AVfM takes no stand on religion, neither endorsing nor opposing religious principles. However in the light of recent suicide bombing in England we have decided to post the following piece by Doug Mortimer, with the caveat that the opinions expressed are his own. – Eds.
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When asked about the recent tragedy in Manchester, Katy Perry replied:
I think that the greatest thing we could do is just unite and love on each other, and like, no barriers, no borders, like, we all need to just co-exist.”
In leftist circles, Muslims are classified as an oppressed group. That might account for why the media soft-pedal some of their misdeeds, but the response of feminists is more of a puzzlement.
Why are hijabs, burqas, honor killings, and other eyebrow-raising aspects of Muslim culture so often relegated to the no-go zone as feminist discussion topics? Why do European feminists constantly complain about “rape culture” in western nations, but remain silent when their countries are inundated by gropy, grabby Muslim immigrants? Why are western men excoriated for the slightest slight – real or fabricated – while Muslim men are given free reign to be…well, Muslim men?
What gives here? Well, when logic fails, turn to the illogical. To help us understand the great Muslim conundrum, let us turn to an unlikely source: British novelist D.H. Lawrence, who was born in 1885 and died in 1930, long before Muslim immigration was a hot topic in northern Europe.
I don’t know if Lawrence’s books are still on college reading lists, but there was a time when he enjoyed cult status among female English majors. By today’s standards, he would be scorned as an exemplar of toxic masculinity, sexism, the patriarchy, male privilege, or whatever you want to call it. But women recognized that Lawrence had special insight into what makes them tick.
Lawrence is a difficult writer to pigeonhole. His work does not fit into any genre or literary movement, but he definitely leaned towards paganism and primitivism, as he invoked the “strange gods” in the “dark forest of the soul.” More than likely, he was under the influence of Nietzsche, Freud, and Jung.
Lawrence’s ideas about men, women, and sex were not likely to win him any fans in the suffragette community of his day. Neither would he find favor with the left (progressives, socialists, communists), or the right (fascists, conservatives, traditionalists). In fact, he despised social reformers and do-gooders of all sorts. He believed in a mystical man-woman, yin-yang ideal, so he would never have advocated going MGTOW.
For the purposes of this essay, Lawrence’s theories about dominance and submission are on point. In short, he felt that true freedom lay in submission. A woman’s submission to a man was essential for her happiness, as a man’s submission to his god or gods was essential for his happiness. Atheism and agnosticism were dead ends. But let’s let Lawrence speak for himself:
Unless a woman is held, by man, safe within the bounds of belief, she becomes inevitably a destructive force. She cannot help herself…Let a woman loose from the bounds and restraints of man’s fierce belief, in his gods and in himself, and she becomes a gentle devil. She becomes subtly diabolic.
Unless a man believes in himself and his gods, genuinely; …his woman will destroy him. Woman is the nemesis of doubting man. She can’t help it.
Men are free when they are obeying some deep, inward voice of religious belief. Obeying from within. Men are free when they belong to a living, organic believing community, active in fulfilling some unfulfilled, perhaps unrealized purpose.
Liberty is all very well, but men cannot live without masters. There is always a master. And men either live in glad obedience to the master they believe in, or they live in a frictional opposition to the master they wish to undermine.
Having digested all that, let’s apply these ideas to the Muslim situation.
A modern western woman would never admit that she wanted to submit to a man – no matter how much her reptile brain urges otherwise. Such an admission would be alarmingly retro. If you’ve ever been to a wedding where the wife-to-be vowed to obey her husband, you’re probably old enough to collect Social Security.
At the same time a woman is casting about (subconsciously) for a man worthy of her submission, dominance in men is overwhelmingly vilified, often dismissed as male privilege, insensitivity, or downright bullying. The savvy alpha male knows he can’t come on too strong today. He has to walk a tightrope.
So a modern woman searching for a man worthy of her submission has a big problem. There has never been a supply of dominant men sufficient to meet the demand, and there never will be. Today, however, the candidates are fewer and farther between. And the higher the woman’s place in the food chain, the harder it is for her to slake her hypergamous appetite.
On the surface, the modern woman may applaud the male feminists, white knights, progressives, or whatever you want to call them. Obviously, these guys wouldn’t dream of asking females to submit to them. Not that it would do them any good, as they do not inflame the female soul.
The tradcons are hardly worthy of respect either. They earn money, their wives spend it. There was a time when that might have worked, as men controlled the purse strings and doled out household money as they saw fit. Today, however, they just hand it all over to their wives. If the paycheck is big enough, it might pacify the female for a while, but as long as she controls spending, the man is no longer dominant.
Of course, there are always the bad boys to submit to. For a number of young women, consorting with tough guys is exciting but potentially dangerous. Safer to strike up a correspondence with some psychopath on death row – which frequently happens and occasionally results in marriage!
Then there’s the fantasy men of popular culture. Think Rudolph Valentino in The Sheik, the silent film about an Arab (presumably a Muslim) who lords it over a Thoroughly Modern Millie. Think of Gone With the Wind and Rhett Butler, the only man in a 1,000+ page novel capable of handling the strong-willed Scarlett O’Hara. More recently, we have Christian Grey in 50 Shades of Grey.
All of the above are variations on stereotyped male characters in melodramas and bodice-rippers. The heroine of such works has some leeway on the passive -active spectrum, but the man must be dominant. Imagine a publisher launching a line of romance novels in which women come under the spell of beta, if not downright submissive, males. I can’t think of a faster way to go bankrupt.
Romance novels notwithstanding, are there any men in the western world openly advocating male dominance and female submission? Let’s have a show of hands here…hmmm, a few pickup artists and that’s about it. Understandably, any non-Muslim who believes in female submission cannot go public. Ironically, the sort of man women yearn for is now illegal, de facto if not de jure.
The acceptable options for men in the western world are to allow women to dominate them (and the culture), or to acknowledge parity and equity, albeit only in high-status, highly-compensated pursuits. Officially, men are not allowed to dominate. In the military or some business ventures, it may happen naturally, but it can never assume the status of policy. Don’t put it in writing and don’t let anyone videotape you espousing such sentiments.
Given contemporary obsession with egalitarianism, it is highly unlikely that western men will ever recapture the urge to dominate. More important, however are creeping materialism and secularism. If Lawrence was correct, then without religious fervor, there is no quickening of masculine energy, and hence no male dominance.
There was a time when clergymen were exalted members of the community. Right up there with doctors and lawyers and such. Women respected them and looked up to them. Today, mainstream preachers are no longer dominant figures. In fact, female preachers – even bishops – are now common in Protestant sects. So what’s been the result? A drastic decline in attendance in “mainstream” churches. That should come as no surprise, since female participation in certain professions inevitably erodes the status of that profession. What kind of God – the ultimate alpha male – would permit a woman to expound on His glories to mortal men?
A contemporary man looking for a god worthy of his service is a bit like a ronin looking for a master. Unfortunately, the only deity approved for worship today is the golden calf. Belief in God, a god, or gods is pretty much relegated to the realm of superstition (though feminists can refer to the goddess or goddesses without fear of ridicule).
In some circles, a kind of egalitarian pantheism is acceptable (the Force is in everything, Luke), as it courses through all living things without discrimination. You don’t serve the force, you use it. It’s kind of like a natural resource you can tap into…light or dark, just like ordering chicken or beer. But this is not the same thing as a god who stands above and apart from man and commands him.
So let’s pause and review.
A woman yearns to be dominated by a man but egalitarianism and democracy inhibit the appearance of such men.
A man yearns to dominate a woman but egalitarianism and democracy inhibit public expression of such a sentiment.
Enter the Muslim man.
The Muslim man is not egalitarian or democratic. He is authoritarian and totalitarian. And he is a true believer. Allahu akbar!
Radical Islam? The chicks dig it. At least they don’t condemn it.
The Muslim man is the answer to western woman’s secular prayers. He does not wish to be their equal and he will not submit to them. If Muslims eventually take over Europe, western women will be required to submit. That is it, pure and simple. We dominate, you submit. No debate, no backtalk, no nuance. We don’t need no stinking dialogue! Allah said it, I believe it, that settles it. Separation of church and state? What binary nonsense!
Binary has its place, however, when it comes to worship. Once the prayer rugs are unfurled, women take the hindmost. How shockingly retrograde! Yet mosques are going up everywhere while churches are deconsecrated and rebranded for various commercial purposes…bars, restaurants, craft breweries, bingo parlors, whatever.
Muslim men have Sharia Law on their side. They don’t have to persuade women to submit. There will be no Muslim equivalent of Vatican II. No need for a referendum or ballot initiative pertaining to male dominance, as Sharia law dictates it. In western civilization, secular courts of law vary from country to country, from state to state, from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and from judge to judge. All that plus legions of weasel-word shysters.
The Muslims are not going gently into the new world order. They have no interest in global government, unless Allah is running it. They don’t care about wishy-washy democracies and their corrupt elections and their bloated human rights agendas.
You may not agree with Muslims, you may not like them, you may even recoil in horror from them. But you’d better respect them.
If you are a western man, you are the subject of female scorn. If you are an underachiever and/or unemployed, you are largely invisible. On the other hand, if you are a Muslim man, you can be all that and less (e.g., violent and illiterate) and still command respect. Can’t remember where I read it, but I remember the saying “One man willing to die for what he believes in is worth 1,000 men willing to vote for what they believe in.” Actually, I can’t remember if it was 1,000 or 10,000, or 100,000, or 1,000,000 men, but the point remains nonetheless. Keep that quote in mind the next time you read about some “cowardly” suicide bomber.
At any rate, I think D.H. Lawrence was a pretty astute diagnostician regarding the plight of western man. So what’s the remedy? Clearly, not democracy, equality, or diversity. Western men exerting pushback against Muslim men might turn things around, particularly if the Muslims are ultimately expelled or defeated, as has happened previously in Europe. Those conflicts, however, occurred when western man believed he was serving God and the only skyscrapers on the horizon were cathedrals.
In the current clash of civilizations, one side has a high birth rate, is intolerant, and narrow-minded; the other side has a low birth rate, and exalts tolerance and diversity. Gee, I wonder which side I should bet on.
Of course, there is always the possibility of some sort of religious revival, but after the Enlightenment, centuries of scientific progress, and increasing secularism, that is unlikely, barring some sort of collective epiphany like the Great Awakening of the 18th Century. They say everything old is new again, but it’s hard to envision that old-time religion making a comeback.
So what’s the answer? New gods maybe? Who would they be? Where would they come from? Would they descend from the heavens in flying saucers? Have we been visited by them before? Dunno, but in the meantime, keep watching the skies.
Meanwhile, remember what they say about what to do if you can’t beat ‘em.
Might not hurt to get a head start by downloading a Koran into your Kindle and studying it in your spare time.
