RadixJournal - Bowden! - 7 - The Feminist Mystique

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Vanguard, a podcast of radical traditionalism.

00:00:24.560 Here's your host, Richard Spencer.

00:00:27.380 Hello, everyone. Today, it's great to welcome back to the program our friend and contributor, Jonathan Bowden.

00:00:36.500 Jonathan, thanks for being back with us. How are things over on your side of the Atlantic?

00:00:41.700 Yeah, it's a bit frigid, a bit cold these days, but probably nothing to what it's like on your side, but otherwise well.

00:00:48.500 Excellent. Today, we are going to talk about another big and important issue for our movement, and that is feminism. 0.95

00:00:58.200 It's obviously an issue of major importance for the world as well.

00:01:03.020 Jonathan, what makes feminism so complicated and interesting is that it's had all of these various waves, as they call them, 1.00

00:01:15.600 and they've often put forward contradictory philosophies and objectives, but maybe that's what's made feminism so long-lasting and powerful in a way. 0.97

00:01:27.260 But to get the conversation started, just talk about that initial impulse towards feminism, where that was coming from, where do you think it cropped up first? 0.97

00:01:43.660 What was kind of the first, first wave, so to speak, of feminism? 1.00

00:01:47.760 Do you think this was with women's suffrage, or was it with some of the many liberal revolutions that occurred in Europe over the course of the 19th century?

00:01:58.220 Where do you think that original urge came from?

00:02:02.920 Yes, that's a complicated and quite a difficult one.

00:02:06.820 I mean, textually, it goes back to Mary Wollstonecraft's The Rights and Wrongs of Women,

00:02:11.400 and, you know, Rights of Women, as against Tom Paine's Rights of Man, produced in a similar time frame at the beginning of the 19th century,

00:02:20.780 sort of coming out of the latter end of the 18th century.

00:02:24.180 And she was part of a radical sort of ferment of opinion around William Godwin and his extended family into which she was intermarried.

00:02:34.260 But the political drift of feminism in its first wave that's discernible has to be in and around the Great War, 1914 to 1918 in Europe,

00:02:48.880 and just after, where you have a militant movement for women's suffrage, concentrating on the vote, but often extending out into other areas.

00:02:57.540 And you have that split into two wings between those who will pursue purely non-violent means,

00:03:04.640 who've been largely forgotten by history, the suffragists, and those that were prepared to use direct action and indeed even violence to get their way,

00:03:13.620 the suffragettes, who are the ones that history remembers.

00:03:17.200 They're the ones who were force-fed in prison.

00:03:19.760 They're the ones who chained themselves to railings.

00:03:22.520 They're the ones who are saucy police officers.

00:03:24.780 They're the ones who threw themselves in front of derby winners and were trampled to death on newsreels at the time,

00:03:31.660 to great and extended excitement and social convulsion.

00:03:36.080 So that was the first real sort of wave, which then fed into the swinging 1920s,

00:03:44.380 as Europe and the West relaxed into a hedonistic decade after the slaughter of the Great War and prior to the coming Depression of the 30s.

00:03:53.160 Second wave feminism, as it's so-called, is correlative to the 60s and sort of has a whole new generation, 1.00

00:04:03.560 skipping out several generations in actual fact, between the first and the second waves.

00:04:08.860 The second wave is notorious for its theorists and its polemics,

00:04:13.360 and it's going outside the box of what is understood to be political and looking at all areas of life,

00:04:21.820 often in a rather caustic and adversarial way.

00:04:25.780 Culturally, the second wave, you could argue, had far more impact than the first wave,

00:04:30.280 but they wouldn't have amounted to anything without the first wave.

00:04:34.180 And the first wave did genuinely convulse the society,

00:04:39.440 because nothing divided opinion, like the issue of whether women should get the vote,

00:04:45.460 because it was axiomatic of all sorts of other matters in the society.

00:04:50.200 By giving them the vote, it indicated that women could do almost all jobs that men could do up to a point. 0.90

00:04:59.020 And it opened the professions to them, it opened the universities to them,

00:05:03.520 it opened higher education institutions to them,

00:05:07.320 it opened a world of politics and political representation to them, not just voting.

00:05:12.560 And so, in a way, it changed the world,

00:05:16.080 and that's why the sort of dynamite of the vote was used.

00:05:21.800 What do you think was the reigning philosophy of the early suffragists and suffragettes?

00:05:29.840 Was it a liberal one?

00:05:32.380 Do you think it could be connected with some of the early social democratic and kind of Marxian movements?

00:05:39.960 What do you think about that?

00:05:43.180 Well, I think the honest answer is yes and no.

00:05:46.100 The truth is that female politics resembles male politics pretty closely, 1.00

00:05:51.640 in that there's a range of opinion, right, left, and center,

00:05:56.420 as what surprised many suffragists when women got the vote, particularly bourgeois women, 0.66

00:06:02.640 is they voted pretty much along the same lines that men did,

00:06:05.920 and were perceived to have the same social and economic interests that men did.

00:06:10.320 But there have been times when the gender gap has been one way and then the other.

00:06:17.780 For example, today, in the Western world, which is quite clearly Anglo-Saxon, the Anglophone world, 0.52

00:06:25.520 there seems to be a marked preference for center-left parties amongst women,

00:06:29.800 as against center-right parties amongst men,

00:06:32.880 and that drift and gap is quite discernible.

00:06:36.020 But there have been times where women have been much more conservative than men,

00:06:39.140 and on certain issues women remain a lot more conservative than men.

00:06:44.680 On law and order issues in the 50s, 60s, 70s,

00:06:49.320 women often had much more conservative attitudes than men.

00:06:54.460 And so it's debatable in a way.

00:06:59.040 Certainly, a large number of bourgeois supporters of female suffrage just wanted the vote as a coping stone, really,

00:07:09.760 as a sort of seal of approval for their admission into social life.

00:07:14.380 And once that happened, they reverted to essentially a conservative tradition.

00:07:20.460 Some of the first women to be elected, of course, into parliaments were on the conservative side, 0.72

00:07:25.220 because it was inevitable that women from a very bourgeois background would be the best-educated women 0.99

00:07:31.040 and would be the women who wanted in some ways to protect the status quo, 1.00

00:07:36.360 and all that the suffrage did for them was allow them to do so.

00:07:39.800 In the past, they would have done that through men, really.

00:07:42.660 Then they had a chance to do it on their own behalf.

00:07:46.400 It is true that the vanguard movements were associated, for the most part,

00:07:52.680 with liberal and with social-democratic causes and with the culture of the left, generally speaking.

00:08:00.000 That's because it was seen to be an out-of-left-field movement.

00:08:02.980 It was seen to be a movement for radical change,

00:08:05.960 and it inevitably adhered to the left rather than the right.

00:08:09.040 Yeah, just to add on to what you were talking about earlier,

00:08:13.640 a good friend of mine often will tell a powerful anecdote about female voting.

00:08:21.360 And if you'll forgive me, I'm forgetting some of the details,

00:08:24.400 but as with anecdotes, it's kind of the essence of it is what matters.

00:08:29.740 And that is, there was a revolutionary parliament in France,

00:08:33.520 and they were actually bringing up the question of whether women should vote.

00:08:39.780 And actually, the people who most vigorously opposed it were the far left of the parliament.

00:08:46.320 And those who supported it with greatest passion were actually what we'd call the right,

00:08:50.840 and even the clerical right.

00:08:52.900 And the reason for this was that,

00:08:56.720 and I think in some ways both were rationally correct

00:09:02.020 to hold those viewpoints,

00:09:03.640 and the reason was that,

00:09:04.720 was that women, if given the chance to vote, 0.99

00:09:07.660 would most likely vote the way that their priests told them to vote,

00:09:12.120 and that women in this sense were a kind of force of conservatism, 1.00

00:09:15.880 that they would maintain the existing religious and aristocratic order.

00:09:22.360 The far left didn't really want women to vote in this way. 1.00

00:09:25.960 But, of course, now in our time,

00:09:28.920 it seems like if we want to think about,

00:09:33.120 particularly in America,

00:09:34.280 what we discussed a little bit last time of this idea of the majority strategy,

00:09:39.180 where you have the large white majority,

00:09:41.240 and it's being dispossessed and attacked by a large rainbow coalition.

00:09:47.500 The women are kind of the, 1.00

00:09:49.380 how do I say, 0.98

00:09:50.540 traitors or kind of a wedge in this,

00:09:53.460 that the women,

00:09:55.100 for whatever reason,

00:09:57.180 maybe purely out of sentimentality,

00:10:00.220 want to vote for center-left parties,

00:10:03.320 the parties that push the buttons about,

00:10:05.760 you know,

00:10:06.040 taking care of the children or whatever,

00:10:09.140 and that they are kind of on the wrong side

00:10:13.000 of the dispossession of America's white historic majority.

00:10:17.840 So, you know,

00:10:19.500 it's a,

00:10:19.960 it's again,

00:10:20.540 it's a very complicated issue,

00:10:22.340 and the social manifestations of women's suffrage can,

00:10:29.380 can,

00:10:29.900 you know,

00:10:31.140 occur in quite different ways.

00:10:33.700 Let me,

00:10:34.380 let me also ask another question about this.

00:10:36.660 You know,

00:10:36.960 in some ways,

00:10:37.700 I want to move on to second wave feminism, 1.00

00:10:40.160 because that's,

00:10:41.360 you can find at least tracks that are more obnoxious,

00:10:46.260 extreme,

00:10:46.820 and things like this.

00:10:48.180 But I want to stick a, 1.00

00:10:49.640 for just for a little bit longer to pre-World War II feminism. 1.00

00:10:55.640 And I'm thinking of someone like Margaret Sanger.

00:10:58.300 And she's in many ways a fascinating individual.

00:11:01.820 She's,

00:11:02.080 she's probably,

00:11:02.840 nowadays,

00:11:03.980 she's looked upon as,

00:11:05.320 by many liberals,

00:11:06.060 as a,

00:11:06.840 as a wonderful,

00:11:08.120 heroic,

00:11:09.320 right-thinking woman,

00:11:10.180 who,

00:11:10.860 was fighting for the rights of women to use contraception,

00:11:15.300 and women's rights in general. 1.00

00:11:17.480 But then we,

00:11:18.200 if you take a little closer look,

00:11:19.620 and you peel away a few layers of the onion,

00:11:21.900 you find that she was a eugenicist of sorts,

00:11:26.700 that she was afraid of,

00:11:29.360 of the feeble-minded and weak and so on and so forth, 0.97

00:11:34.920 overwhelming the healthier stock of America,

00:11:38.700 and that in a democracy,

00:11:40.460 something like that would be truly terrible,

00:11:43.420 terrible consequences.

00:11:44.520 She,

00:11:44.660 she actually was,

00:11:45.780 she would kind of flirt with people like Lothrop Stoddard and Madison Grant,

00:11:50.180 people who are,

00:11:51.720 now would be considered,

00:11:53.520 you know,

00:11:53.920 totally beyond the pale, 0.83

00:11:56.520 fascist, 0.98

00:11:58.000 racialist types. 0.77

00:11:59.800 So,

00:12:00.380 you know,

00:12:00.740 when,

00:12:01.440 maybe,

00:12:02.800 in some of these first waves of feminism, 1.00

00:12:06.140 that we might think we know what it's all about,

00:12:09.440 if we,

00:12:10.080 if we see it through the lens of modern left-right politics,

00:12:13.260 so to speak.

00:12:13.820 But actually,

00:12:14.500 it's something quite different.

00:12:17.240 Do you have any thoughts on that?

00:12:18.320 Some of the,

00:12:18.900 the different strands of first wave feminism and how,

00:12:23.700 how they're kind of surprising when you look at them from our standpoint.

00:12:28.520 Yes,

00:12:29.060 I think that's very true.

00:12:30.160 I think first wave feminism can't be divorced from the past backgrounds of 1.00

00:12:35.400 most of the women who advocated these positions, 0.97

00:12:37.460 although there's been a careful pick and mix of the women concerned so that

00:12:43.100 they seem part of a progressive continuum.

00:12:46.420 There are many contradictions.

00:12:48.320 It's inevitable that these ultra bourgeois women, 1.00

00:12:55.560 for the most part,

00:12:56.860 will often have radically sort of conservative values.

00:13:02.100 And a few of them will have cross fertilized left,

00:13:06.320 right values,

00:13:08.000 and elitist values at that,

00:13:10.660 despite the fact that they're in favor of doing the vote for themselves.

00:13:13.500 And this means that they're not in the favor of the vote for others.

00:13:18.680 It also shouldn't surprise us that,

00:13:20.620 when a lot of female literature is published sort of in the late 19th, 0.87

00:13:28.540 20th century,

00:13:29.500 in a sense,

00:13:30.000 sort of elite literature,

00:13:31.460 it turns out not to be left wing,

00:13:33.240 particularly.

00:13:34.500 A lot of feminist publishing houses have been used by the fact that a lot of the 1.00

00:13:38.240 literature they publish in the early days isn't really at all progressive,

00:13:41.920 progressive in their own terms and in the left terms.

00:13:46.500 That's because the women who wrote it came from upper class backgrounds. 1.00

00:13:50.980 They were the women who were educated at the elite university level in all female colleges 0.99

00:13:55.280 during that era.

00:13:56.340 And their values and what they produced reflect that.

00:14:01.140 You also have a marked partiality for forms of ultra-conservatism amongst certain early female champions.

00:14:10.620 And it's not for nothing that some of the political leaders who emerge first from the dispensation

00:14:16.580 that it gives women the vote turn out to be on the right rather than the left. 1.00

00:14:20.680 Over the time,

00:14:23.840 eugenics and feminism have almost completely separated out.

00:14:27.700 But because feminism is concerned with biological and reproductive health 1.00

00:14:32.620 and wanted to give women control of it, 0.88

00:14:35.540 abortion, of course, 0.70

00:14:36.620 cuts two ways.

00:14:38.920 And although an asthma to the Christian right,

00:14:41.580 abortion does feed into a eugenic agenda.

00:14:45.000 Indeed,

00:14:45.460 without some concept of abortion,

00:14:47.320 you couldn't have eugenics in a meaningful sense.

00:14:50.680 Because how are you to act to prevent these people that certain eugenicists believe

00:14:55.160 shouldn't be born or encouraged from being born in the first place?

00:14:59.220 So there's an inevitable correlation between certain socio-biological and Darwinian ideas

00:15:05.580 and certain evolutionary ideas and feminism of a particular sort,

00:15:11.720 particularly as of the unideological feminism.

00:15:14.220 So it's inevitable that the sort of Mary Stokes wing of the movement will come out of eugenics. 0.95

00:15:25.340 And the family planning and abortion and pro-choice movements are all deeply mired in feminism on the one hand 0.85

00:15:34.300 and eugenics on the other.

00:15:35.760 Yes.

00:15:36.760 Yes.

00:15:37.680 Actually, the religious right in the United States,

00:15:40.500 and I assume in Europe as well,

00:15:41.760 have picked up on this.

00:15:43.580 And they'll usually make inflated claims of,

00:15:48.880 you know,

00:15:49.420 abortionists. 0.96

00:15:50.580 They really want to rid the world of Africans or something like that, 1.00

00:15:55.100 or, you know, 0.91

00:15:55.460 connect Margaret Sanger with Hitler and,

00:15:57.500 you know,

00:15:58.860 various things like that.

00:16:00.140 But obviously this kind of rhetoric is overdone,

00:16:04.580 but it might actually have a kernel of truth to it.

00:16:09.040 But it also points out the egalitarian nature of the so-called religious right in the country.

00:16:17.880 Let's move on to the second wave of feminism and the 1960s. 1.00

00:16:24.940 And I would say that,

00:16:26.100 you know,

00:16:26.460 if you talk to an average Joe in the U.S.

00:16:29.820 or Europe,

00:16:31.100 who's maybe a conservative thinking guy,

00:16:34.720 pretty normal,

00:16:35.680 good instincts,

00:16:36.800 he probably thinks that,

00:16:39.640 when you say the word feminism, 1.00

00:16:41.180 he probably thinks of some woman who's,

00:16:43.280 you know,

00:16:43.960 tattooed and maybe earringed and has totally outrageous views and hates men and was probably,

00:16:51.780 you know, 0.98

00:16:52.000 got dumped when she was at the prom or the dance or something and became a lesbian and just has, 0.76

00:16:59.760 you know,

00:16:59.960 has,

00:17:00.340 is driven purely by resentment.

00:17:02.880 And he probably has a,

00:17:04.900 that kind of man-hating feminist stereotype in his mind. 1.00

00:17:09.880 And in some ways,

00:17:10.940 a lot of that is associated with that second wave of feminism that came with the new left, 0.92

00:17:17.220 that came with the 68 revolutions and so on and so forth.

00:17:20.500 And in the U.S. and Europe.

00:17:23.080 So maybe,

00:17:23.680 Jonathan,

00:17:23.960 maybe you can give us an introduction to this movement.

00:17:27.840 And it's obviously quite different.

00:17:30.000 It has a different vibe,

00:17:32.640 so to speak,

00:17:33.180 to it.

00:17:33.660 And it probably has a different philosophical grounding as well.

00:17:36.700 It might not even be related to earlier feminism. 1.00

00:17:39.080 But,

00:17:39.280 but what are your views on the impulse behind feminism that arose in the 1960s and beyond?

00:17:48.340 Yes,

00:17:50.220 I think this is the feminism that most people associate the term by, 1.00

00:17:54.160 whatever their view.

00:17:56.520 Feminism in the 60s and thereafter,

00:17:58.700 and some of its precursors in the late 50s,

00:18:01.300 tends to be a movement that's concerned almost completely with revolutionary politics,

00:18:07.900 particularly sexual and psychological revolutionism.

00:18:11.480 It only just about fits into Marxism because it relates to biological or pseudo-biological

00:18:17.020 and sort of quasi-biological theories.

00:18:21.380 It's associated with a sort of range of alternative society and slightly madcap women, 1.00

00:18:29.000 like Germaine Greer,

00:18:30.920 who wrote a book called The Female Eunuch, 0.99

00:18:33.300 which at one level is a sort of,

00:18:35.160 quite well done,

00:18:36.400 but hysterical rant about the role of women in society,

00:18:40.280 most of which is utopian in a way because it wants the female role to be changed out of full recognition

00:18:46.220 to such a degree that you could argue one of the subtexts is that sort of women become men over time

00:18:55.380 and men become women over time,

00:18:56.880 which was one of the unstated psychological goals of second-wave feminism 1.00

00:19:06.240 was to see a feminization of men in relative terms

00:19:10.880 and a masculinization of women in relative terms. 1.00

00:19:14.740 And that's not a totally stupid notion when you look at the theories that some of them were proposing.

00:19:22.380 Well, they seem to have succeeded in this to a large degree.

00:19:25.040 Yes, I think, well, feminism is unusual in that it's one of those revolutions that succeeded. 1.00

00:19:30.280 In absolute terms, of course, it's completely failed

00:19:33.060 because it addressed itself to utopias that are not possible of realization.

00:19:41.080 And things like radical feminism, the total separation of female and male lives, 0.99

00:19:46.780 women living separate beehive-like existences in communes, 1.00

00:19:51.960 that's all failed.

00:19:53.500 Yeah, I'll jump in here.

00:19:55.040 And then you can get back to your thought.

00:19:56.500 But actually, Alex Kurtigich was suggesting that I read Valerie Solanos' track,

00:20:03.000 The Scum Manifesto.

00:20:04.760 And Scum, in this instant, means the Society for Cutting Up Men.

00:20:10.600 And she essentially... 1.00

00:20:12.540 Yeah, she's probably the most... 0.86

00:20:13.680 She was an American, of course, and schizophrenic, but she was the most extreme feminist that there's ever been. 1.00

00:20:21.460 Yes.

00:20:21.640 Other feminists do partly regard her tirade as sort of exhibitionistic, sort of Sadian and tongue-in-cheek. 1.00

00:20:31.400 But, yes, she advocates physical attacks on men.

00:20:35.860 And, of course, she did physically attack Andy Warhol. 0.75

00:20:38.360 She shot him in the stomach with a gun. 0.98

00:20:40.220 I...

00:20:41.220 Yeah.

00:20:41.960 From which she later recovered.

00:20:43.680 And she was in prison for three years because of that. 0.81

00:20:47.740 She got up quite lightly because of this regard.

00:20:50.640 She was an act of insanity. 0.96

00:20:52.080 Yeah, she represents, in some ways, the lunatic fringe, even the lunatic fringe of the lunatic fringe within that particular movement. 0.93

00:21:01.960 Although there will be feminists who will defend her because she represents a sort of nethermost position 1.00

00:21:08.200 or a sort of position which it's not possible to get beyond, a sort of virulently sort of man-hating position.

00:21:16.120 But there are positions, misandrist, I think it is, a word that's never used, really, but means female detestation of men,

00:21:25.260 the misogyny being a male detestation of women, which is a quite well-known word.

00:21:30.460 If you take a book like The Woman's Room by Kate Miller, there's a stronger detestation of men in that as anything in Solanus,

00:21:41.400 but it's not as expressed as in a grotesque way.

00:21:46.540 So Solanus is a deliberately absurdist text.

00:21:51.020 But that wing of feminism, radical feminism, as it's called, with a large R, 1.00

00:21:55.880 which is counter-propositional biologically and yet is rooted in biology

00:22:00.120 because it wants a total separation of the sexes 0.94

00:22:04.220 and, in the end, advocates lesbianism, even for heterosexual women,

00:22:09.460 hence books like Lesbian Nation and that sort of thing, 1.00

00:22:14.180 which come out of this particular milieu.

00:22:17.620 Feminist groups had internal debates in the 70s and 80s about lesbianism 1.00

00:22:24.580 when the vast majority of women had to confess that they were biologically heterosexual

00:22:28.940 and, therefore, this wasn't an option for them.

00:22:31.740 And they had endlessly pained debates about whether they should have political lesbianism instead,

00:22:36.960 but it never really got anywhere. 0.95

00:22:40.240 So that wing of feminism, the more lunatic fringe, 1.00

00:22:44.820 radical elements of what is in any case a radical doctrine,

00:22:49.300 have fallen by the wayside,

00:22:50.900 although there are important theorists associated with the anti-pornography movement.

00:22:56.940 such as Andrea Dworkin and so on,

00:23:01.520 who come out of the radical wing and which are still current.

00:23:07.040 Yet another odd reverberation

00:23:09.220 is the association that anti-pornography feminism has with conservatism,

00:23:16.600 particularly religiously-notivated conservatism,

00:23:20.260 unlike libertarianism, for example,

00:23:22.120 which would take a laissez-faire attitude towards commercial pornography. 0.90

00:23:26.700 Yeah, let's put some pressure on this.

00:23:29.540 I actually had porn down as an important subject I wanted to discuss.

00:23:34.380 It obviously didn't really, at least to my knowledge,

00:23:37.720 really come up with first-wave feminism. 1.00

00:23:39.940 But you have an interesting anti-porn movement

00:23:44.260 that did work hand-in-glove with the religious right, so-called.

00:23:50.760 You actually had, I believe,

00:23:52.640 one of the iconic porn's first leading lady, Lovelace, 1.00

00:23:58.020 I'm forgetting her first name, 0.98

00:23:59.640 who was in Deep Throat,

00:24:01.100 one of the early large pornography movies.

00:24:06.760 I think it was the first feature film that was kind of a porn.

00:24:09.560 And Lovelace eventually became part of the anti-porn movement,

00:24:15.700 worked with Vorkin and people of this nature.

00:24:19.140 Yet, I mean, this is, again,

00:24:20.820 it gets back to how I opened the conversation.

00:24:23.040 What makes feminism this lasting movement

00:24:26.300 is its ability to mutate

00:24:28.280 and ability to take on contradictory positions.

00:24:31.540 Because you have now,

00:24:33.120 throughout the 90s and 2000s,

00:24:35.520 I'm sure it's still going on,

00:24:36.600 you have whole courses at major universities

00:24:40.980 in the United States and Europe,

00:24:42.320 and I'm sure as well,

00:24:43.940 on porn as this, you know,

00:24:46.740 way of female power or pure liberation, 1.00

00:24:51.380 or they probably have other terminologies

00:24:54.400 to describe that I don't even understand.

00:24:56.880 And in some ways, there's two,

00:24:58.660 it's kind of a yin and a yang to this.

00:25:00.420 There's the evils of something like pornography.

00:25:03.200 It's just expressing how men want to treat women 0.69

00:25:06.120 as objects and, you know,

00:25:08.840 want to abuse them and so on and so forth.

00:25:11.840 But then it also, 0.96

00:25:14.160 porn might be seen on the flip side

00:25:16.140 as this pure expression of a kind of Marcousian,

00:25:20.940 you know, id-driven society,

00:25:23.140 a pure liberation of social relations 0.88

00:25:26.140 as an orgy and so on and so forth.

00:25:28.100 So feminism, I mean, 1.00

00:25:30.880 maybe this is part of the power of feminism. 1.00

00:25:32.940 It can kind of flip back and forth

00:25:35.960 between things and radically re-evaluate

00:25:39.200 its social positions.

00:25:42.980 Yes, I think that's true.

00:25:45.000 But in a way, it's bound to be like that 0.93

00:25:47.400 because it is slightly ridiculous

00:25:50.020 that half of mankind has a viewpoint. 0.51

00:25:52.120 Right.

00:25:52.800 And if there was a movement called manism,

00:25:56.700 if there was a movement of men,

00:25:58.480 it would immediately divide

00:25:59.680 into all the subsections

00:26:01.060 because men don't agree on anything.

00:26:03.380 Right.

00:26:04.020 And so there's a degree to which

00:26:06.020 to expect women to agree on anything 1.00

00:26:08.440 beyond a few superficials.

00:26:11.560 It is fought with difficulty.

00:26:14.680 So you have to frame the thing

00:26:16.560 that women feel they're in a subsidiary place,

00:26:19.540 and therefore that gives them

00:26:22.600 an alliance with each other

00:26:24.300 that then enables them to align

00:26:26.680 around certain core issues.

00:26:28.760 But even then,

00:26:29.640 they'll still be divided

00:26:30.640 on most other issues.

00:26:32.860 There's the Marxian legacy.

00:26:34.780 It's almost like the female 1.00

00:26:36.060 as a proletariat.

00:26:37.300 You know, they are oppressed

00:26:39.840 by the current state of being

00:26:43.420 and therefore they become

00:26:44.500 a kind of world historical actor.

00:26:46.540 You know, they become

00:26:47.160 the universal subject or something.

00:26:48.640 It's like a Marxianism,

00:26:50.700 gendered, so to speak. 0.98

00:26:53.660 Yes, there's a bit of that going on.

00:26:55.880 Although amongst conservative women,

00:26:58.560 and Dworkin once wrote a book

00:27:00.020 called Right-Wing Women,

00:27:02.320 which is about right-wing women 0.99

00:27:04.080 on the right of the Republican Party,

00:27:08.040 because those are the sort of

00:27:09.420 most discernible right-wing women 1.00

00:27:11.060 she could find.

00:27:12.940 And they've always been

00:27:14.080 a source of fascination

00:27:15.280 to feminists what makes women 0.94

00:27:18.460 otherwise conventional

00:27:19.760 and adopt what they consider

00:27:21.640 to be a male's concentric view

00:27:23.640 once they've achieved

00:27:25.320 just civic equality

00:27:26.820 in terms of careers and jobs

00:27:29.620 and money and things of that sort.

00:27:32.180 And this is the fact, of course,

00:27:34.420 there's a large area

00:27:35.280 of social conservatism,

00:27:37.000 which is part of the female view as well. 1.00

00:27:39.240 Right.

00:27:39.640 The view that basically

00:27:40.680 women have a different role 1.00

00:27:41.800 in life to men

00:27:42.800 and have different tasks

00:27:44.920 in life to men,

00:27:45.980 but they're not particularly concerned

00:27:48.380 if they're allowed

00:27:49.140 to do male tasks. 1.00

00:27:50.540 So if a woman wants to be a judge 1.00

00:27:52.720 and goes all out to be one,

00:27:55.260 the general conservative

00:27:56.700 female attitude now 0.99

00:27:57.940 is why shouldn't she be one?

00:27:59.720 And she may be quite a tough-minded 0.51

00:28:01.520 right-wing judge at that

00:28:03.280 when it comes down to it.

00:28:04.760 But they don't necessarily think

00:28:06.360 the world should be upended

00:28:07.880 so that women can be judges. 1.00

00:28:10.600 It's just an add-on

00:28:11.620 to the female role 0.93

00:28:12.720 that remains otherwise unchanged.

00:28:15.660 Feminism, like a lot of these movements, 0.99

00:28:17.400 is a movement that's only superficially

00:28:20.220 touched the lives

00:28:21.200 of the overwhelming majority of women.

00:28:23.700 Still, after all the propaganda

00:28:25.340 the other way,

00:28:26.760 67% of women,

00:28:28.340 about two-thirds of all women

00:28:29.720 in most societies,

00:28:31.220 want the traditional option.

00:28:33.640 They want some sort of a stable

00:28:35.180 marital or other union,

00:28:37.760 and they want a family with children.

00:28:40.780 And that's pretty much what they want.

00:28:44.080 And feminism doesn't really have 1.00

00:28:46.020 too much to say to those sorts of women, 1.00

00:28:48.520 although it always postulates

00:28:51.380 the notion that it never stops

00:28:52.720 trying to address them.

00:28:54.240 So the bulk of women 1.00

00:28:55.660 remain uninfluenced by it,

00:28:57.460 although they have taken advantage

00:28:58.880 of the successes

00:29:00.440 that feminism has scored. 0.80

00:29:03.020 Because although it's one of these movements

00:29:05.200 that can be seen to have failed

00:29:06.560 completely in its own utopian terms,

00:29:09.880 its effect on society

00:29:11.320 has been so great,

00:29:13.000 and its effect on men

00:29:14.240 has been so great,

00:29:15.560 that in a way it has succeeded

00:29:17.680 far more than other radical currents.

00:29:21.340 It succeeded because it's forced the law

00:29:23.940 to maximize those areas

00:29:26.360 of female-male equality

00:29:27.900 and to desprivilege areas of inequality

00:29:31.380 that did exist in the social

00:29:33.260 and civic space between men and women,

00:29:36.460 to the degree that now

00:29:37.840 men who talk openly

00:29:39.880 about opening those spaces up again

00:29:42.000 are frowned upon by other men

00:29:44.180 and are in a very small minority.

00:29:46.080 Yes, you know, it's interesting

00:29:48.960 just to tell two little quick anecdotes.

00:29:53.200 I did notice,

00:29:54.160 I'm now involved in an oppressive

00:29:56.680 bourgeois marriage,

00:29:58.160 but when I was dating,

00:30:00.920 I did notice that

00:30:03.080 it was still tacitly accepted

00:30:06.520 that I would be paying for every meal.

00:30:08.700 And if I, you know,

00:30:10.080 if I happened to take a girl 0.98

00:30:11.620 on a date and say,

00:30:12.720 oh, you're going to split it down the middle

00:30:14.100 or something like that,

00:30:14.760 I'd probably get a very nasty look.

00:30:18.600 At the same time,

00:30:20.000 if in that,

00:30:21.040 during that date,

00:30:21.780 if I had ever suggested something like,

00:30:24.600 oh, don't you think,

00:30:25.540 since men are the head of the household, 0.85

00:30:28.080 that maybe they should be paid more

00:30:29.720 across the board,

00:30:30.680 that that's a good thing,

00:30:31.580 and it's not really unfair.

00:30:33.100 It's actually fair

00:30:34.580 because men have more financial obligations

00:30:38.280 than women. 0.99

00:30:39.320 Again, I would probably get

00:30:40.620 a horrified and disgusted look.

00:30:43.800 So I think, you know,

00:30:46.180 feminism kind of, 1.00

00:30:47.260 it succeeds in particular areas,

00:30:50.480 maybe fails in a couple,

00:30:51.700 but succeed in general.

00:30:53.720 Let me talk a little bit

00:30:55.600 about something different than,

00:30:57.900 totally different than someone

00:30:59.040 like Valerie Solanos,

00:31:02.280 whom I'm sure most people

00:31:04.600 in the population,

00:31:06.120 even someone who might call

00:31:07.520 themselves a feminist,

00:31:08.560 would probably declare 1.00

00:31:09.460 that she was mentally ill 0.71

00:31:10.860 and maybe was acting purely 0.98

00:31:12.720 out of hatred.

00:31:14.400 And that is the kind of,

00:31:17.340 let's say,

00:31:17.960 modern girl feminism

00:31:20.040 that represents a kind of

00:31:23.180 compromise solution for women 1.00

00:31:25.880 that is actually quite attractive

00:31:27.880 and is about them,

00:31:29.940 you know,

00:31:30.680 playing with the big boys at work

00:31:33.060 or, you know,

00:31:33.620 having the ability to get a job.

00:31:35.660 Even if they eventually

00:31:36.700 might want to have a family

00:31:37.740 a little bit later,

00:31:39.120 that they still have

00:31:40.620 the opportunity to go

00:31:42.060 become a stockbroker

00:31:43.260 or something like this

00:31:43.960 if they want to.

00:31:45.320 And yet,

00:31:46.160 they really don't hold,

00:31:47.960 if you meet these women,

00:31:49.820 they are otherwise

00:31:51.760 normal and healthy.

00:31:52.960 They don't hold any views

00:31:54.300 of men are evil 0.84

00:31:55.460 or should be destroyed 0.99

00:31:57.460 or anything like that.

00:31:58.980 So it's a kind of

00:32:00.080 acceptable compromise feminism. 1.00

00:32:03.160 And I don't want to make this

00:32:05.240 too much of a leading question,

00:32:06.780 but I think it is worth

00:32:08.600 pointing out

00:32:09.480 that since the 1970s,

00:32:12.360 real wages have either stagnated

00:32:15.740 or probably more likely declined.

00:32:18.860 And what I mean by real wages,

00:32:20.180 I mean the wage paid

00:32:21.860 paid to a family member,

00:32:23.620 to a head of a household

00:32:24.680 minus inflation.

00:32:26.840 Essentially,

00:32:27.820 the wage is not keeping up

00:32:29.140 with price increases.

00:32:31.280 And what we had

00:32:32.520 in the 80s and 90s

00:32:34.100 was in essence,

00:32:35.040 mom went to work

00:32:36.140 in the sense of,

00:32:37.640 you know,

00:32:37.820 you could,

00:32:38.640 dad,

00:32:39.100 if he had a normal job,

00:32:40.740 he could no longer

00:32:42.000 sustain a family of four.

00:32:44.780 It was impossible,

00:32:45.940 particularly with,

00:32:46.800 you know,

00:32:47.040 education costs,

00:32:48.220 medical costs going up,

00:32:49.260 so on and so forth.

00:32:50.760 And so,

00:32:51.980 in a way,

00:32:52.980 mom had to go to work 1.00

00:32:54.340 and that that dovetailed

00:32:57.440 with,

00:32:58.160 you know,

00:32:59.520 this kind of more palatable

00:33:01.400 feminism that came out 1.00

00:33:04.800 of all these waves of feminism. 0.59

00:33:06.700 So,

00:33:06.920 in a way,

00:33:07.300 one could say that

00:33:08.140 the glorious Steinems

00:33:09.420 of the world

00:33:10.060 and so on and so forth,

00:33:11.420 they're kind of

00:33:12.280 the central banker's 1.00

00:33:13.460 useful idiot. 1.00

00:33:14.780 And what I mean by that 1.00

00:33:16.240 is that it was,

00:33:17.400 due to things like inflation

00:33:18.880 and economic malfeasance,

00:33:22.760 it was impossible

00:33:23.900 for the man,

00:33:25.760 the single breadwinner,

00:33:27.560 to have a family.

00:33:29.260 And these women 1.00

00:33:30.820 were out there

00:33:31.280 thinking that they were

00:33:32.160 pursuing something radical

00:33:33.500 by suggesting that women 0.99

00:33:34.820 go to work.

00:33:36.020 But really,

00:33:37.060 they were just justifying

00:33:38.540 and maybe even sugarcoating

00:33:40.020 the economic decline

00:33:43.080 of the Western world.

00:33:45.620 so I guess

00:33:48.100 that's maybe

00:33:48.520 my own take

00:33:51.480 on it all there.

00:33:52.500 But you can

00:33:53.060 pick up on that

00:33:54.860 if you'd like to talk

00:33:55.520 about that economic

00:33:57.200 element to it.

00:33:58.640 But maybe,

00:33:59.220 Jonathan,

00:33:59.460 you could just talk

00:33:59.960 about that

00:34:00.820 more palatable

00:34:01.980 kind of compromise

00:34:03.000 feminism

00:34:03.640 which seems to be

00:34:05.260 embraced

00:34:05.840 by,

00:34:08.000 I would say,

00:34:08.960 a vast majority

00:34:09.620 of women.

00:34:10.020 Yes,

00:34:11.900 it's a sort of

00:34:12.700 very practical solution

00:34:13.900 and women have always 1.00

00:34:15.800 been a very practical sex

00:34:17.280 at one level

00:34:18.000 of consciousness

00:34:18.700 and this middling

00:34:20.200 solution

00:34:20.820 where you take

00:34:21.620 a bit of

00:34:22.220 the small r,

00:34:23.460 radical feminism, 0.85

00:34:24.800 and kick the rest

00:34:25.620 into touch

00:34:26.420 and basically

00:34:27.320 can see it

00:34:28.080 as a conceit

00:34:29.440 and as a way

00:34:30.460 to move forward

00:34:31.400 on the career front

00:34:32.580 is an eminently

00:34:34.400 sensible way

00:34:35.220 of looking at it.

00:34:36.600 It's not necessarily

00:34:37.520 what men always wanted,

00:34:38.840 but it's a solution

00:34:40.060 that in a sense

00:34:41.500 neuters 0.97

00:34:43.640 the more virulent

00:34:44.600 aspects of feminism

00:34:45.800 whilst retaining

00:34:46.960 a considerable dose

00:34:48.160 of it.

00:34:48.920 There was a theorist

00:34:49.740 in the 1920s

00:34:51.500 called Wyndham Lewis

00:34:52.500 who wrote a book

00:34:53.720 in 1926,

00:34:55.560 I think,

00:34:55.880 called The Art of Being Ruled

00:34:57.140 in which he suggested

00:34:58.440 that capitalism

00:34:59.240 is real motivating

00:35:00.680 force behind feminism 1.00

00:35:02.180 because the whole point

00:35:03.700 was that the family

00:35:05.000 was an archaic

00:35:06.480 and reactionary institution

00:35:08.360 that was pre-modern

00:35:09.820 and that floated

00:35:10.960 uneasily in the marketplace

00:35:12.240 and that dammed up

00:35:14.000 in an alternative lifestyle

00:35:15.460 all these producers

00:35:16.700 and consumers

00:35:17.560 that could be let loose,

00:35:19.620 but they could only

00:35:20.140 be let loose

00:35:20.800 if women were prized 0.99

00:35:21.760 out of the home

00:35:22.620 and were treated

00:35:23.540 as auxiliary men

00:35:24.780 and were used

00:35:25.780 in the workplace

00:35:26.480 in that manner.

00:35:27.480 And it's a remarkably

00:35:29.240 prescient analysis

00:35:30.420 given that

00:35:31.220 it was regarded

00:35:32.080 as quite mad

00:35:33.580 when he came up

00:35:34.220 with us in the 1920s

00:35:35.620 if it actually

00:35:36.500 appalled almost

00:35:37.540 painstakingly

00:35:39.500 with what's happened.

00:35:41.000 Yes, without question.

00:35:41.780 Also, the welfare state

00:35:43.060 benefits from it.

00:35:43.800 You have women working,

00:35:45.120 they're paying more taxes.

00:35:47.020 You know, divorce

00:35:47.800 benefits

00:35:49.140 certain economic groups.

00:35:51.480 You have,

00:35:52.140 if you're owning apartments,

00:35:53.380 you're going to benefit

00:35:54.440 by the family

00:35:55.920 no longer being intact.

00:35:57.940 And so,

00:35:58.460 in a kind of horrible way, 0.93

00:36:01.300 feminists are, 1.00

00:36:03.300 again, 1.00

00:36:03.540 the useful idiots 1.00

00:36:04.920 of the banking system 1.00

00:36:07.200 in American capitalism.

00:36:10.000 Yes, it's sort of,

00:36:11.340 and you see that

00:36:11.980 in the cultural area

00:36:12.900 as well,

00:36:13.540 where a sort of

00:36:14.980 sex-in-the-city feminism 1.00

00:36:16.540 totally divorced

00:36:18.620 from, in many ways,

00:36:20.400 the lifestyle instincts

00:36:21.660 of the left,

00:36:22.660 which can be

00:36:23.320 quite puritanical,

00:36:24.440 goes with a hedonistic

00:36:27.780 free-market capitalism.

00:36:29.400 You see this sort of

00:36:30.200 combination

00:36:30.800 of feminism

00:36:32.240 and libertarianism,

00:36:33.940 and feminism 0.99

00:36:34.960 and libertarian capitalism,

00:36:37.200 and the two going

00:36:38.100 along together.

00:36:39.320 You see this

00:36:40.020 in the sort of

00:36:40.920 female-issue magazines

00:36:43.120 like Cosmopolitan,

00:36:45.040 which are the female 0.90

00:36:46.080 equivalent of 0.91

00:36:47.380 pornography

00:36:48.160 in many ways,

00:36:49.640 motivated, again,

00:36:51.920 being by the market

00:36:52.780 and what it is felt

00:36:54.360 the market will bear.

00:36:56.340 And quite distinct

00:36:58.460 to the traditional

00:36:59.820 romantic fiction,

00:37:01.760 so-called

00:37:02.300 female emotional 0.95

00:37:03.260 pornography, 0.96

00:37:04.680 which,

00:37:05.100 endless stories,

00:37:06.980 fictionalized,

00:37:08.880 about romances

00:37:09.720 between men and women,

00:37:10.840 which tend to adopt

00:37:11.780 as very deeply

00:37:12.540 socially conservative

00:37:13.500 and sort of

00:37:15.160 old-fashioned

00:37:15.980 timber.

00:37:17.940 Cosmopolitan

00:37:18.580 and Sex and the City 0.67

00:37:19.560 are the exact inverse

00:37:20.720 of all of that,

00:37:22.100 and advocate

00:37:23.740 an almost predatory

00:37:25.120 and sort of

00:37:26.900 slightly,

00:37:27.760 sort of,

00:37:28.500 sluttish 0.95

00:37:29.340 sort of sexuality 0.97

00:37:30.240 for women

00:37:31.120 that traditional

00:37:33.160 moralists

00:37:33.880 were appalled by

00:37:35.100 and also regard,

00:37:36.520 and women on the whole 1.00

00:37:37.720 have tended to regard

00:37:39.080 as a harmful lifestyle

00:37:40.440 for women,

00:37:41.580 but it's now

00:37:42.280 a sort of market-tested

00:37:43.580 to destruction

00:37:44.320 attitude

00:37:44.880 that's favoured

00:37:46.600 on every newsstand.

00:37:49.160 Oh, without question.

00:37:50.300 I don't want to

00:37:51.040 sound too haughty

00:37:52.360 by saying this,

00:37:53.300 but I'm afraid

00:37:54.580 that so many

00:37:55.740 of the women

00:37:56.820 who move to,

00:37:58.600 say, London

00:37:58.880 or Manhattan,

00:37:59.840 they get a job

00:38:00.960 in their

00:38:01.400 Little Miss career growl, 1.00

00:38:03.840 and at some point,

00:38:05.400 they live the

00:38:06.180 Sex and the City 0.88

00:38:06.720 lifestyle.

00:38:07.600 At some point

00:38:08.160 in their mid-40s,

00:38:09.660 they wake up

00:38:10.840 alone and lonely

00:38:12.300 living with cats,

00:38:14.240 and it's,

00:38:15.860 again,

00:38:16.340 I'm not trying

00:38:17.520 to demean anyone,

00:38:18.840 it just seems

00:38:19.480 to be the case,

00:38:20.360 and there seems

00:38:21.500 to be the hangover

00:38:22.880 of the Sex and the City

00:38:24.140 lifestyle,

00:38:24.800 which is,

00:38:25.200 I don't think,

00:38:26.520 anything anyone wants.

00:38:27.960 So, Jonathan,

00:38:28.840 expound a little bit,

00:38:30.420 if you would,

00:38:31.320 on how feminism

00:38:32.860 has changed men,

00:38:34.860 and I think it's

00:38:36.000 something a lot

00:38:36.760 more complicated

00:38:37.700 than wissification

00:38:40.240 or men have become

00:38:42.020 like women. 0.99

00:38:42.740 I think it's

00:38:43.580 something deeper

00:38:44.740 and more varied

00:38:46.240 than that.

00:38:46.720 Yes, I think it is.

00:38:49.440 I think what's

00:38:50.120 happened is a whole

00:38:51.080 storehouse

00:38:52.200 or memory chain

00:38:54.060 of male archetypes

00:38:55.280 and types

00:38:55.840 has gone down,

00:38:57.260 has been sort of

00:38:57.980 zapped and

00:38:58.680 factored down.

00:39:00.460 Certain types of

00:39:01.800 sort of raw

00:39:03.300 heterosexuality 0.83

00:39:04.540 in a relatively

00:39:05.380 traditional

00:39:05.980 and sort of

00:39:06.860 very masculine,

00:39:08.540 capital M

00:39:09.140 sort of a way,

00:39:10.000 have gone down

00:39:10.540 the memory hole.

00:39:11.280 but so have

00:39:12.740 elements of

00:39:14.220 the dandy

00:39:14.840 and the

00:39:16.900 sort of

00:39:17.680 overstepping,

00:39:19.180 flamboyant 0.90

00:39:20.180 sort of heterosexual,

00:39:21.540 those roles,

00:39:23.260 which were quite

00:39:23.980 marked

00:39:24.540 and quite varied,

00:39:25.780 the sort of

00:39:26.080 bohemian male

00:39:27.020 roles as well,

00:39:28.680 of a more

00:39:29.440 traditional type.

00:39:30.660 They've gone as well,

00:39:31.980 or they've been

00:39:32.880 rather neutered 0.50

00:39:34.280 and confined

00:39:34.960 as well.

00:39:35.720 and there's a

00:39:38.020 whole intermediate

00:39:39.000 zone of

00:39:40.000 masculine identities

00:39:41.140 that have had

00:39:42.100 their card marked

00:39:43.300 and have gone

00:39:44.320 into the past.

00:39:45.460 The question is

00:39:46.400 why has this

00:39:47.060 occurred?

00:39:48.000 And I think the

00:39:48.620 motivation is almost

00:39:49.620 completely male

00:39:50.620 and completely

00:39:51.680 internalized.

00:39:53.280 I think it's

00:39:53.880 many men

00:39:54.600 do not feel

00:39:55.480 that they can be

00:39:56.240 successful in

00:39:57.060 private life,

00:39:58.440 do not feel

00:39:59.080 they can attract

00:39:59.720 the women they 0.98

00:40:00.240 wish to attract

00:40:01.100 or be seen as

00:40:01.840 attractive to

00:40:02.600 such women 1.00

00:40:03.260 and certainly

00:40:04.700 not get along

00:40:05.560 the side of

00:40:06.200 them if they

00:40:07.680 are otherwise

00:40:08.480 than the present

00:40:10.060 sort of postmodern

00:40:11.000 man.

00:40:11.960 They feel that

00:40:12.940 they've got really

00:40:13.540 no chance in

00:40:14.600 the private life

00:40:15.360 states if they

00:40:16.560 remain loyal to

00:40:17.980 traditional and

00:40:20.020 rather heedless

00:40:21.040 masculinities that

00:40:22.940 are in conflict

00:40:23.840 with the egalitarianism

00:40:25.200 of the present

00:40:25.740 order.

00:40:26.740 And this is

00:40:27.280 something where

00:40:28.120 theory is all

00:40:28.840 very well,

00:40:30.100 that if you want

00:40:30.740 to have a sort

00:40:31.720 of a happy

00:40:33.000 or beneficent life,

00:40:34.360 you have to

00:40:35.200 do various

00:40:35.860 things to make

00:40:36.700 that turn

00:40:37.320 around in

00:40:37.960 the private

00:40:38.420 area.

00:40:39.780 And men

00:40:40.800 have basically

00:40:41.580 just bitten

00:40:42.160 on the bullet

00:40:42.740 really and

00:40:43.420 have adopted

00:40:44.020 a whole new

00:40:45.760 set of masculine

00:40:46.820 constructs in

00:40:48.240 order to be

00:40:48.820 successful with

00:40:49.580 women. 0.81

00:40:50.340 And they think

00:40:50.920 they've actually

00:40:51.340 been quite clever

00:40:52.260 because they've

00:40:53.360 adopted an

00:40:54.000 element of male

00:40:55.140 feminist language,

00:40:56.800 posture and

00:40:57.720 behavior in

00:40:58.940 order to get

00:40:59.560 on with women 0.96

00:41:00.300 once equality

00:41:01.460 was formalized

00:41:02.800 in civics and

00:41:03.700 in law and

00:41:04.820 in social

00:41:05.280 behavior.

00:41:06.480 Men haven't 0.99

00:41:06.920 changed deep

00:41:07.640 down that much,

00:41:09.280 maybe, but

00:41:10.460 behaviorally they've

00:41:11.460 changed a great

00:41:12.200 deal.

00:41:13.180 And this shows

00:41:14.080 that men don't 0.89

00:41:14.780 revert to being

00:41:15.560 something else

00:41:16.240 when they're on

00:41:16.720 their own these

00:41:17.400 days except very

00:41:18.340 occasionally and

00:41:19.940 under the influence

00:41:20.700 of all-male banter

00:41:21.940 or drink or

00:41:22.680 whatever.

00:41:23.600 So that's pretty

00:41:24.300 rare.

00:41:25.680 It's not the

00:41:27.980 reversal that

00:41:28.800 scandalized

00:41:29.400 feminists would 1.00

00:41:30.020 expect on the

00:41:30.800 whole either.

00:41:31.440 So I think a

00:41:36.120 lot of men

00:41:36.960 feel that in

00:41:39.760 order to have

00:41:40.300 successful families,

00:41:41.520 in order to have

00:41:42.080 successful private

00:41:43.060 lives, they

00:41:44.460 need to downplay

00:41:46.760 certain prior

00:41:48.120 forms and play

00:41:49.620 up certain

00:41:50.820 attitudes and

00:41:51.620 variants which

00:41:52.320 are acceptable

00:41:52.900 today.

00:41:54.040 And I think

00:41:54.580 that's happened

00:41:55.120 right across the

00:41:55.780 board.

00:41:56.980 Yes, as we

00:41:57.700 discussed off-air,

00:41:59.160 our side sometimes

00:42:01.280 underestimates the

00:42:02.660 importance of

00:42:03.500 that 20% of

00:42:05.580 things which is

00:42:06.340 nurture as

00:42:07.500 opposed to

00:42:07.940 nature.

00:42:09.000 And in the

00:42:10.320 case of men,

00:42:11.180 it's almost as

00:42:12.340 if the post-feminist

00:42:14.040 man is a new,

00:42:16.000 different biological

00:42:17.200 species.

00:42:18.160 I mean, he's not

00:42:18.760 exactly.

00:42:19.280 but that nurture

00:42:21.660 of the equation

00:42:23.100 is quite

00:42:24.220 powerful.

00:42:25.820 Yes.

00:42:26.640 Well, no one

00:42:28.380 would engage in

00:42:29.060 politics, no one

00:42:30.020 would engage in

00:42:30.700 any social

00:42:31.260 ideology if the

00:42:32.920 20 to 25% of

00:42:34.480 things which is

00:42:35.520 nurture as against

00:42:36.780 nature was

00:42:37.360 unimportant.

00:42:38.380 So it's in some

00:42:39.620 ways the crucial

00:42:40.300 vortex through

00:42:41.180 which everything

00:42:42.460 becomes the way

00:42:43.200 it's bound to

00:42:43.740 be.

00:42:44.000 if you just

00:42:46.060 left it to

00:42:46.700 nature, you

00:42:47.760 would end up

00:42:48.380 with a semblance

00:42:49.140 of what nature

00:42:50.040 wanted, but you

00:42:51.760 would probably

00:42:52.520 give the game

00:42:53.240 away to all

00:42:53.960 sorts of people

00:42:54.640 who wish to

00:42:55.380 denature nature

00:42:56.620 as much as

00:42:57.160 possible.

00:42:58.320 So nature on

00:42:59.820 its own isn't

00:43:00.460 enough, and men

00:43:02.140 have not

00:43:02.540 fundamentally

00:43:03.300 biologically

00:43:03.940 changed, but

00:43:04.800 their behaviorism

00:43:06.020 has altered out

00:43:07.380 of all

00:43:07.700 recognition.

00:43:08.220 If your average

00:43:11.380 man in the

00:43:11.880 1920s looked at

00:43:14.020 what happened

00:43:15.000 today, he'd

00:43:16.300 be baffled, and

00:43:17.420 yet a part of

00:43:18.020 him wouldn't

00:43:18.440 be, because

00:43:19.420 he'd just

00:43:19.940 perceive it as

00:43:20.680 a tactic which

00:43:21.540 is adopted in

00:43:22.400 order to be

00:43:22.940 successful.

00:43:25.540 Do you think

00:43:26.520 that's all it

00:43:28.460 is, is a

00:43:29.160 tactic, or do

00:43:30.040 you think that

00:43:30.760 it's a...

00:43:31.660 It's a tactic

00:43:32.060 that goes quite

00:43:32.860 deep.

00:43:33.420 I think it's

00:43:34.500 rather like

00:43:35.760 learning a

00:43:36.300 stage part in

00:43:37.480 a play.

00:43:38.220 But you

00:43:39.100 learn it so

00:43:39.840 well, it

00:43:40.420 sort of

00:43:40.820 becomes your

00:43:41.900 ombit.

00:43:43.200 It becomes

00:43:43.700 what you

00:43:44.380 wish to be

00:43:46.100 when you're

00:43:46.500 off set.

00:43:48.660 I think it's

00:43:49.740 a part that's

00:43:51.540 being learned

00:43:52.440 to such a

00:43:55.280 degree that

00:43:56.480 it's become

00:43:56.980 second nature

00:43:57.720 now.

00:44:00.440 Maybe that

00:44:01.360 proves that

00:44:01.960 part of the

00:44:02.480 prior masculinities

00:44:03.620 were also

00:44:04.200 slightly rhetorical,

00:44:05.840 that they

00:44:06.160 proved themselves

00:44:07.300 to be so

00:44:08.000 adaptable and

00:44:09.160 so changeable.

00:44:10.740 But I think

00:44:11.540 it's the

00:44:12.220 pressing need

00:44:13.180 to be

00:44:13.600 successful in

00:44:14.940 this area,

00:44:15.720 which is the

00:44:16.240 prime motivator.

00:44:17.960 Also, I think

00:44:18.760 it just goes

00:44:19.800 with egalitarian

00:44:20.800 discourse.

00:44:22.160 Because what is

00:44:23.100 the alternative?

00:44:24.460 If the

00:44:24.820 alternative a

00:44:25.840 sort of cult of

00:44:26.620 male superiority,

00:44:28.440 many men would

00:44:29.580 feel uncomfortable

00:44:32.160 with that,

00:44:33.000 because the

00:44:33.700 idea of

00:44:34.240 superiority and

00:44:35.160 hence

00:44:35.400 inferiority in

00:44:36.740 any area

00:44:37.520 strikes people 0.95

00:44:38.680 as axiomatically

00:44:39.900 discomforting in

00:44:42.700 present circumstances.

00:44:44.460 To bring this

00:44:44.840 conversation to a

00:44:45.600 close, let's

00:44:46.100 talk a little

00:44:46.520 bit about the

00:44:48.020 woman question 1.00

00:44:49.660 from a deeper

00:44:51.260 and anthropological

00:44:53.220 standpoint, and

00:44:54.340 that is the

00:44:54.880 role of the

00:44:55.660 woman in the

00:44:56.200 West.

00:44:57.480 Certainly, it's

00:44:58.460 no coincidence

00:44:59.460 that so many

00:45:01.100 of these

00:45:01.340 feminist movements

00:45:02.360 were arising

00:45:03.720 out of Europe

00:45:06.360 writ large.

00:45:08.400 Even if you

00:45:09.180 want to blame

00:45:09.720 Marxism on it,

00:45:10.900 it's arising out

00:45:12.180 of the European

00:45:12.700 milieu at some

00:45:13.560 level.

00:45:14.600 And a lot of

00:45:15.640 that has to do

00:45:16.220 with the fact

00:45:16.720 that despite

00:45:18.140 some of the

00:45:18.700 horror stories

00:45:19.540 told by leftist

00:45:20.740 academics, women

00:45:21.700 are treated better

00:45:22.840 in the Western

00:45:23.320 world than they 0.99

00:45:24.000 are in the

00:45:25.600 rest of the

00:45:26.060 world, quite

00:45:26.620 frankly.

00:45:28.300 One likes to

00:45:29.420 imagine the

00:45:30.280 oppressive

00:45:30.940 bourgeois marriage

00:45:32.100 or something,

00:45:32.740 but the

00:45:33.360 oppressive

00:45:33.740 bourgeois marriage

00:45:34.680 is actually, in

00:45:36.540 comparison with

00:45:37.360 most other gender

00:45:39.220 relations around

00:45:39.820 the world, quite

00:45:41.260 equitable.

00:45:42.800 And so it's

00:45:44.060 probably no

00:45:44.880 surprise that

00:45:48.000 feminism would 1.00

00:45:48.920 grow out of

00:45:49.720 the Western

00:45:50.040 world.

00:45:51.060 And so there

00:45:51.800 seems to be a

00:45:52.480 tension in the

00:45:54.140 West between,

00:45:55.780 let's just call

00:45:56.700 it liberalism,

00:45:57.560 granting people

00:45:58.040 more quality,

00:45:59.740 thinking that

00:46:00.800 people can

00:46:01.300 transcend their 0.94

00:46:02.780 biological or

00:46:04.840 material rootings

00:46:06.340 and kind of

00:46:07.280 decide for

00:46:08.220 themselves.

00:46:09.420 And then also

00:46:10.400 another deep

00:46:12.240 Western tradition,

00:46:13.780 which is the

00:46:14.560 family.

00:46:15.320 And which in

00:46:15.840 many ways, I

00:46:16.420 should point this

00:46:16.980 out, if one

00:46:18.620 wants to be a

00:46:19.220 crude Darwinist,

00:46:21.060 in some ways the

00:46:21.660 monogamous family

00:46:22.820 is also a great

00:46:24.600 victory for

00:46:25.320 feminism. 1.00

00:46:25.700 I mean, obviously

00:46:26.560 if we were going

00:46:27.300 to truly live in

00:46:28.220 a Darwinian

00:46:29.160 atmosphere, we'd

00:46:29.960 have some sort

00:46:30.540 of polygamy where

00:46:31.460 the big man, the

00:46:33.520 strongest guy, gets

00:46:34.740 all the women and 0.94

00:46:35.820 all the weaklings 0.99

00:46:36.980 are either killed 1.00

00:46:39.080 or serve as

00:46:40.860 slaves or

00:46:41.480 something. 0.61

00:46:42.340 But in many

00:46:42.880 ways this

00:46:43.320 tradition, a very

00:46:44.820 deep tradition, one

00:46:45.820 that predates

00:46:46.400 Christianity, of 0.96

00:46:47.900 the family and

00:46:49.160 monogamous

00:46:49.720 relations, that is

00:46:51.760 also something

00:46:52.380 uniquely Western.

00:46:54.720 You know, you

00:46:55.280 don't see a lot

00:46:56.140 of monogamy in

00:46:57.160 say the Old

00:46:58.080 Testament or in

00:46:59.180 Semitic traditions,

00:47:00.140 but you see

00:47:00.760 polygamy and

00:47:01.520 tribal relations.

00:47:02.560 But that

00:47:03.040 monogamous family

00:47:03.960 is something

00:47:04.320 uniquely Western.

00:47:05.120 So, you know,

00:47:06.580 just taking up on

00:47:07.440 some of these

00:47:07.880 thoughts that I've

00:47:08.780 put forward,

00:47:09.540 Jonathan, what do

00:47:11.000 you think is,

00:47:12.160 from an

00:47:12.900 anthropological

00:47:13.540 standpoint, the

00:47:14.960 role of the

00:47:15.940 woman in our 0.59

00:47:17.680 European culture?

00:47:18.720 Yes, I think

00:47:21.640 it's really the

00:47:22.900 traditional role.

00:47:24.000 It's the role

00:47:24.820 that predates

00:47:25.940 60s feminism. 1.00

00:47:27.740 I think it can

00:47:28.960 be compatible

00:47:29.620 with doing

00:47:30.240 various jobs,

00:47:31.680 but I think it

00:47:32.560 is the mother's

00:47:33.320 role and it's

00:47:34.720 the traditional

00:47:35.380 female roles 0.98

00:47:36.840 extended out into

00:47:39.440 the educational

00:47:40.120 area, into

00:47:40.980 nursing, into

00:47:43.580 areas like that.

00:47:45.020 that, but

00:47:45.500 essentially it's

00:47:47.200 the sort of

00:47:50.720 the mother role,

00:47:52.300 the Madonna role.

00:47:53.640 Of course, there

00:47:54.200 is a sexual role

00:47:55.200 as well, and

00:47:57.400 the sort of

00:47:58.900 scarlet female

00:47:59.980 role is part of

00:48:01.600 that continuum

00:48:02.360 because it has to

00:48:03.160 be, because all

00:48:03.940 wearers have to be 1.00

00:48:04.880 covered by it.

00:48:06.240 So that's all part

00:48:07.380 of the package.

00:48:08.480 And all of those

00:48:09.300 survive in the

00:48:10.220 West quite

00:48:12.680 markedly, actually,

00:48:13.740 despite feminism's 1.00

00:48:16.060 impact.

00:48:17.080 So feminism's 1.00

00:48:18.120 changed everything,

00:48:18.900 yet everything's

00:48:19.440 remained the same,

00:48:20.300 or all of the

00:48:21.400 female lifestyles 1.00

00:48:22.700 that pre-existed

00:48:23.840 feminism coexist with 1.00

00:48:25.840 those that have

00:48:26.360 been changed by it.

00:48:27.860 I think what's

00:48:28.540 really happened is

00:48:29.440 that feminism 0.99

00:48:29.860 hasn't changed

00:48:30.620 women at all. 0.56

00:48:31.820 It's changed

00:48:32.280 certain female 0.78

00:48:32.940 patterns of

00:48:33.460 opportunity, but it

00:48:35.060 hasn't changed

00:48:35.640 women one iota. 0.99

00:48:36.800 What it has

00:48:37.420 changed is it's

00:48:38.180 changed men a

00:48:38.880 great deal.

00:48:40.240 I think men 0.84

00:48:40.920 have been the

00:48:41.440 real recipients of

00:48:42.520 feminist ideology. 1.00

00:48:43.740 men have been

00:48:45.760 transformed by it

00:48:47.860 or have been

00:48:48.680 reluctantly so

00:48:49.920 transformed because

00:48:51.740 they feel that

00:48:52.440 there's no option

00:48:53.340 but to accept a

00:48:54.840 certain dose of

00:48:55.740 it in order to

00:48:57.080 have some

00:48:57.940 successful private

00:48:59.160 life.

00:49:00.220 So I personally

00:49:02.180 believe that it's

00:49:03.440 feminism's act of 1.00

00:49:04.420 action on the

00:49:05.800 male gender that's 0.99

00:49:07.300 the crucial issue.

00:49:08.840 Women have changed 1.00

00:49:09.940 to a degree because

00:49:11.000 they've adopted some

00:49:11.840 of its vocabulary

00:49:12.620 but men have

00:49:13.860 had to adapt to

00:49:15.620 a much, much

00:49:16.640 greater degree

00:49:17.520 because it was an

00:49:18.600 alien vocabulary

00:49:19.580 as far as they

00:49:21.680 were concerned.

00:49:22.800 They have adopted

00:49:23.620 it and they have

00:49:24.640 had to get rid of

00:49:26.460 or junk an

00:49:27.880 enormous prior

00:49:29.320 traditional male

00:49:31.000 set of vocabularies

00:49:32.360 only a proportion

00:49:33.560 of which are

00:49:34.040 heard anymore

00:49:34.940 even amongst

00:49:36.600 men, even when

00:49:37.340 they're on their

00:49:37.780 own.

00:49:39.220 So feminism 1.00

00:49:39.760 has bitten

00:49:40.440 very deep

00:49:41.440 and has

00:49:42.520 changed men

00:49:43.640 but probably

00:49:44.500 not for the

00:49:45.020 best.

00:49:45.860 If you look at

00:49:46.500 the way men

00:49:47.120 are depicted

00:49:47.640 in 1950s

00:49:48.940 films which

00:49:49.640 is sort of

00:49:50.180 before the

00:49:50.760 cultural watershed

00:49:51.580 and how

00:49:53.580 women and 0.99

00:49:54.260 men are

00:49:54.640 depicted and

00:49:55.440 allow themselves

00:49:56.180 to be depicted

00:49:56.880 and depict

00:49:57.480 themselves more

00:49:58.500 more is the

00:49:59.960 point, from

00:50:01.300 maybe 1970

00:50:02.220 onwards, you

00:50:03.360 notice a really

00:50:04.260 radical transformation

00:50:05.500 in the way

00:50:06.680 masculinity is

00:50:07.760 configured, the

00:50:09.900 way heroic

00:50:10.460 masculinity is

00:50:11.360 configured, the

00:50:12.260 way all forms

00:50:13.120 of masculinity

00:50:13.700 are configured

00:50:14.620 and certain

00:50:16.460 traditional forms

00:50:17.600 of masculinity

00:50:18.280 where the

00:50:19.560 Humphrey Bogart

00:50:20.460 character slaps

00:50:21.520 the woman because 0.99

00:50:22.200 she's misbehaving 0.98

00:50:23.260 would now be

00:50:24.280 regarded as so

00:50:25.220 unacceptable as

00:50:26.800 to cause a

00:50:27.720 frisson if

00:50:28.440 they were to

00:50:28.840 occur in

00:50:29.440 contemporary

00:50:29.880 cinema, for

00:50:30.620 example.

00:50:32.620 Well, it's

00:50:32.880 interesting that

00:50:33.500 there's a deep

00:50:34.600 ambivalence with

00:50:35.480 all this.

00:50:35.940 I've noticed

00:50:36.360 this with the

00:50:37.140 success of the

00:50:38.420 television show

00:50:39.100 Mad Men, which

00:50:41.020 in some ways

00:50:42.040 represented men

00:50:43.700 behaving badly

00:50:44.580 and so women 1.00

00:50:45.200 could kind of

00:50:45.700 gawk at the

00:50:47.160 oppressiveness and

00:50:48.620 outmodeness.

00:50:49.360 So you'd have

00:50:49.920 men, you know,

00:50:51.000 openly hitting on

00:50:52.120 their secretary and 1.00

00:50:53.380 lots of ass 1.00

00:50:54.380 slapping and 1.00

00:50:55.260 having, you

00:50:56.440 know, little

00:50:57.220 affairs during

00:50:58.420 lunch breaks and

00:50:59.300 so on and so

00:50:59.700 forth.

00:51:00.340 At the same

00:51:00.800 time, if it

00:51:03.100 were just that,

00:51:04.020 I don't think

00:51:04.380 it would be a

00:51:05.120 successful show.

00:51:05.880 It might be a

00:51:06.360 successful show

00:51:07.080 for men, like

00:51:08.040 on the Vice

00:51:10.540 network or the

00:51:11.880 Spike network. 0.99

00:51:13.080 It's some kind 1.00

00:51:13.980 of stupid 1.00

00:51:15.080 jock, you know, 1.00

00:51:16.520 all men

00:51:17.540 programming cable

00:51:18.800 network.

00:51:19.200 but the reason

00:51:20.940 why Mad Men

00:51:21.760 was successful

00:51:22.360 was at some

00:51:23.460 level that

00:51:24.740 Don Draper

00:51:25.720 figure, that

00:51:26.540 tall, dark,

00:51:28.200 masculine,

00:51:29.260 strong, self-

00:51:31.460 confident, willing

00:51:32.680 to put someone in

00:51:33.500 its place type of

00:51:34.420 man, is something

00:51:35.680 deeply attractive to

00:51:36.800 women and it's 1.00

00:51:37.860 something that they

00:51:38.840 continually long for,

00:51:40.920 maybe even despite

00:51:41.760 themselves, but

00:51:42.380 certainly despite

00:51:43.080 feminism. 1.00

00:51:44.240 But Jonathan, I

00:51:45.140 think we have

00:51:46.280 just scratched the

00:51:47.720 surface on this

00:51:48.860 issue.

00:51:49.800 Well, thank you for

00:51:50.460 being with us and I

00:51:51.620 look forward to

00:51:52.140 talking with you

00:51:52.760 again next week.

00:51:54.700 Thank you.

00:51:55.080 That's right.

00:51:55.440 All the best.

00:51:56.040 Bye for now.

00:52:13.540 Bye for now.

RadixJournal - January 09, 2018

Bowden! - 7 - The Feminist Mystique

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