Christina Hoff Sommers has an interesting article on gender issues in the Weekly Standard.
What would Mansfield have us do? His book is primarily a conceptual analysis of manliness. It is not a self-help book. But it should surprise no one that this bossy, opinionated, and intrepid male thinker has a lot of advice to dispense. Women who like manly men will want to pay close attention. He says a lot of useful things your women's studies professors probably forgot to mention.
First of all, he thinks we should clearly distinguish between the public realm and private life. In public we should pursue, as best we can, a policy of gender neutrality. He firmly believes that the law should guarantee equal opportunity to men and women. However, "our expectations should be that men will grasp the opportunity more readily and more wholeheartedly than women."
Though he mentions it only in passing, it follows from his position that our schools should be more respectful and accepting of male spiritedness; they must stop trying to feminize boys. A healthy society should not war against human nature. It should, he says, "reemploy masculinity." That means it has to civilize it and give it things to do. No civilization can achieve greatness if it does not allow room for obstreperous males.
In the private sphere, his advice is vivé la difference! A woman should not expect a manly man to be as committed to domesticity as she is; nor should she assume that he is as emotionally adept as her female friends. Manly men are romantic rather than sensitive. They need a lot of help from females to ascend to the higher ethical levels of manhood, and Mansfield urges women to encourage them in ways respectful of their male pride.
Men, for their part, need to be gallant to women and respectful. Above all, they must listen to them. Mansfield offers this advice to young men:
Women want to be taken seriously almost as much as they want to be loved. To take women seriously you must first take yourself seriously and after that ask them what they think. And when they tell you, try to listen.
He is not suggesting that women accept a subordinate role; on the contrary, he compares women to philosophers. They are, on the whole, less assertive, but that makes it easier for them to be observant, reflective, and calmly judgmental: "It should be expected that men will be manly and sometimes a bit bossy and that women will be impressed with them or skeptical."
The world of gender studies has never before had to confront anyone quite like this solitary rogue male professor of politics. Critics will rail against his excesses and feminists will be indignant and offended. But many women will be charmed by his effrontery, and grateful for the truth and wisdom in Mansfield's elegant treatise.
(Posted by Trask)
