Feminism and decline of the society

Interesting article. It seems to be correct about society failing as socialism and feminism increase. Unfortunately I don't have any solutions as to how to stop it. I am a big believer in the adage "The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world" so I think a big piece to fixing these issue is getting children away from the influences of socialism and feminism. In order to do this we need to move away from our public school system and away from single motherhood. That is no easy task.

I homeschool my own kids, I support homeschool laws and I hope the public school system goes bankrupt. I also teach my kids about the importance of an intact family. Other than that, I am not sure what else to do.

One thing which does puzzle me, is why all the criticism of patriarchy (not so much related to this article, but in many other articles on gender and social attitude). Do people not know that there is no successful matriarchal societies? ghettos are matriarchal societies and they are the least productive and most dangerous societies.

I remember vividly a cab ride I once had from an airport. The driver said he was from Pakistan and related a harrowing delay of three days when he was going through Riyadh from NYC to Islamabad -- on Sept. 11, 2001. Bad timing. He didn't know what had happened in the US (where he said he'd lived the past 15 yrs.) but he found out soon enough. The Saudi police arrested him and held him for questioning. They made numerous calls to his employer, the US State Dept., etc., just to be sure he wasn't involved in the attacks. I suppose under the circumstances, it was understandable, to a degree, but it must have been pretty scary for him. Anyway, he said his kids and wife and he were going to visit his parents back in Pakistan soon, but he was nervous about it because he knew his kids wouldn't act anything like "normal" kids. Well, not normal for Pakistani kids, anyway. And that's because, I told him, his kids weren't Pakistanis -- they were Americans. Just because their parents were born and raised in Pakistan doesn't mean his kids were, obviously.

I said this was not uncommon. I said I thought American society is by and large very easy to adapt to, and once people have gotten used to speaking their opinions about many things that they can't in other countries w/out running serious risks to liberty or even life, they come to not only get used to it, they actually come to believe it's a natural right. Holy crow! The nerve of some people!

So I told him not to fret too much about it. The kids' grandparents would love them, I said, no matter what. Grandparents are like that. :)

Anyway, feminism is, like it or not, part of the American social ethos. Maybe not the most nuts feminist ideas (not yet, anyway), but it's here. If the Muslim world thinks it's impervious to its influence, I'd just ask them to consider that a mere 60 yrs. ago, many people thought a woman wearing her hair down in public was at the least unseemly and at worst a clear sign of "hussiness". Likewise for smoking in public. And as for single motherhood? Enough to cause a hometown scandal. American society unabashedly leaned toward reserved and conservative behavior (at least in public) and most Americans reported having a strong religious affiliation. Just a few decades of feminism has changed that.

So I have this observation (or suggestion) for anyone who aspires to "take over" the western world: Be careful who you choose as your enemy for you will eventually become just like them.

I think birth rates could be a very interesting issue, for which I have no real solution. Basically, the birth rate of Western nations is below replacement level but the birth rate of many Muslim countries is above replacement level. With enough time, the Muslims will so outnumber us Westerns that they can can impose their culture. They win because they're having babies and we're not.

I also agree with Kris that patriarchy is the most successful form of society. I do prefer a more "enlightened" patriarchy than the extreme patriarchy of the Muslim world. Somewhere between extreme Islam and extreme feminism happiness lies.

And finally, a story about flying out of Riyadh: I had to change planes in Frankfurt and had to re-check in my luggage before boarding. The inspector asked me if anyone had given me anything to carry on the plane. I lied and said "no." In fact, I had been given letters by my American friends to mail in the states because it makes delivery so much faster. So they inspected my luggage and the letters, but decided I was okay to fly. That was before 9/11 but anyone flying out of the Middle East was suspect.

Another big factor in fecundity is being able to afford your kids. In Japan, fecundity is super-low, despite Japanese society encouraging reprod'n. This is b/c w/ so many ppl on such a small landmass, it has naturally gotten very expensive to have kids. Economic competition for space itself is a big factor but so is the cost of food, educational activities outside school (which like in the US and Europe have become expected of parents in the middle and above classes to supply -- or else "How is jr. going to get into a good college?"), etc. All these are economic and cultural factors but perhaps the biggest is the risks associated w/ parenthood that men know exist for them, a consequence of feminism. But so is the push to get women in the workplace FT. That second thing is not bad, IMO. The first is. Reason being, working parents (both) can find a way to have >2 kids after age 30. It can be done. But when men know doing so is dangerous for them, or women are taught to think it's damn near the worst thing they can do (also a product of feminism), fecundity drops.

Wait til this ideology burrows its way into Islam. Here in the US, it already has. Eventually it'll take hold in the M.E.

But it's not all that bad. The human pop'n could benefit from a self-imposed RIF, as could the planet.

Interesting idea, but I think the vast majority of western men don't want to accede to the breakdown of church/state separation and a suspension of civil liberties around the matter of what religions are permissible to exist inside a nation just to finally have their parental rights respected, as that's throwing the baby out with the bath water. To put it another way, the price is too high and less drastic means than implementing sharia are available. One big one is simply to modify the current presumption of responsibilities around the cost of children vs. the right to custody. There's more to it than that, but the matter of fecundity and/or fairness to fathers in "family court" need not be addressed by introduction of compulsory observance of a particular religion and basing a nation's entire legal system in its source book. I suppose, depending on the religion, that's one way to do it; it's just not the only way, and may, as I speculate, not be palatable for whatever reason to the pop'n at large.