Doris Lessing, feminism, secular religion

Doris Lessing was a celebrated novelist, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2007.

She was born to English parents and grew up in Rhodesia in the 1920s. She moved back to England in the 1930s, got married, had children and then divorced in 1943, leaving the children with their father.

She became part of the great shift of Western intellectuals toward communism at this time, although she left the Communist Party after the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. Later in life she became interested in Sufism.

I found an interview with Lessing in the New York Times from 1982 that raises some interesting themes.

The interview begins with Lessing distancing herself from feminism:

The idea that she has abandoned feminist concerns particularly irks her, since she never wrote from a consciously feminist point of view but was adopted by feminists in search of a heroine: ''What the feminists want of me is something they haven't examined because it comes from religion. They want me to bear witness. What they would really like me to say is, 'Ha, sisters, I stand with you side by side in your struggle toward the golden dawn where all those beastly men are no more.' Do they really want people to make oversimplified statements about men and women? In fact, they do. I've come with great regret to this conclusion.''

There are three themes here. First, Lessing identifies feminism as being hostile to men and as setting men and women apart from each other. I think that's worth noting as you sometimes hear the argument that feminism was somehow friendlier in the past than it is today. That is not how Lessing experienced it, despite being supportive of leftist causes herself.

Second, there is the utopianism of the radical left, the idea that human nature can be acted on, perhaps through education, or the dismantling of oppressive social norms or institutions etc., to create an ideal society  - a "golden dawn" in which an ideal of freedom and equality will be realised. This helps to explain the first theme - the hostility to men expressed by feminists. If it is men, acting through the patriarchy, that are the brake on achieving utopia, then men become the enemy of humanity and the villains holding back the realisation of humanity's ultimate purposes. Little wonder, given this world view, that feminists would be so hostile to the opposite sex.

Third, there is the idea that leftism is, to some degree, a kind of secularised religion. Lessing goes on to draw out this point:

''There are certain types of people who are political out of a kind of religious reason,'' she says, digging dirt ferociously out of the kitchen table. ''I think it's fairly common among socialists: They are, in fact, God-seekers, looking for the kingdom of God on earth. A lot of religious reformers have been like that, too. It's the same psychological set, trying to abolish the present in favor of some better future - always taking it for granted that there is a better future. If you don't believe in heaven, then you believe in socialism.

''When I was in my real Communist phase, I and the people around me really believed - but, of course, this makes us certifiable - that something like 10 years after World War II, the world would be Communist and perfect.''

''I was once an idealistic and utopian Communist,'' she said, ''and no, I am not proud of it. The real politicos are a very different animal, and I'm angry that I didn't notice that very evident fact.

I think it's worth pointing out here that the alternative to being a utopian socialist is not to be unconcerned with "the city of man". It is to recognise that human nature is flawed, and therefore social institutions and norms have an important role in limiting the ill effects of the baser aspects of our nature (as well as fostering the nobler ones). You do not make progress in society by abolishing all restraints on human nature; the task is a more complicated one of making some sort of good order out of the biological, social and spiritual nature of man, a task that draws more on the steady accumulation of wisdom, the making of culture, and the fostering of virtue than on simplistic political formulas.

Millennia of woe?

A feminist by the name of Suzanna Danuta Walters has written an opinion piece for the Washington Post with the title "Why can't we hate men?"

I found the piece interesting because it spells out so clearly the logic of the feminist position.

I have been writing for many years that if feminists took their theories seriously that they would be, at the very least, deeply conflicted in their attitudes to men. After all, feminists claim that throughout history men have organised together to create privilege for themselves at the expense of women; that men enact violence against women to uphold this privilege; and that at the core of society is a conflict between the two sexes for power and status.

If you were a woman who really believed that, then it would be logical to see men as the enemy and to have some sort of negative feelings towards men as a class of people.

And Suzanna Walters (a professor of sociology) acknowledges this:

...it seems logical to hate men...Women experience sexual violence, and the threat of that violence permeates our choices big and small. In addition, male violence is not restricted to intimate-partner attacks or sexual assault but plagues us in the form of terrorism and mass gun violence...wage inequality continues to permeate every economy and almost every industry...women have less access to education, particularly at the higher levels; women have lower rates of property ownership.

...So, in this moment, here in the land of legislatively legitimated toxic masculinity, is it really so illogical to hate men? For all the power of #MeToo and #TimesUp and the women’s marches, only a relatively few men have been called to task, and I’ve yet to see a mass wave of prosecutions or even serious recognition of wrongdoing. On the contrary, cries of “witch hunt” and the plotted resurrection of celebrity offenders came quick on the heels of the outcry over endemic sexual harassment and violence. But we’re not supposed to hate them because . . . #NotAllMen. I love Michelle Obama as much as the next woman, but when they have gone low for all of human history, maybe it’s time for us to go all Thelma and Louise and Foxy Brown on their collective butts.

...So men, if you really are #WithUs and would like us to not hate you for all the millennia of woe you have produced and benefited from, start with this: Lean out so we can actually just stand up without being beaten down. Pledge to vote for feminist women only. Don’t run for office. Don’t be in charge of anything. Step away from the power. We got this. And please know that your crocodile tears won’t be wiped away by us anymore. We have every right to hate you. You have done us wrong. #BecausePatriarchy. It is long past time to play hard for Team Feminism. And win.

It's all there. Men have created "millennia of woe" for women so that women "have every right to hate you". The suggested solution is for men to play for the other team by giving up all power ("Don't be in charge of anything").

Nor is this is new feature of feminism. In 1913 a male feminist by the name of W.L. George noted of the "new women" of his era that:

The "New Woman", as we know her to-day, a woman who is not so new as the woman who will be born of her, is a very unpleasant product; armed with a little knowledge, she tends to be dogmatic in her views and offensive in argument. She tends to hate men, and to look upon Feminism as a revenge; she adopts mannish ways, tends to shout, to contradict, to flout principles because they are principles; also she affects a contempt for marriage which is the natural result of her hatred of man.

Again, we should not be surprised as the same logic was at work in 1913 as it is more than a century later.

Professor Walters appears to be a lesbian and so can more readily embrace the logic of the feminist position. For heterosexual feminists the situation is more difficult: they have to reconcile the logic of their politics with their desire for relationships with particular men. The difficulty of achieving this is magnified when you consider that feminist women are not likely to be attracted to servile men who are willing to roll over and give up masculine power. The result is an uneasy compromise between the personal and the political for more serious feminists, whilst most women continue to refuse to identify as feminists at all.

The larger point, of course, is that feminist assumptions have to be challenged. The picture that feminists have of the past is, mostly, a strange one. It does not acknowledge the sacrifices that men made on behalf of their wives and children; nor does it recognise that men and women, rather than being set apart, mostly worked together for the larger benefit of their families and communities (ultimately producing Western civilisation).

I want to finish on a positive note, so I'm going to praise, again, the work of traditionalist women on social media, who are pushing a much more positive message of men and women cooperating together for larger purposes of love, family, community and culture. In no particular order, here are some of the traditionalist women worth following on Twitter:

Sarah Jean Gosney: https://twitter.com/sarahjeangosney

Sophie: https://twitter.com/mtnhousewife

Cherry: https://twitter.com/SewTrad

Trisarahtops: https://twitter.com/xTrisarahtops

Kami: https://twitter.com/Highheeled_Kami

A note to Melbourne readers. If you are sympathetic to the ideas of this website, please visit the site of the Melbourne Traditionalists. It's important that traditionalists don't remain isolated from each other; our group provides a great opportunity for traditionalists to meet up and connect. Details at the website.