Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Chivalry and Other Forms of Female Oppression

An eye exam is not an intelligence test, for the most perfect vision can coexist in the most perfect idiot. And vice versa: the person with a high IQ can obviously have poor vision -- and not just the physical kind. Rather, he cannot see various nonlocal relationships that illuminate and extend the past, present, and future, within both the interior and exterior, or upper and lower vertical.

Example. Okay, I don't want to get sidetracked, but what's really going on with this epidemic of sexual predation and perversion in various bastions of the left, e.g., Hollywood and the Swamp Media (and surely academia cannot be far behind)?

Now, there are plenty of idiots on the left, but there are also some intelligent people. However, the vision of the smartest among them is so limited that they can scarcely see what is under their noses. They seem to think it is a problem of men, or of a culture insufficiently steeped in the ideology of feminism. That is what they see because that is all their vision will allow them to see. "Ideological blinders" is such a cliché, but I don't want to waste my time thinking up a better term.

Some conservatives have speculated that the left is the ideal shelter for these sexual predators, such that their political affiliation is just a calculated pose. I don't think that is the case, at least with the majority. There may be some pure sociopaths, but even sociopaths have principles. Hitler could murder human beings all day but would never harm a dog. Likewise, Charlie Rose might stalk women all day, but wouldn't be caught dead at a Tea Party rally, or reading Thomas Sowell. There are limits to his depravity!

So, what's really going on? Well, if ideas have consequences, metaphysics has... big ones. In other words, if your metaphysic is wrong, then everything else will follow. For ultimately, a metaphysic is your "map of the cosmos," and don't try to pretend you don't have one. If you don't have an explicit metaphysic, then it only means you have an implicit, unexamined, and undoubtedly stupid one.

Feminism is an idiotic ideology rooted in an even more idiotic metaphysic. To believe it is to believe what is false, right down to the ground of being. What could go wrong?

Now we're really in danger of a major side trip, because this touches on the central theme of a book I'm currently reading, Freedom from Reality: The Diabolical Character of Modern Liberty. I'm holding off on a recommendation, because it is very dense, difficult, and expensive, plus I'm only about a third of the way through. But you can get my drift from the title: the feminist ideal of liberty is indeed diabolical (literally), for it is a freedom from reality, which is (obviously) no freedom at all.

What is it then? In other words, if feminism doesn't entail freedom, then what does it entail? Er, slavery? That's a good start, for it implies that the person is bound more to the ideology than to the reality which the ideology is supposed to symbolize.

But leftism does not symbolize reality, except in a hollow and self-referential way. In this way it has the identical structure as p0rn: a completely empty symbol of what it is representing. If you conflate the two, then you are dragged down to the level of the empty symbol, and the entire cosmos vertically collapses in on itself.

In this light, what is scientism but scientific p0rn? You have to understand what I am saying literally. Science is not reality, obviously. Rather, it is a symbolic system that represents reality, but always in an open, dynamic, and incomplete way. It always points beyond itself to the reality it symbolizes.

But consider, for example, global warming enthusiasts: they aren't even troubled that their models do not conform to the reality they are supposed to represent! As such, they are just like feminists for whom feminism is infinitely more important than what it is supposed to map, i.e., reality.

Back to our main peripheral point, what is going on in the Swamp. Let's put it this way: how do you stop rape, or any other bad human behavior, for that matter? With violence, or at least the threat of it. Can feminism stop this violence? For example, can a feminized president bring peace to the Middle East, or stop Korea from acquiring nukes, just by being extra-womanly? How did that work out? Didn't it just provoke the malefactors?

Here's a little paradoxical secret for feminists: men devalue women, and that is a big reason why they value them. Sounds paradoxical, but it is thoroughly orthopardoxical, and the basis of chivalry.

Let's just consider the plain, unadorned reality: everyone who has not been poisoned by ideology knows women are weaker than men. Thus, they need to be protected by men -- or better, by maleness. For related reasons, men don't want to do what a woman can do. Rather, they want to do what a woman can't do. If a woman can do anything a man can do, then to hell with manhood.

But what does feminism teach? That a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle. That there are no essential differences between male and female. This is a deeply untrue doctrine, but the depth of its falsehood is even deeper than you might think. It is ultimately false because reality does not consist of atoms in the void -- not at any level, from the subatomic to the human and beyond, all the way up and into God.

Rather, ultimate reality is relationship, and there is not a thing you can rightly understand unless you first understand this principle. Thus, for example, to say a woman "needs" a man (and vice versa) is not nearly adequate to the case. Rather, woman refers to man, and vice versa. Man and Woman are symbolic realities that point beyond themselves to the Other that completes them on that level.

Another and even more primordial relationship is Man and God. Man refers to God, as God refers to Man, the latter going to the doctrine of incarnation. To understand that man is created in the image and likeness of God is one way to "see" this reality.

I think we can agree with feminists that a lot of catastrophes in the world are caused by men, indeed, probably the vast majority. Who commits all the violent crime? Who starts all the wars? Who's in charge of ESPN? Not women.

Perhaps the central purpose of culture is to shepherd merely biological males into psycho-spiritual manhood. Men commit rape and other abuses, obviously. But such crimes are unthinkable for the mature man. Now, the critical question is, how does one create such a man? Can feminism do it?

Ha! Remember what was said above about men having a kind of in-built devaluation of the feminine sphere. If it's only Mom telling me "No," then that amounts to a green light to go ahead and do it. Feminism is like a parchment barrier: "Peace (between the sexes) in our time!"

But if Dad says No? That's a different story, isn't it? I read somewhere that Brad Pitt confronted Dirty Harvey at a party and warned him in no uncertain terms that if he tried anything again with his girlfriend, then violence would be visited upon his fat, disgusting person.

Imagine an alternate reality, in which a Pajama Boy or Girl warns him that if his behavior continues, then he may well have to attend sensitivity training and learn how his maleness is really a disease that can only be cured by a psychic castration. I wonder if this is what he's learning in "rehab?"

The bottom line is that Manhood is the only solution to the problems unleashed by men; there is no "downward" solution, a la feminism, but only an upward one into the telos of proper psycho-spiritual manhood. But again, that cosmos -- the real one -- does not exist for the left.

I'm confident my son will never abuse women. He will, however, open doors and give up his seat for them, so I guess that makes him a hopeless oppressor. Again, chivalry is a function of seeing the underlying differences between the sexes.

Well, our little sidetrack hijacked the post. We'll just leave off with a few timelessly timely gags courtesy of the Aphorist:

Modern man inverts problems' ranks. When it comes to sex education, for example, everyone pontificates, but who worries about the education of the sentiments?

Ideologies are fictitious nautical charts, but on them, in the end, depends against which reef one is shipwrecked. If interests move us, stupidities guide us.

In society just as in the soul, when hierarchies abdicate, the appetites rule.

A modern man is a man who forgets what man knows about man.

24 comments:

Gagdad Bob said...

On a similar if not same page:

"you put your hands on a young woman, and chances are that young woman has brothers, a father, cousins. In the best of possible worlds, those fathers, brothers, cousins, husbands put their hands on you. And you end up crawling on the floor, unable to breathe.

"Yes, I suppose it’s sexist of me to think of it this way, or old-fashioned or patriarchal or ethnically tribal or some other sin or thought crime that I haven’t figured out yet."

ted said...

I suppose such manhood can also be represented by the right kind of woman too. David Warren told this amusing story in a recent piece: "Being Marlon Brando didn’t help, either, according to a movie-star anecdote I have picked up somewhere. He is said to have groped Sophia Loren, during a film shoot many years ago. She set him straight crisply. By the time she was finished with him, the megastar was reduced to a whipped little boy. He behaved much better to everyone on set, after this humiliation."

I suppose this alludes to true empowerment by a woman with dignity, in place of the sexualized empowered and victimized one depicted into today's feminism.

Dougman said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Dougman said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
julie said...

Ha! Remember what was said above about men having a kind of in-built devaluation of the feminine sphere. If it's only Mom telling me "No," then that amounts to a green light to go ahead and do it.

Ha - yes, that is a constant battle. They know they've reallycrossed the line when Daddy has to step in.

Imagine an alternate reality, in which a Pajama Boy or Girl warns him that if his behavior continues...

In Sweden, there's a public information campaign instructing women to forcefully hold their hand out in a "stop" gesture to stop sexual assault. By "immigrants," presumably, since Swedish men clearly self-castrated a generation or two back. I leave it to the reader to imagine how successful the gesture is at thwarting unwanted advances.

Re. men devaluing women, yes, and that's as it should be. Ideally, the Father is the head of the household. He can't be that it if the mother isn't situated just a little lower. Far from being a bad dynamic, it is the best one, for the simple reason that a body can have only one head, and if there are two there will be mischief.

Tangentially, I'm reminded of several occasions talking with Christian women who suffer anxiety because their husbands are atheists or just seem uninterested in matters of faith. The tendency in such situations is to nag, fret and hassle the husband about it, which is generally completely unsuccessful even though she might be right. Most men simply don't respect their woman's opinion about these things, no matter how much they love and cherish their wives. They may be coerced into attending, but the heart won't be in it. For a woman, the best thing to do if she's worried about her husband's faith is love him, live her faith the best she can, pray, and leave the rest up to God.

Which, if memory serves, is pretty much what Paul advised Christian women to do.

Gagdad said...

--women who suffer anxiety because their husbands are atheists or just seem uninterested in matters of faith.

Good friend of the wife has that same problem -- she's an active Catholic, while he has no interest whatsoever.

Boys are not only unimpressed by mom going to church, they will devalue it if they come to see it as a female thing. Interesting that the "religious spirit" passes through the male line, at least for boys.

For that very reason, Dennis Prager talks about why it is important for God to be the father. Likewise, you can have female priests and rabbis, but don't expect men to see them the same way as they do males. For me, they always seem kind of counterfeit, like they're just playing at the role.

julie said...

Yep, totally agree. When I see a woman "priest," I assume her motivation for putting on the collar has more to do with worldly goals than holy ones. It's not done in service to God, but rather in rebellion against Him. There are other ways to serve.

And again, that's not to say that women are never right or that they don't have anything to offer as far as spiritual wisdom goes, it's just that the reality of the male/female dynamic must be respected, perhaps especially in religious matters. If you don't understand the dynamic, no matter how much you love God and your heart longs for your man to love him too, you will have precisely the opposite effect.

Dougman said...

Oops!
Those comments were for a different blog.

So sorry

Dougman said...

Rather, ultimate reality is relationship, and there is not a thing you can rightly understand unless you first understand this principle. Thus, for example, to say a woman "needs" a man (and vice versa) is not nearly adequate to the case. Rather, woman refers to man, and vice versa. Man and Woman are symbolic realities that point beyond themselves to the Other that completes them on that level.

I put that out on my fb page.
With credit to you, of course

julie said...

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Dougman said...

Happy Thanksgiving

ted said...

This is a good talk (although I don't fully agree with all his points) about why perennialism (even esoteric) is so challenging.

julie said...

Speaking of Sweden, castrati, and people who don't like the difference between male and female...

They crack down on "gendered language" because it's too difficult to crack down on actual evil.

Rick said...

“There are other ways to serve.”

Not only that, but I’m certain there are ways in which it’s critical for women to serve in ways that men are not the best at. It’s seems true of any natural system or organization.
Something missing and the organization cannot last. Duplicating parts x infinity or substitution with artificial sweeteners, fillers, and understudies is no answer either.
Male and female He made them seems instantly recognizable as True, irreducible and therefore complete.

julie said...

Yes, just so.

I'm reminded of many of the young people I know. One in particular, in a different world she would be an ideal wife and mother: lovely, sweet-natured, likes to take care of people, loves children, etc.

So is she married or even seriously dating? Nope, as far as I know. She's been spending her prime years traveling the world, visiting third world countries to care for other people's children, and pretty much putting off any semblance of maturity or traditional adult responsibility. The message that has been drummed into her head since infancy is that the worst thing a girl can be is "just" a wife and mother, when to anyone paying attention she's by nature really not suited for much else, whereas she would be fantastic at that.

Other young people I know get married, but then don't even consider having kids. Careers come first, etc. Plus as they've all been told (again since early childhood), it's their job to Save the World. Far more important than "just" having a family.

julie said...

Lest the point was lost, the girls reject womanhood in favor of acting "like men," because being a woman just isn't good enough. As to the men, in response they usually end up remaining boys for life.

Much misery all around. Not to mention generational sterility.

Sad.

Gagdad Bob said...

For that matter, you don't have to be a celibate male either, because the Church always has a great need for deacons.

Rick said...

Julie — I know that young lady. Someone along the way convinced her to become an engineer. Because STEM and the cause and so forth. Unfortunately she was able to pass the tests and continued on until employed as a not very good one. She tried very hard. To tears, she tried, but we had to let her go. She could not complete a project. But her heart was not in it, in contrast to, for example our sr engineer (maybe 10 years older) who still fascinates me on a daily basis with how much he knows (he must devour things mechanical in his leisure and since childhood). She on the other hand I witnessed once how wonderfully delightfully she was with small girls. Her heart was in that because it was effortless and a joy to her to be with them. She must have loved being a young girl (my wife has retained this wonderful quality, probably the quality I love the most).

Rick said...

I wish my 24 year old son could meet the young lady she has postponed. They would have a wonderful time together.

Bob, I don’t know if you’ve seen the movie Pride of the Yankees. It’s been a while since I have but some of the best scenes in that movie are the ones between him and his wife. The wonderful playful childlike-like and even silly ways they “played” together.
Did I imagine them?

julie said...

I was almost that girl. I wanted to study acoustical engineering for a while in college, and was probably smart enough, had I been dedicated to doing the work. By God's grace, the opportunity to go for it never arose, and by the time I went to a school that had it, the urge had passed.

I am grateful every day to be "just" a housewife. The funny thing is, women don't realize that whatever their interests are, there is some part of daily life that touches on it. Science, chemistry, art, psychology, accounting, nursing, fitness, nutrition, music, education, on and on; almost anything you can study for a "real" job has applications at home that are just as important, and quite often more useful. But that's not a message most girls will hear these days.

Re. the play between man and wife, we were watching the original Thin Man last night. Nick and Nora have that same quality; it's as fun to watch them together as it is to figure out the murder mystery.

julie said...

Related to the post, There is a profound beauty in the pleasure we can give to one another as men and women, but our culture despises this very beauty.

Rick said...

Oh my god, Julie — I only read the first paragraph of that Dalrock Post and nearly fell off my chair. I was just going to say that about my wife cooking. How it makes me feel. I don’t know if it’s possible to explain. The closest thing I can think of is a kind of comfort when my wife cooks on the weekend and for some reason now it seems more so at our age just the two of us. I think it is comforting to her to do it too. Like I’ve heard it can be to do the ironing or how she likes to pick out her clothes for the week on a Sunday afternoon. It seems to be similar to how... she’s often mentioned when I asked if I was making too much noise working in the basement and she answered no she liked it.

Joan of Argghh! said...

Happy Thanksgiving, dear family under the pelt!

Van Harvey said...

I hope you all had a Happy Thanksgiving! I thought of my fellow raccoons, but I was too happy celebrating with my soon to be daughter in law's family, to become undistracted. :-)

Theme Song

Theme Song