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Statement 1:
There are biological differences between men and women.
Statement 2:
Despite the biological differences between men and women, a woman can do anything a man can do better than an average man, and a man can do anything a woman can do, with the exceptions of breastfeeding and giving birth, better than an average woman.
Defense of Statement 2:
The key word here is average. Average is not that high a standard. A determined woman athlete will be far stronger, than an average man. Similarly, a determined man, can set a much higher than average standard for child care, and nurturing behavior. Determined people will always beat the average.
Statement 3:
Both roles, the womanly role of mothering, nurturing, and homemaking, and the manly role of fighting and protecting the home, are determined by nature, and both have a natural place in the world. The role of woman is not, in any way, inherently inferior to that of man.
Statement 4:
Men, facing hairy barbarians, armed with swords, battleaxes, and other pieces of lovely nastiness have occassional reason to look a trifle ascance at doing the 'manly' thing. Women traditionally object to this not so manly reluctance. 'Come back with your shield or on it' being a fairly classic example of woman's way of encouraging men to be manly.
Statement 5:
This results in a social stigma, attached to men who fail to do the manly thing, and do something else instead. For example, the woman thing of staying at home, cooking, and taking care of the children. A social stigma against men doing womens work. The idea in fact that men do not do 'women's work' because it is beneath their dignity as men. (OK, you come up with a better reason to go out there and get chopped into little pieces.)
Statement 6:
This social stigma is meant to keep men doing what they are supposed to do. It is meant to modify the behavior of men, and not be taken too seriously by women. It is useful to women to have men believe that 'women's work' is beneath them as men, for a number of reasons. This idea, that there is something wrong with 'women's work' is not supposed to be taken seriously by women.
Statement 7:
This is the feminist contradiction. Feminism classifies 'women's work' homemaking and child rearing activities, as slavery. Feminism condemns women who do 'women's work' as slaves. The inherent contradiction of feminism, is that it buys into a male prejudice against womanly activities. Then it tries to dignify women by telling them to act more like men. This is not pride in being women. This is not pride in womanhood. In order to be a radical feminist, you have to have subconsciously bought into the male chauvinist idea that being a woman is somehow inherently inferior to being a man. The feminist agenda, competing with men at being men, derives from this fundamental sellout. This acceptance of the doctrine that being women is less important, less dignified, less worthwhile, than being men.
Statement 8:
Women, who are proud of being women, would not be putting down the things that nature adapts women to naturally do better than men. They would be proud of their roles as homemaker, and childrearer. Not ashamed of their sex, or the activities associated with their sex.
Go back to statement 1. There are biological differences between men and women. Women have different metabolisms, they see differently, are more sensitive to nuances in communications, and in many other ways better adapted than men for social and homemaking activities.
Why should women be ashamed of what makes them women?
Statement 9:
This fundamental logical contradiction in the feminist attitude and agenda. The idea that you can dignify women by accepting the idea that womanly activities are inherently inferior to manly activities doesn't make a lot of sense to me. In fact it is nonsense, in the most literal meaning of the word.
Statement 10:
Happiness comes from doing, as much as possible, what come's naturally.
Defense of statement 10. Happiness is not logical. It derives from the satisfaction of fundamental emotional and psychological needs. Those needs are programmed by biology, not logic. In order to satisfy those needs, and be happy, it is necessary to do what is programmed by biology. Ergo, women who have children and make homes will find greater happiness and satisfaction in their lives, than women who do not. Because these activities satisfy their biological needs.
This suggests, that most women will be happier, and lead more satisfying lives, doing womanly things.
So theoretically, women will be happier being women, and men will be happier being men, and a society which encourages women to be women and men to be men will have more happy and satisfied people in it than one which confuses these issues.
Top Origin of Error
1) What, is the origin of the Feminist Inconsistency. The idea that you can gain greater dignity as a woman by condemning womanly tasks?
2) It originates in the idea that a wife is the servant of her husband. Obviously, a servant is inferior to the master. Thus, one must reject servitude. One can only gain dignity by gaining freedom.
3) In order for women to gain dignity and respect, they had to refuse to accept a position of servitude to men. They had to refuse the chattel slavery of traditional marriage, and stand on their own two feet.
4) So, it was wrong for women to do things for men. Cooking for men, cleaning house for men, washing clothes for men, all the acts of a servant, beneath the dignity of a free and equal woman.
5) Thus, women, in order to stand as free and equal members of the human race had to renounce these servile caregiving tasks, and be their own people.
6) In the argument above, 2 leads to 3 which leads to 4 then to 5, and in five you have women condemning traditional womanly tasks of nurturing, caregiving, and homemaking as the marks of an inferior person. This is the origin of the Feminist Contradiction.
7) So the place to challenge it is at Statement 2 above. Is it true, that a wife because she takes care of some of her husbands needs, is the servant, the inferior of her husband. Restated, is being a caregiver the same as being a servant the same as being inferior?
8) Obviously, being a caregiver, means that you are of service to the people that you care for. On the other hand, a person who wins the Congressional Medal of Honor for bravery in combat is of service to his or her country. Does this act of service make one inferior?
9) Obviously, being of service to others does not automatically make you inferior to others. In fact, the greatest honors in society are supposed to go to those who are of the greatest service to others.
10) Being of service to others, therefore, does not automatically make you inferior to others.
11) Women, are well suited biologically to be primary caregivers to the people around them.
12) They are, the primary caregivers of their own children.
13) Does this make them servants, inferior to their children?
14) If being the primary caregiver to their children, constantly on call to care for and supply the needs of their children, does not make them inferior to their children, then how does caregiving behavior directed towards their husbands make them inferior to their husbands?
15) Obviously, it doesn't. Caregiving is a natural womanly thing. It is as natural to a woman to be a caregiver to her husband, as it is for her to be a caregiver to her children.
16) This does not make her a servant, and it does not make her inferior. The idea that it makes a woman her husband's inferior, or servant, is flattering to the male ego, and offensive to female vanity, and is not really true at all.
17) Being a caregiver, is not the mark of an inferior person, and women can be proud of their role as caregivers, and proud of how well they fill that role, without being inferior people, and being a caregiver to a husband as well as to children is something that women can honestly take pride in doing well.
18) Women do not have to reject or condemn traditional womanly tasks and activities, in order to be proud of themselves. Women do not have to refuse to be caregivers to their husbands, in order to be proud of themselves as human beings.
19) There is no reason why women, in order to have dignity, need to condemn traditionally womanly tasks. Doing so is not really supporting women, it is accepting a masculine judgement of womanly things, it is a radical sellout of women by women.
Top Problems Caused
The Feminist Contradiction, the idea that you have to condemn womanly activities in order to have dignity as a woman, has been shown to be false. Since it is false, courses of action based on it, are likely to be in error.
Sometimes, wrong ideas lead, by happenstance, eventually to correct results. On the other hand, they more often cause new problems.
What are some of the courses of action produced by the Feminist Contradiction. 1)The idea that marriage is exploitative of women and should be radically changed is one. 2) The idea that by getting rid of the role model of women as mothers and housewives you could 'free women from an enslaving stereotype' is another. 3) The idea that by portraying women as more powerful and enabled, you could increase the dignity and respect that women enjoy is a third.
Each of these ideas, noble and obvious as they seem are based upon a false assumption. The assumption that the role of housewife and mother is a cause of degradation or in itself a degrading role. Being based upon a false assumption, they are very possibly false themselves. Each of them has, in fact, led to a change in social conditions which makes life harder, unhappier, and more stressful to the average woman. Each has led to social conditions which make the chance of a woman having a happy and fulfilling life worse than it was before.
One of the problems in this sort of argument, lies in the difference between ethical philosophy, and biological reality. The communist principle 'From each according to his ability to each according to his need' is a good example of this. It sound's very noble. Unfortunately, what it means when applied to the real world, is that people don't get paid for working hard. If they work hard, the excess that they create is taken from them and given to someone who didn't work for it. This results in a slow or nongrowth economy, and people who do not have a real work ethic. Idealistic statements which chop behavioral realities off at the knees just don't work.
When looking at the behavior of different sexes in a given species. Certain limits are imposed by the biology of the species. If a set of standards of behavior are vocally embraced which are biologically difficult or impossible for the species to emulate in reality, behavior collapses back to a biologically maintainable standard. This is especially true of sexual behaviors, because these, more than most others are biologically programmed, and least amenable to major or radical modifications. So, in order to realistically examine or predict the practicality of 'idealistic' statements and standards of behavior, it is necessary to compare them to the biological reality, and test, their turthfulness, and their probable success or failure.
Top Marriage
The statement "marriage is exploitative of women and should be radically changed" is a good example of this. The 'truth' of this statement seems selfevident, if you have accepted the masculine notion that 'woman's work' is inferior and degrading. Since traditional marriage has women doing 'woman's work' that is being the primary caregivers in the family unit. If you assume that that kind of work is degrading, then marriage is degrading. If, however, you believe that caregiving is praiseworthy and respectable, then the matter is clearly open to question.
Beginning with the basics. It is necessary to compare traditional marriage to its natural biological behavioral counterpart. Humans are adapted to a life as hunter gatherers. They spent probably several hundred thousand years as hunter gatherers before embarking on the development of an agrotechnical society. In human groups still living a hunter gatherer existence, the female not only is the primary care giver, she is also the primary provider. Through her gathering activity approximately 70% of the food and nourishment of the family is provided.
In traditional marriage, the man assumes the role of provider, and the woman is allowed to concentrate on caregiving. On the surface, at least, this appears to be an improvement over nature. The man provides more than nature dictates, allowing the woman to concentrate more on her role as caregiver, and freeing her from some worries and burdens.
On the other hand, this makes the woman more dependent on the male. Such dependence is apparently offensive in a society where independence is considered preferable.
This is illogical. You cannot give a person greater responsibility without depending on them to discharge that responsibility. In other words, you cannot increase the responsibility of the male in the relationship without increasing the dependence of the female on his fulfilling that role. In other words, you cannot depend on someone without being dependent on them to the degree that you depend on them. You should be able to depend on your marriage partner.
Thus, a woman cannot choose to allow a man greater role in supporting her without also choosing to depend on him to do so. So, the traditional marital arrangement of the male as primary provider, and the female as primary caregiver represents a division of labor, in which the female is less selfsufficient than in nature, but is allowed to concentrate more completely on caregiving tasks. This division of labor allows for better caregiving, which benefits the children, and thus, in the long run the parents.
It appears to be an improvement on nature, for all parties concerned. Like most tradeoffs, it represents a paradox, greater freedom in one area in return for increased dependence in another.
What is happening now that traditional marriage is breaking down? Single parenting is becoming more commonplace.
Most single parents are women. In a single parent household, the female is both the primary provider and the primary caregiver. Instead of being able to focus on her caregiving skills, she must learn provider skills as well. Her time is also divided between caregiving and providing. So, in most cases, she cannot do as well at either task, as she could if she could concentrate all her effort on one or the other.
Clearly, this is disadvantageous for the female. She must work harder, to learn several sets of skills and she must work harder to both provide and caregive. Her worries are increased, and her income decreased.
Clearly this is disadvantageous for the children. They have only one person to care for them. The male's contribution as a secondary caregiver, and as a male role model are missing. They are at greater risk, due to the divided attention of the primary caregiver.
This is advantageous for males who do not desire the responsibility of having a family. It is disadvantageous for males who want a family.
Overall, the idea that marriage is exploitative of women has resulted in poorer conditions for children, and harder, more harassed lifestyles for women.
Consider the cost to the woman of her caregiving activites for a male mate in this context. She is already engaged in all the caregiving activities necessary for her children. Cooking, laundry, housework, etc. The amount of time necessary to make one extra meal, wash one more persons clothes, or clean a house with one more person in it is negligible.
It does not represent a significant increase in her necessary work. If the male does not have a job, he is still available as a secondary caregiver, making her caregiving activities easier, he provides a male role model for the children, and a stabler environment.
So, even in a home where the male is only present, without being a provider, he represents an improvement over the single mother lifestyle, and is worth the additional energy expended in his keep.
If the male does have a job, the female probably applies the major portion of his income in providing the home and food for the children and herself. The extra energy or work required for caregiving activities to the male are well rewarded. Even if all the male does is come home, drink beer and watch tv, the female is substantially better off than in a single parent lifestyle.
Obviously, the traditional marriage is a significant improvement over nature, for the female, and well worth the modest investment in additional caregiving required to maintain the male. The social standards which make the male accept responsibility as primary provider, work to ensure a superior lifestyle for the female and children.
Males, however, adapt well to an environment where the female does it all. Females also accept this, as shown by the Culture of Poverty in the US and in England. Look at Andy Capp, for an example of this natural pattern. It is endemic to human, and most mammalian biology. The male fights and mates, the female is the primary caregiver, and provider, hunter in carnivorous species like lions, gatherer in the human species.
When this artificial system, of male as primary provider is attacked, as feminism has done, behavior reverts to the natural, the male ceases being a provider, and the female is worked harder, and female and children suffer.
So, a traditional marriage is not exploitative of the female, but advantageous for her. It makes life better for her and for her children. In return for this improvement in her life, she must be caregiver to the male, and this may involves some ego stroking as well as other forms of caregiving.
A wise woman will make the necessary compromises and go to the additional trouble necessary to keep a halfway decent male around, because in the long run, her life will be better, and happier if she does so. The additional work, for a woman who is or wants to be a mother, is negligible when compared to the benefits.
Top Stereotypes (role models)
This statement includes the hopeful assumption that by there is no inherent biological need or instinct for men and women to seek sexually specific role models. It assumes, that if you change the female role model so that it is virtually indistinguishable from the male role model in dress, work, etc. that children will not seek a clearly distinguishable role model for their sex.
This assumption is highly questionable. Children want to learn from their parents and associated elders, older siblings, cousins, friends, how they are supposed to behave when they grow up. Since reproductive behavior is closely tied to species survival, it is one of the most impelling of biological urges or instincts, and one that doesn't just vanish because of wishful thinking.
The feminist assumption suggests that traditional womanly caretaking assumptions are degrading and inferior to roles that society assigns to the male. An inherently masculine assumption. The role model (stereotype) that the feminist assumption has attempted to replace the womanly caregiving role model (stereotype) with is a very masculine woman. She does the same work men do, she has the same attitudes towards caregiving activities, cooking, housework, etc, that men do. She is only distinguishable from her male counterpart by her sex.
In the natural world, the woman makes the home. She prepares the food, provides care and nurturing to the members of her family group. She creates the home. Without her, there is no home. She creates the world of the child, and she is the center of the world for the adult male. She is where the male always goes home to.
This is a very powerful and respectable role. The feminist woman abandons all these natural, emotional, relational sources of personal power and dignity in order to compete with men on men's terms, i.e. by accepting the masculine assumption that these empowering activities are undignified. The feminist woman is woman stripped of all her womanly attributes except for her sexuality.
As children grow up, and seek visually different role models for their sexes, they can choose to act like men as men, to act like women who dress and work as men, or they have a third choice.
The sex symbol. The only overtly womanly stereotype available in the feminist world is the sex symbol. Madonna, the super models, beauty pageant winners, etc. For children, this sends a clear message. Be a manly woman, or be a sex symbol if you are a girl. Treat women as though they are men, or treat women as sex symbols (objects) if you are a boy.
The loss of the womanly role model, the woman as wife, the woman as mother, the woman as primary caregiver, the woman as homemaker. All fundamental, archetypal, and powerful roles. Has resulted in children having to see women as either sexless or sex symbols. Girls growing up in this environment must choose to subordinate their sex, or to be sex symbols. Boys must choose to ignore women's sex, or treat them as sex objects. Girls do not want boys to ignore their sex. Boys are interested in girls as girls.
This results in gender confusion, a loss of clear understanding of how to treat the other sex, and, in those persons who insist on having sex anyway, the understanding that the socially correct way to treat women, as sexually active women, is as sex objects.
Thus, the feminist inconsistency, tends to increase the tendency of girls to view themselves as sex objects and of boys to treat girls as sex objects.
The lack of a clear, womanly role model, who is womanly in behavior and attitude, as well as sexuality, has increased societies tendency to treat women as sex objects, and thus has increased overall the level of personal (relationship) degradation of women. While providing a minority of women with a small increase in professional freedom.
The womanly icon of the 1990's is not the career woman, not the feminist, but the sex goddess. The feminist attempt to substitute a politically correct feminist role model for the archetypal, homemaking caregiving womanly role model has resulted in the increased objectification of woman as sex objects.
Being a sex object is powerful, but it lacks the full humanity, the dignity, the emotional and relational depth of being a caregiver and homemaker. A sex object is not a friend, or a partner, or a life companion. A wife, a homemaker, a mother is all of these.
Modern society needs to recognize, dignify, and respect the traditional womanly attributes of woman as wife, mother, homemaker, primary caregiver.
Top Gender Confusion
3) The idea that by portraying women as more powerful and enabled, you could increase the dignity and respect that women enjoy.
This sounds really valid. It is, however, based upon the assumption that women were not treated with dignity and respect prior to this. It is based upon the assumption that women, by being portrayed as caregivers, were being treated without dignity and respect.
The only episode of the sitcom 'Father Knows Best' that I can recall off the top of my head is one where Mother was right and Father was wrong. The title itself, being the title of a sitcom, suggests that society as a whole was well aware that 'Father Knows Best' only some of the time. I suspect that if you were to take the sitcom episode by episode and problem by problem you would find that Mother and Father were right about equally. I don't know for sure, but I would be willing to bet that far more episodes portrayed Mother as knowing best than would have done so, if it were meant to be degrading or disrespectful to women.
Traditional culture has a huge fund of anecdotes, stories, and jokes which clearly show a deep respect for women and for what women do. The old saying 'A man may work from sun to sun, but a woman's work is never done' is one. It shows a real understanding of the value and importance of women and of the fact that in doing what they do they are difficult to replace. Men find doing what women do more difficult than women.
More than this, the source of authority, in these situations where sometimes the man is right, and sometimes the woman is right is important. Women are right in their area of expertise. The jobs they do, and the things they do. Men are right in their area of expertise. This is authority based on knowledge and experience. A very sane, a very reasonable basis for awarding authority in any given situation.
In changing this situation, feminism insisted on women who were right, regardless of whether they were right or not. Women are right because they are women. If they can't win reasonably, then victory comes from a clever rejoinder, or a cutting remark, or manipulative behavior. All social and communications skills that women have a biological edge in as opposed to men.
Humans are a social species. If the king wears a dress, all the courtiers start wearing dresses. Children growing up seeing these shows are moved to imitate, dress like, and act like the people being portrayed as more powerful. Boys growing up are given a choice of growing up to be low status males who are the verbal doormats for women or feminine men, or of growing up to be the best women that they can.
This leads to increased gender confusion. Men who would otherwise have grown up quite happy to be men, will now seek to emulate women and their perceived power. These men will not be available to women as men. This is not really about sexuality, it is about perceived social power.
This reduces the total proportion of male males in the population, and makes finding a suitable mate harder for the female.
Top Summary
The feminist inconsistency has in reverse order of how they were treated above, a) reduced the number of males available as satisfactory mates for women b)increased the tendency of society in general to perceive women, when acting as women, as nothing but sex objects, and c) increased the stress and workload of the majority of women by destroying traditional sex based division of labor.
This represents a significant loss in quality of life for the majority
of women in society.
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