Friday, August 05, 2005

So who's for a Culture of Emasculation?

I said in a blog comment today over at The Next Hurrah that we should try to change the terminology of "Culture of Life" to be "Culture of Emasculation".
First, because this is actually what it is -- the so-called "pro-life" people are against anyone making their own personal moral choices. They want to take our decision-making autonomy away and that is emasculating us all. Second, I would love to use the term "emasculate" because its the scariest word in the English language for all these men who are running the Christian Right and anti-choice groups. They would just hate it.
So here's a news story that proves my point -- Masculinity Challenged, Men Prefer War and SUVs. A researcher at Cornell university study did a survey of undergraduates. "Participants were randomly assigned feedback that indicated their responses were either masculine or feminine. The women had no discernable reaction to either type of feedback in a follow-up survey. But the guys' reactions were "strongly affected," [researcher Robb Willer] said today. "I found that if you made men more insecure about their masculinity, they displayed more homophobic attitudes, tended to support the Iraq war more and would be more willing to purchase an SUV over another type of vehicle," said Willer said. "There were no increases [in desire] for other types of cars." Those who had their masculinity threatened also said they felt more ashamed, guilty, upset and hostile than those whose masculinity was confirmed, he said."
So describing people who oppose choice of promoting a Culture of Emasculation might be a pretty noticeable way to shake these people up, and make them realize what they are really promoting.

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