The war of short-haired women against dudes and their pants feelings continues. Indeed, it’s gotten so bad that pickup artist/rape legalization proponent Roosh V is calling for state intervention.
In a blog post today, Mr. V cites a passage in an Evo Psych textbook suggesting that men tend to prefer long hair on women because healthy hair is an indication of good health and diet, and therefore of “higher reproductive value” in women.
And if cutting off this hair is displeasing to the boners of dudes like Roosh, well, it must mean that women who wear their hair short are, quite literally, mentally ill. No, really; that’s what he thinks. (Emphasis mine.)
If a woman cuts her hair to a short length, or shaves it outright in a Skrillex haircut, we can now confidently say that she is making herself appear less fertile, less beautiful, and less healthy. A woman cutting off healthy hair is one step away from literal cutting of her skin with a sharp object, because both behaviors denote a likely mental illness where the woman presents herself to society as more damaged than her genetic condition would indicate, suggesting that she has suffered environmental damage that has reduced her overall fitness.
Or maybe she prefers short hair because it’s easier to manage? Or because she thinks short hair looks cute? Nah, couldn’t be. She’s clearly a danger , not only to Roosh’s boner but to herself!
She must be monitored by state authorities so she doesn’t continue to hurt herself.
Roosh posts pictures of women he thinks have committed “self-harm” by cutting their hair short, thus transforming themselves from sexy ladies to hideous short-haired monsters.
Really? I’m pretty sure that all this proves is that Roosh has such a hard-on for long hair that he’s unable to see straight. To my eyes, and I suspect a lot of others, these two women — actresses Ginnifer Goodwin and Keira Knightly — look fine with long hair, and fine with short hair. (I actually prefer their short-haired looks, but, you know what? It’s really none of my business.)
But Roosh not only sees short-haired women as an affront to his manhood; he also sees them as a threat to Western Civilization itself.
What should we think when deluded women are actively encouraged by society to harm themselves by cutting their hair instead of growing it out and looking beautiful? One that doesn’t care about the fertility of its women and, in turn, the needs of men who want to mate with fertile women. Unless there is something within a society that promotes beauty in the form of long hair, we have little choice but to conclude that it is sick, grotesque, and sterile.
Roosh goes on to argue that art should reject such cultural sickness and celebrate the fertility of young women.
Oh, wait, that was Hitler.
Setting aside Roosh’s creepy, quasi-fascist obsession with female fertility, I do have a couple of questions for Roosh and the Evo Psych crowd in general:
What about infertile women with long hair? There are lots of women, cis and trans, who can’t do that whole pregnancy thing; many of them have long hair. Would Roosh lock them up for false advertising? (Actually, never mind; I’m sure he would, though probably not without hitting on them first.)
And what about short-haired men? Like Roosh and his pals, many evolutionary psychologists find it difficult to think beyond conventional gender stereotypes. All the studies listed in the Evo Psych textbook Roosh sites revolve around women and their hair, never men and their hair, even though the same reproductive logic would apply to them as well. Poor diet can reduce sperm count and cause infertility.
So why isn’t long hair on men “preferred across cultures” the way that long hair on women tends to be? Why isn’t Roosh calling for short-haired men (like himself) to be confined to the psych ward?
Could it be — possibly, maybe, sort of? — that there’s more to love and lust than what’s in our genes, or in Roosh’s jeans?
It’s easy to identify evo psyche as not a science because it’s not falsifiable. One can use evo psyche principles to come up with testable hypotheses, but if a hypothesis is tested and found to be false, evo psyche “researchers” can (and always do) explain the negative findings without any alteration to their basic assumptions.
Everything Roosh and other evo psychers spout is unverifiable, because even those hypotheses that are testable can’t falsify the basic assumptions. The original explanation for gender roles, that women are naturally monogamous and men are naturally polygamous because: differing reproductive strategies, turned out to be nonsense when research found that men and women cheat on their partners at identical rates. This didn’t make any evo psychers reassess their basic assumption that gender roles are somehow natural. It just made them start looking for a new explanation to account for their assumption.
That’s not how science works. That’s the opposite of how science works. That’s more like a secular religion.
donnadiva: “… half-baked theories of how our cave-dwelling ancestors lived …”. So true.
If you read the actual data what it really tells you is that our hunter/gatherer ancestors showed an incredible diversity in social grouping types.
For far too long this raw data was shoehorned into our current narrow definitions of how we do things today, only in very recent times has a more rational and scientific examination of it occurred.
This applies just as much to more recent history. Just take a single example, taking a European centric view of war.
The history of Europe (and the UK) has been of endless war (and brutality and extermination) with each other and non-Europeans. There has never been a period where Europeans have not been at war with each other or in one place or another (I think one study showed that the UK had only been NOT been at war with only about a dozen nations in the whole world). But we extrapolate that to other areas and cultures, many of which were (and are) far less warlike.
Similarly our current narrow gender/sexual roles came mostly from just one place, the Middle East, with its largely tribal social customs spread by Judaism and (most of all) by its much larger offshoot Catholicism, with Islam (many years later) borrowing large chucks from both of them and also spreading ME social rulings elsewhere.
Large areas of Europe and the rest of the world had far more gender/sexual diversity prior to Christianity arriving. The British Empire then later spread these rules all over the place , forcing their laws on their colonies and conquests (India, Malaysia, US, Australia, Canada and so on). For example, the Indian (etc) anti-homosexuality laws were introduced by the British, they didn’t exist beforehand, ditto so many other places.
British property laws were forced on on its colonies/conquests, which at that time meant no woman could own anything, only males could, no matter what the local laws and customs originally were and if you didn’t like it a whole bunch of soldiers would turn up to ‘persuade’ you rather forcibly (to the point of extinction if required). As I always say you don’t get to conquer a third of the world (with good goes at many other places like Russia and China) by being ‘nice’.
You could make a strong argument that the two authorities most responsible for anti-female and anti-GLBTI prejudices and laws in the whole world were the Catholic Church (and later the break away Protestant ones, some of whom are worse) and the British Empire.
Does this matter? IMHO it does, because I think it important to work out ‘why’ things happened and are the way they are, to then better understand how to change it. For example, there is simply no point in trying to change the Catholic Church on its gender/sexuality views, they have been that way for nearly 2,000 years now. What you can do is block, isolate and politically out manoeuvre them.
One thing I am realising as I study this stuff more is that Feminism and GLBTI activism are by necessity intertwined, because our enemies are after us both. Those ‘religious rights’ legislations being introduced in parts of the US are aimed just as much at women as GLBTI people. Using them to take away reproductive rights to women is a first priority for them. So in this case (as in so many others) we have work very closely together, as they will try to ‘divide and conquer’ if they can.
Hard to imagine that people in 21st century US are still trying to impose BC Middle Eastern tribal social norms on others. But far too many do and dream about women being slaves, barefoot and pregnant again and that GLBTI people are totally exterminated.
The MRA ‘movement’ (always makes me think of bowels when I write that) is just another expression of that, just another symptom (in essence) of a larger malaise. (Yes there are deliberate puns in that sentence).
It’s interesting how the evo psych sexists want it both ways: Gender roles and stereotypes they like are purely the result of evolutionary selection with no cultural input. But when there is deviation from them that troubles the evo psychers, such as women cutting their hair short, all of a sudden society is culpable and should crack down on these rebels to force them into the “proper” behavior (that they are biologically wired for).
Unfortunately, a nontrivial number of persons on both sides of that equation don’t take that view. Historically, feminism has been pretty exclusive against women who are not white, straight, cis, and middle-class, while other equality movements that are not primarily for women’s equality have frequently made sexism a part of their dogma.
@ Lisa
(I think one study showed that the UK had only been NOT been at war with only about a dozen nations in the whole world).
Hey, We’re not that bad; it’s nearly *two* dozen.
Here’s the list. Amazingly, it’s not apocryphal.
Andorra
Belarus
Bolivia
Burundi
Central African Republic
Chad
Congo, Republic of
Guatemala
Ivory Coast
Kyrgyzstan
Liechtenstein
Luxembourg
Mali
Marshall Islands
Monaco
Mongolia
Paraguay
Sao Tome and Principe
Sweden
Tajikistan
Uzbekistan
Vatican City
Maybe we should do Monaco next. Probably cheaper to invade than actually pay for a holiday there.
@Lisa “One thing I am realising as I study this stuff more is that Feminism and GLBTI activism are by necessity intertwined, because our enemies are after us both. Those ‘religious rights’ legislations being introduced in parts of the US are aimed just as much at women as GLBTI people. Using them to take away reproductive rights to women is a first priority for them. So in this case (as in so many others) we have work very closely together, as they will try to ‘divide and conquer’ if they can.”
I enjoyed your whole comment but I want to single this part out. So much this. Gay rights victories cannot come at the cost of women losing reproductive rights yet I’m seeing progressives act like you can have cafeteria style human rights where we get, say, legalized same sex marriage but we have to throw the social conservatives an anti-choice bone to appease them. It doesn’t work that way. Those compromises brutalize real people who can’t fight back and all they do is embolden the sex fascists to push for more. You are so right that they need to be resisted, not accommodated in any way and, no, they don’t need us to reeducate them. They are perfectly capable of changing their own minds and most simply refuse to.
On the feminism + GLBTI activism stuff, it deeply disappoints me that so many wealthy white gay men end up going extreme right-wing because they don’t care about anything at all save their penis and their bank account. Peter Thiel comes to mind. The same social-conservative enemies are after us both, but many–especially the most relatively privileged and also shallow in this game–operate entirely on a “we don’t have to outrun the bear, we just have to outrun you” strategy.
Also, Lisa: as a trans woman, I fucking *wish* nearly 100% of trans women were feminists. There are far too many for my comfort with 20th-century ideas of gender roles, or who still haven’t gotten over the male privilege they grew up with. There were a shitload of trans women opposing Gamergate last year, for instance, but enough sided with GG to drive me bugfuck. I’m *hoping* they’re just pre-everything and will either learn the error of their ways once they actually transition *or* that they’ll give up and stop calling themselves “trans women” while they spout their antifeminist horseshit, but I know it isn’t always so. There are even trans women in the neoreactionary movement, of all things. There are not words to describe my loathing of them.
Donna Gratehouse (@DonnaDiva): Agree totally, I see it as two sides of a coin, some differences on the back and front, but still joined together forever in the one and the same coin.
I see this a symptom of fragmentation between all the activist groups, and a warning that we all have to work more closely together. Our common interests are far greater than any differences, despite what some think.
They may be evil those anti-women, anti-GLBTI groups, but they are not stupid. They are perfectly aware of what these ‘religious rights’ laws are intended to do. If they can hammer all of us as the same time, all the better they think.
As for how you fight that politically that is a matter of strategy and tactics. If you can kill these laws by using transgendred people as a poltical rational then great, the important thing is that they are killed so we all benefit. Though personally I am in much more in favour of a coordinated campaign between all the dfferent groups that are affected, as I dislike an ‘all the eggs in the one basket’ approach as being much too risky and more easily countered.
And I also agree totally that there can be no compromises, no throwing them a bone or another group under a bus whatsoever. People can’t cherry pick and say ‘that group’ has a right to choose things affecting their bodies, while ‘that other group’ doesn’t have that right.
Take a simple example that some don’t seem to get (on many sides) is that a cis-woman’s right to contraception (etc) is exacty the same as my right to HRT. It is about all of us choosing what is the right treatment for ourselves as individuals and no one else should have any say in it. Therefore we both have a very strong common interest in fighting against anything or anyone that tries to restrict either of our accesses.
Our common enemies are also aware of this and will try to apply it the opposite way. If they can set a precendent denying one group something, then they will try to extend it to other groups and they will lie endlessly and twist the truth into a pretzel to do it.
Another ‘mental example’, if they managed to ban oral contraception of the basis of ‘health risks’, how long would I continue to get HRT (using pretty similar hormones) for? Yep, not long at all, about 5 minutes longer I’d guess. if that is not a common interest then I don’t know what is. So I have a very strong ‘vested interest’ in womens open and free access to hormone based contraception (and other types of course), over and above a very strong wish for common humanity and common human rights.
United we are strong, divided they will kick the crap out of us.
AkkisonW: “…the error of their ways once they actually transition….”. They will, or at a least a vast majority will, like all humans some will follow all sorts of beliefs. I personally don’t know any TGs (part time, transitoning or transitioned) that are not feminists to one degree or another. And it is not about fitting in or not as the case may be with gender expression and behaviour norms (some do, some don’t), it is just a clear awareness of rights and daily treatment.
I have no doubt some don’t start out that way, they soon change their minds when reality mugs them.
Yes, sadly there is always a sub-group within an oppressed minority that ‘have made it’ and then work hard to pull the ladder up after them, forgetting all the hard work, blood, sweat and tears done by so many others to get them there. A tragic part of humanity that repeats itself over and over again (yes within the TG community as well).
Alan Robertshaw: Didn’t realise there was so many, something to aim for in the future then, that will justify the defence budgets….lol.
I’d go for Liechtenstein, all that money there to grab, sorry appropriate, um I mean put into safe keeping, um to save it from terrorists, or something…….. Like what happened with Iraq’s money and the Ukraine’s gold, (whatever happened to Libya’s gold?), all put in a ‘safe places’.
AllisonW: “There are even trans women in the neoreactionary movement, of all things. There are not words to describe my loathing of them.”.
Trust me I loath them even more than you do, they are total traitors to my group and harm me and my friends. Not many fortunately, but enough to drive me nearly insane.
And never, ever get me started on the damage Dr. Anne Lawrence, herself a MtF transsexual, has done to the entire transgendered community worldwide and all the lives she has helped to destroy. The word ‘loathing’ is far,far too mild for what I feel about her.
Every group has it’s equivalents of what we used to call in the working class as ‘class traitors’. Summed up beautifully by an age old song, to the tune of the Red Flag:
“The working class can kiss my arse,
I’ve got the gaffer’s job at last.”.
Gaffer being boss.
‘I’ve made it …FU’ is a shorter version of that.
@Lisa: I’ve always had some serious mismatches with the male gender role, going back to my mid-teens when I realized that I was a pacifist when most of the guys I grew up with were just marking time until they got out of high school so they could join the military — there was a neat little war going on in Vietnam and many of the guys wanted a piece of it.
I am a fairly big guy (6’3″ and 250 lbs. or so) and I am only attracted to women, so it’s been very easy for me to “pass” as a man. But I wanted to add my comments about how adolescent male peer-group policing reinforces toxic masculinity. Any guy who shows any “feminine” behavior will have it pried out and ridiculed mercilessly. Also bad behavior toward girls is encouraged and good behavior ridiculed as sissified. The classic insult for a man who likes to please women is “pussy-whipped.”
This is one of the major means by which toxic masculinity is nurtured and passed on, but it it is really difficult to counteract. I did my best to prepare both my sons and daughters to resist peer pressure, and it worked out pretty well — though I’ll never know whether I did something good or that was just the way they were. (Maybe resistance to peer pressure can be inherited?)
In any case I don’t think you can overemphasize the role of peer pressure and gender role enforcement and misogynistic attitudes. When I look at groups like MRAs and MGTOWs I see echo chambers that work to reinforce “women are evil” dogma.
Donna Gratehouse (@DonnaDiva): ” But when there is deviation from them that troubles the evo psychers, such as women cutting their hair short, all of a sudden society is culpable and should crack down on these rebels to force them into the “proper” behavior (that they are biologically wired for).”.
Yep, the only ‘logic’ I expect from them is ether circular or a logical fallacy. Boil it all down and what you get is “just do what I want, no matter how stupid, sexist, prejudicial or illogical it is, if you don’t you are a bad woman just because………………”.
“Oh and change everything you do when I change my mind, just because…………..”.
Far too many evolutionary psychcs have fallen in the the trap of: “For every complex issue there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.” (paraphrase).