William A. Donohue
In every society throughout history, young men have been the most violent, risk-taking, promiscuous, and reckless segment of society. If men have been the most morally destitute, women have been, or at least are expected to be, the most temperate. But that hasn’t been true for some time, and now it is clear that women have at least caught up to men: their moral descent is incontestable.
About a decade ago, several young black women came back from visiting Africa only to report how discouraged they were. The men treated them as sluts.
When these gals asked the guys why they were being treated as tramps, the young men said they took their cues from BET (Black Entertainment Television). The guys reported that their image of young black American women was taken from TV: what they were accustomed to seeing is girls gyrating and grinding to music, acting in a lewd fashion. So they acted accordingly. The girls were horrified.
The same could be said about white girls. The way they are depicted on MTV (Music Television) is the same way they are portrayed on BET. What is surprising is why anyone should be surprised when young men treat young women the way they are baited to treat them.
Take the story in this issue about Cosmopolitan and Glamour, two champions of abortion. One woman explains why she hates her newborn child, and the other explains why she lied to the father of their child about his paternity. The former “hated, hated, hated” her new status of motherhood, and the latter—who used to hate men—says she doesn’t want a husband around to raise their child.
The narcissism of these women is emblematic of the cultural descent of women. One speaks pointedly about how she “had a kid,” and how she hates being the “mother to an infant.” Her language is important: she did not have a baby, and she is not the mother of her child: she had a “kid” and she tends to “an infant.” Babysitters have been known to express more affection.
The other gal not only lied to the father of her child—she told him he wasn’t the father—she insisted she was going to do this by myself. As she put it, “I don’t need anyone, thanks.” Whether her child needed a father was irrelevant.
The woman who hates being a mother said she feels “trapped,” complaining that her life is “basically a middle-class prison.” How reminiscent of Betty Friedan’s 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique: she whined that women who lived in suburbia were housed in a “comfortable concentration camp.”
Then we have Ms. Autonomy, the one who doesn’t need anyone. She confesses that she was so bored sitting in a hotel room in Ireland that she decided to find a man in a pub. She bedded the first guy she met (she must have been raised in suburbia), and bingo—she got pregnant. “In the heat of the moment,” she explains, “condoms were discussed but never used, and although I took a morning-after pill, it didn’t work.” But I bet she aced sex ed.
If the authors of these sorry tales are sick, what does that say about their readers? Narcissists attract: the appetite these readers have for self-indulgence is insatiable, and the supply of writers willing to feed them is equally unlimited. But are they happy?
Trying to find happiness while going solo is a fool’s errand: it never works. Indeed, falling back on yourself is the road to hell, not happiness.
Virtually every study shows that those who have the strongest bonds—with God, their spouse, their children, and others—are the happiest and the healthiest. Those who have no one are the most miserable and the least healthy. Sadly, after all the progress women have made politically and economically, they are going backwards on the happiness scale.
Two University of Pennsyl-vania professors, Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers, examined men’s and women’s health and happiness over thirty-five years and found that “measures of women’s well-being have fallen both absolutely and relatively to that of men.”
Unfortunately, the role models available to young women today do not embody the characteristics that allow for happiness. A case in point is Amy Schumer.
The number three best selling non-fiction book this fall has been Amy Schumer’s The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo. She is known for her egomania, sexual exploits, and foul mouth—she wins every race to the bottom. Who likes her? Glamour says its readers “love” Amy. It can safely be said that she personifies the moral descent of young women better than anyone.
We are not left with a pretty sight. Many young women today are emotionally spent, living on empty. Some live in a “middle-class prison,” thoroughly “bored” with life. Others hate their children, as well as the men they use. Most important, all of them hate themselves.
Looks like the “comfortable concentration camp” still exists, at least for some women. Only this time, they are all alone.
