This is unintentionally comical:
Amy Glass has a dilemma on her hands. She can't stand the idea of being average. But by definition, most folks are going to be average. That's the nature of averages. Most folks fall within the normal range of the bell curve.
Oh, and please don't tell her, because that would crush her self-esteem, but Amy Glass is average. An average woman. An average feminist.
Indeed, she understands that at a certain level because she herself sets the bar so low:
I want to have a shower for a woman when she backpacks on her own through Asia, gets a promotion, or lands a dream job…
Sorry to break it to you, Amy, but those "accomplishments" are pretty "average." Indeed, Amy's notion of above average is like contestants who try to get into Guinness World Records by how many hardboiled eggs they can stuff down in a minute.
Amy can't afford to set the bar too high because that would condemn herself to being "average." It's not as though she's ever going to do anything truly extraordinary, like winning an Olympic gold medal, solving a famous math problem, making a scientific breakthrough, or becoming a world chess champion. So she has to settle for "getting a promotion" or "backpacking through Asia."
Amy's right. Getting married and raising kids is oh-so "average." "The most common thing, ever, in the history of the world."
BTW, it's ironic that her notion of an above average accomplishment is when a feminist succeeds in doing what is average for a man. Backpacking through Asia or getting a promotion is pretty average among males. So Amy is one of those feminists who is measuring herself by men. How many men measure themselves by women…much less by feminists?
Let's contrast the role she assigns herself with the role nature assigns her. If naturalistic evolution is true, then an accomplished woman is about on the same plane as an accomplished orangutan or chimpanzee. What self-respecting great ape wants to be an average orangutan when you can be get promoted from a beta orangutan to an alpha orangutan?
Still, in the great scheme of things, does it really matter where you were on the pecking order of great ape society? Is having "backpacked through Asia" on your tombstone a more impressive epitaph than "loving wife and mother"? Who are you trying to impress? And if your goal in life is to impress others, then your sense of self-worth depends on the importance (or lack thereof) that other humans assign to you.
What's so great about being extraordinary, anyway? Do geniuses lead happier lives?
What if "average" means being what God made you to be. Is that humiliating? Or should that be fulfilling?
Consider family photo albums. We find other people's photo albums boring. That's because the people pictured in there aren't related to us. We don't know them. We are not a part of them.
Take a picture of an old woman. For most of us, that's all it is. Just a picture of an old woman. A stranger. She's "average." Billions like her.
But there's someone out there who sees that picture differently. When a grow child looks at that picture, they don't see a stranger. They don't see a generic old woman. They see their own mother. And that makes all the difference. She's average to everyone else, but she's special to them. She meant nothing to the world, but she meant the world to them.
The pestle of a godless universe grinds the average and the extraordinary into the common mortar of recyclable powder. Whether ordinary or extraordinary, we are utterly and ultimately insignificant. Replaceable. Forgettable. Interchangeable. Irrelevant.
It's only in a Christian universe that individuals matter.
Great post.
ReplyDeleteIt's also unintentionally funny how a single woman who has never been married (or so she portrays herself) is lecturing married women (among others) about how raising kids is easy, stupid, unimportant, etc.
ReplyDeleteAmy Glass said:
ReplyDeleteDoing laundry will never be as important as being a doctor or an engineer or building a business.
It is if people want to have clean clothes to wear to the hospital or office! :-)
On a more serious note, a woman who is "merely" a mother but who mothers well, raises pious children, and so forth could be of far more worth in God's eyes than an immoral female physician or CEO of a famous company who has no compunctions about using patients or people to climb the ladder and make a name for herself in her hospital or workplace or community. It's arguable from God's perspective mothers like Susanna Wesley or Sarah Edwards will have had more impact on the world for good than feminists like Hillary Clinton or Nancy Pelosi will have had.
It's also important in that these mundane jobs, like washing dishes and cleaning clothes, expel disease from the home. A woman who does so saves her own life and the lives of her entire family each and every day (many times a day). Even doctor's don't get that track record.
DeleteShe ought to go without washing her dishes for a month while she eats off of them and see how long she lasts. Pop-feminism is nothing more than a philosophy for the superficial mind. True feminism would embrace these activities as part of a role that is beyond important to those within the household. But I guess impressing strangers is more important for a flip-flopped world.
What's even stranger is that she has a blog post about using her sexuality to get what she wants in her career, being a flirt at work, sleeping around to curry favor, etc. Is this what feminism is supposed to be about?
ReplyDeleteI think I found a good pairing for Amy with the enlightened Professor rebuked here:
ReplyDeleteMonogamy is unnatural
For what it's worth, if anything, here's my comment over on Amy Glass' combox.
ReplyDeleteAmy Glass said:
"All of you hateful people are just 'breeders' anyway. Our overpopulated world would be much better off with less of you and more of me. At least I produce something with my life. My job is 10x more fulfulling than raising kids. At least I'll have something to show for it when my time is done."
1. A mother who raises good children who in turn raise their own good children and so on and so forth will not only have "something to show for it" but in fact have "something to show for it" for generations to come. (Amy is at best limited to her single lifetime.)
2. It's unintentionally amusing that Amy would say stuff like this. Imagine if Amy could travel back in time prior to her conception and convince her "breeder" mom not to be a mom. Where would Amy be? Amy wouldn't exist. She wouldn't be able to make her voice known like she does now.
What's more, Amy is teetering on the brink of anti-natalism.
3. Amy assumes it's more "fulfilling" to work than to raise kids. That may be true for her, though I bet she'd be in the minority.
However, many if not most women (and men) desire to marry. Many if not most women have a maternal instinct (just as many if not most men have a paternal instinct). In short, many if not most women (and men) have an innate desire to marry and have a family.
As such, to have one's innate desires met would be "fulfilling." Those who have oft-longed to marry and have kids and had their longings realized would be sated with joy and gladness.
In fact, for many if not most women it can be "more fulfilling" to have a family than to have a job.
Thus, Amy's point that it would be "fulfilling" and "more fulfilling" to have a particular job than to raise kids, and that raising kids is not "important," is "stupid," and so forth simply isn't true for many if not most women.
4. Isn't it "more fulfilling" to spend oneself for someone else like a mother spends herself for her children than it is to spend oneself for oneself alone? Amy wishes to be free to do this or that, not tied down with marriage and children, but the truth is marriage and children is liberating. For instance, there are scientific studies which have shown the happiest people over the course of life are not necessarily those who are the richest people, the most attractive people, the most athletic people, or the like, but rather those who are well loved and have others to love well. At the end of the day, are solitary pursuits for dream jobs, global adventures, and such "accomplishments" more "important" and "fulfilling" than loving relationships with others (e.g. spouses, parents, children)?
5. I'm not sure how Amy can criticize something she hasn't done with such venom. As far as I'm aware, she's not married nor does she have children. How would she know whether marriage or motherhood are more or less fulfilling than other things in life like career?
Given two Amys in two possible worlds, Alternate-Amy who married a good husband and had lovely kids, and Present-Amy who never married or had kids but focused entirely on writing, how does Present-Amy know Alternate-Amy would be far less fulfilled than Present-Amy? On what basis does Present-Amy make such a self-assured calculation?
6. It's unintentionally funny how Amy accuses others of being "hateful" when she's the one who's hating on women who aren't like her. After all, it's pretty "hateful" to say: "I Look Down On Young Women With Husbands And Kids And I'm Not Sorry." Indeed, one can't help but notice how bitter Amy comes across in her writing.
Delete7. Not to mention for Amy people are "hateful" basically for not agreeing with her. She's only tolerant of those who agree with her. But that's not genuine tolerance. In fact, that's intolerance of others.
8. What's further unintentionally comical is how Amy's aspirations are so "average" (as she herself has put it). Travel the world? Get a dream job? That's what most Americans want to do. That's "the most common thing" among Americans. So Amy's aspirations are pretty "average" aspirations.
9. To be frank, Amy's writing is mediocre at best. She simply doesn't write well. The essence of her writing on this website is to act as an agent provocateur. But that's not writing. Rather, that's rabble rousing. The internet savvy would say it's more akin to trolling. But even judging by Amy's own criteria, her writing isn't "productive" or even "something" much if by "something" she means something valuable or worthwhile such as valuable or worthwhile to read. Then again, if trolling is her goal, then I guess she makes a fine troll.
10. On a personal note, I'm a med student. I recently got married. Speaking solely for myself, if forced to choose, I would certainly trade a happy medical career for a happy marriage and family any day.
The pestle of a godless universe grinds the average and the extraordinary into the common mortar of recyclable powder. Whether ordinary or extraordinary, we are utterly and ultimately insignificant. Replaceable. Forgettable. Interchangeable. Irrelevant.
ReplyDeleteIt's only in a Christian universe that individuals matter..
That's a piece of literary art. Somebody needed to say it.