Dominus: A Woman Looks At Men's Lives
Gittelson, Natalie
their anger as reason, and therefore free speech not as persuasion but as giving vent to indignation." Radicals think their righteousness--their angelic concern for social justice--gives...
...I try not to get into a rut and insist "It's all wrong...
...He is now pushing her to make it legal, but Jenny refuses to make an honest man of him...
...Rather he seeks to initiate 'wise and noble things' by persuading others and serving them as a moral exemplar...
...The "marry me or buzz off" tactic would be unthinkable to a young man of his enlightenment...
...power is what private man defends himself against...
...Decidedly not, Mansfield says...
...He is even deprived of the tried and true remedy for singleness that Jenny herself would doubtless not have hesitated to use 20 years ago...
...There exists no more emphatic denial of those possibilities than homosexuality--or its sisters in sin, bisexuality and asexuality...
...No one can persuade who thinks he can always persuade, for his rhetorical concessions made to persuade are soon transformed by his eagerness and confidence into real concessions of his own and finally into surrender of his position.'.' II I The sentence speaks volumes about the failure of liberalism during recent years...
...2] I I I II 0000000600 g 0000000000000000000 B 00000000.00000 B 009000000000000000'000 e 0000000000000 D 0000 DO 000000 Q 0 000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000 BOOK REVIEW Dominus: A Woman Looks At Men's Laves Natalie Gittelson / Farrar, Straus & Giroux / $10.50 After more than a decade's close observation of the relations between men and women, Natalie Gittelson has come to the conclusion that "the so-called feminist revolution has transformed the consciousness of American men more dramatically, more decisively--and perhaps more dangerously-than the consciousness of women...
...It is not a pretty picture: The men of Dominus are an anxious and debilitated lot...
...This New York millionaire had to end his last affair because " 'she wasn't introducing me to any new ideas...and she wasn't earning any money either.' " But a more independent woman would probably be just as hard to live with: " 'When you're both creating your own busy schedules every day from the top down it' s almost impossible to interlock.' " Interlocking is no problem for Raleigh Jones: He and his girlfriend, Jenny, have been closely joined for six years--since adolescence...
...Men are withdrawing in droves, it seems, from the exigencies of the manly life...
...The American Spectator May 1979...
...Summing up the history of modern man, Lionel Trilling once said" Some paradox in our nature leads us, once we have made our fellow men the objects of our enlightened interest, to go on to make them the objects of our pity, then of our wisdom, ultimately of our coercion...
...The homosexual's absolute revulsion from the womb, the bisexual's indiscriminate use of orifice, and the asexual's aversion to any, bespeak a determined rejection of the fundamental and indispensable male function as progenitor...
...but does not seek to rule others...
...His one ambition, he admits, is to stop working...
...Without moderate and public-spirited leaders to defend liberalism, it will continue to make too many concessions to illiberalism...
...he proclaims proudly...
...No baby vomit stained his lapel, no cat hairs laid a furry mist on his wine-colored trousers...
...Why is it that they seem so, well, unmanly...
...The practice of toleration does not compel the liberal to become a mere agreeable fellow, much less an indiscriminate lover of all mankind and all nature...
...Dominus is her report on the state of men~--a journalist's portrait of the modern American male...
...Indeed, the sorry state of men is the hottest topic of conversation around the powder room...
...their anger as reason, and therefore free speech not as persuasion but as giving vent to indignation...
...The spirit of liberalism, Mansfield says, could benefit from an injection of what Plato calls thymos: "the spirit...responsible for our wish not to be ordered around by others...
...Since so many contemporary liberals tremble before the priests of social justice, the liberal prospect is a dismal one...
...If liberalism is to resist such oppressive high-mindedness, it needs more aggressive defenders--needs especially an adequate sense of leadership...
...Whenever women get together, the questions inevitably arise: Where are all the men...
...Miller "lived clean as a Naomi Decter is a researcher at Newsweek Naomi Decter whistle...
...Sometimes they're more interested in talking about sex than in doing anything about it...
...Liberals must have a firm sense of where they stand, and must also realize that persuasion does not always work...
...Classic liberalism regarded power in a negative sense...
...I [and] also responsible for our wish to order others around...
...The truth is a matter of faith, not deliberation, and in their hearts they know they are fight...
...No female moods or menstrual emissions sullied his psyche or his sheets...
...In consciousness-raising groups across the nation, men are announcing the need to " 'reach out to other men and touch those parts that have been repressed.' " Like Paul Delaney, whom Gittelson calls "the soul of a butterfly trapped in a gorilla's body," they are consumed by a desire for " 'a world where...internal or external sexuality with the same or different sexes is of little or no significance.' " Any woman over the age of 14 has encountered more than her share of Ned Millers and Raleigh J oneses...
...Although liberalism began as a defense of the private realm against the demands of the public realm, such liberals as Mill and the authors of The ~ Federalist Papers realized that liberalism needs to acknowledge the dignity and honor of the political vocation...
...And Gittelson amply demonstrates the growing appeal of that particular moral affliction...
...James Campbell, another confirmed bachelor, allows as how he might be willing to abandon the single life if only he could find just the right woman...
...Mill, however, was dissatisfied with such a negative view of power, and Mansfield cites Mill's remark that "the best individual has public spirit, perhaps even ambition...
...Radicals think their righteousness--their angelic concern for social justice--gives them authority...
...Trouble is, though, the right woman is awfully hard to come by...
...Either they propose on the first date, or they disappear at the first sign of attachment...
...That would be close-minded.' "Ironically, this yearning for the safe haven of marriage seems as much a denial of male possibilities in a man of 20 as does its opposite in his older brothers...
...In search of evidence and understanding of that transformation, Gittelson talked to hundre~ds of men about their dealings with women, with each other, and with the world...
...With astounding frequency," Gittelson notes, "American men used the vocabulary of exhaustion, inadequacy, and defeat to describe the way they felt about themselves.'" Male ambition, responsibili' ty, andsexual drive are on the wane as men become prey to what Gittelson calls "gynecic longings" the wish to shed worldly obligation, theneed to nurture, the itch to ex ' periment with homosexuality, theurge to abandon regular work, the desire to cry...
...One shining example is Ned Miller, a West Coast bachelor whose personal creed is selfishness...
...Toleration and persuasion: Is this mere warm milk...
Vol. 12 • May 1979 • No. 5
