NR conservative has no problema with appointment of pregnant woman as Spanish defense minister
Sage McLaughlin writes:
Lisa Schiffren at NRO writes this morning:
The Spanish minister in question is the newly appointed Defense Minister, Carme Chacon [sic], 37, who began her new job this week, seven months pregnant. Is this really so bad? Whatever I happen to recall about my own ability to focus and act decisively at seven months, the fact is, it passed. She, likewise, will be fine in a few months. The reporter was nattering on about pictures being shipped around the world of the very pregnant woman reviewing troops—as if this is so inappropriate or bizarre.
Yes, Lisa, as if! What prompted her musings was the sight of an Ethiopian cab driver in Washington, D.C. “laughing uncontrollably” at the mere thought of it. It never occurs to her that when foreigners are literally doubled over in laughter at the sight of your Defense Minister reviewing the troops, then there is something definitely amiss. Schiffren assures us that, based on her own experience, this pregnant Minister of Defense be able to focus and act decisively “in a few months,” so everything is just fine. In the meantime, we’re to assume that Spain has no need for a MoD who is capable of focused and decisive action. I will go as far as to say that the fact that Ms. Schiffren doesn’t see a problem here, that she could actually express (or feign) puzzlement at why a person might find that scene bizarre, lends actual support to the notion that women are on the whole poorly suited to administering the military affairs of a nation.
Military inspections of this kind are ritual affairs. It is as though right-liberals have absolutely no sense of the underlying symbolic meaning of things, or the ways in which our ritual symbols express the concrete realities which form our society, or how a ritual sign can often make real the thing that it is meant to signify. I would estimate that left-liberals, like the Spanish president who appointed a seven months pregnant woman to run his MoD, understand these things perfectly well. When he saw to the inspection of his soldiers by the very picture of human frailty and weakness, his purpose was clear—both to project maximum disdain for the military cult of martial prowess and to communicate something brazenly false about the sameness of men and women. But Ms. Schiffren is puzzled at why a man from Ethiopia would find the spectacle ridiculous.
LA replies:
Exactly. Schiffren, as a right-liberal having no principle other than the individual equality of all human beings without regard to sex, religion, nationality, and race, is clueless as to the symbolic meaning of this left-liberal attack on Spain’s image and reputation. Right-liberalism, by emptying society and existence of all meaning other than abstract individual equality, turns the society into a void which is then taken over by the left and by aliens.
As for Mr. McLaughlin’s second point, my view is that except in a male-led society operating according to a normal male ethos where women in positions of responsibility are themselves operating within that male ethos (e.g. Mrs. Thatcher), women do not belong in high government positions.
At the end of her note at the Corner, Schiffren does oppose Chacon in that position, not because she’s seven months pregnant, but because she’s a pacifist. If she were not a pacifist, Schiffren would approve her.
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Paul Gottfried writes:
It seems that my social views are exactly the same as yours. Actually I find moderate feminists far more problematic than the supposedly more extreme kind. Here I agree with Carol Iannone and Caroline Graglia.
LA writes:
The full impact of Schiffren’s comment didn’t hit me when I read it before:
“The reporter was nattering on about pictures being shipped around the world of the very pregnant woman reviewing troops—as if this is so inappropriate or bizarre.”
I like Lisa Schiffren, but I have to say that that is the most insensible statement by a self-defined conservative that I have ever seen. Let’s hope that Schiffren can see how foolish her observation was.
Steve D. writes:
“As for Mr. McLaughlin’s second point, my view is that except in a male-led society operating according to a normal male ethos where women in positions of responsibility are themselves operating within that male ethos (e.g. Mrs. Thatcher), women do not belong in high government positions.”
I have long been opposed to women serving in government, on the grounds that men—being not only more aggressive, but also having higher average intelligence and more even temperaments—are suited by nature to be the leaders of human societies. When a woman takes a top leadership post, what are you saying about your society other than it lacks enough suitable males? Even in the case of Margaret Thatcher: was there NO MAN in England better suited to lead the country? Really?
I recently came across another excellent argument against women in politics in a Camille Paglia article dealing specifically with Hillary Clinton. She posed the question: what sort of men willingly serve under a woman like this?
All in all, women in high government function best as a top-notch early warning system: Nancy Pelosi? Condoleeza Rice? Warning! U-turn! U-turn!
LA replies:
Thatcher did not become prime minister as a result of a committee looking at every individual in the country and choosing a prime minister. She became prime minister as a result spending years rising to the top of her party and then running for party leadership.
One must say in fairness that Thatcher had more intestinal fortitude than any male politician in that wimpy Island for the last 50 years.
For all her impressive strength of character and decisiveness, my main problem with Thatcher is that she did nothing to stop the Third-Worldization and Islamization of Britain. She opposed socialism, but was blind or indifferent to the ethnocultural destruction of Britain and the West.
KPA writes from Canada:
I found it funny that a(n Ethiopian) cabdriver would listen to NPR in the first place, and then laugh at its story.
Also Howard Sutherland’s comment at the very end of his post about Lisa Schiffren’s inability to wonder “why this Abyssinian should be here in the first place” is my very unPC view as well. By the way, I think he probably has the region right too.
75% (90%, 95%?) of Ethiopians (immigrants and their children) have not invested in, are unattached to, are uninterested in Western/American/Canadian culture. They spend precious time building and living in their enclaves, recreating the safe “back home” feeling. I’ve always said to people, to their shock and dismay, why not try going back. The dictatorship of Mengistu Haile Mariam fell more than 15 years ago, and the country has opened up tremendously, with some strife and conflict, but nothing like before.
In fact, there is a strong diaspora movement of young professionals and older, retiring people, who are making that decision. The country has also many incentives for those returning. Even local pop singers are singing about “come back.” I haven’t seen this in other African countries—Somalia, Nigeria, for example.
I think it saddens people when I say that I’ve put all my eggs in the Western basket. Despite their residency (often long-term) in the West, it is almost a sacrilege to them to admit that this is one’s life and lifestyle. It is, of course, the difficult conflict of immigration and assimilation.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at April 18, 2008 09:46 AM | Send