[American Thinker] The phrase, "Women can do anything men can do," seems at first to be a rather harmless sentiment. As with all such, it has its uses, if not taken too far. If men can be surgeons, then so can women. If men can run a hardware store, then so can women. If men can be linebackers in the National Football League -- uh, too far.
Unfortunately, for leftist ideologues, there are no moderate positions on anything. You either agree with them in every detail, or else you are evil. Can we discuss our differences? No!
By now, you have surely read about the firing of James Damore, a software engineer at Google. He was fired for writing a thoughtful memo that questioned the wisdom of Google’s diversity policy. There is no need to repeat all the arguments, pro and con, of what he wrote, or whether it justified his firing. That has been done elsewhere.
The point of this commentary, is to remark on the insanity of it all. According to leftist ideology, there are no legitimate reasons, legal or social, to distinguish between men and women. Ever. Well, we can set quotas that favor women, but that’s only because women are treated so unfairly. Otherwise, we must pretend, as the late Betty Friedan claimed, that aside from external appearances (she called it, "packaging"), men and women are exactly the same in every relevant category. All of them.
The left seems never to ask why it is that women have, historically, been given roles that are viewed as subservient to men. If they would analyze the facts, then perhaps they could help fashion better policies for a society in which the roles and status of the sexes are being transformed. Jumping from medieval concepts of chivalry, to a sexless society, cannot be done in the one fell swoop of an Equal Rights Amendment -- if ever. To deny that is to deny reality, both biological and social.
Related: Daily Mail - First woman in training to become a Navy SEAL drops out of the rigorous program after just a few weeks |