The “Women can do everything men can do” craze — that’s what it is, a craze, as in it doesn’t make any sense — started somewhere in the late 1960’s to early 1970’s. Probably with Angie Dickinson in “Police Woman.” Then it became a way for hack writers to stay relevant, which is where we are now. Mara Jade is just as powerful a Jedi as Luke Skywalker…which, again, doesn’t make any sense. Supergirl is stronger than Superman, and that doesn’t make any sense either.
This is all fiction and it shouldn’t impact real life. In any way. But you know what, these are affairs of human beings, which also don’t make any sense. Fiction is affecting real life. Girls of dating age are ready to start some “serious” relationships with guys, and they don’t know how to do it because they’re not sure why we need guys. At all. For anything.
Mrs. Freeberg isn’t keeping up with the times. She and I have a “Martha and George Washington” height difference…or a Mathilda of Flanders / William the Conqueror height difference. Oh, she has step stools and when I’m not around and something’s on the top shelf, she does what must be done. But when I’m home…Honey? Can you get the thing? Usually the flour. Third shelf above the dishwasher.
She’s my Number One. Of course I jump up and get her what she needs. I may be a lazy asshole, but I’m a six foot tall lazy asshole, and she’s cooking my dinner. So I can continue to be an obese six foot tall lazy asshole. Oh yeah, and then the jars. She needs to open jars. Honey…?
I say: She’s smart. These “Women can do everything men can do” types are the dumb ones. They should be learning from her.
This targeting of men for uselessness — it’s counterproductive and cruel. It’s the cart before the horse. The conclusion comes first, and then we’re supposed to shoehorn reality into it. That isn’t how it’s supposed to work, at all, anywhere. And reality isn’t complying, because it turns out men can do quite a few things women can’t do. The cruelty is what’s inflicted upon the boys-coming-of-age. The message has gotten across to them that they lack value, aren’t supposed to be able to do anything, and if they’ve learned to do anything women can do it so much better. That’s a terrible message to deliver to anybody who’s teetering on the brink of adulthood, no matter what their gender is.
“Women can do it all” is false. It’s an argument that’s over before it’s started. You just pay attention to the “reality” taking shape around us, and you see even the title of “Woman of the Year” is being taken by a man.
And you know what else? It’s boring. It didn’t start last year, or the year before. It’s been going on for decades. Decades, and decades, and more decades, our noses being ground into it, like it’s punishment, the way you would grind a puppy’s nose into its own mess during the housebreaking. Except this is not our own mess.
In addition to being false, and boring, it’s divisive. We don’t need this. Women and men complement each other. We belong together. My wife is five feet one inch — no more than that — of amazing-ness, and if she sees something needs doing she’s going to do it even though her knees are missing cartilage, her neck bones are fused together and she’s allergic to everything. But I’m the never-sick guy who can’t find anything in the drug store because he never needs anything, full size, full height. So if I can see she’s going to wreck herself trying to do something, I’m going to do it first.
The current cultural norm, and target of motion, is: Men are useless. We should just lie in the sunbeam, like cats, waiting for our mistresses to do everything.
But it isn’t going to work, because it doesn’t mesh with reality. It doesn’t even mesh with the fake-reality we’re building elsewhere, doesn’t mesh with the Mulvaney “reality.” Men come out on top here and there, now and then, in a lot of places. Because we should. Just like women should & do come out on top in other places. That’s the design, in both intent and in effect.
If you like, you might say God knew what she was doing when making that call. But the call got made, and that’s the way it is. We don’t work well as replacements for each other, because that’s not what we are. We’re all built for a higher purpose than that.