"The sort of woman I am critiquing (and this applies to men as well in many ways, though I don’t believe we really need another piece by a woman critiquing men at this stage in our civilization) is the sort who, believing that she is the best of the best because contemporary feminism says “you are wonderful and men suck,” sits around doi…
"The sort of woman I am critiquing (and this applies to men as well in many ways, though I don’t believe we really need another piece by a woman critiquing men at this stage in our civilization) is the sort who, believing that she is the best of the best because contemporary feminism says “you are wonderful and men suck,” sits around doing nothing but watching The Bachelor while getting her toenails painted and expecting to have all the success in life just from looking pretty."
Honestly, I'm struggling to think of even a single woman of my acquaintance (of any age) who fits this description. Sounds like a caricature of a 1950s housewife. Not something that you would become by reading too much feminist literature (or watching too many feminist videos for that matter).
My male friends show me the sorts of women they get on dating apps. It makes me absolutely ashamed to be a female. You have women with intense lip filler and fake nails in skimpy dresses who work some 40k/year job and have never read a book in their lives. I have seen them and met them! It's very real and very sad!!
I live in Los Angeles. Forget hundreds, try thousands.
I recently joined a historical women’s club populated primarily by 60y+ ladies. We have tea, volunteer with the veterans organization, and identify forgotten 18th/19th century graves for a genealogy database.
I’m thirty, so…not exactly how I pictured my social life… But who cares! These women know how to play cards, they’ve seen bands like the Beatles live, their faces are gently lined in the loveliest way, and from a writing standpoint, many have lived through the Vietnam war—the period my current book is set.
Someone once told me to “live in the world as you want it to exist,” and I suppose that’s what I’m attempting to do. The noise is pervasive, but there are pockets of refuge. Take heart 🤍
Let me see if I get this right: you saw some women on dating aps who posted a couple of their most flattering pictures (nail polish and all), and from this, you conclude that they think that that they are wonderful and men suck, and that they should have "all the success in life just from looking pretty"? Jumping to conclusions much?
Not at all. There are women who are not terribly intellectual and who try to find male partners by investing in their looks. This much is true enough. Moreover, Liza looks down on these women. She's entitled to look down on them, I suppose. (I would, however, point out that not everyone is particularly intelligent - which is not the same as "intellectual" but is something of a prerequisite for it - and men do generally care about a prospective partner's looks.) The rest is just jumping to conclusions. Who says they think they're wonderful, while men suck, and who says they think they should have "all the success in life" just for looking pretty? I also don't understand what a 40k/year job has to do with it.
I do look down on women who aren’t intelligent and invest in their looks—and the ones who call themselves feminists while they’re at it. Because the purpose of feminism was to equalize potential in men and women. It has had the exact opposite consequence.
If these women spent as much time with a book as they did at the salon or getting Botox, we’d have a much stronger next generation of leaders. Think about the values that many of these children learn from moms who have never thought a real thought in their lives. I believe that feminism is to blame for this phenomenon.
(1) "Feminism" is one of those words that, in contemporary English, means anything you want it to mean. ("Communism" is another.) In other words, it means nothing.
(2) Looking down on unintelligent people is like looking down on short people. You're entitled, I suppose, but what do you expect them to do about it?
(3) Books have their place, but they are not a panacea, they are not without downsides, and they are certainly not to be worshiped. Plenty of bad ideas came from, you guessed it, intellectuals. Who else? And how did they communicate those ideas? Via books. Plenty of people go through life just fine without reading. Would they be better off if they read a bit more? Yes, probably. (Although telling a legitimately dim person to go read books is like telling a 1.60 m guy to go play basketball. It's a form of cruelty.) On the other hand, reading too much has downsides of its own. You run the risk of starting to "live in your head" and losing touch with reality. (This is actually somewhat personal for me because the single darkest episode of my adult life was, in fact, triggered by too much reading. It was a long time ago, but you know what, I would have been a lot better off at the time if I'd paid more attention to clothes, or make-up, or cooking, or what have you, and less attention to books.) Actually, people (writers) used to understand this. Mary Bennet, Emma Bovary, Tatiana Larina all come to mind as cautionary tales, though some of those characters fared better than others in the end, so it's not all hopeless.
"The sort of woman I am critiquing (and this applies to men as well in many ways, though I don’t believe we really need another piece by a woman critiquing men at this stage in our civilization) is the sort who, believing that she is the best of the best because contemporary feminism says “you are wonderful and men suck,” sits around doing nothing but watching The Bachelor while getting her toenails painted and expecting to have all the success in life just from looking pretty."
Honestly, I'm struggling to think of even a single woman of my acquaintance (of any age) who fits this description. Sounds like a caricature of a 1950s housewife. Not something that you would become by reading too much feminist literature (or watching too many feminist videos for that matter).
Thennn why have I met hundreds of them of them?
My male friends show me the sorts of women they get on dating apps. It makes me absolutely ashamed to be a female. You have women with intense lip filler and fake nails in skimpy dresses who work some 40k/year job and have never read a book in their lives. I have seen them and met them! It's very real and very sad!!
I live in Los Angeles. Forget hundreds, try thousands.
I recently joined a historical women’s club populated primarily by 60y+ ladies. We have tea, volunteer with the veterans organization, and identify forgotten 18th/19th century graves for a genealogy database.
I’m thirty, so…not exactly how I pictured my social life… But who cares! These women know how to play cards, they’ve seen bands like the Beatles live, their faces are gently lined in the loveliest way, and from a writing standpoint, many have lived through the Vietnam war—the period my current book is set.
Someone once told me to “live in the world as you want it to exist,” and I suppose that’s what I’m attempting to do. The noise is pervasive, but there are pockets of refuge. Take heart 🤍
Let me see if I get this right: you saw some women on dating aps who posted a couple of their most flattering pictures (nail polish and all), and from this, you conclude that they think that that they are wonderful and men suck, and that they should have "all the success in life just from looking pretty"? Jumping to conclusions much?
Taking it a bit literally, are we?
Not at all. There are women who are not terribly intellectual and who try to find male partners by investing in their looks. This much is true enough. Moreover, Liza looks down on these women. She's entitled to look down on them, I suppose. (I would, however, point out that not everyone is particularly intelligent - which is not the same as "intellectual" but is something of a prerequisite for it - and men do generally care about a prospective partner's looks.) The rest is just jumping to conclusions. Who says they think they're wonderful, while men suck, and who says they think they should have "all the success in life" just for looking pretty? I also don't understand what a 40k/year job has to do with it.
I do look down on women who aren’t intelligent and invest in their looks—and the ones who call themselves feminists while they’re at it. Because the purpose of feminism was to equalize potential in men and women. It has had the exact opposite consequence.
If these women spent as much time with a book as they did at the salon or getting Botox, we’d have a much stronger next generation of leaders. Think about the values that many of these children learn from moms who have never thought a real thought in their lives. I believe that feminism is to blame for this phenomenon.
(1) "Feminism" is one of those words that, in contemporary English, means anything you want it to mean. ("Communism" is another.) In other words, it means nothing.
(2) Looking down on unintelligent people is like looking down on short people. You're entitled, I suppose, but what do you expect them to do about it?
(3) Books have their place, but they are not a panacea, they are not without downsides, and they are certainly not to be worshiped. Plenty of bad ideas came from, you guessed it, intellectuals. Who else? And how did they communicate those ideas? Via books. Plenty of people go through life just fine without reading. Would they be better off if they read a bit more? Yes, probably. (Although telling a legitimately dim person to go read books is like telling a 1.60 m guy to go play basketball. It's a form of cruelty.) On the other hand, reading too much has downsides of its own. You run the risk of starting to "live in your head" and losing touch with reality. (This is actually somewhat personal for me because the single darkest episode of my adult life was, in fact, triggered by too much reading. It was a long time ago, but you know what, I would have been a lot better off at the time if I'd paid more attention to clothes, or make-up, or cooking, or what have you, and less attention to books.) Actually, people (writers) used to understand this. Mary Bennet, Emma Bovary, Tatiana Larina all come to mind as cautionary tales, though some of those characters fared better than others in the end, so it's not all hopeless.