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Is Hatred for Mike Pence’s Marital Code Driven by Feminist Resentment?
The Rage Generating Machine went into overdrive when word got out that Vice President Mike Pence goes out of his way to avoid even the appearance of inappropriateness with women. A reporterette with Canada’s National Post says that Mike Pence’s commitment to remaining faithful to his wife is because he’s a part of … I am not making this up… “rape culture.” She writes, “The implicit reason is that he must avoid alone-time with women lest his stringent religious moral code fall apart in the presence of a little lipstick and décolletage. That is rape culture.”
How much of this hate, I wonder, is driven by feminist jealousy that Mrs. Pence has found a good, decent, loyal man?
I mean, if you’re a woman of the left, consider your dating pool is made up of men in the model of Bill Clinton. Anthony Weiner. Elliot Spitzer. Al “Release the Chakras” Gore. John Edwards. Chris “Waitress Sandwich” Dodd. Ted Kennedy. Gary Hart. Jesse Jackson. former NY Gov. David Paterson. Gary Condit. Jim McGreevey. Gavin Newsom.
You can kind of see how women on the left might resent a marriage where the man respects his wife so much he chooses to avoid even the appearance of inappropriateness.
Published in Culture
I think if I were in the VP’s position I wouldn’t have given that information out, because it’s a given that if there’s ever any possibility that he’s violating those rules they’ll jump on him for that, regardless of the fact that they’re currently against it.
Feminists want to see boundaries between men and women even when there aren’t any (e.g. the wage gap) and fight and rail against those boundaries, so it makes them uncomfortable when people not only acknowledge a boundary but respect it and support it.
Pence is such an honorable man. There may be something to what you say: how many women on the left can point to their husbands with pride because he honors and respects them? I also have to believe that there are lot of women on the left who think making this a big deal is just plain silly. They can’t all be jealous of Mrs. Pence, can they?
Glenn Beck has talked about how many married men in the public eye make sure they are never alone with a woman, because of appearances. They don’t want a photo showing up in the National Enquirer with a story claiming that they are having an affair when they were just having lunch and talking business.
Regarding the Rape Culture thing, that’s insanity. If we were talking about Anthony Weiner, OK, maybe he couldn’t stop himself from hitting on a woman he was alone with. To suggest that Mike Pence can’t control himself is baseless.
I can’t say that I am not sympathetic to the ladies problems that come from this. Networking and coaching are real things, and do really become part of career advancement.
Its not women’s fault that feminists have made every woman a potential randomly exploding career and marriage ending grenade. If powerful men are risk adverse in this area high potential women suffer for it. Its not fair, but unless we solve the man’s problem, it won’t get better.
Having been in the military in the 90s, having to have witnesses to performance counseling was a real thing especially when dealing with a combative black female who would openly use both as a weapon.
Very little.
It’s more likely that the author opposes any action men might take which reduces her ability to accuse them of a crime.
If one insists upon a legal regime where the burden-of-proof is on the accused rather than on the accuser in cases where there are no third-party witnesses, then it follows that the only way to protect oneself is to never enter into situations where there are no third-party witnesses.
Except with a Republican administration it would be the New York Times taking on the National Enquirer role.
But Muslims forcing women to keep their heads and arms covered is good thing?
Now, Mis, you are being ratonal! Do you think these women are in touch with something ugly like their own jealousy? Or worse, would admit it? It’s so much easier to blame the guy in these matters.
This has nothing to do with anything except that Mike Pence is a Republican. If people found out at he woke up at 6 a.m., it would be scandal because that’s when weirdos wake up. It’s been said — and I think it’s absolutely true–that if Barack Obama had this policy, the same people would think it’s the most endearing thing ever. We should stop believing there is anything intellectual or philosophical about people’s objections. One hates to think that way, but this complaint about Pence is beyond silly.
I can’t help thinking Pence is trying to be a counterweight to the images of a lewd Donald Trump.
When the famous tape of the newscaster Bush and Trump came out, Pence distanced himself far away from it:
I can’t explain the Left’s obsession with Pence’s marriage. My only guess is that his marriage is a visible contradiction to everything they believe cannot exist. They don’t believe in true love and commitment between a man and a woman.
I’ve written it before, and I’ll write it again, “rape culture” hysteria provides the College Republicans with a huge opportunity to rebrand themselves. Rather than fighting for college men’s right to be sexually promiscuous without consequence, they should create a massive campaign promoting sexual abstinence as a solution to “rape culture”.
Advocating that people not have sex is rape culture, somehow.
Yes, we have no bananas – and we had to destroy the village to save it.
It’s my understanding that this is something that was first mentioned in 2002. Not just something he’s decided to do since being elected VP.
If only Mike Pence had driven a woman off a bridge and left her to drown. That’s how you get the left to respect you!
Back when George W. Bush was president I remember saying that if Bush ordered pork chops for supper, the left would say it’s a calculated insult to Muslims. If he ordered sushi, it would be cultural appropriation. Pizza would reveal his fascism.
Billy Graham had a similar policy. Any time spent alone with a woman not his wife, whether for counseling or planning or whatever, would be seized on to attack him, or would be an opportunity for rumors. So he just didn’t do it.
Some other, lesser known pastors have the same policy.
By giving that information out, he’s essentially burned the bridges to any temptation to make a new rule for himself now that he is in a new job.
I’ll add – when it’s the cultural norm for young(ish) women to be chaperoned, it also becomes more reasonable for others to suppose a woman willing to go unchaperoned is, ah, up for more stuff. I got myself into that kind of culture clash once, and know others who have. Looking back, I can see why someone who was used to the nice girls being chaperoned might have thought I was deliberately playing at temptress. I wasn’t – I was just clueless. Ah, well, lesson learned, and fortunately only cost a surprise groping, which, disturbing as I found it at the time, was much less than it could have cost.
After a date, if one party invites the other up for coffee, or to look at some etchings, we’re all supposed to know that’s an excuse to create hanky-panky opportunities. In an environment where chaperoning were the norm, it wouldn’t be surprising that willingness to go unchaperoned – for any reason, at any time – could be thought to send the same sort of signal. The feminists do have a point there, though it’s better labeled as inevitable social signaling rather than as “rape culture”.
George W. Bush eats?!? With his mouth?!? And his teeth?!? Symbolic of his blood lust, clearly. Not like the rest of us, who get our power directly from the sun.
That’s Ted “The Swimmer” Kennedy.
This really is nobody’s bidness but that of the VP.
Rape culture? The idiocy of much of what is getting into the “print” medium continues to push me deeper and deeper into a smaller and smaller bubble of reading material. Pretty soon it will be just Ricochet and the Victoria’s Secret catalog.
Whoops. Almost forgot American Rifleman.
Actually in a business situation I invoked this policy a long time before I was a couple. The problem is that people gossip. If you go eat with a person of the opposite sex (not in groups) gossip will occur. It does not matter if there is anything to the gossip or not. It will hurt reputations, both male and female. That gossip may get back to significant others and harm those relationships, because people like to do that sort of thing. The gossip will get to coworkers and management, both will question your judgement or try to use said gossip against you. It is just safer to avoid a one on one, male – female dynamic in a work situation. If you are doing a meal that involves opposite sexs then just ask a few other people along or bow out. It really is not difficult to do.
Couldn’t you use the exact same logic to claim that any man willing to go unchaperoned sends the signal that he’s a predator?
I thought the common consensus is that all men were predators ready to rape any womyn at any time.
Popular culture in the West, which is overwhelmingly controlled by the Left, promotes promiscuity and scorns modesty. Teenage girls are subjected to enormous peer pressure to engage in sexual activity whether they want to or not. This is a significant contributor to mental health problems in young women. That’s much closer to being “rape culture” than Mr Pence’s sensible regime.
Meanwhile it is my consistent observation that discussions about adultery very seldom address the devastating effects that marriage breakdown frequently inflicts on children. So it’s refreshing to see a person in a leadership position following a few simple personal rules that promote the stability of marriage.
I’d say practically speaking, at least in Western cultures where chaperoning is still normal, if women are supposed to display their honor by ensuring that they’re chaperoned, men are also supposed to display their honor by not taking advantage if a woman is for some reason unchaperoned.
Now, it would be horrible if the honorable thing for a man to do were to take advantage of a woman because her chaperone is not around, so this kind of chivalry makes sense. But it also makes it easier to infer that the woman, not the man (who is expected to be honorable in either case), is signaling a specific openness to naughty opportunities if she’s with a man unchaperoned.
While it’s nice that, a lot of times, this gossip doesn’t happen, you’re right that it also can.
Though I enjoyed the freedom of growing up in a time and place where a guy and gal happening to be alone for a while wasn’t inevitably a topic of gossip, yes, gossip can be a problem, and I don’t begrudge men being prudent about avoiding gossip when reputations are at stake.
Also, left wing men aren’t really men at all… and right wing men have virtually no patience for feminists.
My suspicion is that a great amount of feminist hatred for men is cover for the fact that they are fully undesirable to almost all men.