What I love about the modern feminists – or the patsy females who go along with them out of a vague sense of solidarity – is that they are putting paid to all the theories of women being kinder, gentler, and more trustworthy than men.
This is in a way a good thing, because that myth, like the myth of the noble savage, is one of condescension. Denying us the full range of human agency and ability for evil as well as good amounts to considering us less than human, sort of victim/pets that always have to be cared for.
It is also a good thing because between chivalrous romanticizing of women and the left’s fetishizing of women as victims, we’re giving “feminists” way too much leeway for their horrible acts.
Take the #MeToo movement.
Sure, in Hollywood very bad things have happened for a very long time. And if it surprises anyone that an industry obsessed with beauty and youth will have its dark side on the casting couch, I’d like to sell them some swamp land in Florida.
And the Hollywood misdeeds, reprehensible though they were, weren’t exactly a function of bad men doing bad things. They weren’t even a function of bad men doing bad things while taking cover under their impeccable liberal connections and causes. No. It was a case of bad men doing bad things, enabled and abetted by women who either went along with it, encouraged it, or used their vile behavior to their own advantage.
Don’t tell me those women couldn’t do anything. That is bovine excrement. I too worked for years in a field with powerful gatekeepers who could ban you for any reason or none at all and ensure you never had a career. (My husband is watching “Episodes” on Netflix and keeps commenting on how similar it is to the publishing industry. He’s right, which is why I can’t watch it.)
There are still ways around, or under or over. Sure, your career won’t go as far if you don’t do what they expect. (In my case it was more political compliance than putting out. I’m not sure which is more corrupting.) You’ll work twice as hard for half the results. So what you’re saying is that you’re willing to sell something – your sexual purity, your political integrity, whatever – for advancement in the field?
Well, yes, the men engaging in this traffic and bullying are evil, but as for the women, we also know what they are. What we’re negotiating now is the price. How much career advancement are you willing to debase yourself for?
So from the beginning, the whole #MeToo thing was not a play of villains and ee victims. There was behavior on both sides, particularly in Hollywood and in political offices across the land.
And then we got to #MeToo and to women across the land dredging up events sometimes forty years old to point out they too were victims and had suffered.
Otherwise rational women demanded that – somehow – no man, ever, be a bad lot. They might not realize that’s what they demanded, but when they say that no woman should be afraid of walking alone at night, or that no woman should ever face an unwanted pass at work, what they’re saying amounts to “Men must all be saints. We won’t settle for less.” Because while there are ways to prevent even the very rare bad apple from hitting on you or worse – like, everyone wearing personal locators and body cams – that is not a society I particularly want to live in.
But now we are using the naked exploitation of #MeToo to go after men who are, to put it mildly, weak, infirm and at the mercy of caretakers who, in the way of our society currently, are mostly women.
I was first disturbed when I read about the accusations against George H. W. Bush. I perused all the articles and, unvarnished, they amounted to “made mildly dirty jokes” and might or might not have placed his hands in indelicate places on visiting females. Okay. So.That’s bad of course.
But you have to take into account who did it, meaning his age and his state of health.
George H. W. is 94 and in a wheelchair. I understand, though I can’t find a reference handily, that he also suffers from some chronic and worsening medical condition.
My medical friends have, at any rate, said on various occasions that after the age of about 85 percent of people start losing faculties. I’ve seen this in my own family. It is often correlated with other illnesses being treated by long-term medication. But the effect of it is that people seem to lack impulse control, at least to the extent they once had it.
They might also lose – I’m not sure quite how to put this – the ability to tactfully judge what is and what isn’t appropriate on any given social occasion. Particularly when they are men from another era, one in which the relationship between men and women was quite different, they might not realize certain gestures and comments have gone from being playfully ribald to offensive.
I am not a fan of George H. W. Bush, and we voted opposite sides in the last election, but to compare him to Harvey Weinstein is a gross injustice. Harvey got away with what he did because of his power to make or break careers in Hollywood. If an eager young thing wanted to become a name actress, she’d give Weinstein what he wanted. Meanwhile, if a woman whose bum was patted by George H. W. Bush from his wheelchair had turned around and given him a setdown, there would be no bad implications for her whatsoever, except perhaps being known as a b*tch who made a disabled and elderly man cry.
And ultimately, that’s what we’re looking at: the assumption that all women are now and at all times, world without end, victims of all men, and that all men, regardless of age and infirmity, are aggressors. It only leads one way. In the end, you empower women to mistreat powerless men, all the while donning the fetching mask of victims.
This is good because it strips from women the illusions of being “nurturers.” At least it does once people see past the mask.
On the other hand, it is bad, because it puts old, frail men at the mercy of cruel and mercenary women.
The man is 95 and infirm and also recently widowed, a condition that puts everyone, but particularly a very elderly person, in an emotionally vulnerable position.
According to the article above, one of the nursing services he pays to be on call has made allegations against him. The allegations are, on their face, pretty terrible.
The Marvel creator, 95, is alleged to have repeatedly groped and harassed a string of young female nurses employed to care for him.
He is said to have asked for oral sex in the shower, walked around naked and wanted to be “pleasured” in the bedroom.
While these allegations are possible, it should be noted they were only made after the company employing these nurses had its contract with him terminated. No report or complaint is on file from when these gross abuses were supposedly happening.
Also, again, as with George H. W. Bush, notice that Stan Lee had no real power over these women. Sure, they might have been discharged from their jobs if they’d complained while the company they worked for was employed by him. Given how the company has reacted now this seems unlikely, but it’s possible. But given the nursing shortage throughout the land, they would surely have had no trouble finding another job, beyond the fact that they would then have had an impregnable case against him and his company.
While he was their client, he was not their employer, nor did he have the ability to blight their entire career for no reason at all.
I find it likely that he might have walked around naked. Given his age and a certain artistic lifestyle, this might have been done without any sexual intent. The other claims are hard to judge out of context, and though they might be true, they could easily fall under the heading of “misjudged jokes” or “trying to break the ice.” Heaven knows I’ve been known to make sexual jokes without any intent of following through. For many years, I threatened to dance naked on tables at conventions (trust me, it’s a threat). Good thing I’m female, because if I were male, I’d probably be held to have harassed vast majorities of the audience.
You know, again, I have no clue what happened, but an elderly man easing the embarrassment of having to be helped to shower by saying something like “While you’re down there—” for instance, might be interpreted as “asking for oral sex.” But it would take someone who ignores normal humanity to think he was serious.
On the other hand, it’s absolutely possible that nothing ever happened, and that the harpies in charge of the nursing company who looked after Mr. Lee simply saw an opportunity to make a quick buck off an elderly millionaire.
This is the bad side of the #MeToo movement. Once you cast men and women as abusers and victims forever, regardless of inclinations, individual personalities, age, and health status, you’re handing abusers a club to take advantage of some of the most vulnerable people among us.
Forever.
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