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The Future of Women
What do I see on the horizon, for women? I am not a prophetess - a “Cassandra” - but as a lifelong member of the XX gender, I’m deeply curious, invested, and opinionated about this topic. When Hank Pellissier (IEET managing director) sent me questions that he and James Hughes (executive director) compiled asking for predictions on the future of females, I couldn’t resist. Here are their questions and my responses:
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COMMENTS
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/06 at 02:19 PM
Peg,
This is a delightfully argumentative interview which I very much enjoyed reading, but….isn’t it a bit bleak? Maybe I missed it, but I struggled to find anything you seemed really positive or hopeful about. Is it really that bad? What, of any, would you say are the most promising signs or developments re empowering women?
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/06 at 04:09 PM
Here’s another vague, globalistic, “generalizing” (as pastor Alex would reply) comment of mine; remember, though, how vague and globalistic social science is.
IMO women’s progress is akin to all social progress: cyclical. As I remember it, feminism started well in the late ‘60s but subsequently slowed down markedly, plus was somewhat commercialized as well: “You can have it all” was a rallying cry yet also a marketing device; “having it all” meant personal fulfillment, yet also was meant in the literal sense of a woman being able to purchase whatever she wanted if she could as an individual break through the glass ceiling.
Cyclical is the key, IMO. In a larger sense, there is a 100 percent chance of revolution this year, probably around the time of the electoral conventions this summer. All the same, the meaning of ‘revolution’ has been dumbed-down to a certain degree; ‘revolution’ has a more extreme connotation than is actually the fact. There is a direct precedent for today: 1968, which was—by no means coincidentally—Year One for feminism. Unfortunately, some of us remember clearly the aftermath of 1968: a drift away from idealism towards the three ‘C’s:
confusion, commercialization, and resulting (and justifiable) cynicism.
Posted by ptittle on 02/06 at 04:36 PM
Peter, you can’t separate technological advances from the culture in which they exist. Hence, yes, my bleak outlook. Just look back in history. Margaret Sanger and Morgentaler, to name a couple in the reproductive area - did the technological advances result in woohoo for women? They both got stoned, figuratively. In another country, they would have gotten stoned, physically.
Posted by ptittle on 02/06 at 04:40 PM
Intomorrow, interesting comments. I have pondered whether all change is generationally cyclical because for some stupid reason, adolescents rebel against their parents. (which doesn’t bode well for the future of humanity - we don’t have time for that silly two steps forward, one step back, kind of progress)
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/06 at 04:55 PM
Peg, I wasn’t specifically talking about technological advances, I was thinking more about cultural advances.
The very fact that these days we at least _talk_ about female empowerment is surely some kind of progress? Since the invention of the wheel and the taming of the horse me. Pretty much cornered the public sphere, hence all these patriarchal religions and societies. And it’s true that these are VERY resilient. But I find it difficult to believe that the position of women today, in the most advanced societies, is as bad as it was before. So there is some kind of progress isn’t there? And as I’ve said on other threads in relation to other issues, of we are to make further progress surely we need to celebrate and build on what already exists? Otherwise it all smacks a bit of defeatism.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/06 at 05:12 PM
We will find out for sure this year, the indicatiors are all saturated to the max; only the cultural conservatism of the oppressed (as Fukuyama correctly wrote) has kept OWS-types from going farther than they have already; they have been dormant for the winter, but when summer comes they are guaranteed to rebel.
What much have the young—who make up the backbone of OWS
—have to lose anymore? Their elders dominate them as much as elders did youth in the Gilded Age albeit more silkily.
Gilded Age Lite.
This includes women.
Now, the end of this decade may very well see us drifting back to the status quo, but we go one step at a time. As Peg wrote in her piece, we are not clairvoyants.
Posted by ptittle on 02/06 at 05:21 PM
On the one hand, I want to say yes, Peter, overall things are better now than they were a hundred years ago.
On the other hand, I want to say, like Intomorrow, that they seemed to be better thirty years ago (60s, 70s).
And on the other other hand, I’d like to suggest that our view of history might itself be skewed. I think there’s a lot of women’s history that has been suppressed - so maybe things were better a hundred years ago too! (or not as bad as we’re led to believe when we read history that barely even mentions women) (I recently read an account that totally didn’t mention Marie Curie, for example, let alone say that SHE was the discoverer, not just a helper for her husband.)
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/06 at 05:33 PM
As I remember it (one has to eventually invoke the Judgment Call), the years 1967- 1973 were better, and then Watergate kicked in—just as the Vietnam War ended.
Another judgment call would be to say that materially conditions were worse in Curie’s time: treatment for radiation poisoning is better today.
Posted by Christian Corralejo on 02/07 at 12:07 AM
I recall mentioning in an old comment that things are neither better or worse. Its just a combination of problems changing and standards rising.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/07 at 12:50 AM
That’s a fairly concise way of writing it, Chris. Women do live a bit longer than in the past, so let’s just say they are inching ahead and the glass in the glass ceiling isn’t quite as thick. That’s a start, eh?
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/07 at 05:29 AM
It’s probably a bit pointless to speculate on whether things were “better” or “worse” than before in some kind of general sense. Better to think about: in what ways were they better, in what ways were they worse? In other words, where do we see progress, and where do we see things going backwards? And then crucially: why is this happening, and what should we be doing about it?
Peg I take your point about our skewed view of history. But again, what operational conclusions should we draw from this? And what are the parameters that we’re interest in here? My own take on feminism is that once the “low-hanging fruit” was picked (voting and such), it became less clear to the feminists themselves what constituted progress, with the result that the movement somewhat splintered and ran out of steam.
On a somewhat different issue I think we could be making more out of Hank’s/James’ questions about the future of gender. Peg you said in one of your responses that there have been “numerous gender options for the last 100 years, and still most people choose male or female”. Well, yes and no. To the extent that gender is a social construct, yes we’ve been able to choose something else. But then, to the extent that gender is a social construct, has it ever been as black and white as “male and female”. There are very many ways of being “male”. I am certainly not “male” in the same way as, say, Arnold Schwarzenegger or a peasant labourer in rural China. Anyway all this is somewhat missing the point that _biology_ has bequeathed a very clean, neat separation into male and female (let’s face it, the ambiguous cases are extremely rare), and this both (i) massively influences our culturally constructed gender roles, and (ii) may be about to change as a result of technology. How do we feel about this? (In my case: a mixture of curiosity and alienation. The world, and especially future prospects, is just getting too weird, and I’ve reached an age where I start to yearn for simpler and more familiar times…but there are opportunities, and it sure is a fascinating time to be alive.)
Posted by ptittle on 02/07 at 11:14 AM
Well, peter, i’m not so sure biology has bequeathed a very clean, neat separation into male and female. Perhaps, as measured, by genitalia/organs (i wonder though how frequent ‘gender reassignment’ at birth really is?). But what about levels of testosterone and estrogen? I suspect that’s not a clean and neat separation. Would love to hear some actual numbers on that…
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/07 at 11:57 AM
Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about the prevalence of intersex births:
“Prevalence
The prevalence of intersex depends on which definition is used.
According to the ISNA definition above, 1 percent of live births exhibit some degree of sexual ambiguity.[78] Between 0.1% and 0.2% of live births are ambiguous enough to become the subject of specialist medical attention, including surgery to disguise their sexual ambiguity.
According to Fausto-Sterling’s definition of intersex,[79] on the other hand, 1.7 percent of human births are intersex.[79] She writes,
“ While male and female stand on the extreme ends of a biological continuum, there are many bodies [...] that evidently mix together anatomical components conventionally attributed to both males and females. The implications of my argument for a sexual continuum are profound. If nature really offers us more than two sexes, then it follows that our current notions of masculinity and femininity are cultural conceits.
[...] Modern surgical techniques help maintain the two-sex system. Today children who are born “either/or-neither/both” — a fairly common phenomenon — usually disappear from view because doctors “correct” them right away with surgery.[79]
According to Leonard Sax the prevalence of intersex “restricted to those conditions in which chromosomal sex is inconsistent with phenotypic sex, or in which the phenotype is not classifiable as either male or female” is about 0.018%.[80]”
The Fausto-Sterling figure of 1.7% seems surprisingly high to me, and while one can always be wrong, if it really includes cases where there is _any_ feature normally associated with the other sex then it seems to be an unreasonably generous definition. The Leonard Sax figures seems much closer to what I would have expected (but again, one can always be wrong). But even if we go with 1.7%, if we compare it to things like skin colour, sexual orientation, right-/left-handedness and so on that’s still a pretty “clean, neat separation” by nature’s standards. And language of the type “masculinity and femininity are cultural conceits” makes me suspect that Fausto-Sterling has something of an axe to grind.
The fact seems to be that the vast majority of human beings alive today, even before any surgical reassignment or “clarification”, fit pretty neatly into the male camp or the female camp, in terms of both genitalia and chromosomes. There will be other features of course (let’s take facial hair as an example) that are more or less strongly correlated but would not be considered as an essential feature. Ditto testosterone/estrogen levels, although if anyone does dig up some numbers on that I would expect the correlation to be VERY strong.
Again, one can always be wrong, but I think we’re on very thin ice if we try to make out that male-female duality is first and foremost a cultural construct (let alone “conceit”). No, it is first and foremost a biological construct, one that we share with other sexual species. Whereas once those distinctions begin to blur as a result of technology, then things get REALLY interesting.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 02/07 at 12:42 PM
@Peg re ” But what about levels of testosterone and estrogen? I suspect that’s not a clean and neat separation. Would love to hear some actual numbers on that…”
This website edited by some good friends may have some numbers:
http://www.venusplusx.org/columbia/
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/09 at 05:51 PM
The following, by Jonah Goldberg at NRO, is in response to Obama’s contraception mandate:
“The Left often complains about the culture war as if it’s a war they don’t want to fight. They insist they just want to follow ‘sound science’ or ‘what works’ when it comes to public policy, but those crazy knuckle-dragging right-wingers constantly want to talk about gays and abortion and other hot-button issues. It’s all a farce. Liberals are the aggressors in the culture war (and not always for the worse, as the civil-rights movement demonstrates).”
The above is a rare ‘conservative’ admission of how values are relative to time and place. In pre- ‘60s Dixie, Civil Rights was tantamount to heresy; today it has been accepted to the point of smarm—today Rightists will proclaim their lack of racism until their lack of sincerity is eventually manifested by force of its being repeated.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/10 at 12:35 AM
Maybe he’s got a point. One of the myths I’ve come across a lot in policy circles (and by the standards of US politics they would certainly be considered “liberal”) is indeed that policy can be, or should be amenable to being, reduced to “sound science” and “what works”. It’s like there are implicit moral realisms, which are never quite made explicit (and recognised, as they should be, as “values”), but which magically and surreptitiously turn an “is” into an “ought”.
It’s as if, while conservatives are angry and fine with that, liberals don’t *want* to be angry. And conservatives certainly make them mad. And rather than fitting them at their own game, and winning, we hide behind analysis and “science”.
Take abortion for example. Is there any really credible reason to say that life begins at any point other than conception? Consciousness, perhaps; sentience, perhaps, but life? Yet we are reluctant to admit that, because we are scared of the simple, emotive logic: that abortion is therefore killing human life (or course it is), and is therefore murder. Because human life is sacred, isn’t it? Well in fact, that’s a moral realism, one that we’ve inherited from Christianity. All societies have some kind of taboo against taking human life, but all societies also make exceptions. But do we dare make that argument explicit? Are we capable of telling a story that has the emotive power of the “pro-life” story?
In fact the main problem with conservatives isn’t the lack of sincerity, it’s the lack of vision. As you’ve often pointed out, Imtomorrow, it’s their continual harking back to the past (a nostalgia that Goldberg would do well to recognise lay at the beating heart of fascism at its inception, and not “liberalism” as he has claimed). We need to tell them positive stories about the future, and map out strategies to get there. When we start to engage people in our vision for the future, then they will start to realise that, deep down, they don’t care about the “hot button” issues all that much. And then we will be able to pursue the pragmatic, compromise-laden policies that we actually need.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/10 at 12:52 AM
“All societies have some kind of taboo against taking human life, but all societies also make exceptions. But do we dare make that argument explicit? Are we capable of telling a story that has the emotive power of the ‘pro-life’ story?”
So can’t we tell them abortion is expedient? besides, what I dislike most about pro- “life” is how it is used as a wedge issue. And what I dislike most (aside from Christianity’s collective unconscious of crucifixion) about Christianity is how agape love is a myth—
so-called conservatives care about their people, their families and friends, their unborn/fetuses—not others’. The pretension in this case is they do not actually (why should they?) care whether someone else aborts their own fetuses/unborn. It is too remote from them.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/10 at 12:59 AM
...Pete, the Bible says without love faith is like the tinkling of empty bells; thus if alleged pro-life Christians do not care about others’ families, about slum-dwellers, about others’ children, about others unborn/fetuses, then isn’t their own faith the tinkling of those empty bells?
And who does the bell toll for? it tolls for thee 
Posted by Christian Corralejo on 02/10 at 01:56 AM
@ Intomorrow “the Bible says without love faith is like the tinkling of empty bells; thus if alleged pro-life Christians do not care about others’ families, about slum-dwellers, about others’ children, about others unborn/fetuses, then isn’t their own faith the tinkling of those empty bells?”
I don’t know what kind of Christians you have been around but this one of the most inaccurate assumptions about Christians that I’ve heard from you. One of the most significant parts about being a Christian is caring about “and” helping others. In fact, you can say that a large part of Christianity is about making everything not about ourselves (individually), but God and others. Its statements like yours that makes me doubt that you (and most people here) actually as much about genuine Christianity as you think you know.
@ Peter Wicks Let me say something about the conservatives lacking vision statement. As a conservative myself, I’m open to new ideas and strategies for the future. It’s just that many strategies that liberals through out aren’t all that new and their effects weren’t always positive. Whether we like it or not, history tends to repeat itself (or at the least rhyme) and conservatives wouldn’t be sticking to past ideas and strategies (many of which stood strong for a very long time) if that wasn’t the case.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/10 at 03:36 AM
@Christian
Olive branch: I also see a lot of merit in being sceptical of new strategies and sticking to then “tried and tested” ones, and it makes sense for conservatives to play this role.
Where it goes wrong is where responsible conservatism slips over into out-of-control nostalgia, which arguably is what gave birth to fascism 100 years ago, and in my view it underlies much of what is wrong with American conservatism today. (You do agree there’s something wrong withAmerican conservatism today, don’t you?)
I think you missed the “if” in Intomorrow’s statement about Christians. Sadly, some of the most high-profile spokespersons of “Christianity” in the US are right-wing bigots who have hatred, not love, towards the poor and those of other cultures, races, sexual orientations and so on. This confirms the similarity between this virulent movement and the fascism of yesteryear.
Does that mean all conservatives are nostalgic extremists. ‘Course not. Does it mean that all those who consider themselves Christian have failed to internalise the sermon on the mount. Not at all. But some of them have, and they need to be called out.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/10 at 03:47 AM
@Intomorrow re abortion: “expedient”? Don’t think so. To a moral realist (and they are generally the ones who shout the loudest), “expedience” is almost a dirty word, almost akin to corruption. I’ve come across this amongst environmentalists as well: anyone who is ready to compromise with the “enemy”, in this case business (especially big business), for reasons of “expedience” is a sell-out. It comes from our primal, tribal, warrior instincts.
Of course, “expedience” is precisely what I’m talking about when I refer to “the practical, compromise-laden policies that we actually need”. But expedience doesn’t sell. Compelling, positive visions do.
@Christian On which subject…...my advice would be to wear the label “conservative” as lightly as I wear the label “liberal”. It is good to be conservative in some cases (for example when one suspects the progressives are about to “progress” off the edge of a cliff), and good to be “liberal”, tolerant, and indeed progressive, in others. Even in the most conservative of traditions there has to be a story, dynamism, a sense of progress. It’s about finding your inner non-conservative.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/10 at 03:50 AM
A further thought: isn’t the sermon on the mount about the most socialist creed that there is?
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/10 at 03:56 AM
“The pretension in this case is they do not actually (why should they?) care whether someone else aborts their own fetuses/unborn. It is too remote from them.”
They do, but not out of compassion for the unborn. It their most sincere (and some of them are, perfectly, sincere), it’s about fear of moral corruption, bad karma, and divine retribution. And not entirely without good reason: the taboo against taking human life
is not to be dismissed lightly, even in the exceptional cases. It’s just that they might apply the same logic to drone attacks (and generally don’t).
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/10 at 06:26 PM
“As a conservative myself, I’m open to new ideas and strategies for the future. It’s just that many strategies that liberals through out aren’t all that new and their effects weren’t always positive.”
Please re-read the Jonah Goldberg excerpt above, he is very bright thus his double-mindedness cannot be dismissed as from ignorance; what is crucial is: Goldberg is emblematic of today’s post-Reagan fecklessness; conservatives don’t have Reagan to guide them, nor do they have the Cold War to unite them—they are running their GOP automobile on Reagan fumes. Having known Mid America since 1977 I now see only the old- fashionedness of Mid America keeps conservatism in business.
Fair warning, Chris: you risk the intense double-mindedness (no, not quite schizophrenia) that conservatives are prone to, wanting to live in the 1770s (the Tea Party); the 1980s (the Reaganites); even a few in the 1950s (elderly Ike-conservatives).
You want to live in the past and also the future, Chris? it wont work for the rest of your life, you’ll end up bumping into yourself philosophically, spiritually.. you’ll wind up attempting to square circles. You can’t be a modern-old-fashioned radical conservative moderate technoprogressive without tying yourself up in knots by way of rationalization.
At your age you can throw the old garbage in the dumpster with little difficulty.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/10 at 08:29 PM
...Chris,
glance at NRO, the premier conservative site, they take ‘the past is prologue’ far too seriously; today’s front page is stuck in decades ago (Santorum), centuries ago) Mohammad Baqer al-Majlisi, and timepoints in between. You are open to new ideas and strategies for the future, they are not. They want others to grow up, be mature, yet their own dithering and cluelessness is a immature.
If they attempt to live in the past, present and future simultaneously, IMO their minds will eventually be as weather vanes, spinning in all directions.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/10 at 09:00 PM
One more stab at it tonight,
it isn’t merely sentimentalism, Pete; in service of nostalgia there is disingenuousness, Newt Gingrich being the ne plus ultra. He is far far too smart and educated not to know that what he is peddling is malarkey; he is far too experienced in business, academia, in the public sector (Speaker of the House, ‘95- ‘99) not to know he is full of it. Only a ‘tard or desperate paleocon would fall for his souped-up conservative blarney. His witch’s brew (no offense to Wicca) includes a pinch of Reagan, of Alexis de Toqueville, of Alvin Toffler—all mixed up with eye of Newt and four leaf clover. Goldberg is another piece of work.
After what happened last decade I wont tolerate them anymore; it is the limit.. enough is enough. Think of it: Carter *only* wasted four years as Chief Executive; Bush wasted a full eight. Shouldn’t Rove get some sort of raspberry award for it?
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/11 at 07:11 AM
@Intomorrow
I agree with much of what you write, the only thing is I think you need to distinguish a bit more carefully between rank-and-file members of the conservative “movement”, for want of a better word - that is to say people like Christ who tend to identify themselves as conservatives, and _some_ of the high profile (and indeed behind the scenes) leaders of that movement, both the Tea Partiers and the GOP establishment. It is the latter that are disingenuous; it is on the sentimalism and insecurity of the former that they prey.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/11 at 07:13 AM
Christ!? I meant Chris 
Blame the iPad auto-correct.
Still laughing about this, as I wait for the 180 seconds to elapse…
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/11 at 06:47 PM
A (St.) Francian slip?
This comment will drift on-topic, as many readers are of course interested in emerging tech to start with, and going off-topic only worsens it for them.
First, nothing much can be done at this time—a stock reply putting it off into the future—concerning the false consciousness of the rank and file, though it is not to be as pessimistic as it appears because we keep in mind the progressive-reaction cycle.
Second, it isn’t Chris’ religion, it is the Rightist Simi Valley politics; the overwrought and cloying posturing on contraception; the hysteria of pro- “life”. A childish fixation on fetuses, plus the obsession with gay penises and lesbian vaginas.
Sure, Pete, not everyone is an intellectual so it has to be dumbed down to a lower common denominator.. not to mention a noticeable decline in education. Which brings up how Americans can do business well, yet cannot even work together on improving their childrens’ and grandchildrens’ education! however perhaps that isn’t being counterintuitive enough: situation normal all fouled up. We both know the GOP are supposed to be spoilers, that is their role.
If only they didn’t go out of their way to be such smarmy cornballs.
At any rate, IMO men will not give up their power over women at this time. People want great wealth for obvious reasons; they want power so they can tell others what to do but not vice versa.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/11 at 10:03 PM
“that is to say people like Christ who tend to identify themselves as conservatives”
Come to think of it, didn’t Christ run as Conservative candidate for Treasurer of Jerusalem, 20 CE? his campaign slogan was “Render Unto Caesar”
The following is for Chris:
it isn’t that abortion is not a valid issue; it is how it is blown out of proportion by pro- “life” hysterics to a colossal degree, as if it were an existential issue such as nuclear proliferation; this is partly due to remote causation/slippery slope. They think, “if we don’t strike down Roe v. Wade, it will lead to the destruction of Western civilization.”
And contraception is a non-issue, it is religious wingnuts grasping at any wedge handy enough to brandish as a political weapon.
So there is some dissembling involved on the part of the Religious Right, Pete.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/12 at 02:35 AM
“Second, it isn’t Chris’ religion, it is the Rightist Simi Valley politics; the overwrought and cloying posturing on contraception; the hysteria of pro- “life”. A childish fixation on fetuses, plus the obsession with gay penises and lesbian vaginas.”
Right. But who is behind this politics, this cloying posturing? Sure there is some dissembling involved on the part of the Religious Right, but at what level? To what extent is it deliberate, to what extent is it self-deception…or “false consciousness” as you put it. We need to understand which, because there is no point in arguing with dissemblers, one just has to try to expose them, whereas there is a point in arguing with the sincerely deceived.
“First, nothing much can be done at this time—a stock reply putting it off into the future—concerning the false consciousness of the rank and file, though it is not to be as pessimistic as it appears because we keep in mind the progressive-reaction cycle.”
I fear pessimism less than defeatism. This is what will kill us. Pessimism says, “The prospects appear to be dire,” and there is plenty of good reason to believe that (the progressive-reaction cycle notwithstanding). Better not to be in denial about it IMO. Defeatism, by contrast, says, “Nothing much can be done at this time, let’s put it off into the future.” this breeds passivity. There may be some kind of positive swing of the pendulum at a later date, as you appear to suggest, but by then it may be too late. Perhaps it’s already too late - there’s me being pessimistic again - but the key word in that sentence is “perhaps”. It might not be too late, but the here-and-now may also be our last chance to do something about it.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/12 at 10:23 PM
You write good comments, Pete!, will try to respond in kind. Yet first an apology for the bad pun “Franciscan slip”, it is a jest bad enough to get a guy 86’d from every transhumanist site on the Web.
One ever-recurring difficulty is the fear of biting the hand that feeds one; some of us feel guilt at criticizing religion, business, govt—and guilt is used to manipulate us. I feel guilt in criticizing Christianity albeit where would we be if such as Galileo had not implicitly done so? Chris wrote I was being unfair to his faith though he has referred to gays and others in derogatory terms: by Chris’ lights, Christians are to be considered immune from rebuke save for by other Christians? So then Rightist Christians can criticize Islam’s flaws but not the other way around? Hardline Marxists tell us to unite in proletarian solidarity; Christians tell us to unite in Christian ecumenicism…. however both Marxism and Christianity are akin to financial instruments with nothing to back them up. Religionists want us to trust them—not merely God—yet they give us no reason to trust them. As you wrote, the Sermon On The Mount is more socialist [than, say, Debs ever was], and BTW so is the entire New Testament; the Old Testament being a violently superstitious tome.
This segues back to Peg’s piece.. rightwing religion is to hold women down, why qualify this fact? the Commissar thinks he knows what is best for the worker; the religionist thinks he knows what is best for women. And to say the least, they both are only playing it by ear just like the rest of us, pretending their revealed truths make them tantamount to moral soothsayers. Now, it is IMO probably better to live a clean life, however all seriousness and no play can make Jack a dull boy. True, no partying means one wont be infected with STDs; but then if you stay indoors all day you wont get into an accident—sit in a chair in a safe home all day long staring at the walls, and one will stay out of trouble, perhaps one’ll even live a few years longer. Stock the pantry with the finest organic food and highly purified water, venture outside merely to visit physicians’ offices and maybe one will add a decade or so to one’s clean, safe, uneventful life.
One can paraphrase Hank in writing how the ratio of imbeciles to worthwhile (e.g. above room-temperature IQ) Christians is not encouraging. Nevertheless, it goes without saying at a technoprogressive site, you are correct on defeatism; with the caveat that in America one has to fight about not merely everything as in Europe, but everything all the time, what makes America dynamic, as the platitude goes. But, Pete, if you lived in America you’d be less enamored of the dynamism, and more aware of the mundaneness, of dreary celebrity culture that has merged with King Of The Mountain politics: being in Belgium, you don’t see the entirety.
Religion is pleasant next to politics,which is the real reason I like religion; bad religion’s fairy tales are fluffier than the brawling, brass knuckle fairy tales of bad politics.
At any rate, my chronic mistake is to utilize logic in examining that which is illogical, am not counterintuitive concerning these matters.. like an absentminded professor visiting a ghetto and saying,
“Tut tut, these indigents ought to read Weber; and can’t the poor dear wretches be told of the hierarchy of needs? my MY, we must do something about it, toot sweet. Heavens to Betsy!”
Attempting too strenuously to make sense doesn’t make sense.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/13 at 12:40 AM
PS
Pete,
can’t speak for anyone else, yet can write how I want to give religion its due- not because there is verifiable substance to faith, but it is a, perhaps The default, religion/spirituality is the premier escape—one doesn’t have to drink, smoke, pop a pill, to get high on religion; and, again, religion is IMO more pleasant than politics, would rather hear a singer sing ‘Amazing Grace’ than a politician sing ‘Hail To The Chief’.
Nonetheless, the religious do harbor many ulterior motives, so I don’t and wont trust them. Naturally, there are besides ulterior motives also misapprehensions that we need to discuss with them (if they will listen). Even more, *we* need to communicate with libertarians—long as someone else does the communicating, not me!—as they are more interested in transhumanism, and are more industrious; Libertarians are real Doers, not be-ers and thinkers. Unfortunately, what libertarians don’t know, do not want to know, what the religious don’t either, what Marxists do not get, is that the majority of men, probably the overwhelming majority, want power more than liberty; want power more than piety; want power more than egalitarianism.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/13 at 04:29 AM
@Intomorrow You also write great comments!
As before I agree with much. Perhaps even all. I’ll only say two things.
1. I also see the attraction of religion, compared to “bad politics” and much else. Yet there are other ways to fill this void than finding even worse addictions. Positive psychology has done great service in taking the insights of traditional religion (including Christianity) and putting them on a firm scientific footing. The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt is a particularly good and accessible example in my view.
2. Your last sentence (about people wanting power more than liberty) is entirely “Fliesian”, and there’s a lot of truth in it. Yet power is also an addiction, and it doesn’t necessarily lead to happiness. It is almost tautological to say that what people really want is to be happy (what else does it mean to “want” something). Only when we free ourselves from our addiction to power can we be truly happy. The good news is that more and more people are beginning to understand this. The bad news is that time is running out.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/13 at 12:57 PM
“The bad news is that time is running out.”
Yes; the big surprise (shock, even) to me concerning futurism was how little advancement there was after, say, circa 1971 or so. I’m slow on the uptake, so it didn’t sink in until the last decade.
It must revolve around an interest in not wanting to delink from nature, which is related to nostalgia of course. I look at the quaint old homes on the prairie and it stands out right away that the lure of nature is at least as powerful as a ‘technetronic’ future.
But to go back ontopic, men have no intention of allowing women to cease being subservient to men, it is more often than not an attitude one has towards children:
“you women are lost without men so we will guide you.”,
when part of the reason women are ‘lost’ is because men have mis-guided women.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/13 at 03:03 PM
... btw, what is meant by “bad religion” is when you visit a pleasant church with your wife now and then,
it is no problem.
Bad religion is when, like, you visit a fire and brimstone church and the minister tells you you are going to Hell: but he says to first place your money in his offering basket before you descend to Down There. Then you would know what bad religion is about.
And I get where sentimentality comes from; however I’m not sentimental for 1776, life was great in the 18th century until one needed anesthetics, antibiotics, surgeons, etc. Life was great until one got real real sick—then life wasn’t so great anymore.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/13 at 05:34 PM
I don’t think the quaint old homes thing is _only_ nostalgia, or if it is it’s nostalgia of a highly innate variety. Deep down we still want to be in some prominent position overlooking a vista of African savannah, or some hybrid of that and where we grew up. And in principle this isn’t _incompatible_ with high-tech, the technology just needs to be discrete and blend in. You want the quaint home on the prairie, but with Internet access and all the other mod cons. If we learn to listen, perhaps we’ll even get there.
On men-women, again I follow you just up to that point where you slip into defeatism. You know that “Men have no intention of allowing women to cease being subservient to men” isn’t true for all men everywhere. Apart from anything else, not everyone has such strong identification with their gender. I certainly want to live in a world where women are empowered.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/14 at 06:08 AM
Perhaps we feint at colonizing space when we actually want to stay on Earth with the savannah and the little house on the prairie as backdrop?
Perhaps we feint at empowering women, when men deep down want to keep them the Second Sex?
Accentuating the positive is only proper and just….
going through the motions of social progress—which appears to be the rule not the exception—is not. Pete, I haven’t heard anything new re social progress since the early ‘70s; feel as if am someone who has bought into social snake-oil my whole life. However if these are matters which are excessively antinomian and ought not be discussed then please say so. You are the rare someone who is capable of giving a straight answer.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/14 at 10:48 AM
That’s a nice compliment, thanks!
In order to give a straight answer I have has to look up “antinomianism” on Wikipedia, and the following particularly struck me: “While the charge of antinomianism can and often does apply to those who reject the keeping of any codified moral laws, antinomian theology does not necessarily imply the embrace of ethical permissiveness; rather it usually implies emphasis on the inner working of the Holy Spirit as the primary source of ethical guidance.”
Now if we replace “the inner working of the Holy Spirit” by “an intuitive sense of what is likely to lead to the greatest good”, then we have utilitarianism. Hallelujah! So no, if you are antinomian in this sense then I will never accuse of being too antinomian to be worth listening to.
What really interests me though is your comment: “[I] feel as if am someone who has bought into social snake-oil my whole life.” I’d be interested to know more about this. The 70s was when I grew up, in England. We then went through the “every man for himself, there’s no such thing as society” 80s, but things seemed to get better in the 90s. People started realising that values were important, it’s not just about being rich and “upwardly mobile”. It all became a bit more touchy-freely, in a sometimes cringeable but basically good way.
Then came 9/11 and the Bush years, of course. After an initial burst of sympathy America became more hated than ever overseas, and the decision to invade Iraq, among many other things, divided Europe, exacerbating old wounds and creating new ones. By then I was here in Brussels, gradually coming to realise that my office job in the European Commission didn’t suit me, but struggling to find a satisfactory way out. In the mean time, however, I was coming across gems of wisdom from positive psychology to Tim Ferris’s Four-Hour Work Week, and started to find the path I was looking for.
One should not extrapolate one’s personal experience to the entire world, of course, but I believe the bottom line is that if you look closely you can find promising processes alongside the depressing or downright terrifying ones. A recent global happiness survey has found (by asking them) that people are generally happier than they were four years ago. Something to be…happy…about?
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/14 at 12:08 PM
I agree with utilitarianism. At any rate, ‘antinomian’ in the previous comment was shorthand for subverting the status quo, rebelling against codified laws, because laws are not primarily concerned with justice; laws are are about traditions, the legal system, as you know, is based on precedents. Many dislike the subversion of the status quo for any number of reasons, including the losing of one’s position; a families position; a dynasties position. People do not spend a good portion of their lives—decades—obtaining power to merely throw in the towel just like that.
Pete, haven’t heard anything really new on social/political progress since the early ‘70s, appears the majority are talking out of both sides of their mouths: they want change, but on condition change doesn’t reduce their positions, their families’ positions; their dynasties’ positions. And then there is change affecting the ambience of their lives, speeding their lives up so they cannot savor what they once did in the manner they did.
I look at America and wonder if they will be willing to let go the past enough to progress, wonder if we are stuck too far into the past. For instance there are people down South who are not merely angry about the Civil War- they are still fighting it after almost 150 years.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/14 at 02:05 PM
Well, hypocrisy is nothing new, it’s pretty much part of the human condition. So yes, people want change, but also fear it. And we get stuck in our ways as well. For example I’ve been fighting with my old boss via e-mail over the last 24 hours over an appraisal procedure that is essentially irrelevant with regard to my future plans and prospects. Why?
I think what I read in your comments is essentially disillusionment. It’s like you were hoping for something else, and are having difficulty coming to terms with how things have actually turned out to the extent that you also find it difficult to really see, or at least really _connect_ with, the more promising developments that are occurring.
In fact someone like iPan, or perhaps even CygnusX1, is more “antinomian” in the sense you describe than you are. You say you want to be subversive, but you are too pessimistic and circumspect to be convincing. You describe the status quo in a generally accurate way (albeit somewhat bleaker than is justified by the evidence), and tend to be pessimistic about the prospects for doing anything about it. A true “antinomian”, in the sense you describe, would be more positive about the prospects, if we only abolish those repressive laws and governance models.
Of course they’re wrong, and in a sense so are you (or more precisely you are exaggerating) when you say that laws are just there to prop up the status quo. Common law systems (unlike those on the European continent) indeed emphasise precedent, but they are also voted on by politicians, many of whom want change. There was nothing particularly conservative about the US Constitution when it was drafted. It was a revolutionary document, containing much idealism.
But indeed, some laws need to go, as to some governance models. The US Constitution is, in my view, seriously out of date. So, probably, is the UN Declaration on Human Rights, and in many ways the whole system. A balance always needs to be struck between the pragmatism of realpolitik balance of power and the idealism of values-based laws and arrangements. For a while the EU was doing a reasonably good job at that, but the failure of its richer nations to show solidarity to others in their time of need bodes very ill for this continent, sadly.
And what about women? Well, we’ve lost Peg and everyone else, for now at least, but I get the impression from her article and comments that she largely shares your disillusionment with the situation. But we do need to go beyond disillusionment. There’s just too much still at stake, and while there’s life there’s hope.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/14 at 02:39 PM
“But indeed, some laws need to go, as to some governance models. The US Constitution is, in my view, seriously out of date. So, probably, is the UN Declaration on Human Rights, and in many ways the whole system”
Above is what I mean, we are in fact walking anachronisms. Am disillusioned with chirpy old-time futurism, The original popularizers of transhumanism were prats. Robert Anton Wilson merely for instance produced a high ratio of techno-mystical gobbledygook, and I want no more part of that—save it for young greenhorns who need to learn things the hard way. Dancing Wu-Li Masters on Mars and all that is for those under the age of 30. Can you blame Peg for being disillusioned if she is? Feminism started fairly well, then went nowhere fairly quickly. And living in Belgium, you can appreciate America’s ‘vibrancy’, its ‘dynamism’ from a safe distance. Think of it: the Battle of Antietam was 150 years ago, and still Americans re-fight the Civil War; they think it was exciting. Well, WWII in Belgium 1944 was exciting too, if one didn’t get his keister blown off. So when the Constitution is changed, then increased optimism will be warranted. Optimism Da, Chirpiness Nyet, Tovarish.
One question is should I blog at your site so less comments between us are here at IEET?: have the feeling Peg and others don’t reply because they are tired of the repetition.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/14 at 03:48 PM
You’re very welcome to blog at my site Intomorrow. It’s not something I’ve really made much effort to get going so far, but it’s one of several avenues I’m keen to explore. Any suggestions for improvement/new articles ara also welcome. Certainly beats arguing with my ex-boss.
That said, with the occasional exception of CygnusX1 I don’t see anyone really complaining about our going off-topic, and Hank can always give us a sign if he sees a problem. Whether others want to join in or not is their business.
No I don’t blame Peg for being disillusioned with feminism and the progress of female empowerment generally. Several of the women I know here (including my wife) have similar concerns. Personally I have mixed views, and this problably applies to the putative lack of social/political progress from the early 70s on more generally. I think some of the movements that tended to be associated with progress back then indeed ran out of steam, but partly because having obtained some early victories the issue seemed less urgent, and what constituted further progress less clear.
By the way we have battle reenactments here in Europe too. Down the road at Waterloo, for example. And in my home village in England where the Monmouth rebellion is commemorated. And for WWII there was the Dambusters, Dad’s Army, and more recently Allo Allo (Listen carefully, I will say this only once).
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/14 at 07:01 PM
“Certainly beats arguing with my ex-boss.”
Tell him to come to America and work for the Republican Party- he is just what they need. Pete, nothing is going to improve with those rubes in the saddle. They say they want mature behavior by the public yet their formerly immature politics is now childish—and if politics is a reflection of the public then more is the pity.
————————————————————————-
If OWS wants change, IMO they have to ruin the GOP convention next summer and keep after them. Obama’s people aren’t afraid of change, so if OWS wants to have at the Democrats as well, fine. Naturally, the alternative is to let it inch on as it has; and if that is what the majority want, then so be it. However if they want others to be decisive, can’t they make up their own minds? if change might be too much to adapt to, can’t they indicate such?—if they waver.. how can they expect others to not waver?
We are expected to deal with the public without knowing what it is they want; without they themselves knowing what they want.
Posted by ptittle on 02/15 at 12:29 AM
Yes, Peg is disillusioned. (and you lost her more for the off-topic than the repetition - if i don’t stay in the thick of the conversation, i just find it really difficult to get back in…)
see on my site “I am not a feminist” - it’s short, so i’ll just paste it here for your convenience - it’s a reaction to all the young women etc who seem to think it’s over… (quite apart from the lack of ‘progress’ on the really big things - I’m watching reruns of the tv program “Commander in Chief” - so very telling that the show got cut after just two seasons. and we STILL don’t have a movie about Steinem. We have had two (?) about Morgentaler, but none about Sanger. The novels studied in high school english mostly are by men about boys for boys…and on and on…
anyway, here’s the piece:
I’m not a feminist. Feminism is so over. We live in a post-feminist world.
It used to be that men pressured women to have sexual intercourse with them. And despite the fact that it meant risking years of unhappiness for us (unwanted pregnancy, unwanted children), for ten seconds of bliss or relief for them, we’d do it. How stupid was that?
Of course, without the weight of the patriarchy, fewer of us wouldn’t’ve done it, but still. (And by ‘the weight of patriarchy,’ I include the social bit of being raised to yield to men and the economic bit of having to marry one in order to have children.)
But now? Nothing’s changed. Damn right you’re not feminists, as all you young things proclaim with revulsion. Because you’re still servicing men. Only now it’s with blow jobs. You’re still trading your pleasure for theirs. (Your clitoris isn’t in your throat.)
When a boy makes a girl come and keeps his own pants on, when a boy becomes popular (or a professional) because he knows what to do with his hands and his tongue, then you can say it’s so over.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/15 at 07:20 AM
@Peg Yes, that’s good…..with one caveat. Well perhaps two. The first is that there’s not actually anything wrong with “you’re still trading pleasure for theirs”. The issue is the context in which we are trading pleasures. The second, related point is that surely it is at least conceivable (I’m not making an empirical claim here, just a point of argument) that men are more interested in sex than women. In which case one can expect, without it necessarily being a sign of continued inequality overall, that the pleasures for which women are trading sexual pleasures will be primarily non-sexual ones.
But on the whole I agree with you: we’re not there yet, and the fact that feminism is no longer fashionable is not necessarily a sign of progress.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/15 at 11:42 AM
I think of progress as being physical, and women living a few years longer than they used to as material progress: the average age for women at death is about 80, so for now it is four score rather than three score and ten.
Is this progress? one could answer in the affirmative.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/15 at 12:15 PM
Yes I would regard increased longevity as progress, although it’s hardly the best indicator. How they rate on happiness surveys (both compared to before and compared to men) would provide a useful complement, but then we also need to consider what we really mean by “happiness”, and how that might differ from self-reported happiness. One would need to ask women what happiness means for them and to what extent they feel they are getting it. To the extent that this is measurable we could then compare their impressions with objective data, which would lead to interesting results. One might also consider sustainability: a lot of people consider themselves happy because they are in some kind of (often delusional) comfort zone, and this tends to be unsustainable because they eventually become bored or disillusioned and angry. Only then do they realise how powerless they really are. And come to resent this.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/15 at 05:48 PM
That is correct, right on target.
At any rate, lifespan is entirely quantifiable; health care is also, albeit to a lesser extent: i.e. x dollars or EUs spent on health care.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 02/15 at 06:14 PM
Dollars or euros spent on health care is double-edged: sign that more people are getting sick or that we value health more? But health is, partly, quantifiable. Pne can measure prevalence of diseases, for example.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/15 at 07:03 PM
Still, that more people are getting sick or that we value health more is quantifiable. And longevity is quite qualitative as well as quantifiable: living to 80 in a developed nation sure beats dying of malnutrition at a young age in a third world country.
Whereas other measures of quality in a woman’s life, for instance, are more subjective. As you wrote above,
“a lot of people consider themselves happy because they are in some kind of (often delusional) comfort zone, and this tends to be unsustainable because they eventually become bored or disillusioned and angry. Only then do they realise how powerless they really are. And come to resent this.”
Posted by guitar39 on 02/16 at 12:42 AM
Y’all better look out boys. More women than men are graduating from college. More are getting hired. More are rising faster. It will take awhile, but women will become dominant. Hang in there, Peg.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/16 at 06:27 PM
“It will take awhile”
Yeah, awhile.
Oldest trick in Future Biz. Why, 143 years from now, you will own a home on Mars, isn’t that wonderful? you will live forever and marry hundreds of people; the streets will be paved with gold.
Guitar, men will not let go their grip on women for decades, decades. The wealthy wont let go of the poor for decades from now, either; they’re stringing them along. Such is what Heaven is about, the poor can’t live dignified lives in their now-lives, so gratification is delayed until the Hereafter.
However race relations have progressed: 50 years ago if one said in Dixie that a mulatto would be POTUS someday, one might have gotten roughed up. So be thankful for small favors, gender and class relations have stagnated yet race relations have moved along fairly well. One out of two aint bad.. one cheer for progress.
Optimism is important, not chirpiness—chirp is for the birds.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/16 at 06:37 PM
“One out of two aint bad.. one cheer for progress.”
That is to write, one out of three aint bad: “One Cheer For Social Progress.”
Guitar, we can’t be rubber stamps for optimistic attitudes; you don’t do that with the religious? you don’t say:
‘sure there’s a Heaven’, of course you will be with your loved ones behind the Pearly Gates, free to pursue an eternal existence of religious fulfilment. Amen.’
Because you know it is from desperation.
Posted by guitar39 on 02/16 at 06:58 PM
@Intomorrow
I don’t want a rubber stamp. I don’t think it is an optimistic attitude. It’s not from desperation, and I wasn’t cheerleading. I see a trend.
“men will not let go their grip on women for decades”
I don’t think they will have a choice in the matter.
And “take awhile” wasn’t to be tricky. I figure that when the current crops of college graduates move into their fields in greater numbers than men, and grow in their fields, and get the experience to be managers and leaders they will make it happen.
I might be wrong. And I’m sorry I was “chirpy.” But I see real tendencies happening. And I hope I’m right.
Posted by guitar39 on 02/16 at 08:01 PM
@Intomorrow
“race relations have moved along fairly well.”
I think that is overly optimistic (though not chirpy).
Consider—
African Americans with a high school diploma or GED are three times as likely to be unemployed as whites with the same level of education. Although African American workers make up only 11.5 percent of the labor force, they account for more than 20 percent of the long-term unemployed, and make up 22 percent of workers who have been unemployed for over a year. And blacks accounted for 39.4% of the total prison and jail population in 2009.
Among recent borrowers, nearly 8% of both African Americans and Latinos have lost their homes to foreclosures, compared to 4.5% of whites. The racial and ethnic disparities in these estimated foreclosure rates hold even after controlling for differences in income patterns between demographic groups.
The median wealth of white households is 20 times that of black households and 18 times that of Hispanic households. From 2005 to 2009, inflation-adjusted median wealth fell by 66% among Hispanic households and 53% among black households, compared with just 16% among white households.
And, while the country finally elected a mulatto man as president, that has heightened racism in certain circles. Not all the people determined to make him a one term president hate him because he is liberal. I have actually seen emails with phrases such as, “get his black ass out of our White House.”
And, I doubt that the emotions would be as rabid on the right if they were trying to beat POTUS Hillary Clinton.
Posted by Intomorrow on 02/16 at 08:50 PM
“I think that is overly optimistic (though not chirpy).”
That is correct, it was over-accentuating the positive;
yet race relations have improved at a faster rate than gender and class relations have. POTUS, being a more or less figurehead, ceremonial, position—presiding over ceremonies and the like—is not really important albeit America would elect a mulatto (blacks being 12 percent or so of the population) while a woman (women being 51 percent of the population) has not been elected president- nor even vice president (an even more ceremonial position; “bucket of warm spit” it has been called).
Even Germany, the nation that put a few million women and girls to death starting 70 years ago, has a female head of state. America is in fact the country of contrasts, the modern-old fashioned nation.
Part Jetsons, part Flintstones.
But in cosmic time we have jumped ahead. Taking the 1920s, the decade of Flappers and mass production, as a departure-point, in 90 years we have made shocking progress. I’m only sour because the radicals of the ‘60s were ambitious on one hand; and mush-headed on the other: many for some reason thought legalizing marijuana was the key to progress. I remember the late ‘60s as if it were literally yesterday—vivid and lurid.
I remember the very moment feminism began. My mom threw her pocketbook on the table and said to my dad, “what was I thinking when I married you? My mother was right!”
What angers me most is Gingrich, he makes me ashamed of futurism; ‘conservative futurism’ is an oxymoron, and anyone who falls for it is a moron.
Posted by guitar39 on 02/19 at 11:17 PM
“I remember the late ‘60s”
The “legalizing marijuana” people say if you can remember the ‘60s you weren’t really there.
I think you were there.
But do you really think the presidency is mostly ceremonial?
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