The Hook Up Culture is Not a Feminist Ideal
Normally I do not copy an article verbatim but this is so good I am putting it in my blog for future reference. Heather Wilhelm has in a few words covered this topic very well.(read in the Age) If you have a few spare moments you should also read the article from Vanity Fair.
The hookup culture as exemplified by dating apps such as Tinder is not doing women any favours.
Time to face up: Does Tinder really work for women? Photo: Simon Schluter
In case you missed it, the August issue of Vanity Fair magazine features an impressively bleak and depressing article with a title worth a thousand internet clicks: Tinder and the Dawn of the Dating Apocalypse. Written by Nancy Jo Sales, it's a salty, f-bomb-laden, desolate look at The Lives of Young People These Days. Traditional dating, the article suggests, has largely dissolved; young women, meanwhile, are the hardest hit.Tinder, in case you're not on it right now, is a "dating" app that allows users to find interested singles nearby. If you like the looks of someone, you can swipe right; if you don't, you swipe left. "Dating" sometimes happens, but it's often a stretch: many people, human nature being what it is, use apps like Tinder – and Happn, Hinge, and WhatevR, Nothing MattRs (OK, I made that last one up) – for one-time, no-strings-attached hookups. It's just like ordering online food, one investment banker says, "but you're ordering a person." Delightful! Here's to the lucky lady who meets up with that enterprising chap!
Sales writes: "In February, one study reported there were nearly 100 million people – perhaps 50 million on Tinder alone – using their phones as a sort of all-day, every-day, hand-held singles club where they might find a sex partner as easily as they'd find a cheap interstate flight."
The article goes on to detail a barrage of pleased young men, bragging about their "easy", "hit it and quit it" conquests. The women, meanwhile, express nothing but angst, detailing an army of dudes who are rude, dysfunctional, disinterested, and, to add insult to injury, often worthless in bed.
"If you want to try to tear us down with one-sided journalism, well, that's your prerogative," said one. "The Tinder generation is real," insisted another.
In an excerpt from his book, Modern Romance, comedian Aziz Ansari was among those who defended Tinder: when you look at the big picture, he writes, it "isn't so different from what our grandparents did".
So, which is it? Are we riding to heck in a phone-laden, relationship-killing handbasket? Or is everything the same as it ever was? The truth, I would guess, is somewhere down the middle. Certainly, functional relationships still exist; on the flip side, the hookup culture is clearly real, and it's not doing women any favours. Here's the weird thing: most modern feminists will never, ever admit that last part, even though it would genuinely help women to do so.
If a woman publicly expresses any discomfort about the hookup culture, a young woman named Amanda tells Vanity Fair, "it's like you're weak, you're not independent, you somehow missed the whole memo about third-wave feminism." That memo has been well-articulated over the years, from 1970s feminist trailblazers to today. It comes down to the following thesis: sex is meaningless, and there is no difference between women and men.
This is absurd, of course, on a biological level alone. And yet, somehow, it gets a lot of takers. Hanna Rosin, author of The End of Men, wrote that "the hookup culture is ... bound up with everything that's fabulous about being a young woman in 2012 – the freedom, the confidence".
Meanwhile, feminist writer Amanda Marcotte called the Vanity Fair article "sex-negative gibberish", "sexual fear-mongering", and "paternalistic". Why? Because it suggested that men and women were different, and that rampant, casual sex might not be the best idea.
Here's the key question: why were the women in the article continuing to go back to Tinder even when they admitted they got literally nothing – not even physical satisfaction – out of it? What were they looking for? Why were they hanging out with fools?
"For young women the problem in navigating sexuality and relationships is still gender inequality," Elizabeth Armstrong, a University of Michigan sociology professor, told Sales. "There is still a pervasive double standard. We need to puzzle out why women have made more strides in the public arena than in the private arena."
Well, we could puzzle it out, but I have one theory: this isn't about "gender inequality" at all, but the fact that many young women, by and large, have been sold a bill of goods by modern "feminists" – a group that ultimately, with their reams of bad, bad advice, might not be very feminist at all.
Heather Wilhelm is a freelance writer.
The Dallas Morning News
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/comment/vanity-fairs-tinder-piece-shows-how-feminism-sold-women-out-20150820-gj4brk.html#ixzz3jho11M1k
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If you want to catch up on my thoughts on this matter and a few others you can in my book A Letter for My Daughters.
The biggest thing you
should take on board is sex is just sex. It is one of the most enjoyable and
fantastic experiences and pleasures you can have, but it is still just sex, not
love. This is not a sex manual there are plenty of good books and web pages on
that. Good idea to get a few clues in
that regard, but it is not the be all and end all. Position and performance
girls, although important, do not add up to fantastic sex.
One of the hallmarks
and barometers of a good relationship is the state of a couple’s sexual
relationship. Another equally telling indicator of a good relationship is the
fact it survives and prospers when there is an absence of sex. Many are the times I have wondered about
couples and their relationship. It stands out when they are close and able to
share their space and togetherness. It flows over into their other lives.
If you are having sex
with someone you are in love with that is the pinnacle, the most glorious time,
the most satisfying thing you will share with anyone. Not technique or
performance, that belongs to machines. No it’s the feeling toward the other
person, that feeling called love, this person you have decided to love. This is
by far the most important ingredient......
The subsistence hunter/gatherer may share his spoils from the hunt with the group, share parenting responsibilities with his sole partner and probably with other males and women within the group, especially his extended family or clan. The suburban westerner will have one wife, 1.2 children and will be expected and expect to work, shelter and look after this family with his wife and perhaps in-laws or grandparents on the periphery. They are constrained in their relationships with women and family by the powerful forces of society, and means. Most men are constrained (or not) by their situation....
A past Blog also exams this conundrum A man's behaviour... or the strange case of Nancy Bacon
We are Psychological Fossils
Males
by evolutionary adaption are drawn to the females he thinks will be able to
reproduce. (Young, good complexion,. 16-28yrs, fertile, etc.) He is governed by
basic desires and aversions which are traits embedded in him long ago. We are the psychological fossils of our
ancestors, the males’ desire for sex with highly fertile women runs directly
against the prospect for a lifelong monogamous faithful marriage. .....The subsistence hunter/gatherer may share his spoils from the hunt with the group, share parenting responsibilities with his sole partner and probably with other males and women within the group, especially his extended family or clan. The suburban westerner will have one wife, 1.2 children and will be expected and expect to work, shelter and look after this family with his wife and perhaps in-laws or grandparents on the periphery. They are constrained in their relationships with women and family by the powerful forces of society, and means. Most men are constrained (or not) by their situation....
A past Blog also exams this conundrum A man's behaviour... or the strange case of Nancy Bacon
Maybe the Hook Up culture has freed men from the normal constraints with all the ramifications that this means...War, Wealth ,Celebrity have the same effect! But is it beneficial???????
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