Women Now Demanding To Be Treated As Eggshells, Not Equals
Camille Paglia gets it right on sexual harassment, from Playboy from 1995:
"[You can't have] the Stalinist situation we have in America right now, where any neurotic woman can make any stupid charge and destroy a man's reputation. If there is evidence of false accusation, the accuser should be expelled. Similarly, a woman who falsely accuses a man of rape should be sent to jail. My definition of sexual harassment is specific. It is only sexual harassment-by a man or a woman-if it is quid pro quo. That is, if someone says, "You must do this or I'm going to do that"-for instance, fire you. And whereas touching is sexual harassment, speech is not. I am militant on this. Words must remain free. The solution to speech is that women must signal the level of their tolerance-women are all different. Some are very bawdy."
Actually, a law professor with an evolutionary orientation, Wayne State's Kingsley Browne, argues that men shove each other around with language; it's a form of exercising dominance.
And if women are actually men's equals, their response to language isn't filing suit -- or trying to bring down a man's career through social media because he makes a joke.
In fact, Browne points out, men using language to shove women around the same way they do to other men involves treating women equally.
It used to be that women marched around claiming that they weren't fragile little dollies; that they could handle what men could. Now just the opposite is the case. Women get men fired over jokes overheard at conferences.
In 2008, Rebecca Solnit sniveled in the LA Times that men won't "let her" talk. Me? I just talk. Nobody stops me. Not even by trying to sue me for $500,000 (though I did have help from a man, First Amendment lawyer Marc J. Randazza, on that one).
I've also been writing here about the awful injustice done to Bora Zivkovic. Many science writers who proudly proclaim themselves skeptics unquestioningly swallowed the notion that Zivkovic was guilty of harassment.
Here's an example of his "crimes." While out for a drink with his wife and one of the women who later accused him, he bought a rose for his wife. He then asked the seller for one for the woman (who was standing beside him at the time), saying he'd also take one for his (heh heh) "concubine."
Say that to me and I'll laugh; I won't file charges against you. It wouldn't even occur to me. (I suspect that women who think this way are those who have not accomplished much in the world and realize that their only source of power -- and, especially power over men -- is the unearned power they can have through sexual harassment charges.)
If this sort of crack is something you can't take, you are not men's equal or anything close. You don't belong in the workplace; you belong at home where your biggest challenge is getting the brownies out of the oven without overcooking them.
Playboy quote via @instapundit
Amy, you are right... up until the last paragraph. As an "at-home" mom (quotes because I'm almost never home!), I can tell you that being at home involves much cruder speech than the workplace ever did!
Lest anyone forget, kids have little to no innate filter into what comes out of their mouths. If you have a big butt, they will proudly announce it... to everyone in Sam's Club (at least until you have trained such behavior out of them).
Similarly, there's the verbal abuse a child who is having a tantrum will spout out (e.g. I hate you, you're ugly, etc). Yes, it can be eliminated, but almost every kid will try every button they can push - at least once - to see what happens. That's the training them thing, but they don't START out that way!
Women (or men) who do not have the stomach for a little bit of discomfort don't belong doing things in the real world. They need help, because they are only fit to live in places graced by rainbow-farting unicorns.
Shannon at May 24, 2015 7:40 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2015/05/24/women_now_deman.html#comment-6029252">comment from ShannonHah, Shannon.
Amy Alkon at May 24, 2015 7:57 AM
I think that you are going too far by saying that a man must state the harassment specifically. I had a supervisor that joked about paying me to stock in my lingerie. At least I thought it was a joke until I turned him down and was fired. Nope, he didn't threaten my job - I guess it was on the line implicitly. He hired a playboy bunny to replace me.
Jen at May 24, 2015 9:44 AM
Great example, Jen.
Here's another, different kind (as told by columnist Ellen Goodman), that I hope most men would sympathize (though not empathize) with:
http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/1987-03-17/news/0110430132_1_harassment-beth-reese-bad-management
Excerpt:
...The lawyers who took this case to court worried that a jury might say, ''This is the modern world, this is the way people talk and behave in the business big leagues.'' Victories in these cases were spotty enough to give them pause. ''My lawyers asked me what my goals were in filing the suit,'' remembers Reese. ''I wanted someone to make this man stop. Even if I took it to court and lost, I would have made someone wake up.''...
(snip)
I mean, would a gay man harassed that viciously because he was gay not get sympathy from Paglia or at least most of society?
Note, by the way, that if I understand it correctly, the plaintiff won but lost half a million in lawyers' fees. That sounds like a serious case to me.
lenona at May 24, 2015 11:39 AM
"While out for a drink with his wife and one of the women who later accused him, he bought a rose for his wife. He then asked the seller for one for the woman (who was standing beside him at the time), saying he'd also take one for his (heh heh) "concubine."
Amy: "Say that to me and I'll laugh."
Correct me if I'm wrong Amy; But, I suspect that you would do more than laugh - you would play along and ask "just a single rose for the concubine? Shouldn't you also be paying for her apartment too?"
I agree with you on that those who think of suing are lacking in real accomplishments in their lives. And that playing victim is the only thing they have really accomplished.
charles at May 24, 2015 3:59 PM
Maybe you could sue him. That'll teach him.
Conan the Grammarian at May 25, 2015 12:40 PM
I think most of the problem is that when the average woman understands what equality really means, she doesn't want it. Women generally don't want to be related to by men the way men relate to one another, just like most men instinctively don't want to play by "female rules" and be accepted as an equal on those terms.
Mike T at May 26, 2015 5:21 AM
There's an idea I've been thinking about but haven't refined, that we'll have achieved equality in our society when a) the once-oppressed party can successfully say 'fuck you' where before they would have suffered in silence, and b) incompetent O-OP can rise to powerful positions just like the dominant faction.
Without naming names, it seems like we've achieved both goals.
Bill Peschel at May 26, 2015 5:28 AM
As younger generations of young men reach managerial roles, having gone through the gauntlet of eggshell feminism in high school, college, and their dealings in social media, will avoid hiring women altogether for any kind of role where their "feelings" may pose a threat to productivity. If/when hiring quotas increase by government decree, they will naturally gravitate towards positions where their business can stay small enough so they don't have to deal with the increased regulations.
TMG at May 26, 2015 5:52 AM
Nothing pisses me off so much as these fragile flowers who have no sense of humor and must be treated with kid gloves.
When I was working in jobs where I was the only woman in a group or the first to do this or that, I had a blast with the guys I worked with. I could swear back at them and laugh and tease them as much as they teased me.
But I've never been a fragile flower type.
Beth Donovan at May 26, 2015 5:57 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2015/05/24/women_now_deman.html#comment-6032487">comment from Beth DonovanSame here, Beth.
Amy Alkon at May 26, 2015 6:10 AM
Reading your piece, it is clear that the difference between you and the snivelers is that they are completely lacking in self-confidence.
TOF at May 26, 2015 6:29 AM
Another thing I have noticed is that women do not banter like men do. We will rib each other unmercifully, but we usually only do it with people we like. I suspect this is just so foreign to most women that they will take the banter as serious comments and misinterpret it.
Rick Caird at May 26, 2015 6:36 AM
Nothing new here. I believe it was a bit over a century ago that G. K. Chesterton wrote of a society woman who demanded that he treat her like he treated men. He replied that, if he did that, she'd toss him out of her home in her fury.
Michael W Perry at May 26, 2015 10:58 AM
Oh hell: Overbaked brownies! Argh! Thanks for reminding me how much I despise my oven. It heats so unevenly.
Dave W. at May 26, 2015 11:12 AM
From Seinfeld:
GEORGE: He gave me a wedgie.
ELAINE: Boys are sick.
JERRY: Well what do girls do?
ELAINE: We just tease some one 'til they develop an eating disorder.
Anchor-town at May 26, 2015 11:55 AM
It's ok to be sensitive and such. When it's accompanied by demands of accommodation, that's when it becomes apt to damage my calm. I think of the peanut-free schools because of one kid that can't handle his legumes. I feel for the kid but creating the peanut-free zone seems like a disservice, with the potential to create a bit of a monster. You have special trials, they are your crucible, to forge you into something outstanding.
Bryan at May 26, 2015 12:24 PM
"It used to be that women marched around claiming that they weren't fragile little dollies; that they could handle what men could. Now just the opposite is the case."
This.
Jay at May 26, 2015 1:03 PM
I think Mike T was on to something. Does "equality for women" mean that men will treat women the way they treat other men, or does it mean men will treat women the way other women treat them?
Perro at May 27, 2015 7:35 AM
Leave a comment