“If Americans can be divorced for ‘incompatibility of temper’ I cannot conceive why they are not all divorced. I have known many happy marriages, but never a compatible one. The whole aim of marriage is to fight through and survive the instant when incompatibility becomes unquestionable. For a man and a woman, as such, are incompatible.”
— G.K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong With the World (1912)
The beginning of economics is the division of labor. If we were all hunter-gatherers, there would little for us to exchange in the marketplace. Hunter-gatherer societies are universally poor. Agriculture and the domestication of livestock were the first steps beyond subsistence and those steps were attended by the development of sex roles. It is only with the affluence and convenience provided by advanced industrial market economies that any idea of “sexual equality” becomes feasible.
Our pioneer ancestors never could have conquered the frontier if the men had stayed home cooking, while sending the womenfolk out to hunt, plow and fight off savage Indians.
A great problem of young people today is that they have been so indoctrinated in the gospel of Equality (capitalized, to signify its status as a quasi-religious belief) that they lack even the vocabulary to discuss ideas like sex roles and complementarity.
Young people are afraid of acknowledging the natural differences between male and female — which are evident to everyone — and this fear leads them into a timid artificiality of discourse, trying to tiptoe around the truth that no one is supposed to mention: Insofar as men and women are different, they are not equal, and all attempts to equalize things which are inherently different are doomed to fail.
This comes to mind after I noticed David Covucci’s article, “New Rules for Women” at BroBible.com, which is a response to an article at the feminist site Jezebel, “New Rules for Men.” Some of what Covucci writes is useful and clever, but he cedes far too much to feminism:
There are horrible males out there who believe a woman should literally be chained to the stove because if she leaves the house her tiny brain will forget she put a pot pie in the oven and then the crust might be slightly overdone. These men are 65. Most of us — even if we hate burnt dough — believe in equality and women’s rights. So while I apologize for old, white males, remember they are our fathers. And they ingrained in us their shitty beliefs. We are fighting to overcome them, so realize that occasionally defaulting back to them isn’t MISOGYNY. We are aware when we are wrong. We don’t need to be hit in the head for it.
David, do you think anyone is deceived by your white-knight gesture? “Oh, there are horrible misogynistic Cro-Magnons out there perpetuating the patriarchy, but I’m not one of them.”
Don’t be that guy who denounces Those Hateful Sexists Over There as a way of touting your own egalitarian bona fides. That’s creepy.
Egalitarianism itself is creepy. No sane person desires to live in that androgynous asexual utopia where men and women are the same, but this is the future to which feminism proposes to lead us.
Also, why do you feel the need to “apologize for old, white males”? What have I done that you need to apologize for? Am I such a boor? For that matter, were my own father and grandfathers really such awful misogynistic monsters?
And, while we’re at it, why “old white males”? Are black men, Hispanic men or Asian men more-feminist friendly than white men?
I think not.
A few years ago, when I had written a denunciation of feminism, someone tried to categorize me as a “men’s rights advocate,” a label I wholeheartedly reject. I don’t believe in “men’s rights” for the same reason I don’t believe in “women’s rights,” because the entire concept of collective “rights” is misguided, especially when applied to the relations between men and women. Each couple must negotiate their own terms of cooperation, their own division of labor, and this individual arrangement cannot be dictated by ideology.
It is my own observation and experience that couples are generally happier, and their unions more durable, the more their relationships approach the traditional arrangement of husband-father-breadwinner/wife-mother-homemaker. That is to say, the more successful a man is in his career, the less pressure his wife feels to enter the workplace. Assuming that the wife has any aptitude for domesticity and motherhood, she really doesn’t want to have to work outside the home just to pay the bills. The two-career household is inevitably afflicted with more stress and conflict after children arrive, because the wife resents her need to abandon her children and return to a job, while the husband feels like a failure because his income is insufficient to support the entire household.
Marriage is the object of courtship, and the purpose of marriage is to create a stable household for child-rearing. The more traditional household is structurally more stable, which is not to say that two-career families are doomed to failure, but rather to say that the basic bond between man and woman is stronger where there is something more to their union than the transient emotion of “love.”
Men and women need each other, and the reason for this need is that men and women are different. Insofar as feminism is about encouraging men and women to be more the same — to be androgynous and sexless — then feminism makes marriage less desirable as an object, less durable and more prone to conflict.
David Covucci apparently believes that he can negotiate with feminism, but this is impossible. Feminism is a totalitarian ideology that acknowledges no limits to its ambitions. Men who seek to negotiate a compromise with feminism are like Neville Chamberlain, supposing he could have peace by handing over the Sudetenland to Hitler.
David, where does your policy of compromise with feminism lead us?
If this is the future, you don’t want to go there, man.
Hhhm. Seems the tattooed young woman in the photo has had a few too many sandwiches, and should refrain from having another.
By the way, ya know what the Pope did? The day after the interview with America magazine, he told doctors to stop performing abortions. And he just defrocked and excommunicated a priest who was doing his own thing with the Eucharist and agitating for gay marriage and women priests. The Pope is Catholic.
Didn’t they also say that Nancy Pelosi can no longer take Communion?
Not exactly in that there is no formal edict. The head cardinal of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura in Rome stated that under canon law 915 must be applied. I don’t know how much power that “must” has, in this case, but Benedict XVI said the same thing, and instructed bishops in that regard. What happened in the DC area is that the bishop gives her Communion and justifies it by saying that it is not her home parish, San Francisco is, and the SF bishop should sanction her. It will be interesting to see if anyone grows a pair, ahem, in the US on this issue.
Thanks!
The hierarchy in the US has been in rebellion nearly as long as I’ve been alive.
Becca, Mm: One thing to keep in mind is that The Catholic Church is structured as a Monarchy. But it is not an Autocracy. The Princes of The Church [Cardinals] have a good deal of independence on such matters.
Somebody tell Busty McTats it’s spelled S-A-M-M-I-C-H. And, I think she’s had her share.
If you’re willing to brave the task, you probably will be able to find some pics of her here [WARNING: NSFW and NSFYE (Not Safe For Your Eyes)]:
http://thethickness.tumblr.com/
‘If this is the future, you don’t WANT to go there, man.’ 🙂 You were so close, Stacy!
Fixed it, Thanks for the proofreading, Genius.
Anytime.
Feminists and Equality worshipers seem to treat females as though they have a disorder that needs treating. One day these idiots will come to the stunning realization that men and women are actually different. There will be much rejoicing and a great celebration of the diversity of humanity.
The Heaven’s Gate cult is the cultural ideal for these jokers.
I’m just waiting for them to own up to their misandry.
Also, most men would prefer a bit more, you know, contrast between men and women. Quoth Sir Winston, “I can admire a manly man, and I rejoice in a womanly woman!”
Sir Winston was, and is, a great role model.
Don’t remember where I heard it, but thought it hit the mark: The reason to get married is to have someone to watch your back.
“… why do you feel the need to “apologize for old, white males”?”
Notice that dead old white males were never mentioned! I don’t care what anyone says, I’m chalking this up as a win …
I have this sneaking suspicion nobody has ever actually asked her to make him a sandwich. I certainly wouldn’t — there may be a dish in which snail testicles, a live frog and aspic of newt would be appropriate, but I feel safe in the presumption that none of them is a sandwich.
While I understand and can agree with portions of this, I’m questioning the implied notion that two income households are existing on “love” alone. People have to do what they have to do (just look at our military families facing a deployment, and how that changes the “traditional” dynamic) , irregardless of what others consider ideal or even more stable. As you said: the familial relationship is something which must be worked out between the people in question, and not a place for ideology — it is perhaps uncharitable to divide them up into groups and pigeonhole them as belonging to the “more stable” and “unstable” categories, or to imply that their bond is less strong.
Oh, and while hunting, plowing, and fighting off intruders may be considered “man’s work” I assure you (from the lessons of my great-grandmother, a truly hale and hearty matriarch who grew up on the western frontier) that women have never been immune from having to do just those very things…sometimes the men are gone…best to know how to be a little self-reliant because you’re going to need it (same thing goes for men — it really is best for both genders to cultivate the ability to do at least some and to at least a passable degree, the other gender’s jobs). People have to do what they have to do to get by; the ideal is hardly the status quo, as most don’t have the luxury for it.
David Covucci is saturated in Leftist Thinking. This is the result of the invasion of Leftist Thinking into all areas of Life – it’s a malignant cancer. It’s especially pitiable in his case because he seems like an intelligent fellow.