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Ceasefire!: Why Women and Men Must Join Forces to Achieve True Equality

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It is symptomatic of the times that any criticism of feminist orthodoxy can only be delivered by a woman. Even then, any hint of allegiance to conservative politics is an automatic disqualifier. It labels one as a reactionary mouthpiece for the alleged forces of patriarchy. Fortunately, there are a growing number of young women challenging feminism's victim-cult politics. Unfortunately, contemporary pioneers for sanity in gender politics such as Rene Denfeld and Christina Hoff Sommers are not likely to get equal time - if they get any at all - in university women's studies departments.

Equally so, Cathy Young, a regular columnist for the Detroit News and contributor to Reason Magazine, is not likely to hit the recommended reading lists of those with a partisan interest in the exploitation male female differences. As the title Ceasfire! suggests, the gender war has gone too far and, as Young exhaustively documents within its covers, damaged too many innocents.

Says Young, "Things were simpler a decade ago, when there were just feminists and anti-feminists." But today there are two feminisms. One is 'equity' feminism; that is simply the commonsense call for equal rights and opportunities. Young is solidly in this camp. No problem there, but its radical counterpart, dubbed 'gender' feminism, defines itself in warlike terms against male oppression. Proclaiming victim status for women leads to a hoard of injustices, not only against men, but nearly as often against women.

Young doesn't suggest men and women are androgynous, but unlike suggestions of Mars and Venus, she places them both solidly on planet earth. They share substantially the same ability to wrong each other - and that they do. Chapter by chapter, myths which are promoted by feminism's fringe, but nonetheless widely accepted in today's political climate, are systematically exploded.

Among these are the tenets of (I dare not say, but Young does) the battered women's movement. Young doesn't deny the existence of domestic violence, only that it can be a two-way street. As she points out, respected University of New Hampshire researchers consistently report women as often as men initiate aggressive physical contact - the so-called 'first punch.' This is a human problem, not part of the feminist declared "epidemic of male violence against women." Mainstream media, as Young repeatedly reveals, either submerges, misreports or misunderstands these complicated dynamics. From there, legislation is enacted on false assumptions.

By and large, gender feminism denies the inherent capacity for violence by women. Women's transgression are dismissed as reactions to an oppressive patriarchal world. Men are presumed guilty, both in feminist theory and in practical application of the law. But recent studies reveal that lesbians (presumably they are feminists) have high rates of violence toward their own partners.

However, Ceasfire! is not an anti-women polemic. A chapter headed "The Conservative Mistake" points at the confusions attached to this issue. A paradox exists. Radical feminism posits that women are moral superiors to males, i.e., they would never file a false claim of rape, they have an inherent capacity civilize and nurture which brutish oaf men lack. Old fashioned Victorian morality agrees - so do some traditionalist conservatives. Women are the fragile guardians of good - a civilizing force - who must be placed on pedestals and protected.

Young notes this "strange convergence of radical feminism and patriarchal conservatism - and the alienation of both ideologies from real life." She points us to the confrontation between the Christian fundamentalist Promise Keepers and the National Organization of Women. Despite initial appearances as polar opposites, they both campaign on a platform of male irresponsibility. Unwittingly, they are working from the same premises.

Another strand of conservatism, agreeable with equity feminism, points to the progress women have made in recent years. Here the belief is "how ridiculous it is to talk about American women as an oppressed group." Indeed, there are statistics the National Organization of Women prefers to avoid.

Young's conclusions are pragmatic. Her twelve proposals are directed toward balance, not vindication of any particular viewpoint. The theme is the de-politicization of gender issues, but one does not ask for balance unless the status quo is skewed, and Young is clear about that. We need to get along. Women have sons and husbands; daughters have fathers and brothers - our issues are family ones. We are the same species.

But radical feminism cannot maintain its cohesion without an enemy. That is why Young's friend and colleague Christina Hoff Sommers once warned, "When feminists quote statistics, reach for your common sense." The "its always his fault attitude" is the mantra of a movement that doesn't want peace. That is the balloon Young seeks to puncture.

Popular media seldom probes for deeper truth. Whether that is due to political ideology, a lemming-like like tendency to follow the herd, or the rushed atmosphere of daily production, false and misleading examples of advocacy research are too often presented as authoritative. Its is a straight line from an interest group press release to the front page - once there, falsehood is elevated to truth. Young has produced a comprehensive counterpoint to the standard wisdom. She wants us to "Get the facts straight." Ceasfire! is directed toward those who prefer truth and insight over perjury and manipulation.

We on the left have a tendency to make a hero of the "victim" whoever he or she may be. To do so, we need our "reasons." We concoct statistics of victimhood, rely on our gurus (e.g., Catherine McKinnon, et al), usually avoiding decadent "male" critical thinking, to develop abstractions to prove the victimhood of same. When our findings are challenged, we throw flames at the straw person into which we've transformed the challenger, claiming most often that the challenge is of no merit because of the credentials, political affiliation, or alleged diabolical objectives of the challenger. As the challenges become more substantial, the flames become hotter.

While the person who recommended the book to me is one whom I trust, I had some reservations about it as Young is affiliated with the Cato Institute, a conservative libertarian think tank. I was relieved to find that, while the book seems aimed at a conservative readership--there is a chapter dedicated to the mistakes of conservatives--by and large the book is a pretty safe analysis of contemporary feminists who are so dedicated to their status as victims that they've endorsed a veritable "paleo-sexism" as Young calls it. And this victimhood is, to me, the opposite of what feminism is supposed to be about! The feminists I've admired have insisted on claiming their own turf, on demanding their rights as citizens, not insisting that their rights are contingent upon their subservience to the omnipotent men.

Oh, and Young had the audacity to acknowledge that women too abuse their kids--and their spouses--much more than many a feminist or court is willing to acknowledge. Thank you, Ms. Young. If a man were to say the same thing, he'd be accused of bitter cynicism. You've at least opened the door to that dimension of honesty.

While I am a strong advocate of women's equality (and racial equality, and...) to the degree that most people from Cato would probably despise me, the present wave of feminists have infantilized themselves. That I do not advocate. Between some women claiming they've been "sexually harassed" on claims that are so abstract that if a man were to claim the same he'd be laughed out of court, and redefinitions of rape to ensure the place of comfortable women in the realm of the rape victim, there seems to be something wrong with the claims. (A Democratic congressman of my acquaintance was recently accused of abuse by his ex-wife. Her attorney implied that the charge itself, despite evidence, should be enough to convict him, or at least seriously challenge his reelection prospects. If I were in a position to do so, I'd have her disbarred!)

Then there are the emotive statements, "if such-and-such were a men's disease, its research would be funded," and the dubious studies by those catering to the latest feminist fads (many of which have been refuted by Christina Hoff Sommers, and others). Young does a pretty commendable job of exposing these fallacies. For instance, the amount spent on breast cancer has surpassed that of prostate cancer by a factor of 50, relative to the number of victims of each! And if I hear one more reference to Faludi's screed "Backlash," I may get into book burning.

Young is wise in covering some dimensions of the "men's movement." And I agree with her approach. It seems that Warren Farrell, in "The Myth of Male Power," may have a good point or two. But he seemed to want to make men into victims too. How about both sexes help each other out and not claim that "other" is subjecting "us" to unspeakable horrors. Then there is the bizarre and dangerous misconception that the "us" are our allies and the "other" our enemies. (Do such claims sell that many newspapers, or that much air time?)

I suspect that a little of Young's speculation meets the needs of her ideology too; there is a little of "it seems to me," or "probably..." But her closing recommendations as to "get a life" (my phrase, not hers) are sound. And I don't see anything wrong with women and men (blacks and whites; gays and straights...) working together. I have this wild fantasy that we'll be able to get something done if we learn to do so!

What's more, I don't see the book as a cheap shot at feminism. (That's one of those flames, of course, aimed at Young). Rather, she exposes fallacies that need to be exposed if we are to work together, instead of against each other. While reading it, you might consider other victimologies, e.g., recovered memory, satanic abuse and other travesties, and ask where they correlate with victim feminism.

First of all let me assure you that there is nothing wrong with American women. There is something very wrong, though, why American feminism "group-think", notably "victim feminism" (Oh, come on, is there *really* any other kind of influential feminism nowadays?). Which strikes me as very, very odd. Blame it on my European identity, cultural and otherwise, but the increasingly virulent rethoric of victim feminism makes absolutely no sense to me. It takes women who are born into one of the richest societies in the civilised world and clothes them in the garments of a Third World-esque "oppression". The irony is, of course, that most of these women have not met with much oppression during their lives and that they have a world of opportunities open to them in a way undreamt to their ancestors, both male and female.

Not that I intend to deny that the odd male chauvinist still exists, but to claim that the way to eliminate anti-woman attitudes is by encouraging anti-male attitudes is unacceptable in my book. And for anyone with more than a nodding acquaintace with moral and ethics, it is not only unacceptable, it is positively totalitarian. Another thing that I find intriguing (and I say intriguing to avoid the over-emotional conotations of "downright angry") is this mindless connection of victimhood with power. I look at the real victims: at the Third World children who die of hunger in countries brimming with natural riches, at refugees that wait and wait for a peace that will never come, and wonder where does all this "patriarchal oppression" rethoric comes from. I have a little game to pose to those women who are bent on blaming men for their every personal shortcomings. I have a little game to pose to those men whose feelings of self-loathing are so intense that they have to rationalise them into that tiresome "I am oppressive by nature, deserving of contempt, blah, blah, blah" mantra: how about growing up into a full human being for a while? How about starting to assume full responsibility for your actions once in a while? Oh, I can sympathise with these trends. I can sympathise completely. It is easier to say "We live in a society that oppresses women" than to say "If I do not develop my full potential it is my fault". It is easier to say "I'm not being promoted because I am a woman" than to say "I'm not being promoted because I'm not qualified enough". It's easier to say "I'm not violent, I'm a victim" than to assume responsibilty for your bad actions and accept the just punishment. But ultimately, this is counter-producive. It is only a form of neo-paternalism.

And what is so good about Young's book is that she sees this. She is able to see through all that screechy rethoric and poke at the deep truths beneath it. She knows that although there are certainly individual men and women who are victims of one thing or the other, neither women nor men are "victims" or "oppressed" or anything else. Real feminism was always about equality, about fairness for *all*, women and men, whites and non-whites, etc. It was never about moral superiority or claiming a privileged victim status. It was about realising how traditional sex-roles hurt both women and men, by imposing rigid behaviour rules and forcing them to follow expectations no one could keep. Where have those ideas gone? We live in a world of professional worriers. A bizarre world where people would rather distort the truth than to sigh in relief with the fact that, say, spouse battering rather than being a epidemic, constitutes unnaceptable and devious behaviour.

It takes bravery to write such a book in contemporary America, although I think there would be much less fuss here in Europe. Only a woman could have gotten away with it, although Ms. Young still has to contend with the screechy no-brainers of (mostly) "gender feminists" whose hate-mail is protected by the very right to free speech they seek to abolish, simply for suggesting that men and women should work together to achieve common goals and that we should stop thinking about "women" and "men" and start thinking about "human beings".

Of course that such ideas, given the present thwarted state of gender politics, come across as revolutionary. To me though, a woman fed on a diet of real equality and critical thinking, to whom humanity consists in assuming your faults along with your virtues and accepting the consequences of your deeds, Ms. Young's ideas come across as solid, commonsensical sanity.

If Cathy Young was a man she would have been accused of being a sexist, misogynist, battering, child-molesting, anti-lesbian rapist, for having the audacity to write this book. And the fact that I completely applaud it probably makes me one in most anti-male feminist (male or female) minds.

I personally do not understand how anybody could see anything in this book that has to do with promoting misogyny, rape, abuse, violence etc. In fact I challenge anybody to present one statement from this book that makes light of ONE of women's true woes. I defy anyone to state one provable lie i.e. untruth in all the facts Ms. Young has presented.

The thought to me of all the critics of this book is that they had already made up their minds before they read it. I mean, if I discover that, truly, only 1 in 1000000 foxes die of human cruelty every year and publish fact this when the Protect The Fox organisation says 400 in 1000000 die using faulty methods of research, am I then anti-fox?! Likewise, if rape rates are lower than NOW thinks, is it "pro-rape" to make known the lower number?

Tell me true, is it anti-woman to note that a father can often be just as good at taking care of the children as the mother? Is it anti-woman to tell the truth that a father is as important as a mother in a child's life? Is there any justification for the belief that a father is only as welcome in the child's life as the mother wants him to be? Is this not anti-child?

Ms. Young deals with issues that have brought the sexes into conflict in the past thirty years, fueled by agenda driven people (you may accuse me of being a rapist here, if you like) who are more dedicated to an ideology than the lives of the women they claim to represent. The agenda driven people I talk of know that to admit that they have made progress means that they stand to lose their jobs so they continue to inject more venom into the relations between the sexes, causing more misery to all.

Feminism has done many wonderful things, and I will move heaven and earth to ensure my wife's, sister's, mother's, aunt's, niece's and (especially) daughter's rights to equal opportunity, security, to pursue love and joy in their lives, but not at the expnense of my brother's father's, uncle's, nephew's and son's rights to the same. And I refuse to take sides. The truth is we can achieve both, and we should, even if it means pissing NOW off.

Thank you Ms. Cathy Young. You are a gem.

Browsing through the "reader" reviews of this book I am even more convinced that Ms. Young is on the right track with her critique of gender feminism. We live in a society that increasingly sees men as inherently evil and women as saviors of the world. It seems that human nature leads us toward such polarization from time to time only to later discover that the power inherent in casting ourselves in the role of savior always comes at a price.

Ms. Young's book merely serves to illustrate the price we are paying for the excesses of gender feminism, and provides some well reasoned thoughts on how to put things into better balance. If we do not do so, our sons are destined to become second class citizens in a world where they will be blamed for all that is evil and ignored for all that is good.

Ceasefire argues that a world like that is one none of us will be happy with...

Even those people who seem to want it so badly.

Well, it appears we have a woman who is not quite entranced by miss Young's theses. Perhaps I can mince a word or two on that subject.

We can take the bad reviews as a glowing thumbs up for this book; anything that only gets long five star reviews on the one hand and hate-email from one or two determined Berkely undergrads on the other has to be good by simple logic. Hated by Berkely undergrad= good book, quod erat demonstradum.

The negative attention paid to her also lends creedence to Miss Youngs ideas in themselves- has anyone noticed the hatefull and avalanch-like attacks come form the political leftist feminists? Sort of throws a little doubt on the monumentally oppressive patriarchial culture notions and the idea of a backlash, doesn't it?

Or to put it another way- If there is a war going on, why are all the vicious and intolerant fighters on the left-feminist side?

All you hep cats take note- the side that won't even consider other ideas is the side that is on the wrong side of history. Read Miss Young. I am.

Cathy Young defends women's right to be bad, to do bad things, to be wrong, to be violent - and to accept the responsibility for such actions. Who would want these rights? Well, today's women should want them - they are the right to be fully human. Common wisdom, fed by advocacy groups (as Young so skilfully delineates), gives us two images of women: 1) the forbearing and sensitive nun, easily offended by the slightest hint of sex or physical confrontation, and 2) the "woman warrior" - infinitely capable and contemptuous of men. If women commit violent acts (and, as Young proves beyond doubt, they commit these acts regularly) it must be in self-defense (the media and the Ad Council tell us). Young's idea is revolutionary and could get us out of the Edwardian simplicities of our current dogma - that men are predators and women are pure and innocent. Women are human, capable of evil, and deserve the right to be held responsible when they do wrong. Now that's equality.

What really surprises me about the responses that criticise this book is how intolerant and abusive they are. And how short and lacking in facts and evidence they are. And they're totally counter productive. If you think Dr Greer is a better cultural observer, show me why - don't just shout at me, I won't listen if you do. This is an extremely well researched and sober book. But perhaps what angers people the most is having their anger cooled by reason. Do some people simply want to hate? Does it fulfill some need to feel real?

It is sad that "readers" of this book feel compelled to say that Young is not really a woman. This can only be because she dares to defend men, who - common wisdom tells us - are beneath contempt. Young speaks out against sexism.

Ceasefire! is the most nuanced, sensitive and objective portrayal of the "war of the sexes" that I've read yet. The picture she paints is especially familiar to any college undergrad: on one side, we have the MacKinnonite victim feminists, on the other, backward-thinking conservatives. With an imposing array of relavent statistics, Young makes a calm, reasoned case for a more equal, just, and peaceful dialouge. The first chapter summarizes the book's theme perfectly - "Men Are From Earth, Women Are From Earth". Disregard this insightful work at your own risk.