The following is an excerpt from OpinionJournal.com’s “Best of the Web” written by the editor, James Taranto.
Out on a Limb
“Healthcare.gov Signups in Oct. May Miss White House’s Target”–headline, Miami Heraldwebsite, Oct. 17
Questions Nobody Is Asking
“Rising Prices Signal a ‘Devastating’ Global Chocolate Crisis: Should Government Act to Save Us?”–headline, Forbes.com, Oct. 14
Answers to Questions Nobody Is Asking
“Why Robert Reich Cares So Passionately About Economic Inequality”–headline, PBS.org, Oct. 15
Beyond Mansplaining
Another intense argument has broken out between two feminist writers. Hanna Rosin, writing last week at CNN.com, argues that the recent standoff in Washington proves that men are bad leaders:
This has not been a shining week for the patriarchy. The men in suits dither, posture, plan negotiation sessions and then cancel them, and employ copious military metaphors–“wage battle,” “refuse to surrender”–to no effect. Increasingly they become associated in the minds of the American people with verbs normally used to describe toddlers, such as “tantrum” or “throw a fit.”
Competence, meanwhile belongs to the women.
Salon’s Katie McDonough disagrees:
There is . . . something uncomfortable, even unfeminist about relying on reductive stereotypes about women to argue why more should be in power. . . .
Arguments exalting women for their rationality and ability to do it “better than the boys,” specifically in this moment of domestic and global crisis, also put women in a traditionally female position of cleaning up other people’s messes. So John Boehner allowed an extreme minority of the Republican party to take the country hostage for 16 days? Boys will be boys! Relax and let the women of Congress clean House.
They can’t both be wrong can they? And who better to mediate this dispute than a man–a mandiator?
We say McDonough is right. Although we reject the notion that the sexes are interchangeable, the notion that women have only strengths and men only weaknesses is equally silly. Moreover, in our experience McDonough herself is an excellent counterexample to the stereotype of women as rational and conciliatory.
However, we have to doff our hat to Rosin for this impressive display of wit:
Perhaps this will be remembered as the week when everything shifted, when we realized that leaving groups of men in charge of global decisions and of facing down terrorists is not a good idea, and we’d better calmly hand the reins over to the women.
Don’t laugh. It happened in Iceland.
“Don’t laugh. It happened in Iceland.” We’d never have thought it possible to improve on the punch line of the classic joke that begins “How many feminists does it take to change a light bulb?”
For more “Best of the Web” click here and look for the “Best of the Web Today” link in the middle column below “Today’s Columnists.
