The Other McCain

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

Feminism: A Problem, Not a Solution

Posted on | February 5, 2016 | 57 Comments

The Ivy League Is Decadent and Depraved, as I reminded readers a few weeks ago, and you’ll pardon me for quoting myself, but the evidence of elite depravity keeps slapping me in the face. Adriana Miele is a senior at Yale University:

Brunch is the ideal time to do it. Dinner is usually too crowded, and lunch and breakfast are so rushed that I don’t have the time. On any given weekend, I arrive at a dining hall past noon, usually with leggings and a warm, knit sweater. I swipe my card.
Then I count the amount of rapists in the room.
Girls at Columbia and Brown got in trouble for releasing lists with names of known rapists on their campuses. My friends and I have still considered doing the same, but we’re too exhausted to deal with the inevitable backlash.
I can’t speak about other campuses because I know only this one, but Yale has an epidemic. Each day, students fear for their safety as they walk across campus. Whether stepping into the library or taking a seat in a classroom, they’re reminded of some of the most traumatizing moments of their lives.
I think it’s true that you can survive Yale despite an experience of violence, sexual or otherwise. You can do it. I have endured Yale. But you shouldn’t be enduring Yale: you should be attending and enjoying Yale. Women and queer people aren’t thriving at Yale the way we should be. According to the Association of American Universities’ 2015 Campus Climate Survey on Sexual Assault, most of us here at Yale have been physically violated and intimidated. Among straight women, it’s over half; among gender-queer students, it’s over 60 percent. . . .
When over half of your undergraduate female population is being assaulted, you have an epidemic. . . .
Since I started counting, I can’t remember a single weekend without noticing at least one rapist (that I know of) in the room. . . .

Either (a) Yale is the Rape Capital of the World, or (b) Adriana Miele is in the grip of a paranoid delusion. Considering annual tuition at Yale is $47,600, and most of the boys she imagines are “rapists” are mild-mannered brainiac nerds, I rather doubt most women on campus in New Haven “fear for their safety.” Does anyone believe these geeky Yale boys, many of them National Merit Scholar finalists, are committing sexual assault on a regular basis? Is dating a Yale boy like partying with the Hell’s Angels during Bike Week in Daytona? What kind of lunatic would claim such a thing? A quick bit of research turned up an autobiographical essay Adriana Miele published last fall:

I didn’t like Massachusetts because my parents got divorced in Massachusetts, and in Virginia, everything was sunny and perfect and the winters weren’t even that bad. . . . I hated everything about the fact that my parents were no longer together, and I felt like something had died. . . .
One of the few places in New England that didn’t feel heartless and evil was the town of Newton, the place where my brothers, mother, and I all attended school: a private Montessori elementary school for the kids, and Lassell College for our mom, who decided to pursue her bachelor’s degree once my dad left. . . .
My mom . . . met my bearded, New Englander father in D.C. Following the affair with his client’s paralegal, my parents separated, and I became extremely depressed. . . . Out of concern, mom got me a therapist in Newton. . . .
My therapist’s office had a big, comfy green chair and bookshelf full of games and books with titles that mentioned “childhood trauma” and “anxiety,” but we didn’t use those words. Dr. S taught me card games and tried to get me to talk about my father and stepmother.

Well, you can read the whole thing, but the short version is, her father is a selfish creep and her parents’ divorce when she was 8 years old inflicted a psychological wound in Adriana Miele from which she has never recovered, and therefore she hates and fears men. This probably explains why she got into Yale, really. Elite schools require applicants to submit essays along with their applications. Because of grade inflation and programs that teach kids specifically how to take standardized tests, lots of kids finish high school with near-perfect GPAs and high SAT scores. The admissions essay is a way for students to signify their “progressive” politics by telling stories about themselves, signalling their solidarity with radical faculty on the admissions committee.

This is why there are dozens of Adriana Miele clones on all the Ivy League campuses, see? If it weren’t for their feminist “Look at Me I’m an Oppressed Victim” narratives, they’d be attending one of those overpriced second-tier liberal arts schools that exist merely to provide a pseudo-Ivy experience for rich kids who got rejected by Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Columbia. Adriana Miele leveraged her victimhood (and half-Peruvian ancestry, to check the “diversity” box) into an acceptance at Yale, so that now her Daddy can pay the tuition bill while she proclaims to the world how all the men at Yale are rapists.

How could anyone even stand to be in the same room with a whiny overprivileged brat like Adriana Miele? The belief that Ivy League kids are “the best and brightest” in America was never really true, and the prestige of that bogus “meritocracy” continues to decline. There is no standardized test for virtue, so maybe the boys at Yale are as bad as the girls at Yale, and rape is everywhere on campus.

Simple question, Adriana: Isn’t your stepmother a feminist, too? Hasn’t all this “liberation” and “empowerment” of the past 40 or 50 years produced a lot of messed-up kids like you? And what about those rapists at Yale, huh? Here’s $20 that says every one of those Yale boys you’re accusing of being sexual predators is the son of a woman who considers herself to be a feminist. Two generations after “Second Wave” feminism emerged from the New Left in the 1960s, it is nearly impossible for young fools to understand the difference between (a) the traditional values that feminism condemns as “patriarchy,” and (b) the selfish attitudes that feminists celebrate as “liberation.” If feminism is to a great extent the cause of your problems, what kind of fool would insist that more feminism is the solution to your problems?

Answer: The kind of fool who attends Yale University.

* * * A SPECIAL REQUEST * * *

The Sex Trouble project, exploring the depths of feminist insanity, is an exercise in reader-sponsored journalism, and I have fallen far behind in my thank-you notes to those of you who have generously contributed. Your generosity would be especially appreciated today, because I’ve got until 6 p.m. ET to hustle up an extra $82 in the tip jar. This involves a brief if rather embarrassing story that might amuse readers.

A few weeks ago, things were going splendidly. My Army son came home for a visit, and we all gathered ’round the TV to cheer Alabama to victory in the BCS National Championship game. Meanwhile, I had received a belated payment for some work I’d done two years ago, which enabled us to catch up some overdue bills and I even took my wife out for lunch at a Mexican restaurant, $24. The PayPal account was doing OK, and I paid the phone bill from that and noticed a surplus sufficient that I could afford to order $58 in feminist books as further research for the second edition of Sex Trouble. What could possibly go wrong?

 

Well, the Great Blizzard of 2016 didn’t create any particular expense, but it did distract me quite a bit, and somehow I overlooked the cable bill, which is also the Internet bill, and the thievish scoundrels nice people at Our Friendly Local Cable Provider told me on the phone the other day that I have until 6 p.m. ET today to come up with an unusually large sum (overdue amount, fees, blah blah blah) or else, no Internet.

And obviously, no Internet = no blogging.

OK, check my PayPal account and then check the balance remaining in our regular account and . . . Yeah, I’m $82 short. And $82, of course, is equal to the sum of $24 (lunch at the Mexican restaurant) and the $58 I spent on books. It’s as if God had been watching every penny and decided, “Yeah, let’s remind him who’s running the show.”

“Fear not!” I told my dear wife. “The tip-jar hitters have never failed me yet. Just maybe say an extra prayer, OK?”

Pushing it to the edge of catastrophe is a bad habit, but there were times I hit the road on The Shoe Leather Fund with no other plan for how I’d get back home. Really, I’m too old to be doing things the gonzo way and should be more prudent about such matters, but for the time being there’s a deficit of $82 and whatever you can chip in — $5, $10, $20 — will be deeply appreciated. Contrary to what feminists claim, patriarchy is usually just another word for “paying the bills.”

HIT THE FREAKING TIP JAR!

Never doubt God answers prayers. Thanks in advance.




 

Comments

57 Responses to “Feminism: A Problem, Not a Solution”

  1. Dianna Deeley
    February 5th, 2016 @ 4:53 pm

    Stacy, I swear never to let you down, ever.

    But – unless Mrs. McCain loves it – would you consider, just maybe, shaving that beard? Or shaping it, anyway? I have nothing against beards, I just like them neat and short and well-trimmed.

  2. Fail Burton
    February 5th, 2016 @ 5:30 pm

    Andy Hardy goes to college in a film called “Andy Hardy’s Blonde Trouble.” Given the era it’s a near certainty that meant Andy was a rapist. I think the next in the series was “Andy Hardy Kicks Uppity Blacks in the Stomach for Not Walking in the Street.”

    Once again we have solid proof Monique Wittig’s warrior-girls are paranoid sociopaths if not actually hearing voices in their heads.

    I love the one about “rape culture” being a synonym for heterosexuality. That’s a keeper quote because it is so true. This is an invented Scientology-like cult that was created by mentally ill lesbians for other mentally ill lesbians. The funny thing about that is that today it is the single defining orthodoxy that will win you a Nebula or Hugo Award over in sci-fi. This country has turned into an incredible shithole of stupid.

  3. Fiorina Out of NH Debate | Regular Right Guy
    February 5th, 2016 @ 5:32 pm

    […] Feminism: A Problem, Not a Solution […]

  4. Taxpayer1234
    February 5th, 2016 @ 5:35 pm

    The thought of NO gonzo goodness because of an internet bill is too much for me to take! Tip jar has been hit!

  5. Finrod Felagund
    February 5th, 2016 @ 6:11 pm

    To radfems, not being completely isolated from the Truth is being raped.

  6. LastNameFirstNameLast??????
    February 5th, 2016 @ 6:21 pm

    They will be perfect for the global Caliphate.

  7. Ale count
    February 5th, 2016 @ 6:34 pm

    There is too Much Rape at Yale.
    1. Yale should be shut down, it is a rape factory. It is a toxic environment full of Rape culture.
    2. Men should be kicked out of Yale and sent to all-male universities where they could be taught traditional values, such as to not Rape. No women should be let into these schools with these rapists, but they can go to sister schools.
    3. Feminists women students shouldn’t suffer because their school, Yale got shut down. They should be provided the best possible university education in the African Congo. The rape rate there is only 11% of all women. This means that the Rape rate will immediately fall by two thirds from 33% to 12%
    If you disagree with me on any of these points, you want women to be raped.

  8. JeffWeimer
    February 5th, 2016 @ 6:41 pm

    C’mon Stacy, admit it: you can’t keep your eyes away from MSNBC.

  9. Zhytamyr
    February 5th, 2016 @ 7:47 pm

    Send your sons to trade school or a trade apprenticeship, it’ll cost a heck of a lot less than 50k a year, and way fewer psychotic SJWs.

  10. Elmer T. Jones
    February 5th, 2016 @ 9:19 pm

    My son had to write an essay for his GED. He told of his alcoholic father who stomped on his baby turtles. They awarded him top honors.

  11. Jeanette Victoria
    February 5th, 2016 @ 9:37 pm

    Full blown paranoid delusion….she needs to be commited and medicated.

  12. Wombat_socho
    February 5th, 2016 @ 9:48 pm

    As Nick Fury might say…

  13. M. Thompson
    February 5th, 2016 @ 10:47 pm

    So, how does this precious little snowflake know these men are rapists?

    I looked through the article, and it seems awfully light on facts other than, “but most of them are men who think they are entitled to another person’s body.” as her definition of rape. Around me, the statute is “First Degree Criminal Sexual Conduct” and the exact definition is “Sexual penetration (vaginal, oral, or anal sex or any intrusion of the victim’s genital or anal openings by any part of the defendant or an object) of anyone or sexual contact with a person under 13 (intentional touching of victim’s bare genitals or anus by defendant or another’s genitals or anus with sexual or aggressive intent) in the following circumstances:

    The victim is under 13 years old and the defendant is more than 3 years older than the victim The victim is 13 to 16 years old and the defendant is 4 years older and in a position of authority over the victim (such as a parent, foster parent, psychotherapist, etc.)

    The circumstances placed the victim in reasonable fear of imminent physical harm to himself or herself or another The defendant was armed with a dangerous weapon or threatened the victim with the weapon

    The defendant causes injury to the victim and either uses force or coercion for sexual penetration or knows the victim is mentally or physically impaired
    The defendant is helped by another person to make the victim submit or the accomplice is armed with a weapon
    The defendant has a significant relationship (defendant is victim’s parent, stepparent, guardian, relative by blood, marriage, or adoption, or an adult who lives in the same house and isn’t the victim’s spouse) with the victim and the victim is under 16 at time of sexual penetration
    – See more at: http://statelaws.findlaw.com/minnesota-law/minnesota-rape-and-sexual-assault-laws.html#sthash.DeBF79gb.dpuf

    Now, this just seems like a fool who wants to criminalize anyone who disagrees with her. She’ll find herself an easy job at some non-profit and never have to deal with what she’s said.

  14. Fail Burton
    February 5th, 2016 @ 11:08 pm

    Just as L. Ron Hubbard was a sci-fi writer who invented Scientology, Monique Wittig was an SF writer who invented performative lesbian liberation ideology, much of it in an SF novel.

    Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is considered a foundational text for sci-fi. But take it away and the landscape for SF today might look much the same.

    Take away Wittig and there is no Laurie Penny, no Judith Butler, no “genderblindness,” no “my prounouns are…”

    Expose this daffy synthetic “back to nature” cult for what it is. Saying men invented heterosexuality to oppress women and suppress lesbianism is as nuts as saying men sank a lesbian Atlantis.

  15. Neo
    February 5th, 2016 @ 11:12 pm

    Let’s face it. The entire Ivy League needs to be shuttered.

  16. Joe Joe
    February 6th, 2016 @ 4:18 am

    Rad-femmery is a mental illness. Remember, though, that there are reasonable feminists like Christina Hoff Sommers who recognize that these mentally ill young women who need “safe spaces” are an embarrassment to women in general. She calls these nutjobs “fainting couch” feminists.

    Perhaps it’s a sign of feminism’s success as a movement back in the 70s that its current adherents feel the need to become self-parodying–or psychotic. Civil rights movements have the same problem: #BLM is a parody of everything Dr. King stood for. It’s time for all of these movements to realize they are now causing more harm than good and SHUT DOWN.

  17. Fail Burton
    February 6th, 2016 @ 5:49 am

    Do the origins of gender studies theory lie in a 1969 Swiftian polemical fantasy written by a radical lesbian philosopher and teacher?

    Do the origins of American marriage and family lie in Gulliver’s Travels? Was Conan the Barbarian a real man and if so, is he the original first man – killer of lesbians? Is Jack London’s Before Adam based on truth? Is heterosexuality based on ancient myths? Was King Arthur’s Round Table actually a bunch of sorceress dykes Andrea Dworkin channeled through past lives?

  18. Patriciadcarson4
    February 6th, 2016 @ 6:50 am

    ?my .friend’s mate Is getting 98$. HOURLY. on the internet?….A few days ago new McLaren. F1 bought after earning 18,512$,,,this was my previous month’s paycheck ,and-a little over, 17k$ Last month ..3-5 h/r of work a days ..with extra open doors & weekly. paychecks.. it’s realy the easiest work I have ever Do.. I Joined This 7 months ago and now making over 87$, p/h.Learn. More right Here;b505????? http://GlobalSuperEmploymentVacanciesReportsHit/GetPaid/98$hourly…. .?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:?2:::::;b505…….

  19. RS
    February 6th, 2016 @ 8:46 am

    Yet another example of pathology morphing into polemic, the inevitable fruit of the belief that “the personal is political,” a worldview which makes no allowance for those times when the personal hovers on the edge of psychological dysfunction.

    In other matters, I note our Yale attendee writes, “Then I count the amount of rapists in the room.” N.B., she’s paying close to $50K a year for a college education but does not yet realize that if you can count the individuals within a group of objects, the correct usage is “number of rapists” not “amount of rapists.” “Amount is reserved for things that cannot be counted, like “water” or “smoke.”

    Of course, some of us learned that in the early ’70s in elementary school, but I suppose the educational landscape has changed somewhat since then.

  20. robertstacymccain
    February 6th, 2016 @ 8:50 am

    I know Wittig from her essays (“One Is Not Born a Woman” and “The Straight Mind”) rather than her fiction, but I suppose her novels may have had a substantial influence. More significant, I think, were the novels of Marian Zimmer Bradley, which drew upon the ideas of neopagan “feminist spirituality” (especially Dianic Wicca) and put them in a setting of historical romance.

  21. robertstacymccain
    February 6th, 2016 @ 9:05 am

    “… reasonable feminists like Christina Hoff Sommers …”

    This pisses me off, and I am tired of repeating myself: CHRISTINA HOFF SOMMERS IS NOT A FEMINIST!

    As much as I enjoy her work, Dr. Sommers’ insistence on calling herself a “feminist” undermines the value of her work by creating confusion in the public mind as to what the word “feminist” signifies, and what the goals of the feminist movement are.

    In 2010-2011, I wrote several long articles explaining why this matters, and the fact that IDIOTS COULDN’T BE BOTHERED TO READ THOSE ARTICLES is not my fault, so I will not repeat those arguments now. But when you say “reasonable feminists,” you are speaking a contradiction. No woman who is reasonable would be so foolish as to get herself involved in feminism, which is a Totalitarian Movement to Destroy Civilization as We Know It.

  22. Can you be crazy and still attend Yale? – If You're Left
    February 6th, 2016 @ 9:09 am

    […] You can if you are a Feminists, as Stacy McCain explains […]

  23. robertstacymccain
    February 6th, 2016 @ 9:09 am

    “… the correct usage is ‘number of rapists’ not ‘amount of rapists.'”

    Yeah, that bothered me, too, but I thought it would be a bit pedantic to point it out. Thanks for taking the time.

  24. RS
    February 6th, 2016 @ 10:16 am

    My inner pendant emerges in the morning before I’ve had my first cup of coffee. Caffeine is required to force it back into its lair.

  25. From Around the Blogroll – The First Street Journal.
    February 6th, 2016 @ 10:33 am

    […] Robert Stacey Stacy McCain on The Other McCain: Feminism: A Problem, Not a Solution […]

  26. Gahrie
    February 6th, 2016 @ 10:40 am

    I know…let’s ban men from schools like Yale and create a system of schools for women where they can go to school without having to deal with rapists….and while we do it, we can create a system of Black schools so Black people won’t have to go to school with racists….

  27. DeadMessenger
    February 6th, 2016 @ 11:36 am

    Just hit the tip jar.

    Interesting story: I got laid off from my job of 14 years right before Christmas. They didn’t really like old cripples there apparently. Even though we now have no income (Mr. DM stays home to take care of me), I still hit the tip jar, because I have total faith that we should…

    Never doubt God answers prayers.

    In Jonah chapter 2, Jonah speaks of his deliverance from the fish’s belly in the past tense, as though it is already a done deal. At the end of chapter 2, the fish barfs him up. That is faith. That is MY faith, and soon I will be starting my new job, even better than my last job. God provides, y’all.

  28. Finrod Felagund
    February 6th, 2016 @ 12:46 pm

    “You should know when
    It’s less or it’s fewer
    Like people who were
    Never raised in a sewer”

    — “Weird Al” Yankovic, Word Crimes

  29. Fail Burton
    February 6th, 2016 @ 12:48 pm

    Like a detective, what I’m doing is trying to track back these 3 essentials that seem to make up French Queer Theory and are reflected in the vast majority of things like Tumblr feminism and the goofballs you write about at colleges. Ideas like “neutrois” didn’t come from nowhere:

    1. Heterosexuality was invented by men to oppress women and served to suppress lesbianism.

    2. Heterosexuality is made “compulsory” through repetitive “performative” acts such as gendered language in the form of pronouns.

    3. Heterosexuality being essentially unstable, one can abolish the “gender binary” as the “heteronormative” through acts of linguistic subversion such as “genderblind” pronouns but also including other gender-biased cultural artifacts.

    What I want is a foundational text that includes those things and before which there was nothing. So far it’s Wittig’s 1969 SF novel Les Guerilleres whose elements she continued to address later on in her essays. One of those is “The Straight Mind” from 1981 (from a 1978 lecture) which begins by addressing the power of linguistics. I can find nothing which predates Wittig’s novel. If that’s true, French Queer Theory was made up wholesale out of the mind of a single obscure Frenchwoman, in an SF novel no less. It appears Butler is taking credit she is not due though not necessarily on purpose.

  30. Rape Roundup | Rotten Chestnuts
    February 6th, 2016 @ 1:30 pm

    […] McCain reports on the latest insanity from […]

  31. Fail Burton
    February 6th, 2016 @ 2:07 pm

    Here is an ode to fat lesbian feminists.

    I am Blimpimandias

    Behold my great white thighs and quiver

    I cannot run around a city block

    Death awaits me if I do

    Rape not want not

  32. Joe Joe
    February 6th, 2016 @ 3:28 pm

    Hoff Sommers self identifies as a feminist, but has made a career out of blowing holes in the fake stats and propaganda of the feminist establishment. One can see her as an early or mid-20th century feminist, but rejecting everything after the 1960s. Hence the title of her 1994 book, “Who Stole Feminism?”

    I know there is an argument to be made that a general support of women’s rights–what Hoff Sommers describes as a “great achievement of Western Civilization”–is the polar opposite of feminism, a leftist movement out to destroy Western Civilization, using the “disenfranchised”–mostly women, blacks and now illegal aliens–as a battering ram. Perhaps Hoff Sommers should use a different term, although it is hard to find one that has any currency. (“Humanist”, a popular term with those trying to distance themselves from feminism, is just another leftist term with fuzzy socialist ideals and a rejection of religion.)

    I think you need to understand that we’re on the same side. No one wants “rape culture” feminism–with its overt threat to due process and the Constitution–to make any headway. No one wants #BLM (another Soros-funded movement) to destroy American policing with its fake “civil rights” arguments. But both are happening.

    Arguing with compatriots over terms is not helpful. Identifying who our friends and enemies are is. When Hoff Sommers, a very rational person, ceases to self-identify as a feminist, I will be happy to use whatever term she chooses. Right now, she is using the term “freedom feminist” and I believe she intends that to be a term in direct contradiction to the totalitarian feminism (or “civil rights”) that we are witnessing currently.

  33. Prime Director
    February 6th, 2016 @ 4:24 pm

    Ha-ha

    Mr Hat yelled @ U

    Don’t feel bad; I sometimes post comments that get deleted, most of the time with cauze (I got the boobooheebiejeebiesnsometimes); but the last one was scholarly and relevent, if off topic; but away it went.

    That’s life in the city

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hfLV_hSj_uE

    At least U got a reply

  34. Joe Joe
    February 6th, 2016 @ 4:57 pm

    I don’t mind a spirited debate. My concern is in seeing the forest for the trees.

    Feminism, as it has been practiced since the 1960s, is only one of a multi-pronged assault against American culture, values, and laws. The Civil Rights movement, also steeped in communist thought with communist roots, is another prong.

    We don’t want to lose sight of the entire game–lots of disparate movements with the same totalitarian goal. We need to see the larger movement for what it is–a privately produced but publicly funded juggernaut against America–but not get sidetracked by terminology. Hoff Sommers talks about freedom and about honoring the choice for women to be wives and mothers, which many wish to be. Radfems yell the Maoist “Women hold up half the sky!” at demonstrations and attack the Constitution with flagrantly and wildly dishonest stats on rape. There is a difference here.

  35. Prime Director
    February 6th, 2016 @ 5:01 pm
  36. Robert What?
    February 6th, 2016 @ 9:27 pm

    I don’t think these women feel superior to men. They feel inferior which is why they lash out. The primary goal of feminism is maximizing women’s freedom of action and minimizing their responsibility and accountability. While at the same time doing the reverse for men: minimizing men’s freedom of action and maximizing their responsibility and accountability.

  37. Garrett Patterson
    February 6th, 2016 @ 11:54 pm

    Hey aren’t you afraid of that Kimberlin nut job tracking you down?

  38. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:06 pm

    Kimberlin is still active (see Hogewash), but RSM hasn’t had to worry about him for awhile. The noose Kimberlin tried to knot for others is slowly being drawn more tightly about him instead.

  39. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:09 pm

    If women were judged as men, then women are quite inferior. Fred Reed wrote a column that dealt with that, and feministas are right to worry about such judgments. While feministas want the “freedom” they have no desire for the responsibility that accompanies that freedom. The result of accepting that on a cultural level is nothing less than chaos.

  40. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:10 pm

    Indeed, He does.

  41. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:12 pm

    You don’t go to a University for an education these days. You go to get indoctrinated, unless you are in a STEM program. While I know of a few STEM instructors that have gone to the loony side of politics, their ability to indoctrinate is quite limited.

  42. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:14 pm

    In this case, I don;t think that’s pedantry. Some feminista might disagree, but they don’t count for much other than trouble.

  43. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:14 pm

    Then demolish the campuses in such a way that no one one would know there was ever such an academic prison in existence.

  44. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:18 pm

    MSLSD is not like a train wreck, it is a train wreck.

  45. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:20 pm

    That’s a different Nick Fury than what I grew up with.

  46. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 12:26 pm

    I would have to come down on RSM’s side on this. Perhaps Sommers self IDs as a feminist, but that’s beside the point. That she pokes holes in the spew of feminists places her outside those ranks, and she confuses the issue as a result.

    There are certain terms that are beyond redemption and feminist is one of them. I doubt Susan B. Anthony would accept the label. She’d probably quit being a suffragette as well, given how things have turned out.

  47. Joe Joe
    February 7th, 2016 @ 4:23 pm

    I can see your way of looking at it, and there’s a lot of truth in what you say. However, Hoff Sommers has a PhD in philosophy and taught university for many years. If she calls herself a “freedom feminist”, it is because she has thought out the term.

    We’ll agree to disagree on this one until Hoff Sommers chooses different vocabulary.

  48. News of the Week (February 7th, 2016) | The Political Hat
    February 7th, 2016 @ 5:48 pm

    […] Feminism: A Problem, Not a Solution The Ivy League Is Decadent and Depraved, as I reminded readers a few weeks ago, and you’ll pardon me for quoting myself, but the evidence of elite depravity keeps slapping me in the face. […]

  49. Quartermaster
    February 7th, 2016 @ 6:06 pm

    She may have thought it out, but citing credentials as the basis for assuming she has is a dead end. Credentials are utterly irrelevant on such issues. Also, using the term gives the impression that she thinks the term can be redeemed. By itself, that would show she has given little thought to the issue, as there is no way she will ever accomplish that given the activities of the RedFems. They simply won’t allow her, or anyone else, to redeem it.

  50. Joe Joe
    February 7th, 2016 @ 6:48 pm

    Hoff Sommers is not the only one using “feminism” for women who are not hard left. Some conservative women use it also:
    http://www.thecollegefix.com/post/26093/

    I think it’s not so much about redeeming the term “feminism” (as you suggest) but narrowing its scope and taking it away from the hard left. A co-opting or taking back of the term.

    There are two ways to look at this. On the positive side, it provides women who like men and take their children seriously a place to go politically. Right now, women with any traditional values are accused of being zombies, controlled by men, the “patriarchy”, etc. It is especially hard for religious and pro life women who are the most battered politically by our secular society, feminist or not. A pro life, family values woman is not a doormat or a puppet or a victim, and joining the Independent Women’s Forum and talking about “conservative feminism” (see the article at the link above) can be a helpful way of persuading her peers that she is not a slave to men but follows her own conscience. Enough strong young conservative God-fearing women co-opting the feminist label (as in “freedom feminism”) can pull many women away from the left, away from Planned Parenthood, and away from hating men.

    Of course, diluting the term “feminism” can also serve to hide the real hard lefties. Right now, they are out there and evident. They overtly repeat Chairman Mao (“Women hold up half the sky”), brazenly support abortion on demand (and even infanticide if the abortion procedure ends up in a live birth) and loudly scream “racism!” when you point out that Muslim migrants are raping European women. Their contradictions are painfully obvious. If the term feminism is co-opted by the more traditional, God-fearing types, then maybe these conservative women act as more camouflage.

    There is truth in both views.