Virgil’s epic poem the Aeneid tells the story of Aeneas and his people, the Trojans, as they flee from their destroyed home of Troy (the Trojan War is recounted in Homer’s Iliad) and venture to Italy to build a new home; the descendants of Aeneas himself (Romulus and Remus) are destined to become the founders of Rome. The first half of the poem recounts the Trojans’ journey to Italy, while the second half recounts the war that breaks out between the Trojans and the Italians, a war kicked off thanks to petty divine intervention by Juno, wife of Jupiter and queen of the gods.
The character arc of Aeneas – the protagonist of the poem who is, “famous for his piety,” (page 3) – provides an arguably excellent example of what occurs as a result of living a blue pill life as a man. We should begin by noting the importance of Aeneas’, “piety,” as it is his defining characteristic and one of the four virtues inscribed on the shield of Augustus (the first Roman emperor and the one during whose reign Virgil wrote the poem); the Latin term for this is pietas, which refers not only to religious devotion, but also to loyalty to one’s family and one’s compatriots and thus selflessness.
The enforced adherence to pietas occurs in a manner that is reminiscent of the blue pill existence by demanding numerous sacrifices from Aeneas in the service of a seemingly noble yet distant and nebulous ideal. In Book II of the Aeneid, Aeneas tells the story of the fall of Troy, which resulted in the death of his wife, Creusa. While Aeneas is running through the burning city, trying to find her – he lost track of her while initially escaping – he encounters her ghost, who tells him that her death would not have happened, “without the approval of the gods,” (as a ghost, she has been to the underworld and can thus see the future) also instructing him to wipe, “away the tears you are shedding for Creusa whom you loved,” (page 47) because they will change nothing. Aeneas notes that he was left, “there in tears and longing to reply,” to her and yet was unable to do so.
The loss of Creusa is arguably the first major sacrifice demanded by the gods – specifically, as Creusa notes, it is the, “Great Mother of the Gods,” (page 47) referring to Juno – from Aeneas, and yet it is a sacrifice made without consent (it occurs because destiny has it that Aeneas will marry another woman named Lavinia, with whom he will give birth to the ancestors of Romulus and Remus). Aeneas is simply forced to accept this tragedy, and its justification is that it serves a higher purpose; even though Aeneas is committed to serving said higher purpose, the death of his wife still takes an understandable toll on him.
The second major sacrifice demanded of him is the severing of his relationship with Dido, the queen of Carthage, in Book IV. Aeneas and Dido fall in love after the Trojans land in Carthage – and have sex for the first time thanks to cynical divine intervention from Juno – but Jupiter (king of the gods) sends his messenger Mercury down to order Aeneas to leave Dido and resume his journey to Italy.
Jupiter questions – in an arguably paternalistic fashion, as if he knows what is better for Aeneas than Aeneas himself – whether, “the glory of such a destiny [becoming a venerated figure in Roman legend] does not fire his heart.” (page 76) When Dido eventually catches Aeneas trying to leave Carthage secretly, Aeneas makes this juxtaposition between what he desires and what the gods demand of him explicit when he states that, “It is not by my own will that I search for Italy.” (page 79) West, the translator, points out in the introduction that the, “weakness and misery,” that Aeneas shows upon being confronted by Dido are signs of, “Virgil’s human understanding,” (page xix) and a contribution to the contrast between the humanity of those on the ground and the wilful apathy of those above.
It is arguably the case that blue pill men live a life characterised by an internal conflict between what they consider to be their duty to the blue pill world around them and the women in their lives on one side, and their own personal desires on the other. Such a life involves the subjugation of the latter to the former in the name of being a ‘good man‘ or a ‘male ally‘, ideals of masculinity which we red pill men know are meaningless. The one distinction I would draw between the average blue pill man and Aeneas, however, is that this process involves more consent from the blue pill man than it does from Aeneas; such men must fully submit to the loss of their individuality and make the necessary sacrifices to do so, while Aeneas genuinely has far less control over this process.
We must also analyse the conclusion of the Aeneid to get a picture of the final destination to which blue pill thinking inevitably leads men. In the final lines of Book XII, Aeneas slays Turnus, prince of the Rutulians (one of the Italian tribes that are at war with the Trojans), the justification for which has been debated by many scholars. The killing of Turnus is certainly at odds with pietas (it has nothing to do with devotion to either the gods or anybody), and it goes directly against another one of the aforementioned four virtues – clementia, which means ‘mercy’ (it’s where we get the word ‘clemency’ from). By the time that Aeneas kills him, Turnus is lying on the ground and begging for mercy, after Aeneas’ spear strikes him in, “the middle of the thigh,” (page 290) and cripples him; Turnus also has his strength sapped from his body thanks to divine intervention from Jupiter, ensuring that he had no chance of winning the duel.
Aeneas slays Turnus
Virgil applies the adjective furiis to Aeneas’ emotional state as he is about to kill Turnus, an adjective that is related to the Latin term furor, which can mean ‘frenzy’ or ‘rage’ or ‘madness’. Furor is significant in that it is depicted as being the opposite of pietas, Aeneas’ defining characteristic; furor connotes letting one’s emotions control one’s actions (instead of one’s devotion to the gods or to others) and being excessively (or, as the Romans would argue, immorally) selfish, being at odds with the selflessness associated with pietas. Aeneas adopting the characteristic of furor is like Jesus succumbing to the temptations of Satan, or Michael Kimmel starting to respect men; it’s completely against his nature. So why does he do it?
My argument as to why Aeneas disregards the ethical code outlined on the shield of Augustus is because he sees no value in adhering to it by the end of the poem. Fulfilling his destiny is a task that has involved many sacrifices for him – namely the deaths of Creusa, Dido, his father Anchises (Book III), and the loyal son Pallas of his ally King Evander (Book X), all losses over which Aeneas grieves humanely – and yet Aeneas has not been justly compensated for these sacrifices, as his understandable human troubles have been ignored and only viewed as obstacles by Jupiter to the accomplishment of this goal. The promise of glory does not fully satisfy Aeneas – this is the type of promise, by the way, that contributes to the male disposability that characterises wars – and it is entirely understandable as to why.
The killing of Turnus lacks a clear moral justification because Aeneas does not believe that one is necessary when those who have been forcing him to abide by that code evidently do not care at all for his wellbeing. This killing is like the existential implosion of a man who has just realised the shallowness of his own value structure, carried out with a nihilistic and Cain-esque fury reminiscent of men who murder their wives over unjust divorces. It is no wonder that such is the case, given that the structure of the idea of fate/destiny – where there is a predetermined end at which one will arrive, by whatever means necessary – resembles that of a lie (because when you lie, you choose an end ahead of time at which you want to arrive, and manipulate everyone and everything around you as much as is necessary to get there).
By the end of the poem, Aeneas has little to nothing of value to call his own, and so he curses Jupiter and destiny – or, in other words, the world around him – for stealing from him what he once loved, and the loss of faith in the proposition that existence is worthwhile is almost always accompanied by undeserved and futile (in the sense that existence can never be destroyed by acts of revenge committed against it) death.
The core lesson that we red pill men can learn from the Aeneid, brilliantly written as it was by Virgil, is that the subjugation of our will to external moral obligations that society expects us to adopt unquestioningly only contributes to the, “modern genocide on the male soul,” that Paul Elam describes in his video ‘Servant, Slave and Scapegoat‘ as being mercilessly conducted by the blue pill world. No matter what the dictates of those whom men perceive to be their gods may be, you must understand that your will is your own and that it can only be broken with your consent.
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Note: All page references to the Aeneid are to the Penguin Classics edition, translated by David West.
I’ve had many, many conversations over the years with blue pill men about red pill ideas. Interestingly, most of the men I’ve talked to have been pretty open to what I was talking about. At least in general terms my observations about men, women and the behavior typical to both resonated with them. I’ve routinely found men nodding agreeably as I described some of their not-so-positive experiences with women in relationship life. They did so even as some of them instinctively glanced over their shoulder, as if to make sure no one was seeing them agree with me.
Plenty of them even quietly acceded to my calling them out on their tendency to tolerate abuse, to enable and play white knight in order to stay out of the dog house. A life spent in some measure of frustration, trying to placate an errant child, of jumping through hoops to keep an uneasy peace is common to a lot of men. Sure, some men don’t share this experience. And some men claim they don’t. You can hear them bragging about how they are in charge of relationships when the woman isn’t listening. But most men I have talked to in relationships identify with this to one degree or another.
Most of them can chuckle at themselves a little bit when they talk about how they put up with the childish demands and entitled attitudes of their female counterparts. Some of them, without compunction, even cast themselves metaphorically as powerless little schoolboys, fearful of being sent to the principle’s office, represented by the disapproval of their wives or girlfriends. They do this with no sense of embarrassment, as though they think all men live this way. And of course, there are plenty of men who do.
All this introspective honesty, this good-natured self-disclosure, takes a nosedive, however, when I’ve talked to men as fathers, vs just husbands or boyfriends. In that matter things become, shall we say, pricklier.
You see, it is pretty easy for a man to admit that petulant childishness is the default setting for a whole lot of women once they settle into a relationship. Most men will just nod their heads knowingly and shrug it off because in their minds, that’s just the way women are.
It’s quite another matter when you start to talk about the role of fathers in instilling said petulance and childishness; when you acknowledge that “Daddy’s little girl,” is highly prone to grow up (or just get older) and become “Daddy’s little bitch,” or much worse.
It’s quite ironic, listening to a man complain about how his wife has crazy unreal expectations. He bemoans the fact that she cannot be satisfied, no matter what he does. He claims that he pulls his hair out trying to figure out how to satisfy her endless demands only to be met with more disapproval and, of course, more demands. He wonders aloud how she ever learned to be such a bottomless pit, and such a bitch about it.
Then you go watch him interact with his four-year old daughter, whom he will endlessly coddle and for whom he will go to any measure to make sure she never lacks anything, no matter how trivial.
And it doesn’t stop when she turns five. Or fifteen, or twenty-five. When it comes to turning human females into paragons of pissy entitlement, the western father has few rivals.
I remember well former vice-president Joe Biden talking about being routinely physically abused by his older sister, informing the world that his parents would have “gone nuclear” if he had ever defended himself. That was the family rules, and they were not negotiable. The girl got to inflict physical pain on the other children with impunity. The boys got to take it. As Biden recounted, he “had the bruises to prove it.”
My clinical experience informs me that the Bidens weren’t by any means the only family who operated on the premise that assault was permissible by girls, and self-defense by boys was strictly verboten.
Often, the main enforcer of this lopsided affair is the alleged family patriarch. Along with the idea of bodily autonomy for the girl only is often a whole slew of double standards reflecting the fact that Daddy’s little girl has Daddy wrapped around her little finger.
After all, has anyone ever coined a phrase describing how a son has a parent wrapped around his little finger? Of course not, because it largely doesn’t happen. The closest thing you’ll ever hear to that is the term “Mama’s Boy” which is an entirely different story.
A “Mama’s Boy,” which implies blind service to the mother, is a pejorative pointing to the general weakness of the son and the power of the mother. Having Daddy wrapped around your little finger implies just the opposite. It is the raw sexual power of the female, and the powerlessness of the father, even with daughter in the state of childhood. She can just crawl into Daddy’s lap, wrap her little arms around his neck and get her way, every time. He just melts. I will spare us all an analysis of the Freudian implications of that little scenario. It’s too gross to go into. Suffice it to say that both family scenarios involve females with power and males without it.
Fathers, in this regard, generally don’t take well to a discussion of the subject. I’ve talked to several of them about enabling dads who treat their little girls like princesses, effectively turning them into cunts who are destined to make a succession of men completely miserable, and who will, in the end, be miserable themselves. Nobody can hold on to any kind of happiness when chronic, insanely unrealistic expectations are the expected path to get there. That’s the curse of modern womanhood. It’s why so many of them are miserable, and why they feel justified in making others miserable when their plans fall apart.
Now, at some point in the conversations with a handful of these fathers, they seemed to reach a snapping point. “Wait a minute,” they’d say, in a suddenly serious and demanding tone, “You’re not talking about me and my daughter, are you?” They weren’t kidding.
“Why not at all,” I lied, aware that we were getting into dangerous territory.
Here I was talking to guys who were so not enabling or over-protective of or unreasonable about their daughters that they looked to be willing to go fisticuffs with a 6’8” 280-pound man if he got too close to the truth.
Either that, or they were reacting chivalrously to an imagined slight against their little princess. I’ll let you decide.
There is a great deal that goes into creating a society of women who feel so entitled to unrealistic demands of men that they make themselves and everyone else suffer.
Certainly, as I mentioned earlier, feminism has played a huge role. So, have obsequious, spineless men. The kind who never met a woman they wouldn’t bend over backwards to please. There’s also basic biology. Men are driven to scatter seeds and the greatest majority of them want and need women’s permission and approval to do it. That alone has them urging women toward very unrealistic expectations in the long term. Very few men can maintain the lengths they go through to achieve sexual conquest. We hear women complain about that all the time.
Indeed, as we look at all this from the aerial view, we see that men in one form or another, are the main culprits. It’s entirely arguable that feminists are only demanding of men what they know men will ultimately give them, reasonable or not. So, in that light, the sole enablers of all this nonsense are men.
That includes fathers.
Fathers are the first arena where women learn their expectations of men. Fathers are the gateway to hypergamy and gynocentrism. They are women’s first lessons in all-take no-give relationships, and where they begin to learn the sheer awesomeness of their sexual power.
Consider that the next time you see a father walking hand in hand with a little girl wearing a tiara and a t-shirt with the word “Princess” written in glitter across the front. Think of it when you hear a teenage girl gush about all the things her Daddy buys for her, or when you hear a father boast that “nothing’s too good for my little girl,” when they would not dream of saying the same about their sons.
Think about it a little more when you see entire families enable abusive girls; when their relational and other forms of aggression are allowed to flourish at the expense of everyone else, particularly the boys.
And if you ever wonder why corrupt, disingenuous ideologies of privilege, like feminism, are so warmly received by a generation of females who think entitlement is the natural order of things, then take a deeper look at how they got there.
If you are looking clearly, you’ll see that chivalrous fathers are a big part of the problem. They shape the training ground for feminists and narcissists. And they will indeed get angry, possibly violent, when you call them out on it.
So, in most cases, it’s better to just let it be. There’s nothing to be gain by standing between Daddy and his Little Nightmare. Life will deliver its own consequences.
The following paper was first published in July 2020 in New Male Studies Journal and is republished with permission.
Wright, P. ‘Gynocentrism As A Narcissistic Pathology,’ in New Male Studies An International Journal, ISSN 1839-7816 ~ Vol 9, Issue 1, 2020, Pp. 24–49, 2020 Australian Institute Of Male Health And Studies
I want to talk for a brief moment about a song that’s a childhood favorite of mine entitled “He Walks Like a Man” as performed by country music singer Jody Miller. The lyrics, written by Diane Hilderbrand, are what I want to look into in particular. Take a moment and read the lyrics, or better yet, listen to the song if you have access to it, but again pay attention to the lyrics.
These lyrics, which I have heard are written by Hilderbrand for Jody Miller for her husband Monty Brooks (although I have no solid sources on that), are sung from Jody’s perspective about the qualities of her man in the verses, with some descriptions surprisingly flattering and beyond the utilitarian clichés, such as “He schemes like a man and whenever he can, he dreams like a man”. Each of these verses is closed with what can be described as a light chorus: “But it’s the little boy; It’s the little boy in him I love”. A bridge within the song speaks of how there is a little boy in every man, and how the little boy shines through every now and then.
An eloquent and simple song which is to this day a favorite of mine. In recent years however I’ve come to appreciate the fact that lyrically it has a different take on depicting through words a woman’s love for her man. We have had our share of songs from plenty of genres describing a woman’s love for a man one way or another, thematically from how supportive and caring their men are, how lovable they are despite their “flaws”, or even more direct songs about “making love”.
However, I think this 1964 hit has a unique take on it that I can’t quite find offhand on other female-driven songs. Off the top of my head, it is the only song I can think of that is about loving a man for being himself. I’m not talking about the “be yourself” advice given to men that are struggling with social situations which is not nuanced or enough or truly meaningful in itself. What I mean about loving a man for being himself is valuing a man as an individual in himself.
My Introduction to the Puer Concept
One thing I’ve come to realize in recent years is what is intrinsic to an individual, that is, the importance of the inner boy in the man, and likewise the inner girl in the woman. What I mean by inner boy and girl, specifically, is the Jungian concepts of puer and puella. To stay on subject with this article I will place focus on the puer, the inner boy. It should be worth noting that “puer” is, in fact, Latin for “boy”. I want to make an immediate distinction of context here to avoid confusion: the puer concept, at least in the positive context I hope to exposit on, is distinct from what is referred to as the child archetype in human adult relations in which one assumes the role of child, and the other as the adult with hyperagency, resulting in a situation where the adult child parasites off of the one assuming the adult role through vulnerability and victimhood. The puer archetype, usually symbolised as a boy, represents spontaneity; and the child archetype, symbolised as an infant, represents helplessness.
Psychologists directly speaking about the puer also can be rather uncharitable in their exposition of it, especially when they cynically associate it with Peter Pan Syndrome…and dismiss it simply as a “failure to launch”. However, I think there needs to be a focus on puer as a highlight of the inner, unabashed boy that embodies everything that is honest, energetic, pure, innocent and enthusiastic. The childlikeness of earnest joy and uncorrupted excitement, and not the childishness of the petulant brat. The awe-inspiring innocence of wonder, wishes, and curiosity, not the stupid innocence of naiveté and ignorance.
I want to credit Peter Wright of Gynocentrism.com for convincing me of this distinction. Whereas I previously broadly used the “inner child” concept to speak largely of the positive aspects of the child to serve as youthful energy for the kind of grown men that spend time tinkering their automobiles and organizing their various collections, I largely glossed over the destructive aspect of the “inner child” in its manipulative, petulant context. Peter had helped me make more of a contextual distinction between the two and introduced me to the puer and puella concepts.
“He Walks Like a Man”, in my mind, speaks to the puer of Jody Miller’s man. The little boy in him is not an infant that pines for his mother’s care. The little boy in him is not a petulant whiner that goes into a tantrum when he doesn’t get his way. If he was in any way these things, the song’s lyrics of how admirable the man is *as* a man will not ring true. Note that in the bridge she mentions that the little boy comes shining through when his man is “happy or blue”. The little boy is the honest, unsacrificed self of a man, encased in the tough exterior that he’s adopted to function as an adult. When the little boy shines through, it should be a joyful encounter of meeting the honest self of a man with his dreams still intact, his wonder unscathed by cynicism, and a lust for life and all the world has to offer. And dare I even say, far from this being the woman’s maternal type of love for this little boy, perhaps it is the inner girl in the woman, the puella, that responds to and loves the little boy in him, the puer.
Cancelling the Inner Boy
I would have spoken about the following subject way earlier but I had been busy scripting up and recording my ICMI20 talk which needed particular attention, and I needed a break afterwards. So although some time has settled since, let’s talk briefly about that silly Tomi Lahren rant about how men are trash.
In her rant she specifically states in a snide voice that feigns wit: “This is a PSA for all the men out there, and all the boys who think they’re men, but they’re actually boys. This is gonna be the summer of canceling boys.” She proceeds to admonish men at large for not living up to what are no doubt asinine expectations for men that she and “her friends” imply to uphold. Everything about her rant exposes the shifting of blame upon all men where in fact there had been no self-reflection in which she can find blame in herself for anything that goes wrong in her relationships with men. It is greatly ironic that we find this brattish quasi-valley-girl woman-child with big sunglasses on her head talking about how men are not real men but are instead boys.
Everything about Lahren, coming across as petulant as any princess, reveals something most may overlook: this is perhaps not so much about her having an ideal man. Ideal men no doubt have come and gone from her life with her being the dismissing agent. It is my understanding she broke off an engagement that came with an obscenely priced diamond ring. No, her real issue is that she hates the inner boy within the man. It is hinted early on that she claims to berate men who are actually boys, and want to cancel said boys. I know what some might think: “Well, wasn’t Tomi just talking about the petulant sort of men who are irresponsible and giving her and her friends a hard time?” Judging by the fact that men who are “responsible” and relatively “real mannish” to a fault have surrounded and have been rejected by Lahren suggests that no, that is not the sort of boy she is in fact talking about. She can only be talking about the alternative, that is, men with youthful energy and won’t break themselves sacrificially to gynocentric society. Why else would she go on a rant? This whole affair comes across as sour grapes from freaking out over “where have the good men gone!” as if she’d just been dumped.
Tomi Lahren paradoxically assumes both the role of a woman who wants a perfect, ideal man that does everything for her, and also the role of an over-controlling mother treating her man like the very “boy” she wants to cancel. She wants a hulk or drone of a man that can make her life as effortless as possible with his puer, that is, his youthful exuberance and positive childlike qualities completely gutted with sheer contempt. At the same time, she treats men like children with a sadistic maternalism that says “if Mommy ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy”. In her rant, Tomi Lahren assumes roles of both self-victimizing woman-child and authoritarian mother. In both capacities, she mongers war upon the puer.
Lahren doesn’t stand out for this uniquely; really, she is just the latest in the line of women embracing “whataboutmeism”, that gynocentric demand of male altruism, to the point that they can’t bear the existence of the independent puer that wants to pursue his own goals instead of giving his valuable time to the beck and call of entitled women like her. But it should be a wake up call for people who latch onto people like Lahren just for saying they aren’t a feminist. The time is long past to recognize that it is not enough. As long as men are valued for only their utility, disposable or otherwise, and not for their own sake as individuals and what they are deep inside manifested in their puer, this gynocentric disdain on the little boy within men will persist.
Discovering Puer and Puella, and the Case for Embracing Them
Here I spoke about two vast contrasts: One – a song in which Jody Miller expresses a true love and appreciation for the puer, the inner boy inside his man, for it is the essence of this man; Two – a rant in which Tomi Lahren admonishes men at large as “boys” as well as expressing hostility to the very idea of a man being in touch with his inner boy, implicitly waging war against the puer.
The enthusiastic context of inner child is something that I’d appreciated for some time, and is not truly new to me. The puer, as distinct from the child archetype, is however certainly new to me. I think that this can serve as a new proper context for me to discern the things in everyday life, be it in interactions with others to things observable in media, to discern what is in embrace of the puer as well as the puella, and what intends to destroy them.
There is certainly more to discover and write about on my part when it comes to these inner children of wonder within us. All this thus far is but an introduction. But if the puer is the childlike source of unfiltered energy of innocence and dreams, maybe embracing that aspect of oneself is the key to bring them back onto their own two feet if ever they are in a situation that they have to.
Any time you see a man excited about immersing themselves in their chosen activity, be it a car, his art and craft, his study, his stage performance, and even with relationships such as among his brothers or his intimate partner, you’re seeing his puer aspect. You’re seeing the little boy shining through. When a man is broken and his life reduced to drudgery, his puer is either dead or dying. Perhaps a case can be made for embracing our puer, resuscitate it if necessary, and discover that within ourselves and in others we encounter in our lives and value.
[Lyrics referenced in this essay:]
Hildebrand, Diane. “He Walks Like a Man” Queen of the House, by Jody Miller. Capitol Music. 1964
I recently mentioned to a friend that feminist verbiage amounts to little more than organized female nagging — the endless attempt to shame & guilt men into serving women. Is it any wonder that feminist street placards emphasise “having a voice,” “women speaking up,” “not being silenced,” and “speaking out”? These phrases are nothing more than euphemisms for the ear piercing, fingernails-on-blackboard nagging that women have never gone without. Sadly, the days of being able to deal with nagging by use the following device are long gone:
Scold’s bridle – historical device providing the nagging woman with some therapeutic time out
So universal is the archetype of the nagging woman that I visited Amazon in the certainty that someone would have written a book titled “The History Of Female Nagging,” but to my surprise found there was none.
I guess its like other universals such as ‘everyone has a buttocks,’ – so blatantly obvious that no book is necessary. That said, I still wanted to dig deeper into the topic and so decided to check an online etymology dictionary, which reads as follows:
nag (v.)
1828, intransitive, “find fault constantly;” by 1840, intransitive, “annoy by continued scolding, pester with petty complaints,” originally a dialectal word meaning “to gnaw” (1825, Halliwell), probably ultimately from a Scandinavian source (compare Old Norse gnaga “to complain,” literally “to bite, gnaw,” dialectal Swedish and Norwegian nagga “to gnaw”), from Proto-Germanic *gnagan, related to Old English gnagan “to gnaw” (see gnaw). As a noun, 1894, “act of nagging;” by 1925, “person who nags.” Related: Nagged; nagger; nagging.1
What struck me here was the association of nagging with acts of biting and gnawing, which is exactly what feels like is happening to your soul when being nagged, as any man or child will confirm. In this respect it reminds of the mythical eagle gnawing at the liver of Prometheus, only to have it happen again the very next day in an endless round of torture.
Considering the longevity and ubiquity of female nagging, and considering also that gynocentrism and feminism are collective nagathons, I think the future looks bleak in terms of a breakthrough for men. Our modern world has successfully institutionalized nagging at the highest levels – from the United Nations to national governments, and all the way down to schools.
This leads to the disturbing definition of feminism as “Institutionalized female nagging.”
Let the naggers chew on that definition for a while.
Perhaps we can put a positive spin on it and say that the drip, drip, drip of female nagging, from bassinet to coffin, has a toughening effect on men, bringing out the best of stoic resistance and emotional control that men are famed for. At least when its not driving men to die early, or to suicide at four times the rate of women.
Having got the gist of what I already knew about nagging, I searched the internet a bit further and noticed the following blog article, which is relegated to Creative Commons. It digs a bit deeper into the topic, so I repost the following excerpts for your interest:
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A brief history of nagging
The nagging wife is the universal villain of married life. From the earliest pages of human history there is perhaps no literature and folk tradition where the character of the nagging wife is not found widely. Along with archetypes of the sacrificing mother, forsaken lover, tragic hero and evil lord, the nagging wife will be found in all societies and cultures at all times in history. Even in today’s world, irrespective of the differences of race, wealth, religion, culture, language and social reform, the character of the nagging wife is universal. She keeps popping up in jokes, films, songs, novels and other cultural cultural creations.
Socrates, the famous Greek philosopher, is supposed to have had a nagging wife who drove him to spend his time in the city squares and gymnasia, much to the benefit of philosophy. The figure of the nagging wife finds mention in the Bible, (indirectly) in the Quran, and is a crucial moment in the story of the Ramayana. She is to be found in renassaince Italy, in medieval England, on the expanding border of America’s “wild west”, in the bedrooms of colonial India and in the sit-coms of post-modern Europe.
What is interesting about this figure of the nagging wife is that it is one of those few characters who transcend history. Like the sacrificing mother, the unrequited lover or the tragic hero, the nagging wife can be found in ancient, slave owning agricultural societies, in prosperous trading medieval ones and in post-industrial wastelands of contemporary West. What is it about the nagging wife which makes this character so universal and transcendental?
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It is not only the wife who deploys this weapon of the weak. Children use it to excellent effect. In that context (parent – child) it is not generally called nagging but rather ‘pestering’. It too emerges from a similar context of powerlessness of children within the family, where the only way for them to get their point across is to ‘pester’ their parents till they accept defeat. Today, the power of children to pester their parents into taking decisions is an important weapon in the arsenal of advertisers who use “pester-power” to sell everything from groceries to cars.
In the contemporary world, many families have moved out of the context under which nagging by wives exists. Women own property, often they are in positions of power and are effective decision makers. Nagging does not automatically end in these contexts, just like it does not automatically exist in all patriarchal families. Today nagging is not necessarily confined to the patriarchal family and has been, in a sense, freed from the context of the patriarchal family under which it originated and survived. It has become a cultural archetype which women (and men) absorb into their personalities in the process of socialisation. Where it exists outside the immediate context of the patriarchal family, it exists only as a weapon of offence and not as a survival skill of the weak wife and it “forges its own chains” for those who deploy it in inter-personal relations. The question arises, are we courageous enough to surrender this weapon? 2
References:
[1] Nag, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
[2] Aniket Alam, A brief history of nagging, Creative Commons(2008)
[Greta Aurora] During my interactions with men’s rights advocates, I have noticed they often refer to the “truth” with regards to feminism and gender relations. I get uncomfortable whenever I hear someone claim they’re in possession of some kind of absolute truth. I don’t like dogmas. How do you feel about this? Do you think human beings are able to ever uncover the complete truth about anything?
[PW] I can understand your discomfort. I would split truth into two categories, the first is absolute truth such as gravity or light on which everyone can agree, and secondly being contested truths which often come with conflicting sets of evidence, especially as we see in complex subjects like race or gender politics.
When faced with conflicting hypotheses and evidence, “truth” is best applied to an individual who takes one partial position among the many available – it is his or her truth alone. But that partial position becomes dogmatic when pitched as the one and only truth, good for all people.
The tendency toward dogma underlines the importance of holding a polycentric approach – ie. the understanding that there are numerous truths involved in any complex field of relationships.
[GA] You trace the origins of chivalry back to the Middle Ages, and the evidence you present is all very clear and convincing. Gynocentrism seems to me as a lot more complicated concept though. Would you not agree that it’s an integral part of not only human, but even mammalian nature? For example, in the vast majority of mammalian species, the males fight each other for dominance and mating opportunities. To what extent do you think humans are capable of consciously overwriting their instincts?
[PW] In mammals, and specifically in human relationships, there exists an interplay of gynocentric and androcentric acts. But the overall relationship between males and females is not necessarily gynocentric as some would insist.
The wombs of females are a precious resource for perpetuation of a species, and that reality elicits some measure of protective gynocentrism from males. Conversely, the offspring produced by women’s wombs would be in extremely high danger of perishing without the protective civilization and infrastructure created mostly by men, thus we can conclude that some measure of androcentrism is also necessary.
So what we have is not “gynocentric relationships” as necessitated by evolution, but rather a reciprocal relationship between males and females designed to bring the next generation of children to maturity. With that in mind it makes little sense to characterise human relationships as simply gynocentric (meaning woman-centered), and it makes much better sense to characterise them as relationships of reciprocity.
As for male creatures fighting each other to gain access to females, this is the behaviour of dimorphic tournament species, which is contrasted with more monomorphic, pairbonding species. According to biologists like Robert Sapolsky, humans show traits of both dimorphic tournament species and monomorphic pairbonding ones, indicating that we have a more flexible potential to move between these behaviours than other mammals. (Perhaps your readers can watch this short clip by Sapolsky)
A more recent paper by Steve Stuart Williams explores whether humans are highly dimorphic, polygynous animals like peacocks, or are a relatively monomorphic, pairbonding animals like robins, and he concludes that we are closer to the latter than the former. The paper, for anyone interested, is titled Are Humans peacocks or Robins?
With such wide variability in human potential, our cultural customs can be set up to encourage male behaviours into just one side of that potential – say for example the competitive tournament style.
If for example we are steeped in the cultural mythology of gynocentrism, a convention that has arisen over recent centuries, we might assume human males are a singularly a tournament species fighting for female access, despite the more complex evidence against this viewpoint. As is often the case, this demonstrates that a cultural myth creates biases in our perspective and limits our potential.
The last part of your question; are humans are capable of consciously overriding reflex instincts, I would say definitely yes – we’ve evolved with large neocortexes for precisely that purpose – rational reflection acts as a survival mechanism in potentially dangerous situations that our instinctual reflexes might lead us into when not checked.
[GA] I’m curious how you interpret one story from Greek mythology in particular: the Trojan War. Is the story of men sacrificing themselves merely to retrieve a beautiful woman a reflection of the human psyche, or merely a form of scripture meant to condition people to see the world a certain way – or anything in between?
[PW] The short answer is yes, myths are correct in stating that beauty is an immensely powerful motivator, so I agree with that particular truth in the Helen mythology. As an aside Aphrodite, who represents beauty, sensuality, sexuality and love, and to whom Helen prayed for release from her powers, is said to be more powerful than even the so-called Patriarchal Gods …… able to weaken even the limbs of the mighty Zeus himself.
Mythologies like those contained in the Illiad or Bhagavad Gita contain profound truths about human tendencies, but they can equally be misleading regarding human behaviour. As I stated the elsewhere, fictional material from classical era such as in Helen of Troy (a Greek myth), or Lysistrata (a Greek play) when used as “proof” of gynocentric behaviour or gynocentric culture is too meagre in terms of evidence…… as the old saying goes, “One swallow does not make a summer.”
Further, in terms of biological facts about human behaviour, myths can be about as trustworthy as would be the movie Planet of the Apes to future researchers studying the history of primates, or My Little Pony for future researchers studying the real evolution of horses.
[GA] My ultimate question is: to what extent is gynocentrism biologically programmed vs socially constructed?
[PW] I partially answered that above in response to your earlier question, ie. that isolated gynocentric tendencies/acts are part of our biological heritage, as are isolated androcentric acts part of that same heritage.
What I don’t buy is the belief that humans are somehow a “gynocentric species” or that overall relationships between men and women are biologically designed to be gyno-centric. This totalising proposition for gynocentrism, that gynocentrism should somehow dictate and swallow all aspects of male-female interaction is both extreme and, unfortunately, popular.
This viewpoint is based on mythology arising out of European culture in which gynocentric customs have become amplified through supernormal sign stimuli – a term used in ethology circles to show how the behaviour of mammals can be made to overrun evolutionary purposes via the deployment of maladaptive sign-stimuli and propaganda. I co-wrote an article on this complex topic with Paul Elam entitled ‘Chasing The Dragon’ which is available in print and on YouTube which explains how the sign stimuli associated with chivalry and romantic love exaggerates gynocentrism in a way that overruns evolutionary purpose.
[GA] You previously mentioned you don’t agree with looking at masculinity and femininity as the order-chaos duality. Is there another archetypal/symbolic representation of male and female nature, which you feel is more accurate?
[PW] Some archetypal portrayals are distinctly male and female, such as male muscle strength and the various tests of it (think the Labours of Hercules), or pregnancy and childbirth for females (think Demeter, Gaia etc.). Aside from these universal physiology-celebrating archetypes, many portrayals of male or female roles in traditional stories can be best described as stereotypes rather than archetypes in the sense that they are not universally portrayed across different mythological traditions.
For example you have a Mother Sky and a father Earth in classical Egyptian mythology, and males are often portrayed as nurturers. Also, many archetypes are portrayed interchangeably among the sexes – think of the Greek Aphrodite or Adonis both as archetype of beauty, or Apollo and Cassandra as representatives of intellect, or warlikeness of Ares or Athene.
To my knowledge the primordial Chaos described in Hesoid’s Theogeny had no gender, and when gender was assigned to Chaos by later writers it was always portrayed as male. There is no reason why we can’t assign genders to chaos and order by which to illustrate some point, but we need to be clear that this rendition is not uniformly backed by archetypal portrayals given in myths – and myths are the primary datum of archetypal images. So broadly speaking the only danger would be if we insist on the female = chaos and male = order as incontrovertible dogma (which, to be clear, I know you are not doing as you rightly oppose such dogma).
There’s a rich history of psychological writings which look at chaos as a state not only of the universe, or societies, but as a potential in all human beings regardless of gender.
[GA] You correctly point out that men and women are more alike than different in temperament, on average – the main disparities are seen at the extremes of the curves, when lined up next to each other. However, there are some significant biological differences, which make me doubt complete equality is possible to achieve. Obvious reproductive and hormonal differences aside, I’d like to ask you to consider physical strength. The average man has approximately double the upper body strength of the average woman. Do you think differences like this can be discounted in a liberal society? Do you not see it as a potential problem with regards to equality under the law and in work environments (e.g. sentencing perpetrators of rape and other types of physical assault; military service; dangerous jobs with a physical component)?
[PW] I agree with everything you mention here. Those differences between men and women are very real and are not going away. While equality may be possible in the numerous areas in which men and women are alike either psychologically or physically (in the area of overlap underlined by Jordan Peterson who stated that “men and women are more the same than they are different”), a complete equality is a ridiculous thing to want or to attempt to mandate socially. That’s why we hear the popular slogan among men’s advocates that “we support equality of opportunity, but not equality of outcome.”
[GA] Speaking of equality in society more broadly, I wish it was possible to achieve. In theory, I do believe we can be different and equal at the same time. However, it’s just not obvious to me what this would look like in practice. Do you think men and women must become more like each other in order to be fully equal? Or can we have equal opportunities and fair legislation, while also celebrating our differences?
[PW] This is something that each modern individual or couple must decide for themselves. Modern society has graced us with the option of following traditional gender roles, or creative modern roles, or perhaps something in between. In his book Myth Of male Power, Warren Farrell advocates a partial move away from traditional gendered roles that ensured cooperation and survival.
He referred to those roles as “Stage 1. survival roles” and proposed a move toward roles which are more shared – such as sharing the child rearing and money earning. This proposition of course infuriates advocates of traditional roles. I wouldn’t personally go so far as advocating the transition to Farrell’s Stage-2 roles, but I think its worth noting that we all do have such options available now.
[GA] In ‘The Dying Femme Fatale’, I mourn the death of femininity in the western world. At the time, I was looking at these issues purely from the female perspective. Do you think there’s a place for traditional masculinity and femininity in today’s culture?
[PW] Yes absolutely, there’s a place for traditional femininity and masculinity – especially for those who are attracted to these ways of being. I look at women in traditional cultures who can be powerfully alluring and simultaneously demure by way of complimenting men’s strength, agency and sexuality – and to my eyes it is art, a beautiful dance that has stood the test of time.
Conversely, I also see the art and beauty of men and women who embrace more of their human potential, and if they can make that work in a relationship I say power to them. Again it all comes back to individual choices rather than who is right or wrong….. at least that’s how I tend to view it.
JOSEPH CAMPBELL: In all the great traditional representations of love as compassion, charity, or agape, the operation of the virtue is described as general and impersonal, transcending differences and even loyalties.
And against this higher, spiritual order of love there is set generally in opposition the lower, of lust, or, as it is so often called, “animal passion,” (eros) which is equally general and impersonal, transcending differences and even loyalties. Indeed, one could describe the latter most accurately, perhaps, simply as the zeal of the organs, male and female, for each other, and designate the writings of Sigmund Freud as the definitive modern text on the subject of such love.
However, in the European twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, in the poetry first of the troubadours of Provence, and then, with a new accent, of the Minnesingers, a way of experiencing love came to expression that was altogether different from either of those two as traditionally opposed. And since I regard this typical and exclusively European chapter of our subject as one of the most important mutations not only of human feeling, but also of the spiritual consciousness of our human race, I am going to dwell on it a little.
The following is an informal conflab about whether gynocentric behaviour amounts to an enactment of narcissism by women, which took place over a decade ago between Peter Wright and Adam Kostakis in the comments section under his essay Anatomy of a Victim Ideology Lecture No. 5. (2011). These ‘thought bubbles’ would eventually mature into a two-part study titled ‘Gynocentrism As A Narcissistic Pathology‘ published in New Male Studies in 2020 and 2023 respectively.
* * *
Peter Wright commented to Adam Kostakis:
All the essays in this lecture series are an intellectual treat.
Might I make one small suggestion; as well as elaborating your Gynocentrism theory, might it not be profitable to do an essay on narcissism? Narcissism (actually gender narcissism) is clearly the libidinous force driving gynocentrism…. if its not, then what else?
A look at Narcissistic Personality Disorder in the DSM-4 gives a simply delicious criteria for an elaboration Gynocentrism theory:
1. Has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements) 2. Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love 3. Believes that he or she is “special” and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions) 4. Requires excessive admiration 5. Has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations 6. Is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends 7. Lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others 8. Is often envious of others or believes others are envious of him or her 9. Shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes
Without mention of the narcissistic drive, gynocentrism theory comes across as needlessly mysterious regarding it’s psychological basis. Sociological analysis gives only part of the picture.
Gynocentrism is saturated with examples of narcissism; all the princesses, pampering and entitlements you have been mentioning.
Oh my! The DSM-IV’s criteria for NPD fits feminist women to a tee!
Fear not; the psychological basis for Gynocentrism is coming. I’m going to run a good few rings around that old chestnut tree!
Thankyou for bringing to my attention NPD’s glove-like fit to the feminist hand … it’s tagged for inclusion!5/2/11 8:27 AM
Peter Wright:
Indeed NPD fits the profile of many feminist women.
Most well-known theorists, from many different schools of psychology, agree that individual disorders detailed in the DSM can and often do show as collective pathologies. On the basis of that idea my proposition is that gynocentrism, as you have termed the long history of special treatment of women (and women’s concomitant expectations of this entitlement), is *psychologically* driven by the universal human drive to narcissism, in this instance in extremis. In order for women to accept the socially sanctioned gynocentric role it must dovetail with a matching libidinous drive, and I cannot think of a more perfect match than the narcissistic drive. Can you?
If this is so then we need to name it and remove the mystification surrounding why this myth is so attractive for women to align with. What is the operant pleasure principle? — Narcissistic gratification.
There are numerous forms of narcissism, all the way from supposedly ‘healthy’ infantile narcissism which is supposed to cease in early childhood (lest it become interpersonally ‘pathological’); through to ‘gender narcissism’ which involves a pathological love for one’s own gender; through to Narcissistic Personality Disorder -the extremely pathological variant at detailed in the post above. After surveying each of these forms of narcissism one could conclude that feminists, and all women actively living the gynocentric myth, are displaying psychological traits of all three forms of narcissism, in various mixtures; ie. infantile, gender, and personality disordered versions.
However we wish to break down the various shades of narcissism, the list of traits of NPD from the DSM is broadly useful for getting inside the head of the gynocentric woman’s head.
But what about males? If males are not living the narcissistic urge, then what is their drive? That takes us into other conversation, but a starting point may be to research ‘Inverse Narcissism’ which is described as the drive to live one’s own narcissistic aspirations by cultivating it in another….. males indulge the narcissistic urge by proxy, in the shape of women. 6/2/11 4:07 AM
Peter Wright:
The following Wikipedia page defining ‘Narcissistic Rage & Narcissistic Injury’ provides insight into the psychological roots of indignation expressed by all those who become angered at the lack of adherence to, or infringements of the gynocentric program: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissistic_rage_and_narcissistic_injury 6/2/11 3:32 PM
From the essay: “I propose that, by opening up space for perfectly satisfying, collective man-hating, feminism offers a form of catharsis eagerly seized upon by those already predisposed to misandry... Feminism provides more than the opportunity for catharsis. The feminist soon realizes that she need not restrict herself to echo chambers, but might try her hand at real change. A thrill rushes through her at the thought of not just disparaging, but actually hurting men.”
Catharsis…. this is good, begins to answer what are the motivational (psychological) principles of feminist behaviours. My question, which you have already answered is why choose this method of catharsis? Why not projecting (unloading) all one’s hatred and violence onto people who pollute the environment, or onto a political party, or something less detrimental to one’s *other* psychological desires- desires like getting a boyfriend or getting married which are high up on the list for many women who play the feminist game (I’d wager the majority of women who subscribe partially to feminist orientation are not unambiguous man-hating lesbians, but women who deeply desire to be coupled with a male for ever after).
So what else psychological, other than blissful catharsis from the scapegoating all ills onto males, might be driving feminist behaviour? How do you explain the haughtiness, arrogance and exclusive female self-reference/self interest inherent to feminism? How do you explain the “Because I’m worth it” phenomenon of feminism? I suggest the narcissistic drive, as I mentioned previously.
Don’t get me wrong here I’m not dismissing the suggestion of catharsis as motivator, which is clearly a correct explanation for the misandric aspect of feminism.
But to return to my above question; to which powerful drive are feminism-oriented women subordinating their desire to couple/marry with males, the later being a very powerful drive in itself if we look at the themes of most women’s magazines (Magazines which bring together in one editorials primarily about marriage/coupling alongside other articles consisting of feminist messages about empowerment, often at the male’s expense). Why are women taking the huge risk of seeking catharsis by man hating when it risks alienating the men they wish to couple with? This is where narcissism comes in as the irresistible drive behind both marriage and feminist aims and behaviours. Self aggrandizement. To place all feminist behaviour at the alter of misandry does not quite get there.
I wonder is it possible that enticement to narcissistic gratification is the bait misandric feminists use to get non-misandric women to take up the feminist push for power? Two different motivations (catharsis-by-misandry, or, narcissistic gratification) for different women. Now that would be a neat alliance.
Actually I just had a new thought, FWIW. Perhaps its possible to place the seemingly different behaviours of misandry and self aggrandizement at the one alter of narcissism?
Here’s how that would work; People in the grip of the narcissistic drive can exist in one of two immediate environments- 1. the environment successfully recognises and feeds my narcissistic hunger and I in turn feel suitably inflated and “worth it”, or 2. the environment is witholding, does not recognise my worth-it-ness nor feed my sense of entitlement, and therefore I take out my aggression on males and acheive catharsis in that act of hating.
In case 1. women can continue the marraige fantasy. in case 2 the withholding male has become an enemy to be destroyed over and over (referred to in the psych industry as “narcissistic injury & narcissistic rage”).
Just to make the case a little further, tell me if you see any likenesses between your average feminist’s behaviour, and the below DSM-IV definition of narcissism:
A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:
1. Has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements) 2. Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love 3. Believes that he or she is “special” and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions) 4. Requires excessive admiration 5. Has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations 6. Is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends 7. Lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others 8. Is often envious of others or believes others are envious of him or her 9. Shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes 5/3/11 8:00 PM
Thanks for your comments – they are always appreciated. Let me go through and respond point by point.
“Why not projecting (unloading) all one’s hatred and violence onto people who pollute the environment, or onto a political party, or something less detrimental to one’s *other* psychological desires- desires like getting a boyfreind or getting married which are high up on the list for many women who play the feminist game (Id wager the majority of women who subscribe partially to feminist orientation are not unambiguous man-hating lesbians, but women who deeply desire to be coupled with a male for ever after).”
I agree that this describes the majority of feminists. Those truly indifferent to men (i.e. actual, not ‘political’ lesbians) would have no reason at all to hate men – and while generalizations should never be drawn from personal experience, the small number of non-feminist lesbians I have known have displayed not the slightest hint of hostility towards men.
Also, some feminists do display rage and hostility towards people for other reasons – they do not necessarily just loathe men, but they may well despise those people accused of polluting the environment as well. The hatred of men generally seems to be stronger though, corresponding no doubt to the primacy of the psycho-sexual drive, as you stated.
“So what else psychological, other than blissful cathersis from the scapegoating all ills onto males, might be driving feminist behaviour? How do you explain the haughtiness, arrogance and exclusive female self-reference/self interest inherent to feminism? How do you explain the “Because I’m worth it” phenomenon of feminism?”
Keep in mind I haven’t really got onto the topic yet. I am getting there. I made reference to the psychological motivation for misandry in this post, but a fuller explanation has its place in a few weeks time. Your comments, on this post and on previous, have not gone unacknowledged. It’s just that I like to be systematic about my writing, and usually plan the shape of these lectures weeks if not months in advance. So, I will get there in due time.
For now, this will suffice: I explain the narcissism by the combination of two factors. First, traditional Gynocentrism (which persists even outside of feminist circles), which elevates women as the protected caste and gives them special status. The cultural ‘programming’ women receive is favorable to them because it tells them that they are superior to men. Feminism has exacerbated this ‘programming’ but it did not create the meme. (I dislike the term ‘programming’, because I reject the view that human beings are automatons whose behavior is determined by social and cultural norms, i.e. I reject structuralism.) Gynocentric and now, feminist cultural memes state that women are the sexual gatekeepers and men exist to serve and impress them. It is shocking how many women, even in this age of supposed equality, still believe this.
The second factor is the advanced consumer economy. Free markets do not just fulfil desires, they create desires too. The ideal consumer is one who is materialistic, narcissistic, competitive, obsessed with social status, and so on. This type of consumer is the most manipulable. What we have found over the last century or so is that women more easily become this type of consumer – I would speculate this is because more women than men are devoid of character, owing to their Gynocentrically privileged status.
I do not believe either of these factors are inevitable or natural. That is, I do not believe that women are essentially or inherently (more) narcissistic or manipulable. They have been made so through Gynocentrism, and advanced consumerism exploits these existing characteristics to boost profit margins. Take a look at some adverts marketed to women – which most are nowadays, along with most TV shows, films, newspaper editorials, etc. There is an almost endless hammering of this idea that women collectively are deserving of more than they currently have (whatever this is), and that women individually are deserving of more than they currently have. This meme is so widespread it has become a droning background noise. Nobody questions that women are disadvantaged because it is on a par with subliminal messaging. The favorable outcome, to the consumer economy, is that women demand more be spent on them. Women control something like 80% of spending in the United States, despite men earning higher income.
The real problem is that this narcissistic materialism won’t go away when women do out-earn men. As Paul Elam has wonderfully stated, when we see men paying for high-income women’s dinners from their unemployment checks, we might actually start to see some change here.
In short, I believe these two factors are what produce the princess mentality. One historical, one recent, the latter leaning on the former. Crush Gynocentrism, and there will be nobody prepared to indulge women’s materialism. Then women will have to actually grow up and face the hardships of life, developing character along the way – that will be a wonderful thing to see, and will result in most women outright rejecting feminism.
Feminism, you see, depends upon the perception that women need to be provided for, even as it pays lip service to the opposite idea. The independent woman is anathema to the countless legal and welfare reforms put in place by feminists, which make life easier for women because they are women.
“Don’t get me wrong here I’m not dismissing the suggestion of catharsis as motivator, which is clearly a correct explanation for the misandric aspect of feminism. Its more that feminism may be better viewed as a ‘syndrome’ which means a collection of disparate motivations and behaviours – as differentiated from a ‘disorder’ which typically have more unified drives and behavioral goals. Feminism is a conglomerate of motivations and behaviours.”
Feminism could be viewed as a syndrome, but actually, I see it as an expression, namely, the radical expression of Gynocentrism. It is narcissism which I see as a syndrome, of Gynocentrism. Gynocentrism is the social disorder – although (in its historical, non-radical form) it does sustain societies, this is at enormous cost to the men in those societies, and so is quite deserving of the term ‘disorder’. Feminism is just Gynocentrism gone nuts. It’s a very old idea taken to inconsistent and unsustainable extremes.
“to which powerful drive are feminism-oriented women subordinating thier desire to couple/marry with males, the later being a very powerful drive in itself if we look at the themes of most women’s magazines (Magazines which bring together in one editorials primarily about marraige/coupling alongside other articles consisting of feminist messages about empowerment, often at the male’s expense). Why are women taking the huge risk to get catharsis by man hating when it risks alienating the men they wish to couple with?”
This is a great question, and I think the only answer I can give right now is that human beings are not always rational. Particularly not when they are emotional, and given the primacy of the psycho-sexual drive, an emotional response is unavoidable when the drive is stunted. Rejecting, and hating, the inaccessible object of desire is an unfortunate, and irrational, but ultimately very human reaction.
Also keep in mind that a lot of feminist innovation has consisted in making young women out of bounds for men. Please go to The Anti-Feminist – link in the sidebar on the blog – and spend a few hours reading. Feminism – or at least, one aspect of it – is the sexual trade union of women whose objects of desire are inaccessible (in short, men pursue younger women, leaving the less desirable women without men). Schopenbecq’s theory that the pill in fact liberated men, and forced women to ‘take power back’ through feminism, is not only intriguing – I cannot find fault with it.
“This is where narcissism comes in as the irresitable drive behind both marraige and feminist aims and behaviours. Self aggrandizement. To place all feminist bahaviour at the alter of misandry does not quite get there.”
Sure, narcissism is mixed up in all this, as I’ve mentioned above. I would say that hostility is generated when the woman who believes she deserves an object is denied that object. This hostility easily translates into misandry, i.e. hostility towards the object that rejects her ownership of it.
“I wonder is it possible that enticement to narcissistic gratification is the bait misandric feminists use to get non-misandric women to take up the feminist push for power?”
Interesting idea. However, narcissism is at root of the problem, as a byproduct of Gynocentrism and preliminary to feminism and non-feminist misandry. I think that female narcissism is always going to be a problem, and we are best served by attacking it at root. I mentioned above that I reject structuralism. I don’t believe any woman necessarily has to incorporate into her personality any of the social ills so far mentioned (materialism, narcissism, feminism), but always has a choice in the matter. She can reject them all, and in the absence of men willing to provide for her and bail her out (a problem which is currently systemic) she would be forced into independence, and would develop character as a result of dealing with all of life’s hardships. I identify character as that which is opposite to narcissism, materialism and dependence. Most men have character because nobody is there to bail them out and they know it; they have to make it on their own. Most women do not experience this, and do not develop character. This is the problem, in my view.
There are many examples of women who do reject narcissism, etc. from their personalities. There are those who do develop character. They can be found in the Men’s Rights sphere as well as outside of it. I have known several in real life. They are simply those women who take their responsibilities as seriously as do the majority of men. It is safe to say that no feminist fits this bill.
“Perhaps its possible to place the seemingly different behaviours of misandry and self aggrandizement at the one alter of narcissism?
Here’s how that would work; People in the grip of the narcissistic drive can exist in one of two immediate environments- 1. the environment successfully recognises and feeds my narcissistic hunger and I in turn feel suitably inflated and “worth it”, or 2. the environment is witholding, does not recognise my worth-it-ness nor feed my sense of entitlement, and therefore I take out my aggression on males and acheive catharsis in that act of hating.
In case 1. women can continue the marraige fantasy. in case 2 the withholding male has become an enemy to be destroyed over and over (referred to in the psych industry as “narcissistic injury & narcissistic rage”).”
Yes! This is largely the conclusion I came to, as described above.
I particularly like your description that as the enemy, the man (which soon becomes men, plural) must be destroyed ‘over and over’. The narcissistic rage – a great label for it – is never satiated, as I state in this lecture. It is possible that hate has so warped the psyche that even possessing the object (i.e. attaining her ideal man) will not cause the rage to cease. Feminist women may well be ‘beyond repair’.
“More concise regarding motivating drives of feminism:
Woman 1. Narcissistic drive woman 2. Narcissistic and aggressive drives
Woman #2 are IMO the main constructors of the feminist idiological and political edifice. Thier drive is aggression, which gives the stamina. Woman #1 would not have seen the project through, as they are already sated.”
Clearly, a certain amount of aggression is needed for one to become a feminist – in the case of the women, anyway (how many times per post do they need to resort to profanity? I suppose they think it makes the point sound more forceful, like typing in ALLCAPS; as if how an argument is made is more important than its content). So, I would say this is true. The non-feminist misandric women most likely possess the narcissistic drive without the accompanying aggressive drive – or they are simply non-activated, and could become feminists through ideological recruitment – think sleeper cells (in the case that the narcissistic drive does not achieve its object, but the woman does not identify explicitly as feminist, that is, she may be misandric on an individual basis but is not (yet) engaged in a collective project to harm men).
“man-hating appears tied up with narcissistic gratification, and in particular narcissistic injury, with feminism being constructed by a collective of such injured women.”
Again, very true. What we need to point out is that these women have not actually been injured, apart from in their own minds: they feel injured only because they possess Gynocentric privilege which makes them feel entitled to the object of their desires without actually having to earn it (they feel naturally entitled, on the basis of bio-essentialism, i.e. because they are women, to the fruits of male labor).
“Is the narcissism more primary than the hate/aggression? These two forces are both driving feminism, but I wonder if the hate has been enlisted by an even more primary narcissistic drive?”
I think this is something of a chicken-and-egg question. Since all human beings begin life as utter narcissists, and needs/wants will naturally go unfulfilled as they grow (which is necessary for the development of character), it’s difficult to say which comes first in the Gynocentric/feminist context. It’s safe to say that they go hand in hand. Hatred for men will result in increased demands on them to serve women; while hatred of men results from narcissistic demands (male service) going unfulfilled. It’s a vicious circle. This is why feminists become even crazier as they get older – or, in a minority of cases, they break out from the circle and become anti-feminists, having become conscious that they are harming themselves even as they harm men. (See: Christina Hoff Sommers, Camille Paglia.)
“Just to make the case a little further, tell me if you see any likenesses between your average feminist’s behaviour, and the below DSM-IV definition of narcissism”
I do – absolutely – every point, and what is more, feminists seem proud of possessing these personality traits, as though being anti-social and exploitative are virtues.
Did you not post this list before? Or was that a different Psychological Anon?
Thankyou very much for the interesting points you raised!
Another correction: in Part 5, I misread your statement as advocating that non-feminists could use the narcissistic drives present in non-feminist women to ‘recruit’ them to the fight against feminism.
Looking at it again, I am really not sure how I interpreted it this way …6/3/11 4:05 AM
Peter Wright:
Adam,
Thanks for your replies to the rabble above. You further clarified gynocentrism and your thoughts about the role narcissism in that context.
Yes I was the one who mentioned Narcissism on a previous occasion on your list.
“Free markets do not just fulfil desires, they create desires too. The ideal consumer is one who is materialistic, narcissistic, competitive, obsessed with social status, and so on.”
Right on. So could we say that markets have exaggerated the degree of gynocentism in much the same way you say that feminism has exaggerated it- ie. that we have two powerful ‘teasers’ which stimulate an intensification in traditional gynocentric behaviour?
“I do not believe that women are essentially or inherently (more) narcissistic or manipulable.”
Agreed, the exaggerated female narcissism is fed by environmental factors, and could be equally have been males if they were (hypothetically) the targets of similar environmental enticements. As it is today markets are keen to find ways to exploit the largely untapped male buyer markets, and if successful there is a likelihood that they will generate an increase in male narcissism.
“..narcissism is at root of the problem, as a byproduct of Gynocentrism…”
Pairing narcissism and Gynocentrism is sensible, though I’m not sure about the word ‘byproduct’ here…. we are back to chicken and egg – ie, would a Gynocentrism operate without a prior, albeit latent narcissistic drive? I’d personally prefer to think of this with metaphors from behaviourism: A drive arousal stimulus (Gynocentrism), releasing a primary psychological drive (narcissism)- ie. the two working in concert.
“There are many examples of women who do reject narcissism, etc. from their personalities. There are those who do develop character.”
Important to remind ourselves that women can choose to say no to narcissism and choose instead to think for themselves and to develop character. The importance of self discipline and willpower are all but forgotten arts in the consumer age, but they are so necessary to the development of character.
You summed it up perfectly here: “Since all human beings begin life as utter narcissists, and needs/wants will naturally go unfulfilled as they grow (which is necessary for the development of character)”.
I’ll take some time and try reading some of the links you have on your blog, and hopefully get a better appreciation for your work. To date I have been immensely stimulated by your writings on Gynocentrism, and appreciate the intellectual range and attention to detail covered.
This following feminist revisioning of the definition of narcissism is an excellent example of the word-play Adam has been dissecting in his previous essays:
The art of Hannah Wilke: ‘Feminist Narcissism’ and the reclamation of the erotic body. http://jenniferlinton.com/2010/12/31/the-art-of-hannah-wilke-feminist-narcissism-and-the-reclamation-of-the-erotic-body/
The growing problem of female narcissism has been long acknowledged by feminists, who attempt to subvert the usual definitions and place a positive spin on female narcissism- eg. advocating it’s necessity to balance out women’s traditional selflessness toward men and children:
‘Who put the “Me” in feminism?’ The sexual politics of narcissism http://fty.sagepub.com/content/6/1/25
I have the full text of the later somewhere…. let me know if you would like an email copy.
Quote from The art of Hannah Wilke: ‘Feminist Narcissism’ and the reclamation of the erotic body.
“Rather, the narcissism of [feminist artist] Wilke can be viewed as a shrewd feminist tactic of self-objectification aimed at reclaiming the eroticized female body from the exclusive domain of male sexual desire. The ‘self-love’ of narcissism is a necessary component to this reclaiming of the body and the assertion of a female erotic will as being distinct from that of the male artist. Wilke wielded her narcissistic self-love as a powerful tool of critique, defiantly placing her own image into the hallowed halls of the male-dominated art institution.”
“Critics such as Amelia Jones and Joanna Frueh have championed Wilke and proposed, through their respective writings, a new and positive view of narcissism as a legitimately feminist, subversive tactic in the making of art. In her catalogue essay entitled “Intra-Venus and Hannah Wilke’s Feminist Narcissism”, Jones contextualized Wilke’s work within the framework of her “radical narcissism” and argued that the use of her own image throughout her art is far from the conventional or passively ‘feminine’ depiction of women as seen in advertising and other forms of mass media. Joanna Frueh, in her essay that accompanied the 1989 Wilke retrospective in Missouri, equated Wilke’s “positive narcissism” with a form of feminist self-exploration and an assertion of a female erotic will. Both Frueh and Jones cogently argue for a “positive narcissism” that expunges itself of the negative connotations [and] actively and unapologetically engages in self-love. Wilke enacts an aggressive form of narcissistic self-imaging that defiantly solicits the patriarchal gaze…”
The above ideas linking gynocentrism with narcissism had already been percolating in my thoughts for some years before the above exchange, and would take another full decade before I wrote a formal two-part study entitled ‘Gynocentrism As A Narcissistic Pathology.‘ (published in 2020) – PW.
