Introduction In the past few months, I’ve encountered several single women who registered this common complaint about the men they’ve been dating: I just can’t find a man who wants to commit. To compound this chorus of woe is the recent rash of books and articles about why men can’t commit, don’t commit, or won’t commit to women. One would think, by seeing these literary titles, that men are socially inept, irreparably ambivalent, and emotionally stunted cavemen. There’s a simple explanation for drawing such a dour conclusion: The overbearing feminist movement in our country—supported by the liberal media, spineless federal and state legislators, and a Napoleonic judicial/law-enforcement system that presumes men guilty before proven innocent—has made it socially acceptable to bash males. Does TV show Everybody Loves Raymond, in which the star character is portrayed as an idiot father, come to mind? No? How about T-shirts encouraging girls to throw rocks at boys? Ring a bell? How about Verizon’s insulting TV commercial showing fathers as incapable of helping their kids with homework? Still not convinced? Perhaps the pending legal case in Chicago where a woman secretly impregnated herself with sperm she received through oral sex, then successfully sued the unwitting sperm owner for paternity? Shocked, aren’t you? Finally, let’s not ignore the countless incidents of vindictive women making false 911 calls to get their boyfriends and husbands arrested and thrown into jail. If you find nothing disturbing about the aforementioned examples, you are uninformed, apathetic, desensitized, or part of the problem. Take a gander at the social pages of any newspaper, and you’ll see that plenty of men are getting engaged and married—to women. It is true, though, that some men avoid commitment—not the simplistic can’t or won’t or don’t that dejected women will decry. Why is that? Anticipated pain. It’s that simple. A man who avoids commitment foresees a lot of pain. Tony Robbins, widely regarded as the world’s number-one success coach, teaches us that, in general, people will do more to avoid pain than to seek pleasure. This is true about every aspect of life, and it is especially true about relationships. Consequently, although a man believes that a particular woman—or, based on his past experiences, women in general—will bring him pleasure, he believes the anticipated pain will exceed that pleasure. Such a man will want no part of commitment. Frequently, a woman will presume that a man’s commitment avoidance is a general intimacy problem, rather than accept the painful truth: he doesn’t want to commit to HER. So, if a woman becomes involved with a man who won’t commit to her, it’s her fault. Why? It’s very easy to determine his desire to commit by asking him, at their first meeting, what kinds of relationships he’s had and what kind he wants now. More important: she should listen to his answer! Too often, he will tell her he just wants to date casually, but she will assume she can change him. Lunacy. Whether he doesn’t want to commit to her, or to anybody, is irrelevant: he doesn’t want to commit. So, if a woman fails to discern and accept his answer, BEFORE getting emotionally attached to him, shame on her. At a natural level, there is no difference between the propensity of men and women to commit—one of the great myths is that women are more relationship-oriented than men. This is total nonsense: Men, just as much as women, want to be in healthy, happy relationships. Besides, I’ve met and received letters from many women who fear or don’t like commitment. The difference, and the reason for this article, is that men face societal and legal hurdles, nonsense, and penalties that women do not. And, these hurdles, nonsense, and penalties are the key reasons men avoid commitment. Three Categories of Relationships To illustrate how the prospect of dating and marrying women looks to men, I have created a model, called The Man’s Relationship Ecosystem TM, in which I graphically depict the social and legal landmarks of male/female relationships. There are three categories of the way a man can relate to a woman (see diagram below). I present them in order of increasing commitment: * Uncommitted: bachelor (no commitment) * Committed: Unmarried (informal commitment) * Committed: Married (formal commitment) & nbsp;
Each relationship category is composed of building blocks, which sit stacked on the Earth. The bachelor doesn’t get involved with women, so no friends & community or extended family enters the equation. He does use the part of the relationship contract that governs how he and his woman, even on one date, will navigate logistics, sex, and money. If, however, an encounter with a woman results in a child, the state’s imposed legal contract immediately kicks in. And, make no mistake: the woman and the state control this legal contract. Remember this: whether a woman lies about her fertility or use of birth control, the state does not care. Imagine that every one of your sperm cells holds a fountain pen in its hand. The moment one of them unites with an egg, it signs the state’s contract. The woman decides whether or not to enforce it. Should she do so, it will endure at least 18 years, maybe 23, depending on the state. The man in the committed/unmarried category experiences all levels of the stack. He is either seeing his woman all of the time from a separate residence or is cohabiting with her. The relationship contract is a continuously evolving, mutually created set of rules for navigating the details of everyday life—sex, money, socializing, friends, household chores, religious practices, schedules, family issues, etc. It endures only as long as the romantic relationship lasts. As before, if this union produces a child, that state-imposed legal contract kicks in. Also, if the parties live together long enough to invest and spend from commingled funds, the state-imposed contract may govern the disposition of assets at the termination of the relationship. This is a nebulous area of the law, but if the parties cannot agree to terms themselves, and one party brings a legal action against the other, the legal contract dictates the terms. In the committed/married category, the man, once again, experiences all levels of the stack, with the added legitimacy that a marriage license and wedding ceremony bestow. If the marriage fails, all that remains is the legal contract. In this category, the law is quite clear about what happens at divorce. The legal contract governs the disposition of assets, income, debts, spousal and child support, and child-custody and child-visitation guidelines. With a 50% divorce rate, ignoring the ramifications of this powerful contract is dangerous behavior. That is why the man and woman should sign a prenuptial agreement, which is their agreement, signed when they get along, and not be straddled with one imposed by the state. The Toxic Bedrock Solidly embedded in the soil of The Man’s Relationship Ecosystem is a layer of toxic bedrock (see diagram above), which has the potential to contaminate every relationship a man has with a woman. Because of this toxic bedrock, women have more power and legal protections than men do. The man, therefore, must rely on the goodness, honesty, and stability of each woman for his well-being. This toxic bedrock contains two, interlinked substrata: 1. & nbsp;Napoleonic legislative/judicial/law- enforcement bias against men (guilty until proven innocent) in domestic-violence cases and in many divorce and child-custody cases. The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) of 1994—thank you, OJ—defines domestic-violence cases and dictates how they are prosecuted. In general, VAWA’s premise is: woman good, man bad. Here are two examples:
Lisa Scott, family-law attorney in Bellevue, WA, and founding member of Taking Action Against Bias in the System, opines: & nbsp; &n bsp; “VAWA was based on lies and distortions about the true extent of intimate-partner violence, yet it continues to be funded at astounding levels. Feminist groups, led by the domestic-violence ‘scream queens,’ tout hysterical claims such as ‘the leading cause of emergency-room visits by women is domestic violence,’ and ‘95 per cent of victims of domestic violence are women.’ Ten years of VAWA has resulted in the wholesale criminalization of being a man. VAWA didn't originate this nightmarish system, but it legitimizes and subsidizes it. & nbsp; &n bsp; In today's domestic-violence police state, it's expected the woman is the victim. All she has to do is call 911 and report that her husband assaulted her. In many cases, she conveniently fails to mention she slapped, punched, kicked, or pummeled him to the point that he pushed her away. As a family-law attorney for 17 years, I have experienced the DV system personally. & nbsp; &n bsp; To some, the solution is a gender-neutral law, such as ‘Violence Against Persons Act.’ Even without overt gender bias, federal intrusion into local domestic-violence policies is corrupting. It nourishes a gargantuan beast and ensures a massive stream of taxpayer dollars creating endless constituent groups lining up to feed at the federal trough.” & nbsp; &n bsp; Greg Schmidt, a Seattle police lieutenant who, in 1994, created the department’s Domestic Violence Investigation Unit, said: & nbsp; &n bsp; “The domestic-violence industry—the trainers, the shelter directors, etc.—can spin things however they want, but most street cops know that women are just as likely to start domestic disputes as men are. But, arresting women puts you under lot of scrutiny. It's bad for your career.” 2. & nbsp;Liberal, anti-male media: systematically treat men as moronic oafs. Men are constantly portrayed in TV shows and commercials, and movies as unable to help kids with homework, do household chores, or relate to women.
An example: On Everybody Loves Raymond, an extremely funny, now-in-reruns TV series, I watched three shows in a two-week span in which “smart wife” Deborah (Patricia Heaton) hit “dumb husband” Raymond (Ray Romano)—in the testicles, in the eye, and in the stomach. Funny, huh? I’ve seen mother Marie (played by Doris Roberts) hit father Frank (played by Peter Boyle) numerous times, usually in the arm. Marie is considered smart, although a hot-tempered buttinsky, but Frank, an irascible character, is considered stupid. “Smart woman, stupid man” is considered socially acceptable. Women physically abusing men is also considered socially acceptable. Had the roles been reversed—smart men, stupid women, or men hitting women—the show would have been shut down after two episodes. Instead, its stars won many Emmys, and Ray Romano, at $2.8M per episode, holds the record as the highest-paid entertainer in TV history. The Essence of the Relationship Contract As I point out in my book, The Man’s No-Nonsense Guide to Women: How to Succeed in Romance on Planet Earth, we men love to be with women because of their ability to soothe us and share intimacy. Fair-minded, intelligent, talented, dinner-buying, men-loving women are so much fun and irreplaceable. Their opposite sisters, though, are not. In my book, I also admonish men to stop tolerating women’s double standards and attitudes of entitlement. What to accept and not accept, and what to give and not give comprise the essence of the relationship contract: how men and women negotiate the rules of daily living. This, of course, is a nonenforceable, innocuous contract that lives only as long as the relationship has a pulse. So, in what situations do men dislike the relationship contract? When women demand double standards. Some women just don’t get this concept. They want double standards. They want chivalry, that one-way offering of special, gender-based, deferential treatment. Chivalry is benevolent sexism, or BS, tendered in exchange for sex with a woman deemed unworthy of a peer relationship. The more BS a woman wants, the less a man respects her. When a man cannot consider a woman his peer, he has trouble committing to her. He may commit verbally, but not in his heart of hearts—which is not a true commitment. So, in many such situations, he will avoid commitment. Here is a pithy example of one woman’s idea of a relationship contract. She shamelessly acknowledged in this letter to me her attitude of entitlement. The reason I reproduced it here is that many women never get to see what some of their sisters are really like. If this letter doesn’t educate you, nothing will: “I think that there is a lot of merit to what you say, but I doubt very much that there are a lot of woman out there who would welcome your concept of how the male/female relationship should develop. I agree that the woman wants it all—she wants to be wined and dined by her man, and yet she wants an equal partnership. I am not saying that it is fair or rational, but I will say that you are not going to get women to change how they feel, and you certainly are not going to change the deeply ingrained emotions women attach to such treatment. I believe that equality does not have to come by a shared monetary relationship but only in a shared level of "power." Power comes in many forms, and I don't believe for a moment that it is all about who picks up the bill at the end of the night. I will grant you that power can come from who picks up the bill, but it is not a given. Nor do I believe that the reverse is true, that a woman always uses sex as her 'power' card. I think that your concepts are stereotypical, but your suggestions for equality are not the only answer. I will use myself as the example because, although I could be fooling myself, and you may shoot holes in how I see my relationships, I think that I do not follow your recipe for equal partnership. But I do follow mine: it is all about who has the power. For you, the one who spends the money has the power, and, for me, that is not necessarily the answer. Even though wealth is a relative term, I think it is fair to say I am a wealthy woman. I am also a very fit, energetic, high-spirited, open, and straightforward female. I was married for 26 years, had a wonderful marriage and two great boys who are now out of the house, and in a position today to do whatever I want, where and when I want—because their father takes care of every financial need that comes along. Because I already had a life that I loved, I am not really looking to jump back into another marriage, even though I am happy to be in a committed relationship. I should also mention that I am a very sexual woman, and I never use that as part of my power. My point is that my life, and what I am looking for, is a very hard act to follow for most men I date. I bring a lot to the table, and a man must bring a lot to the table for me to stay interested. He has to be able to maintain a certain lifestyle, must be athletic, must have enough of the "A" personality to be driven professionally and physically, must be intelligent and emotionally intelligent, and has to be good in bed (or at least willing and able to become good in bed). The men I date must be able to wine and dine me, but they do not have to be able to support me and my lifestyle—beyond the wining, dining, and occasional gifts and trips. That is not to say that I don't do a lot of gifts and extracurricular buying, such as tickets to plays and concerts. So, at the end of the day, I certainly hold my own, but I still want a man, at the end of the night, to be pulling out his credit card vs. mine. I won homes in Aspen and New Jersey and am very generous on many levels. So, although I don't need a man to be able to help me out financially, I still enjoy a man to do that, and I know that, for you, that is the messed up part (or certainly one of them) of a woman. But, if you are talking about "power," for me money doesn't give men power, but it keeps them in the game. If he doesn't have the ability to do that, he holds no power as far as I am concerned. That I don't need the man's money and am as independent as I am gives me the power—even though I still like a man who can afford to pay for dinner, etc. I think that a man only holds the power over a woman when she NEEDS the man to help support her or needs him to make her life better financially. In that scenario, a woman puts up with things and makes allowances for men, because she needs what the man brings to the table. Basically, it is the same as when a man dates a woman half his age. He wants that and therefore is willing to make allowances. For me, it is more what I am used to and what makes me feel good. And, for the men I am dating, they are trying to be able to do what I need.” Any female reading this, who still doesn’t understand why double standards cause a man to avoid commitment, should try an experiment: reread it while looking in the mirror, trying to keep a straight face. In this case, commitment would be the last thought on a man’s mind. Running away from her, as fast as he can, would be his first thought. After meeting a woman like this letter-writer, any man who actually gets involved with her is a masochist. Conclusion Excluding the fear of intimacy and psychological hangups—assuming a guy is healthy, centered, and generally ready, willing, and able to enter a relationship—there are three reasons a man avoids commitment: 1) an unpalatable relationship contract, 2) the toxic bedrock, and 3) the anti-male legal contract. If women want to create incentives for men to commit, they can fix the three reasons men avoid commitment. Otherwise, they should stop complaining. I recommend the following actions to women: * Become a no-nonsense woman. Lose the attitude of entitlement. Remove one-way chivalry from your vocabulary and replace it with two-way romance. Make the relationship contract easy and enjoyable. * Get radio stations, TV networks and stations, newspapers, magazines, and advertisers to stop their negative portrayals of men. Also, demand that your state and federal legislators vote against VAWA 2005 and change it to the Violence Against Persons Act (VAPA), eliminating the anti-male bias in domestic-violence cases. * Stop using family courts as weapons against men . Take responsibility for your actions and inactions. Don’t use the courts’ anti-male biases to your advantage. Take your lumps like a man. Marc H. Rudov <mailto:marc@themansno nonsenseguidetowomen.com>
Marc H. Rudov is an investment banker and business consultant residing in Silicon Valley, California. He is the author of the book The Man’s No-Nonsense Guide to Women: How to Succeed in Romance on Planet Earth TM (ISBN 0974501719) and eight other articles: * “Five Myths About Women” * “The Golden Rule Dictates Your Sex Life” * “How Every Man Can Land His Dream Woman” * “Can Men and Women Really Get Along?” * “Did Your Make Your New Year’s Revolution?” * “Romance Lessons from Tsunami Animals” * “Why Men Dread Valentine’s Day” * “Cellular Compatibility & Great Sex.” Rudov’s book, articles, and dating service are available at www.NoNonsenseDating.com <http://www.nononsensedating.com/>" title="http://www.nononsensedating.com/>" target="_blank"http://www.nononsensedating.c...;; ________________________ Gérard Pierre LEVESQUE
“You want to make a soldier cry, you take his son away,” said Army National Guard Spc. Joe McNeilly of Grand Ledge, Michigan. “It’s devastating.”
Spc. McNeilly provided shared physical custody of his son for five years prior to his deployment, one week on, one week off. Then he was sent to Iraq in January, 2004 for fifteen months. While deployed, McNeilly agreed to give the boys’ mother temporary full custody until he returned from duty. But upon return, the court referee recommended against restoring shared physical custody. Instead, McNeilly’s boy was restricted to every other weekend and a few holidays with his dad.
With reasoning worthy of the Brave New World, Director Don Reisig of the Ingham County Friend of the Court denied that the recommendation had anything to do with McNeilly’s military service. “The fact that he was called up to defend his country makes no difference,” said Reisig. Rather, it was because the mother was the “day-to-day caretaker and decision maker in the child’s life” while McNeilly was overseas.
Hmmm.
Based on this incisive thinking, we can conclude that when married fathers return from Iraq, they should have no role in raising their children, since they were absent from day-to-day decision making while deployed.
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The Marriage Movement recently got hit with some dispiriting news. The U.S. Census Bureau just released a report showing that for the first time, American single-adult households now outnumber traditional Ozzie and Harriet families.
The Census Bureau report comes along at the same time of new evidence that fatherhood still continues under attack. Just view the promos for NBC’s latest reality show, “Meet Mister Mom.” Or read the loony opinion handed down last week by the California Supreme Court which concludes, “We perceive no reason why both parents of a child cannot be women.”
Now persons from both sides of the aisle are insisting that if we hope to save families, we need to rally around fathers.
On the Right, critiques of how government welfare programs worsen the plight of fathers have appeared in the American Conservative, National Review Online, and elsewhere. Eagle Forum head Phyllis Schlafly has penned several hard-hitting commentaries. And just last week Rachel Alexander, co-editor of the Intellectual Conservative website, released a column with the provocative title, “Child Custody: Where Men Hit a Glass Ceiling.”
On the Left, former Democratic presidential candidate Al Sharpton spoke at last summer’s legislative conference of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, urging them to pay far more attention to the plight of young urban black men. And earlier this month Washington Post columnist William Raspberry devoted his weekly column to the issue, complaining that “Fatherless families are America’s single largest source of poverty.”
But there is one voice that is conspicuously absent in the campaign to save fatherhood – the Marriage Movement. Sadly and inexplicably, the Marriage Movement has largely turned its back on men.
Yes, there are a few exceptions, such as last year’s excellent report from the Rutgers National Marriage Project which probed why many men are reluctant to marry. And some marriage enrichment programs like the Secrets of Married Men are sympathetic to the challenges faced by guys. [www.secretsofmarriedmen.com]
But there is a segment of the Marriage Movement that is all too quick to lapse into the habit of pigeon-holing and reviling men. Those images focus on two salacious gender stereotypes: men as abusers and sexual predators.
The findings from social science research are as consistent as they are incontrovertible: women are just as likely to engage in domestic violence as men, and men suffer one-third of all DV-related injuries. [ www.mediaradar.org/media_fact_sheet.php]
But some marriage advocates blissfully ignore that fact. The webpage of one well-known marriage group, SmartMarriages.com, features a section on domestic violence. The section features a report with the tabloid title, “MEN EXPLODE: A Special Report on Men and Rage.”
Likewise, a report from a major conservative think tank concludes, “Marriage dramatically reduces the risk that mothers will suffer from domestic abuse.” [www.heritage.org/Research/Family/BG1535.cfm]
That statement misleads. A reasonable conclusion would have read, “Marriage dramatically reduces the risk that both mothersand fathers will suffer from domestic abuse.”
Another persistent stereotype is the male as the ever-lurking sexual predator. A quick run to the local mall reveals hordes of scantily-clad young females who are aggressively advertising their sexual charms. But when the subject turns to cohabitation, marriage advocates feel compelled to fall back on the old motif of male aggressors who ravish innocent virgins.
For example, University of Chicago sociologist Linda Waite published an article on “The Negative Effects of Cohabitation.” But the article’s summary mentions only the negative impact on women. Does Dr. Waite really believe that in the case of an unexpected pregnancy, 18 years of child support payments is a mere trifling matter to the dad?
What is more regrettable is that some in the Marriage Movement are openly dismissive of men and fathers.
One such leader has written columns that resemble a radical feminist manifesto more than a thoughtful reflection on how to shore up the faltering family. Another has repeatedly – and incorrectly -- claimed that the main cause of fatherlessness is paternal “abandonment.”
There is no more important cause in America today than strengthening traditional families. And as its advocates are quick to point out, marriage consists of the union of one man and one woman.
But if the Marriage Movement intends to reverse the disquieting trends from the recent Census Bureau report, it will need to start paying attention to the legitimate concerns of single men, husbands, and fathers.
Los Gatos, CA (PRWEB) August 18, 2005 -- Marc H. Rudov, author of The Man’s No-Nonsense Guide to Women: How to Succeed in Romance on Planet Earth TM (ISBN 0974501719), has written a new, groundbreaking article called “Why Men Avoid Commitment.” Rudov wrote this article, available as a bonus to owners of his provocative book, to explain, once and for all, that the anti-male environment in this country is the real reason so many men avoid committing to women. Details about buying Rudov’s book, The Man’s No-Nonsense Guide to Women, and getting his new article are available at http://NoNonsenseDating.com" title="http://NoNonsenseDating.com" target="_blank"http://NoNonsenseDating.com.
"Why Men Avoid Commitment" is a groundbreaking article, like nothing else available. It isn't about the irrational fears of men, as some psychologists claim. And, unlike what some books and articles would have you believe, this article does not attribute men’s commitment avoidance to fears about a loss of masculinity in relationships with women. Finally, it does not accuse men of being hopeless, emotionally stunted cavemen, as the movies and TV shows portray.
According to Author Rudov: “Many women are complaining these days that they can’t find men who will commit to them. They think it’s because men hunt and women nest. They think it’s because men are too immature. That’s total nonsense. These women just don't get it and are blaming the men, as usual. ‘Why Men Avoid Commitment’ authoritatively explains that men shun relationships because they dislike dealing with women's double standards; enduring hostile family courts; facing the Napoleonic, anti-male law-enforcement system; and being engulfed in a feminist-dominated society where male-bashing is socially acceptable. It’s time for society to hit the reset button on its views of men. Continuing in the current direction is taking all of us backwards. The time for change is now.”
Robert A. Fink, MD, FACS, neurosurgeon and founder of California Parents United, had this reaction to “Why Men Avoid Commitment”: “Excellent work. Rudov’s article should be required reading for any man contemplating an intimate relationship with a woman.” And, Ilene L. Dillon, MSW, author, psychotherapist, and coach, had this to say: “Marc Rudov has a very solid argument about the commitment avoidance of today’s man, and he’s articulating something that needs to be said.”
By Carey Roberts August 25, 2005 NewsWithViews.com
I recently came across an article sporting the irresistible title, A Nation of Little Princesses. Author Christopher Healy explores the archetype of the princess, which he asserts “is one of the longest-lived in all of literary history.” [Read]
My first reaction was to think, “Here’s some Neanderthal guy trying to peddle outdated gender stereotypes.” But Healy points to the fact that the Disney Corporation has assembled a Princess brand consisting of eight animated film heroines including Cinderella, Snow White, Pocahontas, Belle of Beauty of the Beast, and others. In 2003 the Princess line racked up an astonishing $2.5 billion in sales, up from a mere $300 million in 2001.
And that’s just for starters. “We’ve gone beyond the dress-up and toys, and begun to look at the brand as a lifestyle, filling out all the other things girls need in life,” according to Mary Beech, Disney’s director of franchise management. Things girls need in life?
Healy, proud dad of a three-year-old girl, notes with an equal mix of astonishment and horror, “The ease and rapidity with which a princess obsession can take hold of a young girl’s psyche is mind-blowing.”
Eventually those little Jennifers and Bethanies grow up, go to college, and enroll in their first Women’s Studies course. There they learn that the kiss by their Prince Charming really represents non-consensual sexual assault, that Belle’s Beast is a closet bodice-ripper, and that the fable of the Princess talking to the Green Frog at the side of the well is an allegory of serial rape.
But the Women’s Studies gurus explain they can still make their dreams of tiaras and sequin-studded dresses come true: “Join the Sisterhood, and we’ll turn you into a real princess!”
According to the feminist fable, women were kept under heel for so many millennia that members of the fairer sex need to play “catch-up.” So now women should be the beneficiaries of an ever-expanding array of legal protections, government programs, commercial products, and lifestyle options. That’s the Victim-Princess Complex.
What princess who has just been betrayed by her Handsome Green Frog could resist that offer?
Before long these Wicked Witches of the North have cast a spell on their Little Pretties. These young women soon graduate from college believing that women are paid less for the same work, that women were routinely excluded from medical research, and a multitude of other tragedies that have befallen womankind. Victimization has become a mainstay of their self-identity.
It’s not just the feminist propaganda mill that endlessly replays the woman-as-victim mantra. Chivalrous men, acting out their fantasies of the White Knight in Shining Armor, are guilty as well.
Pick up a copy of your local newspaper and you will see articles – usually written by male reporters and columnists – that reinforce the notion of the downtrodden female. Accounts of women who are stressed-out, undervalued, and abused form the staple of daily news reporting.
Recently I attended a conference where a speaker blandly made the claim that 60 million women around the world had “disappeared.” He didn’t bother to offer any details or proof. And he certainly didn’t say anything about men who were never heard from again.
I imagine that catering to women’s insecurities makes these men feel gallant and proud. But chivalry is defined as being “considerate and courteous to women.” Slanting and distorting the truth – that’s chicanery, not chivalry.
Yet there’s a downside to the Princess-Victim Complex.
Myrna Blyth, former editor of Ladies Home Journal, reveals how women’s magazines turn female victimization into a hard sell for the latest beauty products or weight control program. Blyth decries how these magazines promote “narcissism as an advanced evolutionary stage of female liberation. Me, me, me, means you’re finally free, free, free.”
But the problem goes beyond self-absorbed narcissism.
In his Nation of Little Princesses article, Christopher Healy quotes a father who observes, “Well, that’s the magic of Disney: It’s addictive. It’s like crack for 5-year-olds.”
So the Victim-Princess Complex begins to resemble a dysfunctional habit in which the negative feelings of being a victim require ever-larger “fixes” for women to feel good about themselves. And those fixes come with a hefty price tag. Princesses “only find true happiness once they’re married off with royal expense accounts,” Healy laments.
These women are undoubtedly the most prosperous, pampered, and protected group in the history of the world. But they would still have you believe that women aren’t getting a fair shake.
What is the truth of feminism? A fairytale come true, or a royal deception that appeals to the most primitive instincts of men and women alike?
Carey Roberts is an analyst and commentator on political correctness. His best-known work was an exposé on Marxism and radical feminism. Mr. Roberts’ work has been cited on the Rush Limbaugh show.
Besides serving as a regular contributor to NewsWithViews.com, he has published in The Washington Times, LewRockwell.com, RenewAmerica.us, ifeminists.net, Men’s News Daily, eco.freedom.org, The Federal Observer, Opinion Editorials, and The Right Report.
Previously, he served on active duty in the Army, was a professor of psychology, and was a citizen-lobbyist in the US Congress. In his spare time he admires Norman Rockwell paintings, collects antiques, and is an avid soccer fan. He now works as an independent researcher and consultant.
Roberts now works as an independent lecturer, writer, and consultant. E-Mail: CareyRoberts@comcast.net
COLUMBUS, Ohio – A newstudy suggests that men and women might not be as far apart in sexual behaviorsas previous research has shown.
In many surveys, men typically report engaging in sexat earlier age, more often, and with more sexual partners than do women.However, a new study shows that some reported gender differences might show up because womendon't always answer surveys honestly, but give answers they believe are expectedof them.
"Women are sensitive to social expectations fortheir sexual behavior and may be less than totally honest when asked abouttheir behavior in some survey conditions," said Terri Fisher, co-author ofthe study and associate professor of psychology at Ohio State University'sMansfield campus.
In this study, the researchers asked men and womenabout their sexual attitudes and behaviors under several different testingconditions – including one in which the participants believed they wereconnected to a lie detector machine.
Women's answerswere closer to men's in some areas of sexual behavior when they thought liescould be detected. Men's answers didn't change as much as did women's underdifferent testing conditions.
"Before thestudy, we thought men would generally overreport their sexual behavior andwomen would underreport it under certain testing conditions," Fisher said."However, we found that women were more likely than men to have differentanswers depending on conditions when they were surveyed."
"Our results may reflect currently shiftinggender roles in which women don't feel as strong a need to meet certainexpectations about their sexual behavior."
Fisher conducted the study with Michele Alexander,assistant professor of psychology at the University of Maine. Their resultsappear in a recent issue of The Journal of Sex Research.
The study involved 201 unmarried, heterosexual collegestudents (96 men and 105 women) between the ages of 18 and 25. All theparticipants completed questionnaires that asked about their sexual attitudes,sexual experience and behavior, and the age at which they first had sexualintercourse.
The participants were split into three groups, basedon the different conditions under which they completed the questionnaires.
In one group, the researchers placed electrodes on theparticipants' hand, forearms and neck and the participants were told they werebeing attached to a polygraph (lie detector) machine. However, the polygraphwas an old model that didn't actually work. Although the participants filledout written questionnaires, they were told the polygraph was sensitive enoughto detect dishonesty even in written responses. The participants were leftalone in a room to answer their questionnaires.
A second group filled out the sex surveys alone in aroom and were told their answers would be completely anonymous.
In the third group, participants were led to believethat the researcher might view their responses and the researcher sat rightoutside the testing room with the door open.
In general, the researchers found that women whothought their answers might be seen by others tended to give answers that weremore socially acceptable than did women who thought they were connected to alie detector.
For example, women who thought their answers might beread reported an average of 2.6 sexual partners. But those who thought theywere monitored by a lie detector reported an average of 4.4 sexual partners.Women who were not attached to the lie detector, but who had privacy duringtesting, gave answers in the middle – an average of 3.4 sexual partners.
Men's answers didn't vary as widely. Men who thoughtthey were attached to a polygraph reported an average of 4.0 sexual partners,compared to 3.7 partners for those who thought their answers might be seen.
"Women appear to feel pressure to adhere to sexrole expectations that indicate women should be more relationship-oriented andshould avoid being seen as promiscuous," Fisher said.
Fisher said it is not entirely surprising that womenchanged their answers more than men.
"We live in a culture that really does expect adifferent pattern of sexual behavior from women than it does from men,"she said.
The study showed more differences between men andwomen in sexual attitudes than in sexual behavior. One reason that the studydidn't show more differences in behavior seems to be because the sexdifferences the researchers sought to explain aren't particularly stronganymore.
"Our results may reflect currently shiftinggender roles in which women don't feel as strong a need to meet certainexpectations about their sexual behavior," Fisher said.
However, the results show there are still genderdifferences and these differences need to be taken into account in a variety ofways, she said.
For example, many of the most widely respected sexsurveys are based on face-to-face interviews with participants. But these typesof interviews may lead women to give answers that they feel are more sociallydesirable, even if they are not completely honest. Having participants completewritten questionnaires anonymously may yield more honest results, Fisher said.
Also, medical professionals need to be aware of howwomen respond to questions about their sexuality.
"Based on these findings, a doctor may need toask female patients about their sexual behavior in different ways than theywould for male patients," she said.
This story has been adaptedfrom a news release issued by Ohio State University.
Feminism against science Steven Goldberg National Review, Nov 18, 1991 v43 n21 p30 (3) Brief Summary: Feminist scholars have attempted in past years to use Margaret Mead's work to justify sex-role reversibility. Even Mead stated repeatedly that men have dominated societies as 'leaders in public affairs and the final authorities at home.' Feminism seeks to impose its own ideological interpretation.
IN 1935, when Margaret Mead published her Sex and Temperament in Three Primitive Societies, the prevailing view was that the basic differences between masculine and feminine behavior was owing to physiological differences. In attempting to correct a view that was nearly as exaggerated as the absurdly environmental explanation of sex differences that infuses the social sciences today, Miss Mead exaggerated the degree to which one of the societies she studied (the Tchambuli) associated what we would call the masculine with women and the feminine with men. Few social scientists bought this view. For example, Jesse Bernard, who would have very much liked to be able to accept Miss Mead's conclusions, pointed out that, if the reader ignored the adjectives, the Tchambuli did not seem very different from other societies. "Effete" headhunters and "comradely" women feeding their children are still male headhunters and women feeding their children, and it is only the adjectives provided by Margaret Mead that even begin to suggest otherwise. In response to such criticism, Miss Mead wrote a famous letter to The American Anthropologist in which she pointed out that Nowhere do I suggest that I have found any material which disproves the existence of sex differences. . . . This study was not concerned with whether there are or are not actual and universal differences between the sexes, either quantitative or qualitative. Over the course of fifty years Miss Mead repeated her denial a hundred times, in response to one or another claim that she had found a society that reversed sex roles; in a review of my The Inevitability of Patriarchy, she wrote: It is true, as Professor Goldberg points out, that all the claims so glibly made about societies ruled by women are non-sense. We have no reason to believe that they ever existed. . . . Men have always been the leaders in public affairs and the final authorities at home. Finally, eight years ago I published--in the American Sociological Association's journal of book reviews, perhaps the most-read journal in sociology--a letter making all of the above points. Now, one would think that all this would be sufficient to preclude even the most ardent environmentalist's invoking Margaret Mead's study as evidence of sex-role reversibility. And yet, a couple of years ago I went to Barnes and Noble and located 38 introductory sociology books published in the few preceding years. Of these 38, 36 began their sex-roles chapters with a discussion of Miss Mead's work on the Tchambuli and how it demonstrates the environmental nature of male and female behavior. It is not clear how many of these 36 knowingly misrepresented the facts and how many were incompetent as much as dishonest (uninformed cribbing from other textbooks is near-standard procedure in introductory-textbook writing). But it is clear why the textbooks misrepresent the evidence. They, like the discipline whose work they represent, have an ideological commitment to denying that masculine and feminine behaviors and emotions are rooted in male and female physiologies and that all social systems conform to the limits imposed by this reality. My point here is merely that no case can be made for Miss Mead's having even claimed to have demonstrated that the Tchambuli refute that explanation. Yet 36 of 38 introductory sociology textbooks state it as truth. Ideology for Truth ONE MIGHT think that this sort of substitution of ideology for truth, while rampant in the social sciences, could not possibly threaten the physical sciences. One would, as Margarita Levin demonstrates so stunningly in a recent American Scholar, be wrong. Mrs. Levin gives examples of accepted scientific findings whose putative male biases are seen by feminists as requiring "reconceptualization": ["Feminist scientists"] see male dominance at work in, for instance, the "master molecule" theory of DNA functioning; in the notion of forces "acting on" objects; in the description of evolution as the result of a "struggle" to survive; in the view that scarcity of resources results in "competition" between animals--in short in any theory positing what they deem destructive, violent, uni-directional, or hierarchical. . . . The idea of dominance is directly linked to the notion of scientific objectivity, which . . . is understood as "distancing oneself" from nature. Let us ignore the fact that, as Mrs. Levin points out, there is an equal number of scientific models that can be viewed as feminine: symbiosis, feedback, catalysis, mutual attraction and the like. Much more destructive to the feminist objection is the fact that these, like all successful scientific conceptions, are held because they accurately explain nature; they demonstrate their correctness by making correct predictions. In other words, they work. Because it is their success that validates accepted scientific explanations, it would not matter even if it were true that (as one feminist claims) our acceptance of the concept of inertial motion is rooted in capitalism's need for the movement of money, or if it were true (as another claims) that the replacement of a Ptolemaic system by a Copernican system was a victory of the masculine over the feminine (because the Ptolemaic earth-centered system is "feminine"). Mrs. Levin asks the question that in one sentence trumps all the volumes of the feminist critics: "Do they think we have a choice?" We don't, of course. We believe in inertial motion because we find that, ceteris paribus, objects in space keep moving along at an unchanging speed and that inertial motion is our best explanation of why. We believe that the earth goes around the sun not because this is the macho way of seeing things, but because the earth does (speaking a bit loosely) go around the sun. Moreover, motives for and functions of a claim are irrelevant to the truthfulness of the claim. Thus, the failure of "feminist science" (and "feminist models") is not that it serves psychological, political and social impulses and purposes. The failure of "feminist science" is that it does nothing more than this; it does not explain anything. If it did, or if it demonstrated a logical flaw or failure of prediction in models invoking inertial motion or heliocentrism or anything else--if it were capable of doing anything that cast doubt on any scientific conclusion--then it would be worth taking seriously. Failing utterly to achieve this, "feminist scientists" attempt to cast doubt on accepted scientific explanations through endless discussions of "male paradigms." Such discussions tend to be potpourris of irrelevant facts and misconceptions that have nothing to do with any empirical question; they fool only the nonscientist, who sees impressive-looking scientific references and incorrectly assumes that these necessarily indicate that the person invoking them knows what he or she is talking about. It is not merely wish and ideology, however that lead feminist science to such muddled thought; there is a tradition, embodied in semiotics, hermeneutics and certain forms of phenomenology that feminist science is reflecting (or perverting, depending on one's assessment of the tradition). This tradition tends to deny that there is such a thing as truth and to see perceived truths as merely shared cultural meanings that could, with proper redefinition, be converted to their opposites. It tends to deny underlying realities that set limits on what may be perceived as truth. Whatever the virtues of this tradition in the humanities, its fallaciousness in the sciences is, or should be, too obvious to mention. Science leaves far less room for differing views of truth: someone who believes that gravity is such that when he lets go of a bowling ball it will float gently upward is simply incorrect, and someone who believes it will fall to earth is correct. This is validated by correct prediction and by the painful, swollen foot that accompanies the incorrect prediction. If Wishes Were Horses ALL OF THIS is as true of social science as of the physical and natural sciences. But it is that former that first, most completely, and most nakedly exhibited the contemporary tendency for ideological wish to replace scientific curiosity. In a few major areas of the social sciences this tendency has gone so far that there is but the barest pretense of scientific objectivity. Truth is measured not by concordance of explanation and reality, but of one social scientist's ideology and that of another. Unlike the blind leading the blind, who are at least trying to follow the right path, the majority of practitioners in some of the subdisciplines of the social sciences do not in the slightest care about truth when wish is to be served. If the majority agree on nonsense, then nonsense is truth. Consider, for example, the fact that, among all the thousands of societies on which we have any sort of evidence, there have never been any Amazonian or matriarchal societies. The hierarchies of all societies have always been dominated by males. Virtually anyone with a scintilla of scientific curiosity responds to this empirical fact by asking, "Why?" An answer that can be powerfully defended sees psycho-physiological differences between the sexes as determinative to male and female behavior and to the unvarying social realities that reflect this behavior. Feminist attempts to explain the universality of patriarchy, unwilling to entertain the possibility that psycho-physiological factors are determinative, invariably display certain features. 1. & nbsp;They are unparsimonious, claiming, for example, that patriarchy is a result of capitalism, an "explanation" that requires different causal factors to explain patriarchy in the thousands of societies--primitive, socialist, and the like--that are not capitalist. 2. & nbsp;They beg the question by giving causal primacy to the socialization of boys and girls. This "explanation" fails to ask the central question: Why does every society's socialization associate dominance behavior with males? To give socialization causal primacy is like saying that men grow facial hair because we tell little boys and girls that facial hair is unfeminine. 3. & nbsp;They attempt to deny the universality of the male dominance tendency and patriarchy by demonstrating that some other behavior or institution is not universally differentiated. This is akin to denying that males are taller on average by demonstrating that the sexes do not differ in knowledge of history. 4. & nbsp;They confuse economic cause with economic function. To see economic factors as the cause of male dominance behavior is like seeing McDonald's need for profits as the cause of the human need to eat. 5. & nbsp;They spend much of their time attacking straw-man arguments that play no role in the explanation we are discussing--for example, sociological explanations of why males and females evolved the way they did. The issue is no how male and female physiologies evolved, but the role of the male and female physiologies that did evolve in determining the differentiated psychologies and behaviors of males and females and the institutions that reflect these. 6. & nbsp;They make the mistake of treating the social environment as an independent variable, thereby failing to explain why the social environment always conforms to limits set by, and takes a direction concordant with, the physiological (i.e., never does environment act as sufficient counterpose to enable a society to avoid male domination of hierarchies). This is easy to explain if one sees the environment as given its limits and direction by the psycho-physiological natures of males and females. Much Talk, No Science MUCH feminist social science is not even bad reasoning about empirical questions, but empty or confused discussion that substitutes terminology for explanation. One would be hard put to find another group that talked so much about science without ever doing any science. There are, of course, many women scientists who do science: but these women never make the arguments made by the "feminist scientists" and acknowledge, in private, to being more than a little embarrassed by them. The strongest impulse of the serious scientist is to eradicate the ignorance that the unanswered question represents. The models that the scientist uses serve this impulse. Because "feminist scientists" feel more strongly the need for a picture of reality concordant with their wishes than a need for a picture concordant with reality, they are incapable of understanding the serious scientist. The history of science is replete with examples of scientists who were impelled by emotional impulse to find one thing, but who were forced by logic and evidence to find another. Where the ideologue is content with the inappropriate model or false explanation as long as it satisfies psychological and political desire, the serious scientist cannot live with the awful gnawing of the explanation that doesn't work. But it is the success of the answers to specific empirical questions, and not the difference of motivation between the scientist and the ideologue, that is crucial to science. For science recognizes that even the most serious of scientists is, like everyone else, vulnerable to nonscientific impulses. This is why science has at its core the mechanism for exposing the relevant manifestations of such impulses. Moreover, it might be the case that, if the majority of scientists were women, the selection of empirical realities to be studied would be different. But even if this is true, it has nothing to do with the corrections of analyses of that which is selected for study. If "feminist science" develops a "feminist model" that helps us to answer some empirical question, or demonstrates the scientific inadequacy of accepted explanations, then it will be, as it should be, taken seriously. It will not need the adjective; it will be science. But as long as "feminist science" is nothing more than a failure to explanations--explanation s that make successful predictions, the test that separates the adults from the children in science--it will be, correctly, dismissed from serious discussion. To this point, "feminist science" has provided nothing more than endless, embarrassingly self-congratulatory discussion of terminology--discussion that neither can explain why traditional terminology permits explanations capable of making accurate predictions nor can itself make accurate predictions. When its explanations manage to avoid refutation by a cursory logical glance, they invoke bogus empirical evidence whose misrepresentation can be exposed by spending ninety seconds with the source invoked. (I have checked well over a hundred claims--never made by the ethnographer who actually studied the society in question--that a specific ethnography describes a nonpatriarchal society; it has never taken over ninety seconds with the invoked ethnography to demonstrate the ludicrousness of the claim. I have never found anyone willing to attempt to back up such a claim once it became clear that I had checked the ethnography that had been invoked.) In any case, no one possessed by even the shadow of a scientific impulse cares in the slightest whether an interesting hypothesis is provided by a man or a woman or a goldfish. What matters is not who makes the claim, but the claim itself and its accord with nature; for the explanation of nature is the only justification for the existence of the claim. Those who follow another imperative while pretending to care about discovering nature's secrets--those whose dishonesty and incompetence have muddled the process that has proved infinitely the best for discovering those secrets--subordinate truth to an a priori image of how they would like truth to be. This is indefensible for the scientist, or, indeed, for anyone who cares about finding out what is true. It replaces curiosity with narcissism and rationalizes the narcissism with a claim of humane purpose. All this is obvious. Nonetheless, there is an astonishing number of scientists who publicly acquiesce in a position that they know should have long ago been laughed out of the university, while telling you in private that they know what they support is jejune nonsense, but that they do so in the service of the good. We used to call this lying http://www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/Peop le/Goldberg/science.html" title="http://www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/Peop le/Goldberg/science.html" target="_blank"http://www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/U...
