Oh, Scott Adams! Can you write anything about that whole man-woman business without being a creepy douche about it? In a recent blog post titled “Pegs and Holes” – which refers to exactly what you think it refers to — Adams offers his take on the powerful men who have been in the news lately because, as Adams puts it, they’ve been “tweeting, raping, cheating, and being offensive to just about everyone in the entire world.”
After noting that the “current view of such things is that the men are to blame for their own bad behavior” and that this “seems right” to him – gee, ya think? – Adams decides to get all philosophical on us. (When you’re Scott Adams, this is a very very bad idea.) He writes:
The part that interests me is that society is organized in such a way that the natural instincts of men are shameful and criminal while the natural instincts of women are mostly legal and acceptable. In other words, men are born as round pegs in a society full of square holes. Whose fault is that? Do you blame the baby who didn’t ask to be born male? Or do you blame the society that brought him into the world, all round-pegged and turgid, and said, “Here’s your square hole”?
I’m assuming that Adams doesn’t actually think that baby boys are born with erections, and realizes that it is biology, not society, that hands out penises and vaginas to babies in the first place. I’m just trying to understand the whole pegs and holes metaphor. Why does he think “round” penises and “square” vaginas are somehow incompatible? In the context of consensual sex, after all, penises of all shapes and sizes generally fit into vaginas quite nicely.
As far as I can figure it out, the round-vs-square analogy simply refers to the fact that men can’t simply stick their “round pegs” into any conveniently located “hole” whenever they feel like it. The fact that these “holes” aren’t accessible to any random guy thus renders them “square.” This seems to frustrate Adams, who goes on to complain that “society has evolved to keep males in a state of continuous unfulfilled urges, more commonly known as unhappiness” and that “society is organized as a virtual prison for men’s natural desires.”
Looking at Hugh Hefner’s marital history – he’s been married and divorced and just got stood up at the altar – Adams concludes that:
For Hef, being single didn’t work, and getting married didn’t work, at least not in the long run. Society didn’t offer him a round hole for his round peg. All it offered were unlimited square holes.
What does this even mean? I suspect that over the course of his lifetime, Hef has had about all the sex he could possibly want, and then some. Is it somehow unjust that he couldn’t force his latest fiancée to actually marry him? Or that some women are sexually unavailable – that is, square holes – to him?
It goes without saying that Adams’ notions of human sexuality are profoundly insulting to both men and women . On the one hand, he’s suggesting that men are basically all potential rapists walking around with, er, turgid pegs; and, on the other, he seems to regard women as little more than passive (if stubbornly recalcitrant) receptacles for these male “pegs.”
And so it’s hardly surprising that his grand solution to the conundrum he’s invented is a rather depressing one. After noting that it really wouldn’t be a good thing for men to go around willy-nilly raping women and/or, as he puts it, tweeting their meat, he suggests the real solution is for men to be chemically castrated. And no, I’m not making that up. Here’s Scotty:
I think science will come up with a drug that keeps men chemically castrated for as long as they are on it. It sounds bad, but I suspect that if a man loses his urge for sex, he also doesn’t miss it. Men and women would also need a second drug that increases oxytocin levels in couples who want to bond. Copulation will become extinct. Men who want to reproduce will stop taking the castration drug for a week, fill a few jars with sperm for artificial insemination, and go back on the castration pill.
That might sound to you like a horrible world. But the oxytocin would make us a society of huggers, and no one would be treated as a sex object. You’d have no rape, fewer divorces, stronger friendships, and a lot of other advantages. I think that’s where we’re headed in a few generations.
Is he being serious here, or is this all some satirical “social experiment?” Who the fuck knows. Though I suspect if I accused him of being serious, he’d claim he was being satirical. And vice versa. Because that’s just the way he is.
Also, while I’m at it: the idiomatic expression about pegs and holes posits a square peg and a round hole, not the other way around. Why did Adams reverse this? Why!? Why!!?? Is he trying to drive us all mad?
EDITED TO ADD: Check out Feministe for more on Scott Adams and his peg.
EDITED AGAIN: And Pharyngula as well.
Some of the RAWR ANTI-OPPRESSION IS STUPID ppl ALWAYS forget the class part of anti-oppression xD Class privilege is a huge thing anti-oppression ppl talk about too xD and a big intersection… like most of the agencies (*gasp* some are feminists!) I’m working w/ are about helping poor and unemployed ppl and many of them are white men b/c they need our help (and in various different ways too, which is why intersectionality and knowledge of it is so important b/c even w/ white men there can be all sorts of intersecting oppressions xD Tho I’m pretty sure some of the RAWR EVIL ANTI-OPPRESSION PPL EVERYTHING IS A ZERO SUM GAME ppl think we have like a ranking, and turn away all the cis abled dudes, but not before microchipping them or something xD ) … :3
@Holly he’s also ignoring class privilege, while also conflating it w/ white malehood. xD
Subby has been hanging out here for how long? HOW DOES HE NOT UNDERSTAND PRIVILEGE? HOW???? HOW???????
*cries self to sleep*
Okay. Let’s start here. Privilege is not personal. It has nothing to do with this one imaginary person having a job and another imaginary person not having a job. It’s how society treats one group of people as adequate in some way and another group as inadequate. But dear god, why am I trying to explain this to you AGAIN?
I am digging out TOEJAM smarter than you are.
@Bee:
Another nominee for PRATT perhaps?
@Holly actually there’s sometimes a debate about whether it’s “transgender person” or “transgendered person” like, two-spirit ppl have said that it’s not “two-spirited” but two spirit. (i personally dun sweat the hurricane for whether ppl use either around me) It’s not like it’s a bannable angry thing or the most important thing of the decade.. xD But just an interesting thing I wanted to note. :3 I know the policy that is going around various agencies here is just Trans* for official stuff like when there’s a new policy manual.
Oooo, intersectionality. You are going to illuminate me. Are you trying to confuse me with feminisite jargon? I thought maybe instead of me constantly answering questions you might angelwing me to a higher plane of understanding.
Nah never mind. Any thoughts you might pose would be quite irrelevant. I mean how could you as a woman relate to a common man. Any crime you commit would be dismissed. Any action you take will be endorsed by the State, Mass Media, Acedemia. You’re praised as the “givers of life” or (abortion) “the harbingers of death.” Some man, State institution, Womens Group will always “be there” for you. Your morality and spirituality is assumed by every social institution. You’re brilliant by default, every institutiton tells me so.
It’s little wonder you dismiss my poorly thought out ramblings as backward and bufoonish. Forgive my foolishness for questioning one of the perfect ones. Hopefully tommorow I’ll wake up enlightened and decide I can do more to help women.
He’s exploding into a mass of straw XDDDD
(I’m imagining it as a Death Star explosion xD)
Good shot Kirby, now let’s blow this thing and go home! XD
I conflated two quotes xD I meant “You’re all clear Kirby” xD
that or “Great shot Kirby, don’t get cocky!”
NWO – It’s frustrating how you refuse to think–at all, about anything–but keep talking.
I don’t know where you get the syllables from, sometimes.
Why are you so obsessed with committing crime? You just really want to and feel you can’t do it? You want to be a woman so that you can commit a crime and “get away with it?” Becoming a criminal is your highest calling in life and the most unfair thing ever is that you’re expected to follow the law?
Please, try to make some sense.
Oh no, mockery by Ami. Now I’m really in the doghouse. Pretty standard stuff by this crew, it’s all you know. I guess I’m too stupid to know when I’m overmatched.
Hatred in, Hatred out.
@NWO:
You know, if you addressed our actual arguments, stopped making false comparisons, stopped dismissing statistics because it doesn’t agree with your preconceived notions, stopped making up statistics and doing horrid math to justify them, actually made a point and stuck with defending it, and admitted you might be wrong rather than sinking into “well you all are just a big group of meanies,” maybe you wouldn’t get so much hatred out of the hatred you put in.
Or perhaps this is too much to ask?
He rly IS obsessed w/ me now xD (or afflicted by me might be more accurate xD ) Sry Holly, I’m replacing you as the frustration in his head he can’t get away from xD We should cat fight! >:3
Mrow.
@Kirby what are you talking about? xD His last post and the one after were TTLLY NOT irrationally sarcastic upset emotional explosions xD If he was a poor disabled black gay trans woman, you would have read those as intelligent thoughtful responses to points ppl made. >:| You’re such a hate monger Kirby.
Rawr! >:3
We need some Jello! xD
No wait… Jello is misogynist :O what’s the feminist equivalent of Jello? xD
No wait… Jello is misogynist
He’s no more misogynist than any other punk rocker.
Rawr, it’s all about you Ami.
I’m glad he gets it xD
I mean.. I’m glad he gets that it’s about me. xD
I mean… It’s about me. xD
Given that he went from “i never read a thing you say!” to “OMFG GET OUT OF MY HEAD” and today I went on a bike ride, he vanished, I returned, he’s back going after the girl he can’t read cuz of how I write xD It’s hard not to think this is all about me. xD
Also Kirby reminded me something on IM… besides his constant explosions involving me rattling around in his head (x3), he appears to be adopting things like “Rawr” into his dictionary xD Rodeo cat is rodeo and infectious! xD
I still want to know why he’s obsessed with wanting to commit a crime and get away with it, but I got last-post-on-the-paged with it, so I’ll ask again: Why, Mr. Slave, are you so fixated on the privilege of women to supposedly commit crime whenever they want and get away with it?
Hardly, let’s see…Comedian Who Calls Black Women “the Ugliest Women He’s Ever Seen In His Life” To Host NAACP “Image Awards”
http://www.whataboutourdaughters.com/waod/2008/2/10/comedian-who-calls-black-women-the-ugliest-women-hes-ever-se.html
NAACP Contacts WADO- National Office Won’t Be Speaking Out On Dunbar Village- Addressing Hate Crimes Against Black Women Not ‘Mission’
http://www.whataboutourdaughters.com/waod/2007/8/10/naacp-contacts-wado-national-office-wont-be-speaking-out-on.html
Honestly I can’t even remember the NAACP standing up for a black woman ever and yes I understand my lone experience is not the end all be all.
“I’ve been working on some YouTube Videos to get the word out about Al Sharpton and the NAACP’s ridiculousness related to standing up for the alleged rapists while they ignored the victims for months.”
http://www.whataboutourdaughters.com/waod/2008/3/17/new-dunbar-village-videoscrickets.html
It’s pretty clear the NAACP should be called NAACM(National Association for the Advancement of Colored Men)
Guess the club isn’t working so hot since the unemployment rate of black women(the supposed two-fer) is higher than that of white men.
NWO: Have you ever lived in a cubbyhole that led to someones basement with a candle for company, shivering from the cold? Snow being a blessing because you could drink it?
I’ve lived in a borrowed car.
Then again, I’ve lived in a desert, with no tent to sleep in, while people were trying to kill me; but that’s perhaps a bit different.
I did have all the MREs I could stand to eat.
Spend a day, just 1 day not eating, ya still have to work and whatever, and see what it’s like. By the end of the day, food consumes your every thought.
Not from a one day’s fast. The all consuming nature of it doesn’t really kick in until the sometime between 2 and 3 days of voluntary fasting. I do know that not having steady access to food changes one’s attitudes. The last time I was living on other people’s charity for housing, and making do on odd-jobs and kindness, I was painfully aware of food.
When I got a job, and money was finally coming in, I ate like all get out. It was shocking to me how much food I bought, and the ways in which I sort of hoarded it (much the same way I didn’t go anywhere without toilet paper for about a year after I got back from Iraq).
I also noticed that I was still shitting for about three days of not eating (the longest I have gone completely without food was about five days).
28 hours… good one. And they don’t have anyone to swap out… they’d rather have someone who is punch-drunk from sleep dep? And we wonder why there is contaminated food.
Then again, I’ve pulled 24 hour ops; there was a war on. But you get OT, and DT (federally mandated) for days like that; not so for soldiers.
Go on, tell us another one about how hard your life is (and no, going hungry because you choose to help others isn’t privilege, it’s choice. But you don’t understand what privilege is; when you figure out that you have it, you will have learned something).
Of course… looking at the time stamps, I see that you were posting less than 28 hours ago. That means (wait for it)…. You are lying.
Do the trans status folks feel oppressed if everyone doesn’t worship their choice?
No, they feel oppressed when people get away with murdering them by citing, “gay panic” as a defense. They feel oppressed when people like you make excuses for the people who kill them.
And (thankfully) I am at the end of a page, so there will be something else to read before I have to face more of your attempts at logical argument, and the butchery you do to coherent grammar.
@amandajane5:
Erm, not to play devils advocate (goodness knows Slavey doesn’t need/deserve it), but if it were true that women could commit crime and get away with it, wouldn’t it be something worthy to fixate on? I think the problem is with is inability to use evidence/argument presented to him, not that he’s focusing on the wrong thing.