Sign In
0 Items (
Search
Comments (10)
“Can a privileged white male like me talk about equality and diversity?” While clearly suffering from ‘white-male guilt’, former Victorian politician Rob Hulls, writing in the Fairfax press, grudgingly answered in the affirmative. Bully for him, but that he thought the question worthy of sweating over is instructive. White men are not the flavour of the times. Indeed, those supporting Donald Trump are often described in left-wing media (e.g., in The Huffington Post) as “angry white men” whose influence is dwindling in the racial mixing pot.
I take no personal credit as a white man but it seems queer to me, without in the least belittling other parts of humanity, that the very part of humanity which has made this modern West, in which gender equality and ethnic and sexual diversity can flourish, is the subject of scorn and derision. I will focus on gender equality.
Men and women are one in Christ (Galatians 3:28) and therefore equal; no ifs, buts or maybes. And, in any event, indubitably, life is better for everyone and infinity less mean spirited in societies in which men and women have equal status. But, as we all surely know, that something is closer to God’s intention and better, doesn’t necessarily mean it will hold sway. For most of history and in most places it hasn’t. To wit: bad things have happened, are happening in many parts of the world, and can happen in our part of the world unless we guard the ramparts.
Equality as a state of affairs is often misunderstood. Turning to arithmetic: two plus two makes four but, equally, so does one plus three. Being equal is not the same as being the same. When it comes to men and women there is one important and statistically significant difference across all ethnicities and cultures. Men, on the whole, and with few exceptions, are stronger and more aggressive than are women.
Throughout most of history women have occupied a secondary position to men – certainly outside the narrow confines of the home. Their childbearing role undoubtedly contributed to this. But, undoubtedly, their lesser physical strength and aggressiveness were defining. This hasn’t changed, yet women in the Western world now occupy positions of authority in all walks of life.
Feminists say there is still work to do, and there may be around the edges. No doubt prejudicial sexism still exists in dark recesses. But the major battles have been won — in the civilised world.
Consolidation is not inevitable. Regression is possible, as shown by Islamic countries and Islamic enclaves in the West. Hijabs and burkas have made a comeback. Does anyone, apart from the ride-with-me feminist sell-outs, think this is a fashion statement? They are symbols of male oppression of women. Women are regularly killed, beaten and threatened for not wearing them. Search online. Have a look here, for example:
On hijabs, many – too many – Muslim women (and schoolgirls) living in the West ‘choose’ to wear them, with some saying they are signs of their fealty to God. The Stockholm Syndrome comes to my mind; and, in the case of schoolgirls, parental and Islamic-school pressure. But leave that aside. Within limits of decency and, in many situations, recognisability, it is the right of women (and of men) to wear what they like. But it seems to me that when you know that millions of women wear hijabs only under threat of physical harm it is disingenuous to pretend this away and create an impression that freedom to wear what you like is the predominant factor in play. It is not hard to imagine the despair that this betrayal must create among women under threat of battery for transgressing culturally-imposed dress codes.
Why has the status of women improved so much in Western societies? Birth control has undoubtedly helped in the last sixty years, but the suffragettes, and others beforeand after, have been on the case for a lot longer than that. There are, no doubt, many contributing factors. But I suggest that the determination of women to achieve equality would have been stymied but for the central and supportive role played by ‘privileged’ white men.
I will quote the opinion of one such man writing in 1869:
“That the principle which regulates the existing social relations between the two sexes – the legal subordination of one sex to another – is wrong in itself, and now one of the chief hindrances to human improvement; and that it ought to be replaced by a principle of perfect equality, admitting no power or privilege on the one side, nor disability on the other.” — John Stuart Mill, The Subjection of Women
While JSM was particularly farsighted in his day; as a body, give or take, white men have provided a protective path to gender equality. Sure they have fought rearguard actions to slow progress along the way; all the same, they have progessively given way and at each stage have moved – and vitally so – to enshrine women’s newly-won rights in statute and in societal norms.
Because men are physically stronger they have the power, if collectively led by, say, a pack of primitive religio-ideologues, to take away women’s equality. It sounds simplistic and ridiculous to say that in this modern age. Nevertheless, would young women in Afghanistan be again wearing black all-encompassing ‘bee-hive suits’ if they were stronger than Afghani men? Of course they wouldn’t.
Ultimately, physical strength matters. Unless constrained by civilised values, power does come out of the barrel of a gun or a fist, as confronting as that might be. If the barbarians that I’m thinking of were ever to take over, liberated women would likely find themselves again ‘barefoot and in the kitchen’, so to speak; and, by the way, the LGBTI crowd wouldn’t fare too well either.
Good white men and true, and now also of varied hue, will be required in the sequel to keep women equal.
When the feminists restrict their concern and activism primarily to the welfare of the sisterhood, disregarding political correctness, a raft of multifarious human rights and cultural equivalence, then their interest and that of the “privileged white men” will be identical and will have maximum effect.
I’d never heard the “bee-hive suit” reference before. Many Indonesians, outside of Aceh, refer to the Arabs so dressed waiting for a boat to Australia as “Ninjas”
The US left-wing commentator and comedian Bill Maher first used the reference so far as I know. While he is left, unlike most of his fellow travellers, he can spot a poisonous ideology when he sees it. Peter
Men and women did not evolve physically or socially to be equal, or to be competitive, they evolved to be complementary. The left hate that sort of social arrangement because it implies that in many aspects of their relationships men and women actually ‘trade’ with each other. Trading is a no no for leftists because it is too closely associated with capitalism/freedom. It is enlightening to read some of the really way out leftist literature from some of the revolutionary groups such as the ‘weathermen’ form the USA where they extrapolate their detestation of western social arrangements to the extent that they want to forbid marriage – because marriage implies ‘ownership’ of your sexual partner and they would have people just ‘mate at random’. The most ludicrous but frightening proposal was that they didn’t want mothers to breast feed their ‘own babies’ because that also implied ‘ownership’. Mothers were encouraged to feed youngsters at random.
To finish my rant Peter, although I am an atheist there is much of Christianity that I find desirable. Also, like Christians, leftists also have a ‘trinity’ – class, race and gender.
The Western Democratic Male (MDM) is a highly educated, re-educated and evolved bag of flesh and bones. There are no other male species in the animal and human world that can withdraw and withhold their natural physical advantage in order to allow their beloved arrival. Not even those male animals who expire upon copulation, are required to actively participate in their own demise by allowing their female members to emasculate their full potential during life.
Whilst performing this intricate and difficult act of spiritual suicide, the WDM has agreed to remain absolutely silent under the insults and abuse meted out on an hourly basis to his gender orientation, even in the face of his magnificent sacrifice and his history of courageous progress toward our agreed Godhead. Possibly the most essential and valuable existential contribution toward equality of the sexes and the liberation of women … is the WDM
… they may be a fragile and delicate thing. … it may require generations of manipulation and education to produce a fully functional WDM. Dead white males … rich old white men …. may be the plug holding in the waters and conditions required for the equality of the sexes.
Beware the barbarians are coming – even as the feminists mock and ridicule WDM … it could be wise to follow the direction their dying fingers point. They are pointing at Islam.
I question the assertion above that the WDM is highly educated. Undoubtedly some are. The overwhelming majority, I believe, are either totally uneducated or, if they have some level of modern tertiary education, are no better than well-trained or thoroughly indoctrinated.
Even the truck drivers have spent fifteen years of their lives in full time formal education … and then the need to keep on learning doing courses even to drive a truck and understand the road laws . pay the bills … maintain a family … watch the news. They may not be university educated .. but they are still amongst the most highly trained, manufactured, socially engineered human males ever produced ( more trained than a Roman Centurion) Well trained enough to withstand the Julia Guillard, Nicola Roxon floggings .. the Sarah Hanson Young phenomenon.
Exactly my point. They are well-trained and indoctrinated. They recognise how things are and, perhaps, how they would prefer them to be. But that is very different from something only true education can give them, ie , simply stated, a knowledge of why things are the way they are, and how things ought to be done to make them the way they ought to be.
Interesting phenomenon, the feminism is. It was brought about, mostly, by the well educated and well to do women, who discovered that nobody wishes to do their bidding at well appointed homes anymore. Having lost their maids and cooks after the WWII, they discovered the male oppression and the glass ceilings as a pathway to political power. The suffragettes had, at least, the strength and honesty of their idealism and conviction. Those, who came after, behaved in the idiotic manner, publicly burning their brassieres or throwing paint on the marching veterans, asked for the Aboriginal blessings to land at Tullamarine and supported wearing of the full face covering as a means of the female liberation. These damsels of perpetual distress irreversibly harmed their own cause by their own loutishness, palpable hatred of all males and unthinking anger. Inevitably, their union with the militant Left transformed this ill-defined “movimento” into the destructive , anti-societal force, aimed at the destruction of the family, repudiation of the traditional values and domination of the society, shaped by their nihilist agenda. The shameful and incredibly stupid defence of the Islamic misogyny by the “sisterhood” demonstrates one thing and one thing only – in search of allies, real feminists are prepared to go to bed with anyone. Politically , of course.
There’s a story of the first Soviet feminist, Alexandra Collontai, who was an ardent supporter of the family destruction in the post revolutionary Russia. While she was young and sexually attractive. When she became , aaa… shall we say, too dignified, she ceased to hold an undivided attention of her husband. He started, in full accordance with her own theories , exercise the full freedom with the various young comrades. Our Alexandra changed her tune and rapidly became equally ardent supporter of the “counter-revolutionary” concept of the “bourgeois” marriage. “Tempora mutantur et nos mutamur et illis”, as old and wise Romans used to say.
indeed an interesting phenomenon, the feminism is. Even as the male violence against their previous beloved grows into apparently plague proportions, the feminisms can find no correlation with the small patricide of fathers and the demise of the ‘patriarchal’ family. Feminism was the finest champion of Gay liberation, it is feminism which stands powerfully behind ‘marriage equality’ …. feminism publicly emasculates a gladiator or a politician every week or so on the MSM. But it has absolutely conquered the western democratic male and backs itself with a kind of screaming silence against the Islamic threat.