The answer is that we cannot and will not 'fix' them; because they are not the kind of thing that can be fixed (especially not by 'fixing').
The relations between men and women are the second most important kind of thing in all of reality (when we include with marriage the properly-linked matter of family); but they aren't the most important thing.
And the second most important thing cannot be fixed while the most important thing remains not just broken, but smashed; while there is no insight as to the absolute and primary necessity of fixing the most important thing.
It could be argued that we could, at least, stop making things worse between men and women - could at least stop actively sabotaging the situation, and pushing 'solutions' that actually exacerbate the problems...
But we would need to take a step back and recognise that the reason that we have an inverted, and opposite-of-reality understanding of men and women is because the most important thing is wrong.
While that most important thing remains absent, wrong, incoherent - where would we, where could we possibly, get the desire and judgement necessary to stop doing wrong things and start doing right things?
To suppose that we can (to any significant degree) 'fix' the relationships between men and women in modern life, or even to improve them overall, by changes to laws and regulations and social conventions - is itself itself a part of the problem!
Anyone who claims to know how to fix, or even significantly to improve, the relationships between men and women by changing The System is in fact on the side of the enemy.
(The System is built on on coherent, evil motivated dishonesty. The System cannot be made to do Good. Obedience to The System is intrinsically evil.)
Until we can understand that fact, and until we fix that problem; we cannot do anything other than continue to make things worse in the relations between men and women, and everything else.
7 comments:
I will bite! The most important thing is presumably the proper awareness of God?
@William - Well, Yes, more or less! - but you don't get a prize for stating 'the obvious'!
Joking aside, it should be obvious that this is the solution to our woes but it's extraordinary how resistant people are to accepting this idea. It really does seem as though modern humanity will have to be driven to the wall before coming to its senses. i suppose sin is just too attractive for most people, that and the false idea of freedom we have deluded ourselves into believing.
@William - As you know, I think our modern-materialist false/ incoherent basic-metaphysical assumptions make it (essentially) impossible to think truly (and impossible to take thinking seriously) - plus, people don't even try to think (being 'addicted to distraction').
I was just making something like this post's point to my husband the other day.
I certainly used to put more think-time into trying to solve the systematic problems between men and women, but when it really comes down to it, the fundamental unit, the relationship between a man and a woman, is individual. There will always be those cases where a man and a woman get it right, even against a misguiding system, as well as those cases where a man and a woman get it wrong, even in the best designed system. And even more, those best prepared to participate in an individually functional couple (and I'm not speaking solely of romantic partnership) seem to be those most willing to recognize the limitations of the system in solving individual problems, to see those in close relationship to them as individuals, rather than simply instances of a class.
This is not to say that a person's appreciation of the class of women generally, or the class of men generally, doesn't matter to individual relationships. Indeed, an appreciation of the opposite sex generally (or even the same sex generally) is probably one of the first things to be fixed by fixing the most important thing, which I think involves a sense of gratitude for the reality of the situation and choosing to value whatever pieces of truth available to you; discarding the destructive elements of entitlement, while still embracing a special duty to honor the heritage of being children of God.
Lucinda - Thanks for the comment - You are right that individual relationships can be poisoned by group attitudes.
(Of course, we shouldn't use 'everyone is an individual' as an 'excuse' for unwise or selfish or short-termist decisions tah ignore evidence and experience. On the one hand people sometimes do change; on the other hand, past behaviour is usually the best guide to future behaviour...)
I guess part of my background assumption is I don't believe that history is primarily misogynistic. Part of my basis is that it seems to me that the human male biologically seems to follow the pattern of attracting female attention through acheivement, allowing for female choice. It is the less fit males who engage in domineering behavior toward females, and their offspring would tend to suffer additional hardship because of the dysfunctional relationship between the parents. The other mammalian option would be some sort of single-motherhood, like bears or elephants. I think human offspring with single-motherhood doesn't create the robustness and adaptability that it does in other mammals where single-motherhood is the established method of caring for offspring.
It is true that civilization apparently cannot develop without a patriarchy that channels natural sexual instinct in a way that allows far more unfit individuals to successfully reproduce, but it seems to me that the most successful types of patriarchies are the ones which heavily draw on the alpha model, where the males are expected to form sexual relationships based on qualities that are attractive to the females they partner with. I regard as malignant and fundamentally unfit patriarchies based solely on male authority to determine the sexual pairings. I believe modern examples of such, and historic ones, to be basically parasitic, leeching from the vast benefits produced by fit female-attractive males, whether in their own population or some very successful competing group.
But we are told that these malignant types of patriarchies are basically the same as the ones where female-choice is honored and protected, as though the ancestors of modern freedom-loving and women-valuing civilizations engaged in patriarchies indistinguishable from modern malignant patriarchies where women have no rights. I just don't believe it.
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