So, What Did Feminism Give You?

A stoic’s view on feminism

Tick-tock, a second passes and another thing changes just a little bit. Tick-tock, another second passes and things change even more or perhaps now there are two things changing. Another tick-tock and one can see that regardless of effort, a person will see change as change is inevitable; tick-tock.

 

1960s America was ripe for change, and change it did. World War II had come and gone, the cold war was in full swing, the policing of the Korean peninsula had settled into an uneasy truce as America’s fight against communism shifted south to Vietnam. What many in America and the rest of the Western World did not realize is that while they were off tending to the political gardens of other countries, communism had taken root at home. Some people tried to raise the alarm, but it was already too late.

Joseph McCarthy¹, the junior senator from Wisconsin, had noticed communism in the 1950s and was cancelled for it, to use today’s vernacular. The 1950s had brought many changes to the typical household: dishwashers were improved and made cheaper, clothes washers and driers followed suit, along with vacuum cleaners, and despite that warning in the Bible about mixing fabrics, and clothes were produced in order to reduce ironing time; the consequence of which culminated in the rise of the soap-opera.

 

American corporations and their government noticed this and realized that a potentially new pool of workers was available. Basic economics states that the scarcity/abundance of a good or service dictates the price and so when women were encouraged to join the workforce, under a guise of freedom, resulted in wages stagnating. This so called freedom for women can be marked by the demise of the soap-opera around 1995; I hold that women did not become free, they became taxable.

 

The money people still had one problem, the capricious nature of the male penis, and that had to be managed. Not trusting the men, the keys were given to women who always controlled access to sex, they could not control the resulting gestation period and of course the post birth care which took woman out of the tax base. The solution was the combined oral contraceptive, more commonly known as The Pill, and with The Pill the taxes would be kept flowing. When The Pill failed in its promise, abortion was institutionalized and made readily available via a sales pitch of ‘Safe, Legal, and Rare’; though that didn’t always work out that way.

 

Recapping the events so far, upon seeing the plight of women in the house hold, some men improved the household tools, and other men saw how to capitalize this through mass production; all the while doctors were telling everyone what brand of cigarettes tasted best. What is now known as ‘Big-Pharma’ then came along with ‘The Pill’ thus allowing women to remain in the workforce, all of this being done in the name of freedom. To understand just how little corporations have changed, after the overturning of Rowe v. Wade at the US Federal level, Amazon started offering female employees a free trip to a clinic in a pro-abortion state; thus saving Amazon the cost of employee absenteeism along with any maternity leave expenses.  

 

The 1970s were a period of social chaos, the duality of public messaging was a mess. Many parents and grandparents were fraught with worry over the promiscuous ways of the youth; a cohort of freshly minted adults who did not see the problem, as for them there seemed to be no consequence.

 

There are always consequences and something had to take a hit, and the one social act hit particularly hard was courting.  Courting was understood to be emotionally driven acts with the intention towards marriage, and when it was wacked was marriage followed suit. Marriage once considered a safe haven for women, though it didn’t always work out that way did provide in its promise. Courting/Marriage was also beneficial for men for they got a partner who prepared meals, kept the house, and raised the children while the man laboured; though that too didn’t always work out that way. This division of work and responsibility stood for many centuries allowing mankind and civilizations to grow and expand.

 

The old path was: dating, courting, engagement, and eventually marriage. The death of courting opened the door to more dating, and now feeling financially secure and safe from the consequences of nature, in the name of politeness; let’s say that it was not just doors that were being opened. The now fully empowered woman had a career, was financially secure, and could keep the company of anyone she wished, meaning they were set for life. Yet maybe everything wasn’t all roses and rainbows, because to get that carrier they had to go for a post-secondary education, meaning no children at that time. Following that they had to build on maintaining their career, which meant no children at that time either. The one problem that has risen within the social consciousness is that many women want to have children².

 

Some feminists like to claim that housework is unpaid labour, though I don’t see many housewives paying for room and board. Anything outside of both parties agreeing to a fair exchange of value is at some level a form of communism or slavery, which makes a distinction without a difference.

 

Of course all of this is from the view of a man, a view which many may readily dismiss; to those people I say ‘hold on and think about it for minute’. Feminists have long decried the patriarchy, and yet with the help of the pharmaceutical industry in the 1960s they decided on a ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’ strategy. Women were encouraged to take up the trappings of men; sadly, a lot of cats have been sold due to this ideology. I guess when some finally figured out that they’ve been sold a bad bill of goods; a cat made a good comfort companion.

 

Like so much in life, any myopic view of the world will beget some level of bigotry. In retrospection the question must be asked, what if the rise of feminism in the 1960s and 70s was not the cause but an attempted cure against prolonged misery. 1973 saw oil shortages across the Western world due to embargos from many of the oil producing nations. The price of oil and the line-ups shocked many people by exposing an economic vulnerability, this uncertainty scared many people away from parenthood.

 

A similar reaction recently occurred during the pandemic driven government lock-downs. Many may assume that mandated stay at home orders would produce a bumper-crop of babies, and yet that has not observed³. The government imposed lock-downs were not limited to just the citizenry but also to businesses and once again the impact of financial uncertainty can be seen by the lack of fresh new faces.

 

Progress can not be had without change, yet change does not guarantee progress; furthermore, those who speed towards change may miss the warning signs of an un-railed cliff over which they just might plunge. So ladies and some men… I will offer an answer to the opening question; feminism gave you cats, an obligation to working, taxes, and enough social capital to have your safe spaces invaded by members of a newly minted oppressed class whose month of recognition comes with nicer weather.

 

 

 

 

END NOTES:

1. Sen. McCarthy, rightly or wrongly, was set upon by the mainstream Media and some within the US Government. The term ‘McCarthyism’ was coined, as a metaphorical reference to witch-hunting, in order to describe Sen. McCarthy’s pursuit of communists and their activities within the US. The McCarthy files were eventually unsealed and it turns out he wasn’t as wrong as his distracters claimed.

 

2. A beyond ‘the point of no return’ poll creates the problem of unconscious bias because the person polled may indicate the position that supports their truth over their reality.

 

3. Canada birth rate, recent years (https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/birth-rate)
• The current birth rate for Canada in 2023 is 10.072 births per 1000 people, a 0.75% decline from 2022.
• The birth rate for Canada in 2022 was 10.148 births per 1000 people, a 0.74% decline from 2021.
• The birth rate for Canada in 2021 was 10.224 births per 1000 people, a 0.74% decline from 2020.
• The birth rate for Canada in 2020 was 10.300 births per 1000 people, a 0.73% decline from 2019.