedly perhaps a little less entitled. There doesn't seem to be that much difference there.

    There are certainly many men who are as you describe; since the current social system punishes traditionalist men this should not be a surprise. Since the modern woman views traditional men with utter disdain, choosing to bestow her sexual favors upon "bad boys" with abandon, there are few options for men. Some will chose "game", essentially wearing the mask of the "bad boy" in order to obtain sex. An understandable, but wrong, reaction. Many, many others are just walking away from women entirely, leading lives of some degree of celibacy or other. I know too many men in their 30's and 40's who have simply given up the idea of marriage, because they cannot submit to the whims of the modern woman.

    Neither choice is a good one (the second is not nearly as bad as the first), the better choice being to accept God's word, join a theologically traditional church and seek a wife within that culture.

    As often as not in the divorce courts you'll see two people who are as bad as each other rather than the decent guy who's been given the unfair shaft. Am I wrong on this?

    Since I avoid any association with the divorce industry by choice, I can't answer your question. However, since marriage 2.0 is deliberately slanted to be entirely to the advantage of women, and thus to the disadvantage of men and their children, it seems likely to me that there are some number of decent, but "boring" men being ruined as well as those being divorced for some cause or other.

    I do think though that the decent guy who has some faults can find himself in real trouble in the divorce courts. Society is far less forgiving of male failings, perceived or otherwise, than it is of women's. The internalized self castigation of men, as was seen in the origin comment that was universally condemned is sickening.

    You still don't get it. Any man in the US who is married can be thrown out of his house, forbidden to return, prohibited from seeing his children and shorn of half or more of his assets solely on the basis of a few telephone calls by his wife. Every married man in the US can be ruined in 48 hours, every single one. There is no penalty to a woman who knowingly and deliberately makes false accusations of criminal conduct by her husband. There is no penalty to a woman who decides that "boring hubby" is no fun anymore and needs to be replaced with a newer model.

    No other contract in society can be broken as casually as marriage. That's the reality everyone lives with thanks to the branch of Marxism known as Feminism.

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  55. Jesse_7 wrote:
    Yes marriage is a social construct

    Please read more carefully. I stated that modern marriage, marriage 2.0 is a construct of Feminism. Do not confuse marriage, ordained by God as the proper state for men and women to raise children in, with the abomination that is marriage 2.0, an artifice created by Feminism with the ultimate aim of destroying Godly marriage entirely.

    but it is still something that is negotiated between a couple and not all are unhappy or tilted towards women.

    Don't confuse the legal reality of marriage 2.0 in the US with the institution ordained by God. The legal institution is completely tilted towards women. God's institution ought to be tilted towards Him, with man and wife bringing their unique strengths to the union, creating a mutual bond that for the benefit of each other, any children, and the larger community around them.

    We are in real trouble when we have to rely on hefty laws and social practices to negotiate our relations with our loved ones and yes I do believe marriage should have an element of love involved however that is defined.

    You are missing the point. Marriage as instituted by God is good, how could it not be? Marriage 2.0 is a corruption of God's institution, a deliberate corruption by Marxists who simultaneously hate God while denying His very existence.

    Feminism 2.0 does do its work in the legal system and the divorce courts. It is at its base like marxism a confrontational doctrine in which the classes or the sexes are inherently incompatible and so will be at each other's throats and in power plays.

    Yes, exactly.

    I don't think we have to feed into this though by seeing women as the enemy who we have to keep our foot on the throat of.

    Who said anything of the sort? I'm pointing out the difference between the modern, entitled, empowered, unGodly woman and the traditionalist, chaste, humble Godly woman. The sheep and the goats are different, are they not?

    Rewarding all women regardless of their actions is simply foolish. Submitting to evil done by women because women are somehow to be respected no matter what they do is not only self destructive, it is sinful, it is a form of idolatry. The original "praise all women no matter what" article, and the self-abnegation that went into it being a clear example.

    I can understand why modern men would debase themselves before their wives, though, given the power that those women have to ruin them via agents of the state.

    I agree that any past practice, right or wrong, cannot be used to justify wrongdoing today.

    Good.

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