Vast amounts of cultural confusion is caused by women’s bullying and competing with each other having plausible deniability baked in, with the consequences always blamed on men. It’s as impressive as a good conjuring trick though!
Men are much more accepting of women and their curves, femininity and maternal nurturing. Women are vicious and degrading to other women. The same feminism that calls you fat will celebrate a man dressed as a woman.
To be fair, Bo linked to his own research on this topic carried out 14 years ago. To then suggest that he has only just 'caught on' is therefore incorrect.
I always assumed it was easier for primitive cultures to carve fat ladies from a chunk of stone than to attempt to carve sylph-like figure, which invariably broke. Or maybe they did manage it but the lithe figures didn't survive to the present day the rough-and-tumble of Stone Age life, being at some point ground into the dust by a raiding party from the next village.
"Many opined that these crude comments and attacks on Hewitt were the inevitable work of patriarchy, of men dominating and humiliating women by holding them to impossible ideals. These patriarchs, we are told, sexualize girls, then scorn them for aging. They dehumanize, reducing the vast subjectivity of a woman to a fleshy body—a mere ornament to be ogled."
BS. It is feminine catiness, but consider this: if she were brown or black, they wouldn't dare dis her. Commercials are full of fat black and brown women selling any manner of products.
Bo I can’t really abide all these binaries you’ve got here: maiden vs matriarch, feminist vs. traditionalist, women vs. men.
We all have an aesthetic duty to ourselves and to others to give an honest effort. And nearly all of us—health permitting—can be lean and strong and have good posture and wear clothes that fit well.
The problem with cosmetic surgery isn’t that it strives for the impossibility of youth but that it is vulgar and self-defeating. A BBL is a low-brow aesthetic monstrosity; a strong backside is a boon to appearance, health, and capability at any age.
When I could walk, I often passed beautiful people of all ages, including lovely older women and slouching teens. Attractiveness is heavily correlated with health, both mental and physical. (A woman who lies about her age or a man who wears lifts has a mental health problem.)
I’d say more vanity is in order not less, so long as our aesthetic sensibilities are in order.
After thinking some more about this article, I realised that I have always disliked the way older women, especially older married women, continue to dress as though they were still 18, single and trying to attract a mate. On seeing them the expression 'mutton dressed as lamb' always springs to mind whereas the expression 'growing old gracefully' somehow never does.
If the article is right, feminism is at least partly to blame for both the falling birthrate (by stigmatising motherhood) and the sexualisation of all women in society, not to mention the abomination of gigantic flabby arses protruding incongruously from tiny thongs on beaches.
The only bit I would have liked to read more about, without making the article so long as to put people off even starting it, would have been to show how, though the patriarchy has allegedly always been with us, the rise of feminism coincided uncannily with the permissive society, increased divorce rates, the low status of motherhood and hulking 40-year-old ladies wearing unbecomingly tiny bikinis.
I wonder if this may come to a grinding halt in a few decades’ time, as more feminist and less conservative and religious women seem to be opting out of the gene pool by not reproducing. Those who have been more preoccupied with their careers or ”looks” than having children will not be as many. In that way, evolution will have come full circle.
Bo I was just talking about the Victorian concept of the angel in the house in a X spaces about the red pill adoption of Peter Wright'' "gynocentrism". I told Wright & Elam yeaes ago that it's more correctly ovocentism but their genuine misogyny won't have it.
A brilliant analysis. Should be seminal reading for all young men and women. This is REAL education. Bravo! Will share as far and wide as I am able (and permitted!)
Great article that has the ring of truth to it that 'the malign patriarchy' doesn't. Unfortunately this idea will probably have the same trajectory as the idea that America isn't racist. The people who only ever read the Guardian and The Nation will continue to blame the patriarchy long after the evidence against such a belief has become overwhelming.
I think the problem is deeper in women's culture than just feminism. When i retired i had a lot of time so i read whatever was laying around at our house. My wife had a pile of "good" Regency romance novels. One characteristic was that many of the women in the books were younger daughters. Often (sometimes?) the would mention an older sister who was claimed to be the most beautiful woman in the ton, a "diamond of the first water". These women were always still young and often had just a single child. Or no child yet. None of the diamonds were grandmothers yet. I think that thread in Regency novels is an indication of a common fear in women that as they mature they are no longer beautiful. Sigh.
Aging absolutely sucks, and no amount of venerating motherhood is going to change that. If anything, we should indict mothers for handing the burden of suffering down to the next generation, which need not be brought into existence.
Vast amounts of cultural confusion is caused by women’s bullying and competing with each other having plausible deniability baked in, with the consequences always blamed on men. It’s as impressive as a good conjuring trick though!
Men are much more accepting of women and their curves, femininity and maternal nurturing. Women are vicious and degrading to other women. The same feminism that calls you fat will celebrate a man dressed as a woman.
Glad you're catching on! https://www.paulawrightdysmemics.com/p/debunking-the-myth-of-the-uks-low
To be fair, Bo linked to his own research on this topic carried out 14 years ago. To then suggest that he has only just 'caught on' is therefore incorrect.
He also linked to me. We've known each other a long time. I know he has a sense of humour;)
Ah, I see. An in-joke. Sorry to have butted in.
Has anyone ever had the theory that early sculptures of "fertility goddesses" like the Venus of Willendorf are actually motherhood sculptures?
That they're intentionally not sexually alluring and celebrate the older women?
I always assumed it was easier for primitive cultures to carve fat ladies from a chunk of stone than to attempt to carve sylph-like figure, which invariably broke. Or maybe they did manage it but the lithe figures didn't survive to the present day the rough-and-tumble of Stone Age life, being at some point ground into the dust by a raiding party from the next village.
They perpetuate/ celebrate fecundity - so, presumably, also reproduction - in a harsh and challenging world.
Bo, your conclusion is spot on.
"Many opined that these crude comments and attacks on Hewitt were the inevitable work of patriarchy, of men dominating and humiliating women by holding them to impossible ideals. These patriarchs, we are told, sexualize girls, then scorn them for aging. They dehumanize, reducing the vast subjectivity of a woman to a fleshy body—a mere ornament to be ogled."
BS. It is feminine catiness, but consider this: if she were brown or black, they wouldn't dare dis her. Commercials are full of fat black and brown women selling any manner of products.
Bo I can’t really abide all these binaries you’ve got here: maiden vs matriarch, feminist vs. traditionalist, women vs. men.
We all have an aesthetic duty to ourselves and to others to give an honest effort. And nearly all of us—health permitting—can be lean and strong and have good posture and wear clothes that fit well.
The problem with cosmetic surgery isn’t that it strives for the impossibility of youth but that it is vulgar and self-defeating. A BBL is a low-brow aesthetic monstrosity; a strong backside is a boon to appearance, health, and capability at any age.
When I could walk, I often passed beautiful people of all ages, including lovely older women and slouching teens. Attractiveness is heavily correlated with health, both mental and physical. (A woman who lies about her age or a man who wears lifts has a mental health problem.)
I’d say more vanity is in order not less, so long as our aesthetic sensibilities are in order.
You can measure it any way you choose but at the end of the day the piano either will or won’t go through the door. In the real world binaries rock.
I get the metaphor, but I don't know what you're meaning to suggest either descriptively or normatively.
Bravo, Dr. Winegard!! I've made this same sort of argument to my feminist relatives, which immediately makes their heads spin and explode...
After thinking some more about this article, I realised that I have always disliked the way older women, especially older married women, continue to dress as though they were still 18, single and trying to attract a mate. On seeing them the expression 'mutton dressed as lamb' always springs to mind whereas the expression 'growing old gracefully' somehow never does.
If the article is right, feminism is at least partly to blame for both the falling birthrate (by stigmatising motherhood) and the sexualisation of all women in society, not to mention the abomination of gigantic flabby arses protruding incongruously from tiny thongs on beaches.
The only bit I would have liked to read more about, without making the article so long as to put people off even starting it, would have been to show how, though the patriarchy has allegedly always been with us, the rise of feminism coincided uncannily with the permissive society, increased divorce rates, the low status of motherhood and hulking 40-year-old ladies wearing unbecomingly tiny bikinis.
I wonder if this may come to a grinding halt in a few decades’ time, as more feminist and less conservative and religious women seem to be opting out of the gene pool by not reproducing. Those who have been more preoccupied with their careers or ”looks” than having children will not be as many. In that way, evolution will have come full circle.
Bo I was just talking about the Victorian concept of the angel in the house in a X spaces about the red pill adoption of Peter Wright'' "gynocentrism". I told Wright & Elam yeaes ago that it's more correctly ovocentism but their genuine misogyny won't have it.
As Frank Wright says - ‘feminism - liberating women from womanhood’.
A brilliant analysis. Should be seminal reading for all young men and women. This is REAL education. Bravo! Will share as far and wide as I am able (and permitted!)
We’ve had the patriarchy for 10,000 years; feminist has only been here for 100. I blame feminism.
Not to mention that terrible cliche, ‘social’ media…. self-hood vs the rampant ‘selfie’, & all that entails.
Great article that has the ring of truth to it that 'the malign patriarchy' doesn't. Unfortunately this idea will probably have the same trajectory as the idea that America isn't racist. The people who only ever read the Guardian and The Nation will continue to blame the patriarchy long after the evidence against such a belief has become overwhelming.
Interesting article. Interesting problem.
I think the problem is deeper in women's culture than just feminism. When i retired i had a lot of time so i read whatever was laying around at our house. My wife had a pile of "good" Regency romance novels. One characteristic was that many of the women in the books were younger daughters. Often (sometimes?) the would mention an older sister who was claimed to be the most beautiful woman in the ton, a "diamond of the first water". These women were always still young and often had just a single child. Or no child yet. None of the diamonds were grandmothers yet. I think that thread in Regency novels is an indication of a common fear in women that as they mature they are no longer beautiful. Sigh.
Aging absolutely sucks, and no amount of venerating motherhood is going to change that. If anything, we should indict mothers for handing the burden of suffering down to the next generation, which need not be brought into existence.
Anti-natalism is death cult
Life is a death cult. Nobody gets out of here alive. Anti-natalists don’t create any new people, so we don’t impose death on anyone.