The Horror
The Left believes that conservatives walk around in a constant state of grump ‘n’ frump, annoyed by every manifestation of modernity, itching to roll back to the calendar to a day when women flounced around the kitchen in a modest pink dress and dad came home at day’s end, smoked a pipe, read the paper, and frowned about Bolshevism. We’re the killjoys, the scolds, the gloomy dour dolts, sour apples bobbing in a tub of bile. We lack the lark-song that fills the breast when you embrace the Progressive perspective. The hope! The sense of community, the yes-we-can conviction that a perfected society is almost within our grasp!
I don’t think they realize how their own obsessions look to people who don’t see the world through the prisms they have have taped over their own eyes. From the Atlantic magazine website:
Someone needs to form a committee about this, stat. Yes yes, the trains run on time. But they need to be more supportive. And that conductor? He never listens. Oh he pretends to. But you can tell. MILES AWAY.
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Dec '10
Re: The Horror
That is an absolutely perfect description...of me.
Jun '10
Re: The Horror
That's because women take trips with more stops and detours--trips more suited to the use of a private automobile. So, just use a private automobile. We don't ask, "how can we accommodate vegetarians by making steak knifes more like soup ladles?"
Edited on Feb 1 at 9:41pmJul '10
Re: The Horror
But, James, they take themselves so awfully seriously. Surely this is an Onion piece posted as a prank by James O'Keefe.
May '10
Re: The Horror
When they separate American men from their automobiles then they will have won and we will all be EuroDweebs shuffling to work on trains.
And then women will groped on the crowded trains and then they will try to find a way to get the men off the trains.
Jul '11
Re: The Horror
I tend to see humor in the lefts perspective. In this case since more women ride public transportation we need to accommodate womens needs. On the other hand if more men rode public transportation they would say that we need to accommodate women's needs so they could achieve parity.
Jun '10
Re: The Horror
Took Amtrak back home this evening from Penn Station to RI. Train broke down just outside the city. The woman behind me was incensed! She proceeded to call all and sundry and rant about Amtrak, their general incompetence, how do they get away with it blah blah. She and daughter went up to the dining car and demanded free food service ( which they got). After returning to her seat, she called a number given to her by the conductor. I listened to her hysterical explanation of the horrors she and her mini-me were being subjected to... no air to breathe, they were having panic attacks. Several times she asked the hapless person who took the call, "How are you going to make this right for us?!" It would have been hilarious if it wasn't so freaking pathetic. I curl my lip at the Stanford study, James. We're doomed.
May '10
Re: The Horror
My first thought as well, except: If more men rode trains than women, instead of accommodating women's needs to entice women to ride more, the progressive solution would be to require an equal number of tickets be sold to women as to men, a la Title IX. The trains, thus depleted of men, would run even more enormous deficits and require more public funding.
May '10
Re: The Horror
Hmmm. This suggest a strategy much like the post-modern physics trick...
May '10
Re: The Horror
EJHill: ...
And then women will groped on the crowded trains and then they will try to find a way to get the men off the trains. · 4 hours ago
They already have in Tokyo.
Nov '11
Re: The Horror
Aren't we just so lucky to have these folks give their blood, sweat, toil, and tears to counting women and men on trains. But wait! Could it have something to do with the fact that there are now more women than men in the workforce? Now there is a can of worms.
May '11
Re: The Horror
outstripp
EJHill: ...
And then women will groped on the crowded trains and then they will try to find a way to get the men off the trains. · 4 hours ago
They already have in Tokyo. · 55 minutes ago
You beat me to it!
Mar '11
Re: The Horror
I am not always in a bad mood!
See? Putting the "mad" and the "cap" in "madcap!"
I am afloat in a sea of whimsy. Now get off my lawn.
Sep '10
Re: The Horror
James, In the spirit of one whose eye also delights in sighting very small differences that others often miss—It is too Goudy! Check out the serif on that "g"!—and who also likes to sweat the details, 'n' should be flanked by two single end quotes, indicating missing letters, and not by single end and beginning quotes, indicating a philosophical concept. (Aren't kids who aren't yours a real pain!)
Jun '10
Re: The Horror
We don't have this problem in New Mexico. Our public trains and buses are mostly empty. But we still need them, of course. We wouldn't want to deny welfare moms a chance to go to the casino on the first of every month. Except that the "poor" prefer to go by taxi. Never mind.
Jan '11
Re: The Horror
Every workday morning, I take a commuter train. At 7am, I don't want no stinking experience. All I want is collective mutual ignorance - i.e., to be left alone.
Besides, asking how we can better accommodate female riders implies that they're currently trying to accommodate males. I don't see much evidence of that.
Dec '11
Re: The Horror
I knew a young lady once who spent her spare time as a geurilla poet. Perhaps the ladies have a higher tolerance to annoying smelly people read bad poetry to them while they suffer through the first morning hours sans coffee.
May '11
Re: The Horror
James Lileks: The hope! The sense of community, the yes-we-can conviction that a perfected society is almost within our grasp!
Yeah, well, except for their belief that the Earth is a year or two away from frying in soup of carbon dioxide; that all of society, even including their Messiah Obama, is in thrall to a tiny cadre of evil Wall Street bankers, led by the Koch Brothers, that sucks the life blood out of working people; that the populace consists of zombies brainwashed by Fox News: and that America consists of 1% evil hedge fund managers (who pay no taxes and drive around in limos lighting their cigars with $100 bills and drowning kittens), and 99% people living without health care or food, and struggling to stay alive. Yep, sounds pretty upbeat to me.
Mar '11
Re: The Horror
Indeed, when I first read the subheading, I thought it must have been a mistake. Silly me, I'd have expected they'd want to figure out what they're doing that's driving men away. In the name of Fairness and Gender Balance, you know!
James, you beautifully articulated, as only you can, the set of popular myths I was taught to believe about those on the Right. As someone tweeted recently, one of the most satisfying things about leaving the Left has been discovering how much I like the people I was taught to fear, and how silly and full of holes that popular mythology is. Thanks and good to hear your perspective, as always!
Aug '10
Re: The Horror
Forgive me, but I sorta agree with the article.
Those who control public transit (municipal politicians/administrators) ain't the same people who use public transit (lower-income women without cars).
Many (most?) municipal politicians obsess about getting suburban commuters to leave their cars at home and take the bus.
So, they divert bus routes with the goal of shuttling as many people from the suburbs into the downtown core quickly during rush hour.
However, the people who use the bus the most don't live in the suburbs, and they have no car in the first place. They're the low-income women who rely on bus service to get from their urban (but not downtown) home to the grocery store (or the doctor, or the school) which is also located in an urban (but not downtown) area.
These sorts of routes are being cut all the time to free up funds for those suburban-to-downtown routes, leaving these women quite stuck. What are they supposed to do? Buy a car or move.
Labelling it as a "gender imbalance" is silly, because there isn't a causal relationship there. However, I do believe the correlation is valid.
Aug '10
Re: The Horror
Caveat: This model I'm referring to probably does not apply to the biggest cities like New York, Chicago, etc. The public transit model there is pretty different, since car ownership is reduced even among the wealthier residents. When EVERYBODY relies on public transit, it's a different story.
I'm referring mostly to the mid-sized cities which make up the majority of the municipalities in North America. The cities where automotive commuters are most prevalent, and where municipal politicians are most concerned about reducing car use, in the name of saving the environment.
I'm not generally talking about existing inter-city commuter trains. I'm really talking about how transit planners think when drafting their long-term plans. The focus is on the social engineering of car owners, not on providing better service to existing transit users.
Edited on Feb 2 at 11:31am