Discussing a proposed Senate bill that would reverse the Hobby Lobby decision, Harry Reid announced that the Senate is acting to “ensure that women’s lives are not determined by virtue of five white men.”
This is significant for a couple reasons. First is the glaringly obvious fact that Clarence Thomas is black. Harry Reid is either misinformed or legally blind. Or, more likely, he thinks that Clarence Thomas is not a “real” African American because he is not liberal. The left has a tendency to celebrate diversity only when minorities subscribe to their ideology.
Next and more significant is the idea that men should not have an input in decisions affecting women. This idea is becoming dangerously widespread, even on the right. Recently, when talking to a male friend about feminist attempts to lower the burden of proof in rape cases, he said that he didn’t want to weigh in because he is not a woman and has never been raped.
John Fonte argues in National Review that identity politics and group focus are crucial pieces of the new progressive movement:
Today’s progressivism seeks to create a new group-based “social topography” in which previously subordinated groups (minorities, women, etc.) first obtain parity (equal representation for groups as groups) and then achieve “cultural inclusion” — meaning that group-based norms and values trump universal standards.
Instead of the Tocquevillian idea of viewing the world in terms of the individual and the state, modern progressives see the world as groups and the state. Instead of pursuing individual equality, they pursue group equality at the expense of civil society.
This often begins when activists, claiming to represent marginalized groups, argue that people who are not within the group cannot make decisions that affect the group. Group-based norms begin to challenge universal standards.
So men, please express your opinions about “women’s issues.” I would rather be offended than play into identity politics and subjectivism.
