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Who's Afraid of Feminism?: Seeing Through the Backlash
Contributors explore the diverse territories that feminist thought and activism have affected over recent years. They address the backlash among feminists, taking on controversial figures including Camille Paglia and Catherine MacKinnon, and challenge the myths that women compete in the working world on the same terms as men and that men do their share of work at home. They examine the dismantling of gender and the resurgence of determinism, and argue for recognition of the multiple political and cultural factors that shape women's identities.
- GenresFeminismNonfictionEssays
291 pages, Hardcover
First published March 27, 1997
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July 5, 2012Pretty much the best book cover ever to have when reading in public. Wasn't disturbed once.
August 22, 2019
The omega males are
This is war of course: rad fems vs. omega males. I am intrigued by how the old Marxist rhetoric has been brought up to date and recycled by the feminist movement. Capitalism and the old social order are again the enemies. They are, perhaps, but feminism is not the solution. If feminists had control, instead of the underprivileged women being second class citizens, it would be the omega males. The human condition would not improve. It would be, as The Who phrased it some years ago, "The new boss just like the old boss."
The really depressing thing about feminism is that it's just politics as usual, i.e., more of the same old sorry attempt to get the upper hand. Politics is about power. It is about who gets what, when, where, how and why, as an old poli sci textbook had it. Nonetheless, as social criticism, feminism is interesting. And it is from this point of view that I found this book worth reading. The chapter on pornography and the debate between feminists Paglia and MacKinnon is interesting. MacKinnon is a puritanical prude and Paglia a tantric wanna-be goddess who thinks pornography is freeing. Pornography does free males, and that's what some women don't like about it. They want dependent males.
Also interesting is the argument that the family is a patriarchal institution that imposes subjugation on women by its very nature. In a sense this is right because the main societal purpose of marriage is not to raise children. (The band and the tribe are capable of that.) It is to insure that the alpha males don't end up controlling most of the women, leaving a large number of men without reproductive chances. A feminist might naturally prefer it that way, since then she gets to mate with the alpha male, which is her heart's desire in the first place. The problem is that large-scale societies are unstable if a large percentage of the males have no reproductive chance. They will more than just rage against the alpha-male/harem/matriarchal structure. They will tear it down and rape and pillage as they go. Consequently, we have marriage and the family. To some extent it is a fraud and a lie and a patriarchal institution, but unless we are going back to living in bands, there is no choice.
Since today's sexually disenfranchised males can be controlled by the political structure so that women have little fear of them, there arises the desire, as expressed in this book, to get rid of marriage altogether and take one's chance at mating with the alpha males, and if that doesn't work out, one can always mate with the beta males, or to hell with it. Certainly, one does not have to marry and become a housewife, or in any other way serve an omega male! Please.
And I agree. However, women are naturally not satisfied with that. What they understandably want is to somehow get rid of those undesirable males, which has always been one of the purposes of the war system. But that system is dying, and with its demise will come the ascendency of women. The gender specific qualities of women, being more social and more political, will catapult women into positions of power. That's what men fear. However it may be that a society without war in which all those omega males are running around without females will need some sort of adjustment. I'm sure the more radical feminists in semi-conscious alliance with the alpha males will come up with something...appropriate. Right now we have nearly two million people in prison in this country, the overwhelming majority of them omega males.
Another (implicit) issue is the awkwardness the feminist movement feels in the face of the rise of evolutionary psychology. The problem simply is that, with the discoveries of evolutionary psychology, the feminist sense of moral righteousness as victim is destroyed; and the woman is seen as an equal partner in the war system of violence and rape. It was all so much easier to blame the male for the violence and the other evils of the war system. Unfortunately evolutionary psychology gives the lie to that sophistry. Women, by their sexual choices, have again and again preferred, and have chosen, the war-like, the powerful and the violent male to any nerd. I personally cannot blame them since it is a strong genetic preference, just as males cannot help but chose the young and beautiful over the old and unhealthy.
In the final analysis the problem with some of the essays in this book and with feminism in general is that they're sexist, relying on a gender-specific definition of being human. Anyone who thinks that his or her sexual identify is the most important aspect of self is a fool. Those who identify with sexuality or even with the slippery concept of "gender," and take pride in that identification, are primitives. Sex is a mechanism of the evolutionary system eons older than humans, and as such is a primitive attribute shared by the most unsophisticated of creatures. We all also move our bowels, and that's a wonderful thing to do, but let's not see that as our finest or defining characteristic. We need to identify ourselves as humans or just as living creatures. To emphasize sex or gender as an important aspect of self is not only degrading but delusionary.
--Dennis Littrell, author of “The World Is Not as We Think It Is”
This is war of course: rad fems vs. omega males. I am intrigued by how the old Marxist rhetoric has been brought up to date and recycled by the feminist movement. Capitalism and the old social order are again the enemies. They are, perhaps, but feminism is not the solution. If feminists had control, instead of the underprivileged women being second class citizens, it would be the omega males. The human condition would not improve. It would be, as The Who phrased it some years ago, "The new boss just like the old boss."
The really depressing thing about feminism is that it's just politics as usual, i.e., more of the same old sorry attempt to get the upper hand. Politics is about power. It is about who gets what, when, where, how and why, as an old poli sci textbook had it. Nonetheless, as social criticism, feminism is interesting. And it is from this point of view that I found this book worth reading. The chapter on pornography and the debate between feminists Paglia and MacKinnon is interesting. MacKinnon is a puritanical prude and Paglia a tantric wanna-be goddess who thinks pornography is freeing. Pornography does free males, and that's what some women don't like about it. They want dependent males.
Also interesting is the argument that the family is a patriarchal institution that imposes subjugation on women by its very nature. In a sense this is right because the main societal purpose of marriage is not to raise children. (The band and the tribe are capable of that.) It is to insure that the alpha males don't end up controlling most of the women, leaving a large number of men without reproductive chances. A feminist might naturally prefer it that way, since then she gets to mate with the alpha male, which is her heart's desire in the first place. The problem is that large-scale societies are unstable if a large percentage of the males have no reproductive chance. They will more than just rage against the alpha-male/harem/matriarchal structure. They will tear it down and rape and pillage as they go. Consequently, we have marriage and the family. To some extent it is a fraud and a lie and a patriarchal institution, but unless we are going back to living in bands, there is no choice.
Since today's sexually disenfranchised males can be controlled by the political structure so that women have little fear of them, there arises the desire, as expressed in this book, to get rid of marriage altogether and take one's chance at mating with the alpha males, and if that doesn't work out, one can always mate with the beta males, or to hell with it. Certainly, one does not have to marry and become a housewife, or in any other way serve an omega male! Please.
And I agree. However, women are naturally not satisfied with that. What they understandably want is to somehow get rid of those undesirable males, which has always been one of the purposes of the war system. But that system is dying, and with its demise will come the ascendency of women. The gender specific qualities of women, being more social and more political, will catapult women into positions of power. That's what men fear. However it may be that a society without war in which all those omega males are running around without females will need some sort of adjustment. I'm sure the more radical feminists in semi-conscious alliance with the alpha males will come up with something...appropriate. Right now we have nearly two million people in prison in this country, the overwhelming majority of them omega males.
Another (implicit) issue is the awkwardness the feminist movement feels in the face of the rise of evolutionary psychology. The problem simply is that, with the discoveries of evolutionary psychology, the feminist sense of moral righteousness as victim is destroyed; and the woman is seen as an equal partner in the war system of violence and rape. It was all so much easier to blame the male for the violence and the other evils of the war system. Unfortunately evolutionary psychology gives the lie to that sophistry. Women, by their sexual choices, have again and again preferred, and have chosen, the war-like, the powerful and the violent male to any nerd. I personally cannot blame them since it is a strong genetic preference, just as males cannot help but chose the young and beautiful over the old and unhealthy.
In the final analysis the problem with some of the essays in this book and with feminism in general is that they're sexist, relying on a gender-specific definition of being human. Anyone who thinks that his or her sexual identify is the most important aspect of self is a fool. Those who identify with sexuality or even with the slippery concept of "gender," and take pride in that identification, are primitives. Sex is a mechanism of the evolutionary system eons older than humans, and as such is a primitive attribute shared by the most unsophisticated of creatures. We all also move our bowels, and that's a wonderful thing to do, but let's not see that as our finest or defining characteristic. We need to identify ourselves as humans or just as living creatures. To emphasize sex or gender as an important aspect of self is not only degrading but delusionary.
--Dennis Littrell, author of “The World Is Not as We Think It Is”
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