Nicholas Reid reflects in essay form on general matters and ideas related to literature, history, popular culture and the arts. You are free to agree or disagree with him.
B.S. INDEED
Throughout the world, women are
being harassed by men with evil intentions.
These men ostentatiously open
doors for women; offer to carry women’s luggage when the women haven’t asked
for help; keep enquiring after the women’s health and suggesting a lie-down
when women do the least demanding things; and generally behave as if women are
incapable of doing anything for themselves.
You might be fooled into thinking
that these are simply polite, solicitous men.
But beware - oh beware – of these evil men. They are
manipulative male chauvinists whose main purposes are (a.) to get into the
women’s knickers; and (b.) to treat women as subordinates and sex-objects.
Their apparent good manners are a charade. They soften up unsuspecting women in
order to dominate them.
They are really practitioners of
Benevolent Sexism!!!!
Thus ran a recent cover-story in
the New Zealand Listener, which posed
for readers the leading question “Are relationships
being ruined by traditional attitudes?” (The “traditional attitudes” in
question being opening doors for women, offering to carry their bags etc.)
Not to beat about the bush, let
me admit at once that my chief reaction to the article was a guffaw and snort
as I considered how the article made so much out of so little.
In short, it was a journalistic
beat-up, replete (oh the shame of the Thought Crime!!) with the news that “up
to 80% of people” have some sexist attitudes.
Doubtless there are men whose
extravagant politeness is a stratagem to ensnare and suborn women. But doesn’t
an article like the Listener one
really imply women are so stupid that they don’t already know this? Further, do
such devious men pose any more of a threat to the wellbeing of women than the
treat-‘em-rough Bad Boys for whom, we are constantly being told, some women
fall? And are narrowly-defined “traditional attitudes” any more of a threat to
relationships than selfishness, materialism, hedonism, a sneering attitude towards
marriage (unless it is gay marriage, in which case it is to be promoted) and a
culture which says that individual autonomy is more important than commitment
to somebody else?
Wanna see really screwed-up,
badly-hurt people in bad relationships? I doubt if many of them are victims of
Benevolent Sexism.
As for the phrase Benevolent
Sexism itself, it was made up by two sociologists, who (according to the Listener article) said they were proud
of the fact that the phrase had the same initials as BullShit – B.S.
Tee hee hee.
The value-loaded “research” they
recounted at once suggested crap sociology, while the name they had devised
suggested pre-determined attitudes as well as a fairly primitive sense of
humour on the part of the sociologists. So it is not as if we are dealing with
penetrating, decisive and indisputable conclusions. We are dealing with
partisan, loaded and fairly dodgy commentary.
Okay. Enough with breaking a
butterfly on a wheel. If this singularly silly article annoyed me, it was because,
like so many others in the field, it committed two obvious errors.
First, it was designed to flatter
its readers. Women whose chief worry is over-solicitous and potentially
manipulative men, are women who do not have many real worries. An article of
this sort allows them to see themselves as persecuted sufferers in the cause of
gender equity.
Second, like so many such articles, it had a
reductionist view of human relationships. There are times in any good, healthy
relationship when he will go out of his way for her; and she will go out of her
way for him. If doors are sometimes unnecessarily opened, if bags are sometimes
unnecessarily carried, it can be a sign of real love and concern. If these were
the only signs of love and
concern, then in all probability it would indeed be a superficial relationship.
But to rail at “Chivalry’s dark side”,
as the heading of the article did, is to suggest that all politeness and good
manners are to be shunned. What really seemed to rile both the sociologists and
the author of the article was the evidence that some people – including many
women – actually appreciate being treated with consideration.
If any woman feels a man is
showing special consideration to her merely as a means of manipulating her, the
advice is obvious: tell him to bugger off. Most women are perfectly capable of
doing this. Those who are not – those who fall most easily for polite
blandishments – are just as likely to fall for any other sort of manipulative
behaviour. Or for b.s. sociology.
