Feminist thought is at its root much more problematic than its ostensible profession and popular obfuscation often make it appear in biased battles of the “genders”. One such problem, fundamental to all faithless modernism, is an illicit elevation of the value of autonomy as a consequence of skepticism and rationalism. In the
third chapter of
Women and Decadence, John Flynn describes a certain underlying relativism in feminism, due primarily to one of its correlations with liberalism – itself a flawed ideology which wrongly and arbitrarily identifies choice (will) above truth (intellect), but I digress.
The philosophical basis of liberalism may be understood as a rational lack of complete assurance concerning knowledge and values. This forestalls the imagining of utopias. This lack of certainty breeds a sometimes reluctant tolerance of the beliefs and actions of others but in turn hinders any desire to make others conform to absolutist ideals. In political terms the absence of a monopoly on truth and goodness merely requires a mutual recognition of the fact.
The exponents of liberal feminism are thus seen as somewhat self-consciously part of historical development insofar as they tend not to make absolutist claims and judgements. . .
Relativism, mind you, is not a theory that has a history of getting along well with religions which dare to dogmatically declare absolute truths. In the end, I find it increasingly difficult to see liberalism as anything short of anti-Catholic once thoroughly maintained; and feminism at its best is simply an outgrowth of the egalitarianism typically drawn from liberal presuppositions. But that’s only the rough beginning of its underestimated danger. We’re all constantly inhaling the artificial air of modernism, so usually it’s tough for us to become aware of the radical extent to which it influences our overlooked cultural assumptions. Still, the all-too-familiar reasons for hesitating to throw out every form of feminism to ever exist can be found and perhaps at least questioned, if one searches enough, that is.
And so I’ve taken the trouble upon myself to gather but a few introductory summaries of more traditional thought on the subject for your reading pleasure. Mark Richardson’s e-book on liberal orthodoxy, following a warranted critique of egalitarian autonomy theories which seek to blur or abolish sexual difference in favor of total self-determination, has a short chapter with a basic defense of obligatory
sex distinctions (under the section aptly labelled “In defence of sex distinctions”).
Sex distinctions are important to our identity and our sexuality. Therefore, it won’t be easy for anyone to live consistently by a liberal politics. Most people will be forced to resort to what the American political writer, Lawrence Auster, has termed unprincipled exceptions.
What this means is that liberals will call in public for sex distinctions to be abolished, whilst finding in their own private lives that sex distinctions continue to matter. They will therefore make exceptions in their own private lives to the liberal principle, according to their own comfort level, without admitting to themselves or others that they are doing so.
Jim Kalb’s basic
FAQ on sexual morality responds to an inevitable objection.
What about gays, women caught in loveless marriages, and others for whom traditional sexual morality doesn’t work?
What about those for whom any system of things doesn’t work? What about large muscular men with vehement appetites, minimal intelligence, and violent tempers who find the restraints imposed by modern criminal law unbearable and would have been happier as Visigoths? What about people with an intense psychological need for uniformity, stability and discipline who find that for them the multicultural capitalist consumer society doesn’t work? Such people don’t write books that get favorable reviews in mainstream publications, but they exist and suffer.
. . . All social institutions that deal with fundamental matters seem oppressive to those who for whatever reason have come to think they shouldn’t have to comply with them. The economic system requires us on pain of poverty to get up and go to work every day, sacrificing the best hours of our lives to the requirements of other people. The legal system demands that we deny what seems our own nature by restraining our impulses, and the political system can require us to sacrifice our very lives in its defense. Since we are social beings, the normal response to such necessities is to bring children up to accept the demands that must be met, to view meeting them as part of what it is to be a good person, and to show only very limited tolerance toward those who refuse to comply. It’s unclear why the response in the case of sex should be different. No system pleases everyone; the point is to have a system that works tolerably well as a general thing, and in particular one that deals adequately with such utterly fundamental issues as the relation between the sexes and the care and education of children. Once such a system exists it may be possible to find piecemeal ways of mitigating burdens in special situations, but it’s absurd to make such things the center of attention.
Overall, though arguing in a bit of a different direction, Roger Scruton, a near perfect example of the prototypical gentleman and scholar himself (with the perfection being Portrait), probably explains it best in an article entitled
“Modern Manhood”.
The [newfound] unhappiness of men flows directly from the collapse of their old social role as protectors and providers. For the feminists, this old social role was a way of confining women to the household, where they would not compete for the benefits available outside. Its destruction, they contend, is therefore a liberation—not of women only, but of men, too, who can now choose whether they wish to assert themselves in the public sphere or whether, on the contrary, they wish to stay at home with the baby. . . This is the core idea of feminism—that “gender roles” are not natural but cultural, and that by changing them we can overthrow old power structures and achieve new and more creative ways of being.
Scruton later concludes:
We should see them, rather, as revelations of the moral sense. They are the sign that there really is a difference between the masculine and the feminine, over and above the difference between the male and the female. Without the masculine and the feminine, indeed, sex loses its meaning. Gender is not just possible, but necessary.
And here, surely, lies our hope for the future. When women forge their own “gender identity,” in the way the feminists recommend, they become unattractive to men—or attractive only as sex objects, not as individual persons. And when men cease to be gentlemen, they become unattractive to women. Sexual companionship then goes from the world. All that it needs to save young people from this predicament is for old-fashioned moralists to steal unobserved past their feminist guardians and whisper the truth into eager and astonished ears—the truth that gender is indeed a construct, but one that involves both sexes, acting in mutual support, if it is to be built successfully. In my experience, young people hear with great sighs of relief that the sexual revolution may have been a mistake, that women are allowed to be modest, and that men can make a shot at being gentlemen.
Ridicule me as a raving sexist if you like, but I mostly disparage feminism because it killed chivalry, thereby rendering my inner-romantic a burdensome saboteur whom must persistently be slain with cold instruments of sharpened Reason. Sure, I may pretend in public that it’s the widespread toxicity to traditional Western culture that bothers me, or even perhaps the suffocating intolerance of civilized Christianity, but that’s merely a front for personal weakness at the end of the day. I mean – c’mon – these days, if you’re not extremely careful, exposed vulnerability can and will be exploited by rivals, male or female. It’s every man for himself out there. Gotta establish position in the intersexual competition.
:shrug: My mother says it’s because I’ve never been in love.
). What about men who don’t marry and don’t become religous? Do you have similar words for them?