What Helen Andrews' critics get wrong
The feminization of institutions is a real concern.
Written by Bo Winegard.
In a piece criticising Helen Andrews’ recent article contending that feminization is degrading institutions like academia and the law, David French made the following argument.1
Consider this remarkable assertion: “Cancel culture is simply what women do whenever there are enough of them in a given organization or field.” How can that claim survive even the most cursory historical analysis? Countless male-led revolutionary and radical movements have featured denunciations and purges, secret informants and struggle sessions.
It was not squadrons of women who guillotined dissenters during the French Revolution.
Even in the present day, the MAGA movement engages in cancel culture with remarkable vigor. And those cancellations are intended to protect the feelings — yes, the feelings — of the men on the right.
This is true enough, if a bit polemical. Just because men can create liberal, truth-seeking institutions does not mean that they will. History is replete with examples of male coalitions that crushed dissent and enthroned delusion, their convictions as fanatical and self-deceived as any the modern academy could devise.
What history is not replete with, however, are examples of female coalitions devoted to truth or impartial justice.2 Men can create such institutions; women cannot.3
