While wandering around on the internet yesterday, I came across an article by Suzanne Venker on FoxNews, via Gin and Tacos. The title of the article was “Men – The New Second Class Citizens”.
Mother of God. This calls for an FJM, to ensure that this stupidity is exposed and deconstructed before it spreads.
As I mentioned, this article comes via Ed at Gin and Tacos, who already took a swipe at it. I highly recommend you read it, as it’s very funny.
For those of you that have a fetish for bleeding eyeballs, the original article can be viewed here.
So, without further delay, let’s begin.
In November of last year, I wrote an article for Fox News called The War on Men (which I subsequently expanded to an eBook
). To keep it pithy, in the piece I focused on one effect of this war: the lack of marriageable men. But there’s so much more to it. The truth is, men have become second-class citizens.
Oh God. What have I done?
The most obvious proof is male bashing in the media. It is rampant and irrefutable. From sit-coms and commercials that portray dad as an idiot to biased news reports about the state of American men, males are pounced on left and right. And that’s just the beginning.
Well, it wouldn’t be a FoxNews article without someone complaining about “biased news reports” and Hollywood.
The war on men actually begins in grade school, where boys are at a distinct disadvantage. Not only are curriculums centered on girls’, rather than boys,’ interests, the emphasis in these grades is on sitting still at a desk.
Admittedly, it has been about twenty years or so since I was in grade school, but as I recall the curriculum was centered on science, math, social studies, and English. Depending on your school district, some art, music, and physical education as well. Not exactly a whole lot of gender bias there. Also, “sitting still at a desk” is the foundation of the modern American white-collar worker’s skill set. How are we supposed to compete with China and India if we don’t get our workers sitting still early?
Plus, many schools have eliminated recess. Such an environment is unhealthy for boys, for they are active by nature and need to run around. And when they can’t sit still teachers and administrators often wrongly attribute their restlessness to ADD or ADHD. The message is clear: boys are just unruly girls.
While it’s true that many schools have eliminated recess, it’s important to know why. For example, a significantly increased emphasis on standardized testing, championed by a certain recent former Republican President who shall not be named. Also, significantly reduced school funding resulting in less teachers and aides to supervise large numbers of children.
As for teachers and administrators attributing a small child’s restlessness to ADD or ADHD, as long as they’re not also prescribing them mass quantities of mood altering drugs, they can attribute it to witchcraft for all I care. That should be left up to a medical professional. Who can then prescribe them mass quantities of mood altering drugs.
Things are no better in college. There, young men face the perils of Title IX, the 1972 law designed to ban sex discrimination in all educational programs.
It just wouldn’t be a Fox News article on gender without Title IX, would it? Let’s see if Suzanne understands how Title IX works any better than her peers, shall we?
Under Title IX, the ratio of female athletes is supposed to match the ratio of female students. So if not enough women sign up for, say, wrestling and ice hockey, well then: no more wrestling and ice hockey.
To quote Kevin Spacey in Superman Returns, “WRONG!” Venker’s suggestion is that if you issue, say, 85 D1 Football Scholarships to men, you must also issue 85 D1 Football Scholarships to women, despite the fact that there is no such thing as D1 Women’s Football, or cancel your D1 Football Program.
Now let’s take a look at what the Department of Health and Human Services’ three prong test for Title IX compliance actually says:
- Providing athletic participation opportunities that are substantially proportionate to the student enrollment. This prong of the test is satisfied when participation opportunities for men and women are “substantially proportionate” to their respective undergraduate enrollment.
- Demonstrating a continual expansion of athletic opportunities for the underrepresented sex. This prong of the test is satisfied when an institution has a history and continuing practice of program expansion that is responsive to the developing interests and abilities of the underrepresented sex (typically female).
- Accommodating the interest and ability of underrepresented sex. This prong of the test is satisfied when an institution is meeting the interests and abilities of its female students even where there are disproportionately fewer females than males participating in sports.
It’s also worth noting that the example Suzanne uses makes no sense. If not enough people, regardless of gender, sign up for a given sport or club, then you can’t really play, now can you?
What was once viewed equal opportunity for women has become something else altogether: a demand for equal outcomes. Those are not the same thing at all.
Nope. Last time I checked, still about equal opportunity.
Title IX is also abused when it comes to sex. In 1977, a group of women at Yale used Title IX to claim sexual harassment and violence constitute discrimination against women.
Well then, screw them for thinking that sexual harassment and violence constitute discrimination against women! God forbid we live in a society in which a woman’s right to not be harassed or attacked and her bodily integrity is respected.
Please note: the above is weapons-grade sarcasm.
Genuine harassment and violence should be punishable offenses, obviously. But the college campus is a breeding ground for sexual activity, which makes determining wrongdoing (and using Title IX to prove it) extremely difficult. Sexual misconduct does not necessarily constitute harassment—and women have as much of a role to play as men do.
And now we’re on to slut-shaming. I’m just curious how many right-wing tropes we’re going to end up with by the time we’re done. I need to make a BINGO card for these.
You know, it’s kind of amazing; I managed to get through four years of college without ever being accused of sexual misconduct. I guess I must have been one of the lucky ones.
Here again men are in an impossible situation, for there’s an unspoken commandment when it comes to sex in America: thou shalt never blame the woman. If you’re a man who’s sexually involved with a woman and something goes wrong, it’s your fault. Simple as that.
Unless the woman you’re sexually involved with is capable of parthenogenesis, or you’re a sea horse, as a man it is, in fact, all your fault.
Judith E. Grossman shed light on this phenomenon in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed. A former feminist, Grossman concedes that in the past she would have expressed “unqualified support” for policies such as Title IX. But that was before her son was charged with “nonconsensual sex” by a former girlfriend.
“Title IX has obliterated the presumption of innocence that is so foundational to our traditions of justice. On today’s college campuses, neither “beyond a reasonable doubt,” nor even the lesser “by clear and convincing evidence” standard of proof, is required to establish guilt of sexual misconduct,” she writes.
A helpful tip: don’t engage in nonconsensual sex. It tends to reduce the frequency by which you are accused of having nonconsensual sex.
Last time I checked, a college “tribunal” is not a court of law, and as a private institution can set whatever standard of evidence they wish.
When men become husbands and fathers, things get really bad. In family courts throughout America, men are routinely stripped of their rights and due process. The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) is easily used against them since its definition of violence is so broad that virtually any conflict between partners can be considered abuse.
And now we’ve wandered into Reddit’s Men’s Rights board territory.
“If a woman gets angry for any reason, she can simply accuse a man and men are just assumed guilty in our society,” notes Dr. Helen Smith, author of the new book, “Men on Strike.” This is particularly heinous since, as Smith adds, violence in domestic relations “is almost 50% from men and 50% from women.”
While there is some truth to the latter statement, as always there isn’t nearly enough evidence presented. Although domestic violence rates in terms of “who hit first” are roughly equal, woman are significantly more likely to be injured, hospitalized, or killed in domestic conflicts than men. So, generally speaking, society has a vested interest in treating instances of domestic violence with a male aggressor more seriously than with a female aggressor, as the latter is significantly more likely to end in serious injury or death.
Of course, actually getting someone charged with domestic violence is exceedingly difficult, so there’s that.
Shocked? If so, that’s in part because the media don’t believe men can be victims of domestic violence—so they don’t report it. They would rather feed off stories that paint women as victims. And in so doing, they’ve convinced America there’s a war on women.
As I’ve just demonstrated, women are significantly more likely to be victims. Also, I don’t think the media has “convinced” America there’s a war on women. By any objective measure of success, only convincing half the country that there’s a war on women (provided you assume that anyone that votes Democrat is aware there’s a war on women, which is a HUGE stretch), given the preponderance of evidence in support of such a claim, is an unmitigated failure.
Yet it is males who suffer in our society. From boyhood through adulthood, the White American Male must fight his way through a litany of taunts, assumptions and grievances about his very existence. His oppression is unlike anything American women have faced. Unlike women, however, men don’t organize and form groups when they’ve been persecuted. They just bow out of the game.
This is my favorite paragraph in the whole damn article. Primarily because it’s the last full one, but mainly because the underlying thesis is laid bare.
Please note that up until now, we’ve been discussing men in general. No mention of race, up until now. Suddenly, all of this is about the White American Male. As we’ve all seen in the last few days, Black American Males have absolutely nothing to worry about. You know, other than potentially being killed for being a black man in America.
It’s ironic in that Venker’s closing argument basically refutes her entire premise. “His oppression is unlike anything American women have faced.” This is absolutely true. The White American Male has never faced anything like the oppression faced by women of every color, or even men of any other color. The White American Male is the most privileged socio-racial group in the history of mankind. Moreover, white men predominantly control the levers of power in this country, from the CEOs of multi-billion dollar corporations to the halls of Congress. Only now, for the first time in the two hundred plus year history of the United States, is there someone other than a white man in the White House.
America needs to wake up. We have swung the pendulum too far in the other direction—from a man’s world to a woman’s world.
That’s not equality. That’s revenge.
When the world is controlled entirely by women, I will yield that perhaps we have gone too far. But, considering how ingrained the patriarchy is, both in the Western world and everywhere else, it is exceedingly hard to imagine that happening any time soon, if ever.
And now for the big reveal: Suzanne Venker is Phyllis Schlafly’s niece. Raise your hand if that surprises you at all.
Yeah, didn’t think so.
