The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Feminism and the ‘Friendly Stranger’

Posted on | June 8, 2011 | 59 Comments

“How many coeds do you have to dick-dial behind the back of your pregnant wife before someone notices that maybe that’s not exactly congruent with the teachings of Gloria Steinem?”
Ace of Spades, “In Which I Confess Some Doubts”

Having resisted the temptation to re-open my long war with Little Miss Attila over the history and meaning of “feminism,” I’m wondering if Weinergeddon isn’t waking some people up to what a lot of people have long suspected about guys who kowtow to feminists. That is to say:

Guys who make a big show of being on board with
the feminist agenda are just doing it to ingratiate themselves
with women, perhaps with the worst sort of ulterior motives.

There – I’ve said it as bluntly as possible and, as I say, a lot of people share that suspicion. Being a cynic means that one expects others to act in their own interests, so that whenever you see someone make an ostentatious display of altruistic idealism, your gut-hunch instinct is to suspect a scam: What’s in it for them?

Conservatism is not hostile to self-interest and, I would argue, requires a certain  philosophical skepticism toward professions of altruism. As Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations, “It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.”

If you go through life counting on the benevolence of others, you’re likely to starve to death. And wise people are always suspicious toward the “friendly stranger.” His friendliness may be sincere. He may have no malign intent. But he is a stranger, and therefore his gestures of friendship trigger our suspicious instincts: What’s in it for him?

This kind of suspicion, I think, is appropriate toward any man who makes himself conspicuous as an advocate of feminism. In fact, I am suspicious of any man who remains silent when feminists start spouting their arrant nonsense. (Some obvious objections: Isn’t feminism really just a way for women to bully men? Isn’t the feminist actually demanding that she receive favorable treatment on the basis of her sex? Hasn’t the feminist therefore elevated her own selfishness to the status of a political philosophy? Why should honest men permit themselves to be pushed around by the adherents of feminism, unless they are such cowards that they are afraid to offend those idiots?)

Yet as I say, it isn’t my intent to rile up Little Miss Attila. Rather I call attention to Ace’s musings about Kirsten Powers and her ex-boyfriend Anthony Weiner — you should read the whole thing — because I wonder why so many feminists seem to lack the instinctive “friendly stranger” suspicion toward their liberal male allies.

Most guys probably wonder the same thing. Don’t these women see that guys who make a big show of being “feminist” are just running a game?

The fact that they keep falling for that same transparent scam might lead us to suspect feminists of naïveté. They are the kind of suckers who are born every minute, and who should never be given an even break.

They deserve Anthony Weiner.

UPDATE: Dan Collins suggests the title of this post requires some good music, and Dan’s right.

UPDATE II: Welcome, Instapundit readers!


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Comments

  • http://twitter.com/dustbury Charles G Hill

    “I’m your vehicle, baby; I’ll take you anywhere you want to go.”

    Eventually they figure out that they’ve been taken for a ride.

  • Anonymous

    That’s just it: Liberals are saying Weiner wasn’t a hypocrite, but he wasn’t exactly advertising the fact that he was cybersexing half his Twitter feed, was he? No, he was pretending to be Mr. Faithful Husband and — most relevantly — Mr. Feminism.

  • JeffS

    I believe that nearly all of the “feminist males” we see marching with the “feminist females” are merely beta males looking to get laid. 

    Cynical?  Yes.   But cynicism and realism are separated by a very thin line.  There’s more truth to Stacy’s point than feminists may want to admit.

  • http://thepagantemple.blogspot.com/ ThePaganTemple

    Male feminists are emotional castrati. I bet if the Weiner were to be face to face with some of his on-line girlfriends he’d be so tongue-tied he wouldn’t be able to blubber out a coherent sentence. He’s still that weird little Jewfro kid who probably never got laid until he was in his mid to late twenties, and then very awkwardly. This would explain his strident personality, a matter of frustration. Emotional castrati need to have their egos stroked, and of course,  their, well, weiners.

  • http://twitter.com/killmodell kengoblue

    Creepiest little man in America the #Weiner

    After viewing all of those pressers he threw (it really is TRUE about being fascinated by train-wrecks)  this go-around couldn’t come around any harder.

    Stay classy dems.

  • jules

    Color me cynical, but I’m not sure I believe the  pregnancy story… this guy will do or say anything to keep his job, plus, didn’t it emanate from the NYT?  I guess time will tell, but I wouldn’t be surprised by a stress-induced miscarriage… i.e., Republicans will ultimately be blamed for their loss.

  • Chuck W

    If the internet was not around he would be the guy beating off in the bushes outside some girls window.

  • Anonymous

    Robert Heinlein said it best:

    “Beware of altruism. It is based on self-deception, the root of all evil.”

    If tempted by something that feels “altruistic,”
    examine your motives and root out that self-deception. Then, if you
    still want to do it, wallow in it!”

  • http://assistantvillageidiot.blogspot.com Assistant Village idiot

    It was true of me in the 1970′s.  I can’t have been the only one.

  • Carolina

    Well said. Contrast that with conservatives who are indeed hypocrites, like the Family Values politicians and Catholic priests caught in sex scandals.

    “Guys who make a big show of being on board with the feminist agenda are just doing it to ingratiate themselves with women, perhaps with the worst sort of ulterior motives.”–Ace of Spades

    Guys who become priests as a sign of their deep Christian faith are just doing it to ingratiate themselves with the church-goers in need of help, perhaps with the worst sort of ulterior motives.
    “How many coeds do you
    have to dick-dial behind the back of your pregnant wife before someone
    notices that maybe that’s not exactly congruent with the teachings of
    Gloria Steinem?”
    –RS McCain
    How many alter boys do you have to fuck inside the confines of your church before someone notices that maybe that’s not exactly congruent with teachings of Christ?
    Thanks for the opportunity to reflect on hypocrisy on all sides.

  • http://profiles.google.com/vicioussss Extremely Vicioussss

    There’s a term for this: macktivism.

  • Anonymous

    I agree that it is important, whenever we believe we are acting on lofty motives, to examine ourselves and seek out any hidden selfishness. At the same time, doing good is always generally its own reward: We feel good about ourselves when we do the right thing, and consistently doing so will tend to enhance one’s reputation. So there are essentially self-serving incentives even for actions that may appear altruistic.

    Something I realized a long time ago: In order to help others, one must have resources to share. The beggar and the pauper cannot afford to be philanthropists. Ergo, when genuinely good people succeed, and reap the material rewards of that success, the world becomes a better place.

    You can find a lot of wisdom about such things by carefully studying the biblical book of Proverbs.

  • Anonymous

    It’s the same reason a lot of guys went to the anti-war demonstrations back in the 60′s. That’s where the pu**y was.

  • http://thepagantemple.blogspot.com/ ThePaganTemple

    Also “jacktivism”.

  • Toby

    What vulgar nonsense.  Suggesting that all priests “fuck” “alter” (sic) boys?  Really? 

    At least the priests committing these offences admit they are wrong, unlike the apologists for Weiner (like you) who try to suggest that somehow he is not a hypocrite because he is not some sort of “family values” person.  

    You misunderstand the meaning of hypocrisy, which is saying something that you do not believe.  The family values guys whose behaviour is inconsistent with their words believe their words are correct – they just (like all humans) fall short of their higher aspirations. 

    The point RSM is making is that it is unlikely that uber feminist men actually believe what they are saying, but are simply saying it to get something.  That is hypocrisy (and Weiner is an arch hypocrite).  Your example, isn’t.

  • Tennwriter

    I do believe you hit a nerve, RSM.

  • JeffS

    Carolina doesn’t “misunderstand” anything, Toby.  Carolina is being deliberately obtuse.  It’s an old troll tactic, intended to change the direction of the discussion.

    Carolina knows full well what Stacy means.   She just doesn’t agree, and is happy to misrepresent herself if that’s what it takes to kill the meme that Weiner is a liar and a hypocrite, like most lefties.

  • Carolina

    Last weekend, i was talking to a man-disgusted friend of mine. I suggested she not give up “fishing,” which she has done while wishing the suitable-fish situation were otherwise. So I said, why not try to catch a trout in one of those online dating sites by composing an ad like this: “Wanted. Superintelligent beta male.”

    Subsequently amended by a beta male [?] friend to “non-alpha male.” Does that take the sting out of it, I asked, laughing. Maybe, he said, but really, the beta male IS the alpha male, a different viewpoint and a different sphere.

  • Carolina

    What vulgar nonsense.  Suggesting that all priests “fuck” “alter” (sic) boys?  Really?

    That would be so (for you), if you are deluding yourself that all ‘male feminists’ are there to only get some pussy.

  • Carolina

    Oh, not to forget in a recent RSM post on “feminism”, McCain suggested  with great insight that ugly women who fail to get laid turn into angry feminists. Or something.

    It’s not about male or female feminists per se, in the anti-feminist universe, all feminists are apparently motivated by (a reward of or a lack of)  physical sex.

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  • elaine

    Apparently, any time a woman expressed any kind of positive interest in his rants, Fast Tony made a point of following/friending her back and then conversing with her.  And, apparently, it didn’t take long before he turned the conversation to sex.

    Fast Tony took any opening a woman gave him and decided it was an invitation from her for him to make sexual overtures.

    And that’s probably pretty common from leftie men.

    They don’t support a woman’s right to choose because they believe in a woman’s right to choose; they support it because it means sex with no consequences.

    They nod their heads in agreement when feminists equate sexual empowerment with having lots of sex not because they want women to be empowered, but because they want plenty of easy partners who’ll give it up at the drop of a hat.

    People like Fast Tony are all about using women.  Leftie men who claim to give a damn about women’s rights only say that because they want to get into those women’s panties.

    Fast Tony was not only happy to use any woman who said how much she liked his performance at a public appearance (and then drop her once he’d scored), he was also more than happy to use them again by asking them to cover for him in this scandal, thus adding insult to injury.

    And if leftie women like you don’t start seeing these creeps for the loser-users they are, then they’re never going to learn and will continue to behave like utter boors.

    But please, keep on defending him with your moral relativism. It just confirms my suspicions that leftist women are the dumbest twats on the planet.

  • JeffS

    Stacy usually does when he talks about feminists, Tennwriter.  He’s male, conservative, and views feminism (on both sides of the political aisle) with a jaundiced eye.

    A perspective that they’ve earned, IMHO.

  • JeffS

    ….beta male IS the alpha male, a different viewpoint and  a different sphere” is true only if you re-define “alpha male” to mean whatever you want it to mean at the time.  I don’t (see #2).

    Redefining words is a classic leftie ploy to seize control of the conversation.  By saying “….beta male IS the alpha male, a different viewpoint and  a different sphere“, you are effectively claiming that there is no such thing as an alpha male or beta male in human society, i.e., no male hierarchy. 

    There is a hierarchy in human society where men and women are “ranked” against the group for some reason, which may or may not be sex.  This is a major complaint of feminism.

    So all you are doing is trying to define the hierarchy to your own standards.  And that’s an utter crock. So try again.

    On second thought…..don’t try again.

  • Joe

    If you would not feel comfortable sharing your activities of the day with the wife over dinner, I would suggest there is a reason for that. 

  • Joe

    Carolina that is vulgar nonsense.  Abusers of faith and trust should be condemned for their behavior.  I have no sympathy for the tiny fraction of Priests who disgraced their vows.  I have no sympathy for Weiner in abusing his wife (yes he abused her with his behavior) and his patent hypocrisy. 

  • Joe

    I do not recall a Carolina hanging out here, but I sure recognize the deliberate obtuseness of Anamika/gg. 

  • Joe

    Charles Johnson is a male feminist…I think I just confirmed what you just said. 

  • David R. Graham

    Excellent points.  Careful study of Proverbs will reveal, in addition, that what appears to be self-interest rarely is.  The assumption that people act in self-interest (Hobbs), is faulty.  People act in what they presume is self interest, not what is in self-interest.  The distinction is consequential.

  • Carolina

    One cannot state that reality I behold is constituted by the operations I perform in distinguishing it and at the same time say it is independent of my operations, without contradicting one’s self.

    I wonder if people could hold in MOST areas that reality is constituted by the operations they perform in distinguishing it, and yet not see that in one or two areas — politics, medicine, ethics, whatever — they are assuming that reality is independent of their operations.

    Many of those operations are so familiar that we take them for granted and do not reflect on them. It’s fascinating to watch ourselves and others be who we are, and to learn.

    Take a game of chess for example. The rules of chess are taken for granted so that if I were to move a pawn up 4 spaces someone would rightly suggest I was making a mistake. Given the assumed rules of chess. What is a ‘true’ game of chess? The one created or constituted by the rules we made up.

    For simplicities sake lets take the case of two folk are talking about a ball game.
    One asks the other “What sort of club do you use”?
    The other says “Club? Don’t you mean racket”?
    “Racket” ?
    Is the response. “I disagree entirely”
    You must be out of your mind!”
    You play with a club!”

    “You are totally wrong there. You mean racket. You do not see reality (the truth, freedom, non-duality or whatever you will etc etc) properly. You are ignorant of the One True Game”. –according to Sri Sri bow-down Swami- Tennisji who sat under The Tennis Tree in 2004BCE and had a Supreme Tennis Awakening.

    The argument usually ends with both parties retiring to their corners each reckoning the other is totally wrong. They are, of course, playing different games.

    As I reckon we are often doing on this blog when folk disagree.

  • Carolina

    I’m not resisting analysis along male/female lines, but rather, resisting the irresistible desire to categorize.

    For instance, using the example of male and female types, behaviors, roles, dress, look, we can try and change rules and ideas that appear to cause the majority of any group undue suffering, and to that, it helps to analyze, of course.

    But those things are band-aides for emergencies.

    Not only that, but everything changed by means of changing rules and ideas about things will hurt someone else who won’t be able to fit the new ideal.

    So, if we look at this: “It’s not fear, but greed. The mind doesn’t feel it owns anything that is not clearly defined.”

    It’s a simple enough statement, and maybe it is fear, not greed, or who knows what it is, but it is these definitions we relate to, not the individual person, not even the actual moment we’re aware of at this time.

    Until we solve that puzzle, not just intellectually but actually go beyond it, we can rearrange the psychological furniture all kinds of ways in order to find more useful definitions and only become more trapped, not less.

    More trapped…you know, like governmental law that keep multiplying and in an attempt to be more humane, more orderly, more, more, more, and then it has the opposite effect and the people having to live with it just feel less and less free.

  • Anonymous

    Well, of course I did. One of the things that reveals feminism as a false philosophy is the insistence of its adherents that only they are permitted to discuss its meaning or history. And any effort by critics to point out its errors or shortcomings is automatically rejected in much the same way that criticism of communism was rejected during the Cold War: “Oh, the Soviet gulags, the Ukrainian terror-famine, the show trials and so forth — these are not true communism!” The fact that revolutionary Marxism everywhere was associated with totalitarain police states was, somehow, never accepted as evidence of any inherent flaw in  revolutionary Marxism per se.

    Likewise, whenever we have a “teachable moment” like the WeinerGate scandal — with feminists compelled into ridiculous defenses of a selfish exploiter who, until the truth was known, they hailed as a hero of their cause — the feminists hasten to assure us that this cannot possibly signify any fundamental error of the feminist credo. No, this was not true feminism, we are told, because it is impossible that true feminism could ever have any bad result.

    This is pure humbug, and when any man points out that it is humbug, the feminists seize upon the hostility to their nonsensical ideology as proof that the male critic hates women! Thus, their critics are automatically discredited, so that no feminist need ever heed any external criticism.

    “Epistemic closure,” you might say.

  • Joe

    Since I do not believe Huma being pregnant helps him in the least, I would tend to believe it to be true. 

    I hope she does not take out anger against the spounse against the child.  You can never tell with liberals. 

  • JadedbyPolitics

    The liberals have always been the nastiest of ideologies and the women who call themselves that and follow that crowd ie: NOW are self haters.  To listen to liberal men in groups when speak of women whether Conservative or not is a lesson is misogynist speech.   I laugh every time a see a leftist female defend a leftist male against such speech and actions because I know as a woman myself that they loathe themselves and I revel in the knowledge that I am superior to them in loving myself…LOL!

  • Bill Dalasio

    Frankly, Mr. McCain, you’re less cynical than I am.  You assume that the women in question are getting scammed.  I’m not so sure.  I think a reasonable assessment could decide that they know the guy is just playing the game.  They are playing their own version.  They just insist that they can’t identify the exact nature of their particular exchange.

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  • Anonymous

    Shut your hatehole, you ignorant slut.

    Your gg/Anamika persona’s weren’t any brighter.

  • Anonymous

    “Superintelligent beta male”

    BWAHAHAHAHA!

    You dumb twats deserve exactly what you get, advertising for that.  Idiots.

  • http://thepagantemple.blogspot.com/ ThePaganTemple

    I think you hit upon it. Probably they know, but they are blinded by their own self-delusion. But that’s probably just as true of their male castrati counterparts. It makes sense and also serves to explain why they are so hateful and strident towards their opponents, especially when they are openly chastised or challenged. Nothing is guaranteed to bring out the rage in a leftist more than when they are forced to take a deep look inside at their own shortcoming and failures. If this is true in a general sense, how much more true would it be regarding personal, secret sexual matters?

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    If you’re right, Joe, then my only response is: STFU Carolina.

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    BTW, Stacy, the full quote is: You can’t cheat an honest man. Never give a sucker an even break or smarten up a chump.

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    That’s anamika/gg, most definitely.  The sentence structure gives it away.

    S.T.F.U.

  • Anonymous

    “At the same time, doing good is always generally its own reward: We feel
    good about ourselves when we do the right thing, and consistently doing
    so will tend to enhance one’s reputation. So there are essentially
    self-serving incentives even for actions that may appear altruistic.”

    Precisely Heinlein’s point, on all counts. People do things because they are getting rewarded in some fashion, even if the rewards are intangible. Anyone who claims that they are doing something purely for someone else’s good is deceiving someone, even if it is only themselves.

    And what Heinlein said dovetails rather neatly with Jesus’ insistence that good works are best performed as anonymously as possible.

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    Life is full of surprises, but Kirsten’s stupidity regarding men is not one of those.

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    Their egos are not the only thing they stroke, IYKWIMAITYD.

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    Instead he and Mary and her five sisters do it while sitting next to his cats and keyboard, which is a good thing, because you don’t have to worry about rain.

  • http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

    Trouble is, too many of those guys were willing to sacrifice their testicular fortitude just to get some.  I saw it all the time when I was playing gigs in and going to the clubs.

  • Anamika

    Re. Joe, Randy Rager, Bob Belvedere:

    I do not recall a Carolina hanging out here, but I sure recognize the deliberate obtuseness of Anamika/gg. [by Joe]

    That’s anamika/gg, most definitely.  The sentence structure gives it away.
    S.T.F.U. [by Bob B.]

    Shut your hatehole, you ignorant slut.
    Your gg/Anamika personas weren’t any brighter.[Randy]

    Joe–For the love of God, haven’t you heard the phrase “let the sleeping dogs lie”?

    Joe: You are riding an impotent senile bull, old cowboy. And the more you ride, the more it shows.

    You seem smugly satisfied with what you imagine is a solidly impenetrable premise. That’s fine, if that’s where you choose to life.
    Are you happy? You tell me and write about your anger, tension and
    frustration. The level you clearly express does not seem to square with
    clarity.

    You walked out while the short shorts were playing, Range Rider, and
    haven’t the attention span to stick around for the main feature.

    Bob: Why do I bother, but…
    This is about as unenlightened and cumbersome a construct as I have ever read. It exposes your total and utter naivete and lack

    of experiential knowledge of what you are attempting to write about. You are in over your head, hopelessly trapped by your own stubborn insistence that your constuct has validity. It does not. It is absolutely void of true understanding about the authentic experience of “Anamika”.

    Randy: Denial and counter-attack? Attempting to
    manipulate people’s perceptions? Avoiding answering the questions? Avoiding
    accepting responsibility for what they have said? Minimizing, trivializing
    others? Belittling, controlling, or demeaning? Knowing best? Here? On ToM? Surely
    you jest? Have you lost your tiny male mind?

     

    What
    the heck is wrong with you? Why can’t you just be nice, and simply conform to
    other’s expectations…like you were taught to do…to the image they have of you
    in their minds…instead of insisting on being who you Are.

     

    YOU’RE
    NOT BEING PRETTY, Randy Rager!!!
    It hurt to read such stupid misogyny from you, even though it was just junk food for your jaded senses of ToM members…
    That’s fine though, Randy. You can continue to deny to yourself and
    others that you exhibit aggressive and bullying behavior toward someone
    you see as threatening, i.e., me.

  • JeffS

    I thought you were leaving, Anamika.  How so like a leftie, going back on your word.

  • Anamika

    I thought you were leaving, Anamika.  How so like a leftie, going back on your word.

    It was the ToM members (Joe, Bob, Randy et al) who couldn’t keep their end of the unsaid bargain. I tried to keep my peace but alas, i was dragged right back in. And it wasn’t just my reputation at stake but that of an innocent bystander in Carolina. Thta was the last straw. I had to break my promise and try put the record straight.

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