MoDo would never call it that. But what else is there to make of her latest op-ed? Net net: liberal women were miserable because they didn't have everything they wanted, now they have it and that's why they're so miserable.
Of course, there is another way to put it: all she ever seems to do is bitch, bitch, bitch.
Women are getting unhappier, I told my friend Carl.
“How can you tell?” he deadpanned. “It’s always been whine-whine-whine.”
Why are we sadder? I persisted.
“Because you care,” he replied with a mock sneer. “You have feelings.”
Oh, that.
Stevenson looks on the bright side of the dark trend, suggesting that happiness is beside the point. We’re happy to have our newfound abundance of choices, she said, even if those choices end up making us unhappier.
A paradox, indeed.
Short version: women are unhappier because they are sharing the "unhappiness" burden that was primarily shouldered by men.
That, and men don't turn into nagging resentful harpies as they age.
Posted by: Fen | Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 01:17 PM
It is no paradox, not even a mystery, and certainly not an absurdity, and it does not affect women only. Appetite alone is but momentarily quenchable. Ramp appetite up to concupiscence -- unrestrained libido, the desire to take everything into oneself -- and satisfaction is insufficient the instant it is achieved.
Existential psychology 101, and MoDo does a "Do tell!"?
The "progressive" establishment is in the thrall of concupiscence. Concupiscence is what ACORN does. Arriving in US Senate and measuring for White House drapes is concupiscence. Posing as indomitable ruler of the world is concupiscence. If it happened it would be unsatisfying. If that personality could take the entire universe into itself its appetite would be gnawing its innards. It would need more. This is called insanity, and MoDo wants to decry it and have it too?
Today concupiscence is called "entitlement." It is what it always has been, vacuum-sucking the world for oneself, into oneself, and remaining unfilled, unsatisfied. In classical philosophy it is called libido (love for an inferior) unrefined by philios (love for an equal), eros (love for a superior) and agape (self-less love). The entire purpose of education is to refine and thereby restrain libido. The end of education is philios, eros and especially agape love.
Today of course, "educators" run their devotees in the other direction, towards libido. That makes their institutions not schools but nut-houses, even criminal conspiracies.
The operational face of unrefined libido is hubris, for which there is no equivalent word in English. Hubris is putting oneself in the place of God and claiming the totality of reality as oneself, inside one's ownership, for one's amusement and, most importantly, diet.
The danger of libido added to the general and inescapable ambiguities of life drive strong-minded, soft-hearted people to a life of renunciation.
Posted by: David R. Graham | Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 01:27 PM
Smarter men than Maureen Dowd knew that even our Creator knew better than to try to endow us with anything more than the "right" to the pursuit of happiness...
sits back to await his thrashing by Little Miss Attila and Cynthia Yockey... he's been a naughty blogger.
Posted by: richard mcenroe | Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 02:50 PM
Rats. Dan, I would never presume to tell anyone else how to run their own blog, but one might wish you enabled HTML.
Please assume a lot of italics in that last post in the most politically incorrect places.
Posted by: richard mcenroe | Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 02:52 PM
"That, and men don't turn into nagging resentful harpies as they age.
Posted by: Fen"
Yes. They do. I give you Andrew Sullivan as Prime example Number One.
Posted by: BoR | Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 03:44 PM
"Yes. They do. I give you Andrew Sullivan as Prime example Number One"
Since when does PGML qualify as a _man?_
Posted by: Darth Venomous | Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 05:26 PM
They've aborted their happiness away, frankly.
Posted by: Lisa Graas | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 01:11 AM
Some men and women are unhappy as they believe that all the ills in their lives have been caused by someone else. Hence they seek to "correct the behavior" of everyone else*. If they succeed in getting others to change, the results are always seen as wrong as the argument will have changed to say that great unwashed did not follow instructions correctly.
No matter what they ask for and receive, they are not happy with the results as they fail to see the common and unchanging denominator.
* Being unclear that taking this stance means that someone else has the "right" to do this to them.
Posted by: saveliberty | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 02:13 AM
Lisa, so true. Feminism ended up hurting women more than helping them.
Posted by: Lala | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 07:56 AM
Feminists equalized themselves by castrating the Masculine and now all they have to look forward to in the remaining climatic years of their siliconed lives is a battery-operated vibrator.
Posted by: syn | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 09:06 AM
Women have been going against their natural inclinations to be feminine, and nurturing simply to capture that big feminist pipe dream of "having it all". They're now struggling with the fact that biology trumps any emasculating first-wave feminist rhetoric, and they're probably wishing they kept their mouths shut. Be careful what you wish for.
Posted by: Mister Pike | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 10:15 AM
You forgot that she is getting old.
Posted by: Mikey NTH | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 01:03 PM
New York Times Barbie.
Posted by: Mark_0454 | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 06:29 PM
Many interesting posts, and most of them right-on. Yes--biology and hubris do trump all. Most of the "feminists" in my lefty church expect so much and offer so little; fat, saggy, oily-haired, perpetually scowling, self-righteous, man-hating, Republican-hating, abortion-loving "light-bearers". The idea of "looking good" just seems so....man-pleasingly desperate. OMG!!!! The women who compromise, who accept, who live gratitude and abundance and forgiveness are happier and so much hawwwwtttter.
Posted by: leishman | Monday, September 28, 2009 at 07:05 PM
Anyone could have seen this coming. Remember back in the 70' there was that commercial with the woman singing "I can bring home the bacon, ...fry it up in a pan"?
Yeah, sure. You're perfect. You're the most perfect thing that nature ever created. You can have it all. Job, kids, husband...wait...that's not what you want? Well what do you want? And when do you want it? NOW!!!
They broke the glass ceiling, but now there's glass all over the floor and they don't want to have to vacuum, so they hire a maid. The maid is an illegal alien who has no civil rights because she's hiding from the law. This doesn't bother the feminist, but she still can't quite get to that place they call "happy".
The reason modern women are unhappy is because you can't sell to a fulfilled person. So advertising keeps them guessing, that's what it's there to do.
Posted by: xerocky | Tuesday, September 29, 2009 at 07:07 AM
In case anyone returns here to read more here's an excellent article explaining it all
http://townhall.com/columnists/RebeccaHagelin/2009/09/29/enlightened_-_and_joyful_-_women
Posted by: Lala | Tuesday, September 29, 2009 at 08:25 AM