Under most circumstances, I would like to consider myself an individualist. It is part of my personal and political philosophy to want to allow people to do what they want and engage in whatever personal, social, political and economic activities they please as long as they respect the rights of others. But there is another strong drive in me that yearns for order, discipline and rigidity. Reconciling this with my desire for freedom is difficult and manifests itself with a mixture of libertarianism and an element of collectivism. Although those terms are not compatible, the type of homogeneity I desire in society is not incompatible with the rest of political ideology. Thus, my beliefs in political and economic freedom also include a desire for all Americans to maintain a skepticism on minority issues, support for traditional views on gender, and a strong fondness for a national code of ethics. In America today, there is a great deal of talk about minorities and the respective struggles of individual groups in America. Whether the minority in question be blacks and Latinos, gays, women, or transgendered people, there is a great deal of talk about how the current political, social and economic climate in America today is insensitive and even downright hostile to minority groups who are alleged to suffer from deep-rooted racism, sexism, and homophobia. Whether it be excessive force by police officers, legal bans on same-sex marriage or allegedly discriminatory employment practices, virtually everyone is in agreement that minority groups suffer in America because of traditional ideas about marriage, gender and the last remnants of racism left over from the Civil Rights era. I consider myself to be a person who actively seeks to expand opportunity for Americans and I would like to think that I agree with some grievances people have about minority issues in the country. I disagree with blacks going to prison disproportionately more than white people for drug offences despite that black and white drug usage rates are virtually the same. I think it is abhorrent that black teenage unemployment is so high. I think it is disgusting how America has watched the destruction of the black family and nobody has the courage to start a real conversation about it. I think same-sex marriage should be legal in all 50 states, but I have a real problem with some of the points made by "minority issue advocates" today and the nature of the dialogue that goes on. I believe that many of the arguments made are factually incorrect, feed into a victim complex made by those that wish to divide America on issues of minorities and much of the debate is distorted. Take for a recent example, the Michael Brown shooting. Many people took to the Internet and knew nothing about the nature of the case and posted lies about the shooting simply because they believed them because they had an agenda or an axe to grind with blacks or the police. Rather than looking at the facts, average people and the media simply repeated the headline and following phrase: "...Darren Wilson, the white police officer who shot the unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown." How deceptive and shameful. It was not long before some of the most divisive people in the media and on the national platform started to blame the police department, the officer in question and the apparently obvious racism that caused Michael Brown's death. People like Al Sharpton wasted no time in drawing lines about who was wrong and who was right. People hastily ignored all facts that did not fit in with the narrative that they believed and irresponsibly speculated about the case based off testimony by unreliable witnesses and changed their story. I still remember Youtube comments where people even got lots of likes for saying that the police department staged the video where Brown was clearly seen stealing cigars from the local convenience store before he was shot. Dorian Johnson, Brown's friend present at the time of the shooting alleged that Brown had surrendered and was shot execution style by Officer Wilson. Stories about Brown being shot at the back as he ran away were on the lips of everyone. People believed that Michael Brown was innocent because that is what they wanted to believe. The facts of the case, summarized well, but tediously by the St. Louis country prosecutor proved that Brown had reached through the window of Wilson's car and tried to grab his gun, punched Wilson several times, ran away, but then charged Wilson again when he was shot. There was gunshot residue on Brown's hand proving that he wrestled for the gun. The six times he had been shot (not the ten times that many Brown supporters erroneously believed) were all proven to be found on the front of his body where the bullet entered. Brown's blood was found a distance to the right of where the body was found clearly indicating that Brown ran away, but then ran back towards the officer where he was then fatally shot and his body lay in the streets. But these facts mean nothing to the peaceful protestors and to the violent ones in Ferguson who fired guns in the air, burned down black-owned businesses, torched a police car, burned civilian-owned cars, and looted stores. How ignorant. In the face of facts that do not the false story these people believed, they committed crimes themselves and proved that they were nothing more than opportunists waiting for an excuse to destroy and steal. Even here at Quinnipiac, protestors stood in front of the library protesting the shooting chanting phrases like "hands up, don't shoot." Really? Did these people not get the memo? Brown didn't put his hands up. The "innocent, college bound teenager" commonly referred to as a "gentle giant" was 6'4", almost 300 lbs., and had just finished roughing up a store clerk he stole from. To continue to parrot this nonsense about Brown's innocence is utterly laughable. This goes straight to the heart of how truly desperate these people are to incite hatred in people. The facts are the facts, like them or not. To continue to protest the truth is fruitless, especially when your protests include burning down a Little Caesar's. Although the Michael Brown case may not seem relevant to the topic at hand, it is a perfect example of how low people will sink to prove a false point. People are eager to prove themselves correct, even if it involves distorting facts and silencing those that speak the truth. People have the conclusion "innocent blacks are murdered everyday by racist, white police officers and any case that sounds similar to that assumption must be true, regardless of established fact" and then they set out to prove the point irrespective of how silly and erroneous it is. Really, truly innocent black people are killed every day in America. Sometimes, it is by police officers. Take the Eric Garner case where a man who committed the unthinkable crime of selling untaxed cigarettes was strangled and then died from a heart attack. Why is that officer not indicted? This is a true case of police brutality, but people like Michael Brown supporters dilute the argument when they mix in cases where the cop used lethal force responsibly with cases where the police officer was unnecessarily violent against an innocent person. But, the larger issue in America is this: blacks are killed every day in America.....by other blacks. It is true that most murders are intraracial, but it is particularly bad for blacks as 90% of blacks killed are killed by people of the same race. The 2013 FBI Uniform Crime Report, a compilation of annual crime statistics, also shows that 14 percent of white victims were killed by black offenders; and 7.6 percent of black victims were killed by white offenders. Yes, that means that twice as many whites were killed by blacks than there were blacks killed by whites. Furthermore, according to the Department of Justice, 52.5% of homicide offenders from 1980 to 2008 were black, with whites 45.3% and Native Americans and Asians 2.2%. The offending rate for blacks was almost 8 times higher than whites, and the victim rate 6 times higher. Blacks committed over half the murders in the past 30 years when they are only around 13.2% of the population. White-on-black crime is statistically rarer than the opposite. According to data from the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), an estimated 320,082 whites were victims of black violence in 2010, while only 62,593 blacks were victims of white violence. That same year, according to the Census Bureau, the white and black populations in the U.S. were 196,817,552 and 37,685,848, respectively. Whites therefore committed acts of interracial violence at a rate of 32 per 100,000, while the black rate was 849 per 100,000. In other words, the "average" black was statistically 26.5 times more likely to commit criminal violence against a white, than vice versa and 200 times more likely to commit aggravated assault against a white person than vice versa. Moreover, blacks who committed violent crimes chose white victims 47.7% of the time, whereas whites who committed violent crimes targeted black victims only 3.9% of the time. This trend of minorities occupying a sizeable space in committing crime is further evidenced by the "National Youth Gang Survey Analysis" (2011) that states that of gang members, 46% are Hispanic/Latino, 35% are African-American/black, 11.5% are white, and 7% are other race/ethnicity. According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reports, in the year 2008 black youths, who make up 16% of the youth population, accounted for 52% of juvenile violent crime arrests, including 58.5% of youth arrests for homicide and 67% for robbery. Black youths were overrepresented in all offense categories except DUI, liquor laws and drunkenness. In 2008, the offending rate for blacks (24.7 offenders per 100,000) was 7 times higher than the rate for whites (3.4 offenders per 100,000) From 1980-2008, blacks were responsible for two-thirds of all drug-related homicides. Did you find the previous two paragraphs offensive? You shouldn't have. The previous two paragraphs were purely factual and the sources are cited at the end of this essay. But if you read this to other people, what is the likelihood that they would be offended? I would guess very, very high. This is what living in America means nowadays. It means finding facts- the truth offensive. It means that when someone has the courage to stand up and say that black on white crime is far more likely and prevalent than the opposite (which we are all trained by the media and politicians to focus on), that person is vilified and shamed. Shamed for speaking the ugly truth. The narrative that blacks are viciously persecuted by whites is not only mostly false- the opposite is mostly true. So, why is it that we will focus on a shooting like Michael Brown where the officer was clearly in the right, when there is a truly horrifying race war before our eyes being committed by the very people that we are supposed to pity as victims? Take this prime example by a Huffington Post blogger who inadvertently proves my point about the truly disgusting nature of the race baiters in this country. Julia Craven writes in an article entitled 'What Does Black on Black Crime Have to Do with Ferguson': "The answer to the question posed in this post's title is nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not one thing. Nada. Zip. Zero. The "Black-on-Black crime" moniker is racist rhetoric functioning under the guise of concern for the state of Black America. People of all races -- Blacks included -- seemingly love to discuss how not killing our own and being more respectable will alleviate the effects of racism. It's dangerous, however, to tell Black people to dress better, work harder or be respectable because it diverts attention from the gaze of the oppressor to the behavior of the disenfranchised. It showcases how deep anti-blackness runs within our society. This highly misinformed line of thinking negates the complex historical implications surrounding a white cop killing an unarmed Black teenager." Really, Ms. Craven? Really? How absolutely gods-damned disgusting. We can't talk about the true epidemic of black-on-black crime and black-on white crime because you think it is racist? Are you serious? Having the open and honest discussion of irresponsible personal behavior exhibited by blacks is off-limit conversation because it takes away from the oh-so-obvious reality that white people are the oppressors? What a ridiculous sentiment. We can't talk about black crime because it is racist to do so? People like Julia Craven are people that like to look at the unbiased truth in America and dismiss it because it is offensive to them. I don't care if it is offensive to you, Ms. Craven. You don't speak for all black people, many of whom are disgusted by people like you who continue to the phenomenon of blacks playing the victim and blaming others for their problems. This is a huge problem with minority issues. People too often fail to look at the blatant reality in front of them and analyze it for what it is. It is easier to come up with lies and exaggerations about how white people have easy lives and how black failure is a result of systemic racism that persists because of people who question the all-powerful a social justice warriors. It is far simpler to play the victim and blame other people for your community's problems rather than take a hard look at yourselves and try to adjust the social and cultural norms that keep people down. 72.2% of black babies are born out of wedlock. Maybe that is something we can focus on as a nation? Not having a child simply because you can. Only having children once you have graduated school and are in a loving relationship that can provide a stable, two-parent household for children. What about the conscious decisions by many blacks to engage in drug use or drug selling? How about lobbying the government to end the Drug War so blacks are not harmed by it? Why not erase the minimum wage so blacks can get jobs and money and build up their skills? What about combating the toxic hip hop culture where killing, drug use, and going to prison is glorified? Let's talk about those issues. Oops. I forgot. We can't talk about black issues because people like Julia Craven think that honest discussion is racist. Oh well. Moving on. Amongst other minorities that are given constant attention and pity are gays and people that are transgendered. I think that gay marriage should be legal, but the problem I have with the discussion is that gay marriage is treated like the most important issue in America today. Really? Less than 3% of the population can't get married and that takes precedent over the failing dollar, a stagnant economy, an immigration crisis, and public education in decline? It is simply dishonest to say that the most important issue in America is about gays getting married. How his debate is framed is another problem I have. There are rampant double standards in the debate. If you have a natural reaction to people of the same sex kissing in front of you and you are uncomfortable, or see a gay pride parade where men wear thongs and make-up in the street showing off to anybody who happens to walk by, that natural reaction is apparently not okay, but you still have to believe that their sexuality is perfectly natural and respect it. Their natural feelings are fine and deserving of respect. Yours are not. They are close-minded and bigoted. If you tend to think that heterosexual marriage is preferable when it comes to raising children because you believe that both genders are needed for a developing child, you are immoral and intolerant. I believe in gay marriage and even think that gays should be able to raise children. Having gay pride is fine and accepted, but taking pride in being straight is disgusting and wrong. Apparently, not being accepting of the double standards that come along with the gay rights argument means that you are no better than a religious person who opposes what you support on the grounds of their personal belief dictating what others do. As for transgendered people, I think that we need to be accepting of them, but I think it is also important to respect even the people that find it abnormal, as it is a new phenomenon and is becoming more widespread. Many equality advocates also are displeased with heteronormativity and cisgender normativity. Personally, I think to be angry at these expectations is foolish. It is a generally accepted sentiment to make decisions based on the rule, not the exception. To raise our children in completely sexuality and gender absent environment simply because of the off chance that they may grow up to be a part of a small minority is absurd. I think it is silly to take offence over the idea of heteronormativity, but I think it is even more ridiculous to be upset about cisgender normativity. People have created imaginary oppression that transgender and non-binary people have to suffer. Yes, I am going to assume you're a woman if I am told you are female and were born female. Does it really make any sense to not say anything just in case a person has changed their gender? The male and female genders are things that almost all people accept as a given for humanity. To pretend that it is "oppression" and you are "suffering" because people assume something based on reasonable evidence and a high likelihood being correct, you are in no position to complain when the vast majority of people are heterosexual and cisgender. That's the truth, even if it offends people. This issue has gotten so absurd, institutions like Brown University have gender neutral bathrooms. Rather than leave something simple and obvious enough like identifying what gender you are alone, we feel the need to complicate one of the simplest things in existence- who you are as a man or woman. This is serious civil rights issue? An exceptionally small percentage of the population that feels offended because they happen to be in the minority in society? What a fruitless and foolish debate to be having. The second part that I have worked into my ideas are beliefs about traditional gender roles. Just like minority issues, there is a growing conversation about the role women play in society and how they are being treated like second class citizens. Once again, many of the facts taken for granted in these arguments are actually not true at all, and because of this and the general silliness of some of the points made, the argument is distorted. Take for instance, the wage gap that is so often cited by people which simply does not hold up to the facts. Many people will repeat the lie that women are paid 23% less than men for the same job and this is because of sexism in the workplace. However, when one does even preliminary research, this is shown to be blatantly false. Once you account for occupation, time spent in the workplace, the hours worked and the major chosen, the wage gap practically vanishes. As Christina Hoff Sommers writes, "The 23-cent gap is simply the average difference between the earnings of men and women employed "full time." What is important is the "adjusted" wage gap-the figure that controls for all the relevant variables. That is what the new AAUW (American Association of University Women) study explores." When these things are accounted for, the wage gap goes down to about 6.6 cents. But as Ms. Sommers writes again, refuting claims made by the National Women's Law Center, "'In fact,' says the NWLC, 'authoritative studies show that even when all relevant career and family attributes are taken into account, there is still a significant, unexplained gap in men's and women's earnings.' Not quite. What the 2009 Labor Department study showed was that when the proper controls are in place, the unexplained (adjusted) wage gap is somewhere between 4.8 and 7 cents.... Furthermore, the AAUW's 6.6 cents includes some large legitimate wage differences masked by over-broad occupational categories. For example, its researchers count "social science" as one college major and report that, among such majors, women earned only 83 percent of what men earned. That may sound unfair... until you consider that "social science" includes both economics and sociology majors. Economics majors (66 percent male) have a median income of $70,000; for sociology majors (68 percent female) it is $40,000. Economist Diana Furchtgott-Roth of the Manhattan Institute has pointed to similar incongruities. The AAUW study classifies jobs as diverse as librarian, lawyer, professional athlete, and "media occupations" under a single rubric--"other white collar." Like many studies perpetuating the myth of the so-called wage gap, the conclusions drawn are those based on statistical ambiguities and misleading labels for occupations that lead to erroneous conlcusions. But even acknowledging that there might be a gap, reasonable people like Ms. Sommers say that we should not compel businesses to pay women the last few cents per dollar without having extensively researched and proven that the remaining wage gap is due to sexism. As she later writes in the article, if the wage gap was as large as it is said to be, major corporations would simply lay off all of their male employees and only employee women and enjoy a gigantic market advantage by saving money on paying out salaries. The last point made by Sommers in her article is absolutely crucial to the point that is usually made by feminists following their defeat by the numbers- the belief that the wage gap resulting from conscious decisions made by women are not made freely. "Women's groups will counter that even if most of the wage gap can be explained by women's choices, those choices are not truly free. Women who major in sociology rather than economics, or who choose family-friendly jobs over those that pay better but offer less flexibility, may be compelled by cultural stereotypes. According to the National Organization for Women (NOW), powerful sexist stereotypes "steer" women and men "toward different education, training, and career paths" and family roles. But are American women really as much in thrall to stereotypes as their feminist protectors claim? Aren't women capable of understanding their real preferences and making decisions for themselves? NOW needs to show, not dogmatically assert, that women's choices are not free. And it needs to explain why, by contrast, the life choices it promotes are the authentic ones -- what women truly want, and what will make them happier and more fulfilled." I absolutely agree. I remember seeing an episode of Last Week Today with John Oliver where he was talking about the wage gap. He played clips of people saying essentially what Mr. Sommers wrote in the article. Then, after the compilation of clips was finished, Oliver let a snide chuckle escape and his audience "oooo'd" with disapproval. Why? Oliver then proceeded to make jokes about how it is not fair for women to be paid according to the college majors and careers that they chose, even though they were conscious and deliberate decisions. What a stupid argument. If we can't hold people accountable for the decisions they make and how it may affect what they are paid later on in their jobs, then shouldn't John Oliver be equally disgusted that a McDonald's employee who dropped out of high school makes less than a person who graduated from college with a Master's degree in business? After all, according to Oliver, you can't hold people accountable for the decisions they make when it comes to their career, so those two people should make the same amount of money, right? No. Of course not. Because that is an absurd way to think. Women are able to go into STEM careers and make progress for women in those areas. But many choose to do other things. What is wrong with that? Many women choose to be nurses and teachers because that is what they want to do. Nobody holds a gun to their head and many women decide on a lower paying major and job because they are interested in the field they are studying. That is what they want to do with their time, money and life. But of course, these conscious personal decisions offend feminists who think that it is a tragedy if women are not doing the exact same thing as men. There are other distortions in the arguments that people make about the distortion between men and women. Feminists often think that men as a whole are often to blame for heinous crimes of rape, murder and violence against women. Ridiculous internet videos suggest that rather than talk about what women were wearing when they were raped, men should "be taught not to rape." First of all, not all men are rapists and some rapists are not men. Secondly, are there really places in America where it is taught that it is okay to rape? I'm sure there are, but I would bet that those households are few and far between. It is generally accepted in American culture that rape is a very serious crime. You are branded for life with the title of sex offender, usually serve 15 years in prison or more and are often targeted by other inmates for your crime. People know that rape is serious and disgusting. But feminists say that men need to be taught not to rape. Obviously, I will teach my children about the importance of consent, but to act like men need to be trained like animals not to sexually assault people like it is their nature to do so is offensive and absurd. I'm not going to rape anyone, but I can't remember a time where my parents told me "not to rape." I'm pretty sure I came up with that conclusion on my own. Secondly, feminists here say one thing and do another. They claim that you can't talk about what the victim was wearing because it is irrelevant to the argument and takes away from the fact that the offender was the one responsible for the crime. For the most part, I agree. So why then, do feminists take the individual blame off the shoulders of the outliers in the gender who rape women, the people who truly have something wrong with them and say "teach men not to rape." Most men already know not to rape. It is not my fault that a guy rapes someone simply because we have the same sex organs. He's at fault. So don't relieve the offender of the responsibility and blame the whole gender for a lack of self-control only a few of us possess regarding sexual desire. All of these arguments are distortions and they feed a victim complex that is become all too fashionable as of late to bear as a woman. From claiming that 1 in 5 women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime to cries about a phantom patriarchy, it has never been more "in" to talk about how oppressed women are. But of course, most of these arguments don't hold up to facts or common sense. Like my paragraph on minority issues, these women's issues are excuses to complain about things that aren't real. There is evidence that females benefit unfairly for being female just as much as there is evidence that males benefit from being male. Why can't we talk about how women serve less time than men in prison for the same crimes- if they are convicted at all?! Why can't we talk about men dying in the workplace at far higher rates than females? Why can't we talk about the rate that mothers get awarded custody of the children upon divorce being much higher than that of the fathers? Maybe there is female privilege in this country. Of course, I am not going to actually believe that, because I think that complaining about imaginary advantages that other people have in the country is an excuse to divert attention away from real problems and further divide people. 1st and 2n wave feminism was about political and social equality. Now feminism's major struggles are complaining about statistically non-existent wage gaps, pulling video games off the shelf that are considered "encouraging violence against women," and getting upset when a man compliments you on the street. Feminism today is about claiming that you need feminism because you feel like you have been persecuted. A common feminist line on the Internet is: "Remember- it's not about all men are menaces to women. It's that all women have been menaced by men." Are you serious? People actually believe that every single female on the planet has been victimized by a man? Or how about the petition to remove Grand Theft Auto V from shelves in the Australian branch of the company Target, because the game "encourages" violence against women, when in reality, the only people you are required to kill in the game are men! All the villains in the game are men! It is just as easy to shoot, run over and beat to death men in the game than women! So, why do we feel the need to make mountains out of molehills and conjure up problems where none exist? A selection from Our Favorite 'F-Word': The Misconceptions of Feminism is Uni and Mainstream Culture Students reads: "Rayburn added that this change (viewing feminism in a negative light) in people's views toward feminism was caused by the 'conservative backlash' against liberal issues, which emerged after the counterculture movement of the 1970's." Backlash against these ideas was partly in due to the growing conservative political movement in America, but it has happened so radically because feminism has nothing to do with equality anymore. Now it has to do with theorizing in an ivory tower about fabricated problems that people come up with to cause argument and rile people up. Just look up "feminism" on Tumblr, a site that is overwhelmingly populated with women that don't stand for equality, but rater think that all men are to blame for the actions of a few and that small inconveniences were traumatizing experiences and thus justify a belief system that treats me like the enemy. Feminism is not about equality. Not anymore. The girls and women who truly advocate for equality and nothing more, nothing less ought to call themselves egalitarians and abandon the label that rightly warrants skepticism about their beliefs. Besides the erroneous beliefs that I listed above, one of the ones that offends me the most is the lack of belief held by many that there are differences between males and females. Many feminists think that admitting that there are natural differences between men and women and girls and boys is a way to perpetuate sexism in America. They think that admitting difference continues inequality and that equality is synonymous with be the same. But, that is not true. In fact, the opposite is true. Equality simply being treated the same by people and the law when it comes to your capability and value as a person- it has nothing to do with having the same nature. If we were all the same and were all men or all white or all heterosexual, the word equality wouldn't even need to exist because we would naturally be the same because we all have the same sexuality, skin color or sex organs. Equality is about being thought of as equally valuable as other people in face of the differences we all know to exist. Admitting that men and women are naturally different does not perpetuate inequality- it is a simple truth that most people that are parents realize. Boys tend to be rougher and more excitable. They may be a bit more destructive in their playing and tend to focus on playing with toys and objects. Girls tend to be more polite and constructive in their playing like when they build something (and don't knock it down) or role play as parents with other girls. Of course, I am not saying that there are not outliers. Boys love to play with other kids as well and enjoy role playing as parents too. Toys like Legos and blocks and toy cars are often played with by both genders. Some girls like to play with footballs and roughhouse with boys. This is just as natural as boys playing rough and girls being gentler. There is a fair amount of overlap in play activities performed by both genders. I fully acknowledge this- the problem is that many women's rights advocates and feminists care very little about natural differences. They insist that boys and girls are exactly the same and that is why sexism is an erroneous belief. The problem is that this is not true. Sexism is certainly erroneous, but it is not because boys and girls are the same, it is because boys and girls usually are equally adept at similar things and can satisfy the intellectual demands placed on them. This does not mean that the genders are identical to one another. While still working for ABC, John Stossel produced a special entitled, Boys and Girls are Different. The special landed him in hot water with many who thought that he was excusing the behavior of treating boys and girls differently because of the belief that the genders are different. In a video that I have listed the link of at the end of this essay, Stossel last year talks about when he produced the special years ago. "Feminist professors taught me men and women are biologically the same and it is only because of sexist society, parents and peers encouraging boys to play with guns, girls to play with dolls that causes boys and girls to behave differently. If we just stopped doing that, there would soon be equal numbers of female racecar drivers and male ballet dancers. And I believed that! I really did, until I had children and woke up and did a report on ABC news that got me into trouble..." He then brings on a medical doctor named Daniel Amen who had conducted a brain study of over 46,000 people which showed that men and women are indeed biologically different. Because of differences in the brain, women tend to be more empathetic and compassionate. They have better memories and can remember more vividly serious emotional experiences. They are good with relationships and people, which may help explain why they choose lower-paying majors like teaching and nursing where they help others. There is a quote attributed to Varg Vikernes, a musician that I see as important. Although I don't agree with everything it says or everything he believes, I think there is value in what he says about what feminism has taught women: "Cooking too is looked upon with contempt. A (female and American) friend of mine pointed at the fact that women in the USA are actually more likely to slap a man's face if he asks her to cook dinner than for demanding a blowjob on their first date, and I think that says it well. All the "liberation" of women has done is to cause women to replace all the positive characteristics of women with the negative characteristics of men...The modern women can no longer cook, they no longer want children and they are no longer warm, tidy and loving creatures who think spending time with their family is a good thing. They are probably too "independent" and "strong" to even have a family of their own. The only thing modern women have to offer men today is sex. So instead of being loving housewives who cook and raise children, they are reduced to being sexual objects only - and they are so messed up emotionally and intellectually that they often spend most of the money they make on their jobs on plastic surgery, cosmetics and tons of clothes they think will make them look good, in a desperate attempt to stay or become more attractive. Well, they have no other qualities attractive to men, so what else can we expect? This is the fruit of feminism. The fruit of 'women's liberation.'" The opinions he expresses are certainly strong and some may find them offensive. I myself don't agree with all of it, but the man has a point. Feminism has taught women to throw away the very traits that make them such wonderful people. Being empathetic and kind-hearted, loving people that care for their family, husbands and children has been replaced by this incessant brain-washing that sleeping around will make you popular and get you respect. In my opinion, both men and women should try to control themselves more than they do and try to limit the sex they have to something meaningful. No, I don't think you should have to be married, but at least try to be in a loving relationship with the man or woman you are going to do it with. This disturbing mentality that "pro-women" people advocate for simply encourages women to be more like men and that is not what we should be trying to do! Feminists act like they are liberating women by giving them the opportunity to act like men, but I can tell you firsthand that there is nothing liberating about having a strong sex-drive or being discouraged to use your emotional reasoning! We need women- true women. Women who care about other people. This is not to say that men don't care about people, but women are good at being empathetic. What is so disgusting nowadays is that there is this pernicious belief that describing women as caring and compassionate is sexist and makes women seem weak. How backwards is that? The very nature found in women that I and most other men respect and admire is being shunned by women themselves! This is why telling women to act like men and not be so weak by being nice is so wicked. You are telling women to throw away their greatest assets- the beautiful part of them that men envy. The tender compassion that makes them the very creatures that men pursue and want to commit to. Telling women to go against their nature to be gentle and loving people would be like me saying to young boys, "Stop roughhousing. That desire to play rough is so stupid. It's what society expects of you. Don't act so manly and weak." This brings me to my fundamental point. Men and women are different and having different strengths and weaknesses is no cause for shame! Women should not feel bad that they are physically weaker than men and tend to be less assertive. They shouldn't feel bad that they are good at and want to help people and lend them aid. Men shouldn't feel bad that we are expected to be protecting and strong. We should not feel shame for having a harder time using our feelings in making important decisions. Neither gender should feel shame for having a certain nature, for there is no need to desire the traits of the other nature. There are pros and cons to being both male and female. It is okay to be male and lack female traits and it is okay to be female and lack male traits. Nobody should feel bad or feel like they are "perpetuating sexism" if a girl acts like a typical polite, modest and kind girl and there is no issue in acting like a strong, protective man. These traits are part of who we are as the respective sexes. There is no cause for alarm and you should not give much mind to the people that tell women that they are being liberated for embracing the things that are part of being a man. Don't devalue what it means to be a woman- what makes a woman a woman- her natural beauty, her compassion, empathy and love is what woman such valuable and worthwhile people. So, let's resolve as a society to not disparage and condemn femininity. There is nothing weak about the traditional idea of womanhood. Building on the differences between genders, I think it is important to have gender roles. The biggest grievance people have with gender roles today is the complaint that John Stossel's professors had- they think that having ideas about what it means to be a man or a women perpetuates sexism. But as I talked about in the last paragraph, having distinct differences specific to either gender does not prolong sexist ideas. I think it is sexist that so many women have maligned the very nature of being a woman. My belief that there should be distinct gender roles stems from my belief that both men and women need each other because each gender lacks something found in the other gender. A good way to think of this is the "yin and the yang." Many feminists believe that thinking of femininity as a distinct way of being and living is degrading to women, but as we all know, the yin is no better than the yang or vice versa. They complement each other and are both needed to achieve peace and stability. This is why children benefit so much from stable, two parent households with both a mother and father. Children get both the benefits of being exposed to masculine and feminine traits. This gives the child a sense of balance. Keeping in mind that both masculinity and femininity is important in creating balanced, healthy people, I think society should establish informal gender roles- ideal traits to be found in men and women to give our country and children norms to strive to achieve. These norms are not harmful, they are helpful in maximizing the strengths and minimizing the shortfalls of both genders. In my mind, the ideal man is hard-working and honest. His word is invaluable. He strives to do the best he possibly can at everything he does, particularly at raining his children and doing his job. He keeps himself physically healthy by staying fit and engaging in physical activity. Ideally, he does weights to build muscle and achieve an attractive form, but other types of activities are just as important ranging from jogging to gymnastics. He is intellectual and actively seeks to learn new things every day. Preferably, he has a college education and is well-versed in liberal arts even if that does not have to do with what he does for a living. As Andrew Mills writes in What's So Good About a College Education, "Finally, a college education equips people with the tools for self-examination that renders them able to make informed and intelligent choices about the direction of their lives." He is smart and makes wise, responsible decisions in his life. He may or may not have a strong sex drive, but he is smart and disciplined enough to control himself and does not find it difficult to respect women. He is loving towards his wife and recognizes that she is an anchor in his life, grounding his otherwise hot-headedness. She brings the best out him and makes him a better person by balancing him out, encouraging him to be loving and compassionate and giving. He always asks his wife how she is doing and if anything is wrong and is sincere in his sentiment that he would do anything to make her happy. He is faithful and does his best to not look at other women and would never dream of touching a woman that was not his wife. He is protective of his wife and has a healthy degree of jealousy. He teaches his kids to be disciplined and take pride in the work they do and to always do the best job possible. He teaches his sons that women are worthy of respect and not sex objects. You are chivalrous towards women and revere them, for they often have the good traits that you do not. You need a loving woman in your life to make your life worth living. Women's input is important as they are smart in using emotional reasoning in their decision making, a crucial skill men often lack. He teaches his daughters to be like their mother, the ideal woman. The ideal woman shares a fair amount of traits with the ideal man. She is honest and trustworthy. She works hard at her job if she has one and teaches her children to be respectful, polite, disciplined and smart people. She also actively pursues knowledge and is preferably also college educated. She knows that looks are certainly not everything to being a woman and attractive person. She knows that being funny and witty, smart and interesting does just as much for a true and respectful man as her body. However, she also recognizes the importance of being physically fit and she makes an effort to be strong and in-shape. She might lift weights like a man or do more intense exercises that build and tone muscles. She is modest and knows that giving her body to anybody and everybody often leads to herself being emotionally hurt. She knows that promiscuity is overrated and not a trait that is actively pursued by real men who have a healthy respect for women. She is faithful to her husband as she is to her and is always forthcoming about anything that is bothering her. She does her best to make sure he is happy and provide him with tender care that she knows he needs in his wife. It doesn't matter whether she works or not. Either way, she helps the kids with homework just as much as the father does and tends to their needs. My ideal man and woman sound like respectable people, no? Why does society not expect this type of behavior from people? There is nothing wrong with the traits mentioned above- in fact, the people that possess these traits probably lead healthier lives than most because they know that doing what is in their nature and acting like civilized, respectable people always wins the admiration of others, especially those of the opposite sex. I think that denying differences between men and women is foolish and only robs us of the benefits that each gender has to offer the other and the world. Lastly, I would like to talk a bit about myself and my religion. My religion is an unorthodox one, but I think that one of its major components can be secularly implemented in American society. The 9 Noble Virtues of Odinism are traits that us Odinists praise as a way to lead moral lives. Truth, courage, honor, discipline, self-reliance, perseverance, industriousness, hospitality and fidelity are the virtues by which we try to lead our lives to honor the gods. I think that the moral climate in America is quite pitiful. The people, especially the youth, are directionless and ignorant. I want to focus on my generation because we are the generation that are praised so much. Personally, I think it is hype to expect millennials to get anything done. My generation has seen some of the most irresponsible and revolting behavior there is. We are ignorant of history and economics, we are addicted to technology, obsessed with social media, extremely narcissistic and woefully directionless. My grandfather was 18 when he enlisted in the army and acted honorably his entire life. I think it is sad that our youth is so aimless when our work is clearly cut out for us. Do we prepare for incoming adulthood, gathering all the resources and knowledge we can, knowing that our domestic problems with likely be the biggest struggle we have yet faced as a nation? Nope. Sorry. We're busy binge watching television on Netflix and eating too much. Our youth is incredibly soft and weak. We have never suffered real hardship and will likely have no answers when we are faced with the immense problems that loom over the country even as I type this. Our youth need discipline and guidance. Generation Like and The Betrayal of the Mentors are good pieces of simple evidence that our youth need books and education not the Internet and frivolities. Look at Steven Fernandez in Generation Like. He is a 13 year old skater who has started to make money because of Internet videos he made about skating. Now, many of his views are attributed to the raunchy videos where he walks around with scantily clad women. This is rapidly becoming the best American culture has to offer and it needs to change. America's youth also has a serious problem with learning lessons from our elders. As Mark Bauerlein writes in, The Betrayal of the Mentors: "In a word, the Twixters (Millennials) vision aligns perfectly with that of their wired younger brothers and sisters. It's all social, all peer-oriented. Twixters don't read, tour museums, travel, follow politics, or listen to any music but pop and rap, much less do something such as lay out a personal reading list or learn a foreign language. Rather, they do what we expect an average 19-year old to do. They meet for poker, buy stuff at the mall, and job from job, bed to bed. The maturity they envision has nothing to do with learning and wisdom, and the formative efforts and social scientists highlight don't include books, artworks, ideologies or Venn diagrams. For the Twixters, mature identity is entirely a social matter developed with and through friends. The intellectual and artistic products of the past aren't stepping stones for growing up. They are fading materials of meaningless schooling." I have to agree with him. My generation is aimless and despite unprecedented access to information and countless opportunities, we squander them and choose lives of sloth and ignorance. Millennials lack direction and we need a culture that will teach us and our kids to be smart, disciplined honorable, law-abiding and productive citizens. We will not find guidance in the number of followers we have or the number of likes a photo of ourselves gets. We will not find meaning in life if we perpetuate the useless, anti-intellectual, weak, narcissistic consumerist, all-about-me culture that plagues our youth today. As time has worn on since the inception of the country as an independent state, the country has been gradually deteriorating in terms of its morality. As religion has become less and less important and the expectations we did have on people have fallen apart, we have become a less virtuous people. We have never had a national code of ethics or set model for moral conduct, but take for instance the unspoken beliefs that we had about immigrants coming to America. The country overall had very lenient immigration laws, but culturally, as a people, we expected immigrants to respect the land they had come to and abide by the law. We expected them to learn what English they could, celebrate or at least respect American holidays and send their kids to American schools where they would learn English sometimes before their parents. As Milton Friedman writes in the beginning of Free to Choose: When they (immigrants) arrived, they did not find streets paved with gold; they did not find an easy life. They did find freedom and the opportunity to make the most of their talents. Through hard work, ingenuity, thrift and luck, most of them succeeded in realizing enough of their hopes and dream to encourage friends and relatives to join them." Immigrants came to America and worked hard, abided by the law and worked together to build better lives for themselves. They assimilated. They wanted to become Americans. They were driven and determined to be worthy of the title of American. They strove to become people that were valuable enough to be serious additions to the country and understood that there was an unspoken set of expectations that people act moral. I think we need this again, but it ought to apply to all Americans and people seeking to become Americans. We should emphasize a national code of behavior expected from one another so people have a model to strive for. In summary, I remain firm in my belief of political, social, economic and personal freedom, but I think that as individuals, we can all agree unanimously that minority issues lead to a victim mentality are include many distorted arguments, traditional gender roles and strong national beliefs on what it means to be a respectable man and woman are useful, and that a national code of ethics has utility in providing people with a model to follow to become respectable and valuable citizens. Source List: Page 2-3 Michael Brown shooting http://ift.tt/11HCeOd http://ift.tt/1wl6qN5 Page 3 Eric Garner http://ift.tt/1mfkTQk Page 4 "The 2013 FBI Uniform Crime Report, a compilation of annual crime statistics, also shows similar data: 83 percent of white victims were killed by white offenders; 90 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders; 14 percent of white victims were killed by black offenders; and 7.6 percent of black victims were killed by white offenders." http://ift.tt/1uAFZvj "According to the US Department of Justice, blacks accounted for 52.5% of homicide offenders from 1980 to 2008, with whites 45.3% and Native Americans and Asians 2.2%. The offending rate for blacks was almost 8 times higher than whites, and the victim rate 6 times higher. Most murders were intraracial, with 84% of white homicide victims murdered by whites, and 93% of black victims murdered by blacks." http://ift.tt/13hucga Cooper, Alexia (2012). Homicide Trends in the United States, 1980-2008. p. 3. "According to data from the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), an estimated 320,082 whites were victims of black violence in 2010, while 62,593 blacks were victims of white violence. That same year, according to the Census Bureau, the white and black populations in the U.S. were 196,817,552 and 37,685,848, respectively. Whites therefore committed acts of interracial violence at a rate of 32 per 100,000, while the black rate was 849 per 100,000. In other words, the "average" black was statistically 26.5 times more likely to commit criminal violence against a white, than vice versa. Moreover, blacks who committed violent crimes chose white victims 47.7% of the time, whereas whites who committed violent crimes targeted black victims only 3.9% of the time." http://ift.tt/12C1ghN Page 5 "...of gang members, 46% are Hispanic/Latino, 35% are African-American/black, 11.5% are white, and 7% are other race/ethnicity." The "National Youth Gang Survey Analysis" (2011) http://ift.tt/1wl6tsj "According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reports, in the year 2008 black youths, who make up 16% of the youth population, accounted for 52% of juvenile violent crime arrests, including 58.5% of youth arrests for homicide and 67% for robbery. Black youths were overrepresented in all offense categories except DUI, liquor laws and drunkenness." Unnever, James (2011). A Theory of African American Offending: Race, Racism, and Crime. Routledge. p. 2. "In 2008, the off ending rate for blacks (24.7 off enders per 100,000) was 7 times higher than the rate for whites (3.4 off enders per 100,000) Blacks were responsible for over 52% of all homicides, while two-thirds of drug-related homicides were committed by black offenders (65.6%)" http://ift.tt/11hdqt1 Page 6 "The answer to the question posed in this post's title is nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not one thing. Nada. Zip. Zero. The "Black-on-Black crime" moniker is racist rhetoric functioning under the guise of concern for the state of Black America. People of all races -- Blacks included -- seemingly love to discuss how not killing our own and being more respectable will alleviate the effects of racism. It's dangerous, however, to tell Black people to dress better, work harder or be respectable because it diverts attention from the gaze of the oppressor to the behavior of the disenfranchised. It showcases how deep anti-blackness runs within our society. This highly misinformed line of thinking negates the complex historical implications surrounding a white cop killing an unarmed Black teenager." http://ift.tt/1wl6tsk "...76.2% of blacks are born out of wedlock..." http://ift.tt/1qK8bQs Page 8 "This issue has gotten so absurd, institutions like Brown University have gender neutral bathrooms." http://ift.tt/1wl6tsl Page 9 Wage Gap Myth Exposed -- By Feminists, Christina Hoff Sommers http://ift.tt/1fAHSmz Page 10 John Oliver- Gender Wage Gap http://ift.tt/1rB4SqG Page 12 "Men serve longer sentences than women." http://ift.tt/1qBLyLl "Men die in workplace far more than females." http://ift.tt/1uYVukC "Women win more custody cases than men." http://ift.tt/12C1iGp Page 13 "All women have been menaced by men." http://ift.tt/1wl6qNf http://ift.tt/12C1ghS http://ift.tt/1wl6qNh "Or how about the petition to remove Grand Theft Auto V from shelves in the Australian branch of the company Target, because the game "encourages" violence against women..." http://ift.tt/1ytscMb "Rayburn added that this change (viewing feminism in a negative light) in people's views toward feminism was caused by the 'conservative backlash' against liberal issues, which emerged after the counterculture movement of the 1970's." Uni students, Our Favorite 'F-Word': The Misconceptions of Feminism is Uni and Mainstream Culture Students pg 146, Duffy and et. al Page 15 Stossel video http://ift.tt/1vfFdaB Varg Vikernes quote on women http://ift.tt/1wl6r3x Page 19 "Finally, a college education equips people with the tools for self-examination that renders them able to make informed and intelligent choices about the direction of their lives." Mills, Andrew, What's So Good about a College Education? Duffy and et. al pg. 359 Page 21 "Look at Steven Fernandez in Generation Like. He is a 13 year old skater who has started to make money because of Internet videos he made about skating. Now, many of his views are attributed to the raunchy videos where he walks around with scantily clad women." Generation like (22:05) http://ift.tt/1eZjyIC "In a word, the Twixters (Millennials) vision aligns perfectly with that of their wired younger brothers and sisters. It's all social, all peer-oriented. Twixters don't read, tour museums, travel, follow politics, or listen to any music but pop and rap, much less do something such as lay out a personal reading list or learn a foreign language. Rather, they do what we expect an average 19-year old to do. They meet for poker, buy stuff at the mall, and job from job, bed to bed. The maturity they envision has nothing to do with learning and wisdom, and the formative efforts and social scientists highlight don't include books, artworks, ideologies or Venn diagrams. For the Twixters, mature identity is entirely a social matter developed with and through friends. The intellectual and artistic products of the past aren't stepping stones for growing up. They are fading materials of meaningless schooling." Bauerlein, Mark Betrayal of the Mentors Sean Duffy and et. al pg. 247 Page 22 "When they (immigrants) arrived, they did not find streets paved with gold; they did not find an easy life. They did find freedom and the opportunity to make the most of their talents. Through hard work, ingenuity, thrift and luck, most of them succeeded in realizing enough of their hopes and dream to encourage friends and relatives to join them." Friedman, Milton, Free to Choose, Duffy and et. al, page 95



from Liveleak.com Rss Feed - Search results for 'fail' http://ift.tt/1wl6tIF

v

The Climate of American Culture

Uploaded by: jironde

Views:

Category: Liveleak.com Rss Feed - Search results for fail

Share

Tweet