Global Village Life is Real

Global villages

In one of Woody Allen's films (Annie Hall?  Manhattan?)  people standing in line for a movie overhear some idiot blathering on about the real meaning of Marshall McLuhan's work.  In a hilarious moment, McLuhan himself walks up and says to the young man that he is a fool and completely wrong about his philosophy.  I am a fool who believes that McLuhan prophetically saw our digital future:  life in global villages.  We now live in a world that digital media has almost completely fragmented into those villages.

The idea, very generally, was that some kinds of media do not unite us, but divide us...a kind of relentless social specializing force.  An example many of us have noted:

 Almost everyone comments on the fact that cable TV has 1000 channels of pure crap, and they are amazed that sometimes there is nothing of general interest worth watching.  So what are all those channels doing?  Niche marketing.  Currently the world of Philistine, dumb ass high school drop outs has several cable channels providing them with 24/7 gun-toting, duck quacking, Fox-aganda  bull shit.  They and their families can live THEIR ENTIRE LIVES without seeing or hearing anything other than a terrifyingly narrow POV.  Similarly, digital villages of people can live a uni-lateral life of conservative religion, pornography, cooking, and/or militaria digitally via cable TV, and the internet sites (types of media, BTW that are in the process of merging seamlessly. 

Religionists are still busy creating their virtual worlds of news, music, sport, and even weather (the apocalypse IS coming, ya know...!!).  One can live virtually without ever dealing in facts, science, logic, or reason 24/7.  As soon as we got RT and Al Jezeera, suddenly JLTV appeared.  On wonders when the Neo-Nazi channel will appear, with old Riefenstahl footage and craft suggestions for using human hair.  The insanity just keeps oozing out of ever-bigger TVs.  Of course, none of this is kept from children; as usual, only sex is kept hidden and can only be unlocked by good old American money.  I suppose the Prostitute Life Network would be untenable because it would not discriminate against any particular group and  practice hatred of other humans.

I hear the voices:  Media are merely fulfilling the needs of people --  they are merely responding to free market forces.  Bullshit.  They are making money off stupidity....an activity that transcends all media.   I hear others saying that villages of hate have always existed on the planet...witness Belfast and Kosovo.  Yet there is an unsettling difference.  Propaganda in an older era used to take loudspeakers and leaflets; now the stream is digitally instantaneous, the village is in your phone, on your computer. The computer term "virtual world"  IS "global village." 

Russia and the USA: Winter Olympics musings

     One of my best professors at the University of Illinois often cut through the endless crap of educational "research" by saying that you can understand the whole world if you remember Sesame Street.  The truth often lies in "how are these alike and how are they different".   The 2014 winter Olympics began today, amid much talk of security risks, the rise of Putin, the costs and benefits of the games, and nervous hopes for American Olympians (who seem to have few stand- outs).  A kind of nervous patriotism prevails. 
      American media pundits keep insisting that Russians really want everything "we" do,  from Putin's resignation to Russian gay rights.  If Pussy Riot was actually performing, they'd be making a fortune here.   Meanwhile, Forbes business magazine has declared that Putin is the most powerful and influential political person in the world...and that Obama ranks second!  About 48% of Americans seem almost glad to hear that.  I trust the Obama administration is trying to figure out a balanced and irrelevant response. Remarkably, I know a Russian, or used to.  She's drifted away from my creative circle, but I am pretty sure she is not planning to go back except to visit.  She seemed comfortable in America, enjoying an ever-broadening circle of new friends.

     So I started wondering, ala Seseme Street, how America and Russia are alike, and how they are different.   Here's my personal take on this Siberia-cold winter night in the mid-west of the USA:

Alike:
    Both are  former "super-power" empires, besieged by terrorism perpetrated by various kinds of "wacko-birds, crazies, and anarchists, none of whom realize that if by some miracle they actually did bring down the targeted empire, they would have no clue how to establish anything to replace them. 
    Both have a rich class and poor class, and little in between.  The gap between them, in both places, is growing larger and larger.  The rich only care about the poor if there is a new way to make money off them, get their confused children to fight wars for them, or if they are starting to think for themselves.
     Both enter into stupid and utterly un-winnable wars, nearly always led by conservatives.  In fact they have both fought a useless war in the very same place (known for centuries as the "grave yard of empires"), demonstrating that their military and political leaders did not learn from Viet Nam and still do not understand that you cannot win a war against any insurgency because you carry bigger guns, bring ten times more soldiers, and have really cool tech stuff. 
    The common people in both countries are pretty much the same.  They love their kids, try to keep from starving, suspect all males wearing funny hats who tell them what God wants (while often still believing in a god), and want to die happy.  They also hurt each other, commit crimes of passion, have affairs, and say things they regret.
    Their written languages are both really weird, hard to learn, filled with oddities, probably accounting for at least a percentage of our misunderstanding of one another!
     They both have elaborate "homeland security" operations that are above the written laws and deeply clandestine.  These are allowed to exist because nobody can dismantle them.  These security agencies have all watched and learned from the criminal underworld (you know ...loyalty or death, selflessly obey orders, protect the president/czar/poobah (and FOR SURE, your department head!) at any cost. In some corners of operation they ARE the underworld.
     In both places, governmental agencies and their national businesses sell one thing above all else: fear.  The people must be kept afraid at all costs, and most especially kept afraid of free speech, which is guaranteed with great pomp in the laws that school children are taught.  People who are NOT afraid are, of course, very hard to bully, to brainwash, and to stampede into electing charlatans.
     Both countries are vast and beautiful, and wholly at the mercy of the oil, mining, and corporate interests.  Environmental disasters are common.  Spent nuclear fuel is a ghostly spector over both lands as well.
     Both countries love the beauty and accomplishments of their Olympians, but cannot resist counting medals and waving national flags.
     Muslim jihadists hate both countries with equal and insane fury.
     Facists live comfortably in both countries.  
     Sex in both countries is still equated with the devil.
     Liberals, such as the one writing what you are perhaps reading, are quietly kept track of...

Differences:  

                   I may have to think about that another day.
     
    

Chase or Trace??

OK, my blog entries have been very dark of late.  Time for something a tad lighter. 

Today I was reminded that the apartment building in downtown Downers Grove, right across from the main train station, and its bus-loading lanes, is called:  Acadia on the Green.

Say what?  I see no green of even a mini-golf scope nearby.  At that moment  what I did see was a line of tanker cars rumbling by with "flammable" and "radiation" stickers prominently mounted on them. 

I used to teach about the difference between connotation and denotation in classes, often with the study of poetry, and we always had fun with car names, even occasionally pulling out the famous sequence of letters between an American poet and Ford Motor Company regarding naming a new car model.

So I am reminded of the usual marketing slime-ology that goes into naming the places where people will be asked to live, either by renting or buying there.  I will skip the absurdity of senior retirement home titles...waaaay too easy.  Lets think about  the category that,  of course,  includes Glen Garry and Glen Ross.

Now, let us pick a tree.  It should be a noble tree, a well-known tree, and not too weird (nix "Ginko").  Let's try "Birch".  Now let us see the gradations of name that connote who will live in a place with "birch" in its name.

Birch Heights or Birch Glen:  here we have the ordinary, where there will be diversity, and perhaps even riff raff

Birch Valley:  better, but valleys are low, and southerners will be reminded of who lives on the hill versus "down in the holler.."

Birch Hill:  better still, and of course we are UP on a hill, whether or not it actually exists.

Birch Hills:  Ahhh, many hills, and hence seclusion and discovery.  And who knows, the hills may be alive with the sounds....

Birch Terrace:  OK, but sort of apartmenty sounding.  Besides, terraces are made of hard-scape material, not cushy golf green grass.

Birch Woods:  Oooh, much better.  Living in a woods means trees, and everyone prefers trees over a developer's billiard-table-on-farmland.

Birch Chase:  now we are getting into the money.  People here are not merely in the hunt, they have perhaps won the chase for gold.  Thank goodness Chevy Chase is now mostly forgotten...

Birch Trace:  At last.  Nirvana. Not merely a Chase, but a Trace.  Here there is no "trace" of riff raff, and the only illegals are cleaning the homes and pools.

The Ponds at Birch Trace:  Yikes!  A whole new connotative Eden emerges, and possibilities are endless.  We have trees and ponds and a "trace."  Can life get better


I pause here, as any of my ex-students know damn well I will, to consider names that might, should, could, or oughta be:

The Barbed Wires of Birch Way
The Barks of Birch
The Terraces in the Promenade of Birch Woods
Birchya Can't Afford It Here

The mind spins out of control.  I welcome further suggestions.

More musings about the drift toward fascism in America

     "Ahh, the "either/or" logical fallacy at work."  
     Some of you saw this post on Facebook recently:   "Strange that some young singles know so very much about marriage without ever having been in that kind of love...it's almost like hearing "holy" and "expert" ecclesiastical celibates expound authoritatively on the subject. One out of three marriages in America does end in divorce; so, what does that actually mean? Is that actually a bad thing? Does that mean all marriages are bad? Bad some of the time? Bad all of the time? Bad compared to what? Bad compared to singleness? Bad compared, say, to a drunken stupor at the end of an unsuccessful Saturday evening of looking for Mr/Ms Goodbar? Bad compared to life in old age without children? Generalities simply can't apply to the hundreds of millions of individual human male and female and transgender lives, all of them different, and lived in hundreds of thousands of cultures. Ya makes your choice and ya lives with it; stop advising me about my own choices! Put your big, biased, and inexperienced paintbrush away; there is nothing to paint with it."

     In my older age, which does come with greater experience and wisdom (sorry, 20-somethings...)  I grow more angry with illogic and its drift toward fascism, which is born and nurtured by illogical thinking.  The greatest gift from any god that may or may not exist -- and surely the greatest gift of our species-- is the ability to think, and thus, to reason.  The gift is not faith, it is not identity, it is not even culture itself.  The gift is to be able to reason logically.  

I have written elsewhere about the characteristics of fascism as outlined by Umberto Ecco, who both studied and lived with it.  I see the steady creep of fascist extremism in American culture more and more.  Four examples:

*Religious fascists:  "Our god is the one god and his (nearly always "his") way is the one way and the one truth. This being so, we cannot tolerate or recognize anyone who does not believe as we believe, and we are justified in punishing them for their blasphemy."
*Political fascists:  "Our party is totally right and yours is totally wrong.  Compromise and state-craft are impossible due to the fact that we have unilaterally declared a grave crisis in our country, offering as evidence whatever we choose to offer.  We shall win by crushing our opponents, not listening to them.  I know all these things to be true because a man in a strange hat tells me so in my house of worship which is the only legitimate house of worship."
*Social facists:  "My way of living is superior to your way of living.  My choices should be your choices or else you are stupid and uninformed, and you certainly cannot be counted among my friends.  If I can, I will institutionalize discrimination against you" ("you" based on gender, age, sexual preference, race, religion, etc etc).
*Educational facists: "Our way of schooling is the only way of schooling.  Traditions as we have identified them, must be maintained at all costs.  Whatever was done in the past is to be venerated, and the past was better than the present."

Fascism ( I will re-post my summary of Ecco's outline) is about bullying.  It starts by excluding and labelling, and quickly moves to excluding, punishing, and even exterminating perceived "enemies.  In my view, America is terribly ripe for fascism now.  This is not about the tyranny of the majority; fascism grows from the tyranny of a minority who find a way to seize power, and then exploit the helplessness or passivity of the masses.

But I hear some voices:  this is the old, tired promise of mere relativism.  This is just a guy making sure there can be no right or wrong, which translates into permission to believe or do anything at all.  Wrong!  There are basic laws of right and wrong, subscribed to by all human beings everywhere on the planet earth.  I refer readers to C.S. Lewis on this fact ("The Law of Human Nature"...an essay that used to appear in high school literature anthologies until the Texas Christian right wingers drove it out).  One example is that there is no culture anywhere on earth that highly values and praises betrayal of trust.  See Lewis for many other examples here on my blog.

I hear readers saying to themselves that I am also way overstating the danger of fascist thinking in current America, but I don't think so.  Fascist thinking becomes a habit of thought, replacing logic and humanism and those "laws of human nature" that Lewis outlines so well..  It aims to destroy and humiliate its opponents in whatever category, not to exercise free speech and debate in a democracy.  For example, if I was to say out loud that America was not, is not, and never shall be a Christian country, I would be a target for lynching and car-bombing these days.  And yet, America is not a Christian country; it is a FREE country, where no national religion can ever be established BY LAW.  This fact stuns and angers many Americans, particularly in a time when they feel threatened by the realities that Americans may no longer have the highest standard of living, no longer have the best health care system, no longer have the top educational system, no longer have the safest economy, the safest food supply, the most secure jobs, the most solvent banks....or even the shreds of the so-called "American Dream."  

Hard times indeed.  I can forgive anyone for being angry, most especially the legions of of young people for whom all American promises seem to have been broken, but I won't tolerate anyone bullying me.


     

About facism, the new American challenge

The term fascist comes from Latin “fasces.” Fasces were bundles of rods tied around an ax which were a symbol of the authority of the Roman empire. They were carried by certain of the Roman emperor's lieutenants. That symbol of authority meant that the carriers of it could, if they chose, kill those they deemed enemies of the state (Rome).

The most useful way to detect modern fascism, which people mainly ascribe to Hitler and his so-called “Third Reich” (although nothing about fascism as an ideology is unique to Hitler or to Germany), was outlined by Umberto Ecco, an Italian writer and thinker of some renown who lived through the fascist dictatorship of the 1930s-1940s in Europe. He has outlined 14 characteristics of “fascism”, and they are more important than ever for enlightened citizens in a democratic Republic to both memorize, and, to teach to their children (for critical thinking skill and the ability to detect anti-democratic ideologies is usually never taught in American public or private schools).

By using the term “Ur-Fascism” in his original 14 points, Ecco attempted to capture this ideology without reference to any specific time, place, state, or regime. I attempt the same herein, hastening to say that there is no one, single fascist threat in my view, but rather many of them which seem to be gathering influence in America. Please read Ecco's own words, readily available on the Internet...at least for now...!

Here I outline, with the help of Ecco's own language, his 14 characteristics of fascim. Please note, however, that nothing in these 14 critical aspects suggests that any American guarding against fascism must thus be against free speech, or a strong and regulated military, or naturally opinionated political leaders, second amendment rights, or enlightened regulation of immigration. Neither does it demand that those who guard against fascism should support every human rights lobby that clamors for legal rights or for an end to all censorship! I write this because of the disturbing rise in the number of voices in America who cry loudly that there is only ONE way, only ONE truth, only ONE light; who separate people into those who are with us and those against us; who want to stop the teaching of thinking and the reading of books they “suspect” in our public and private schools; who are forming isolationist communities of extreme fear and prejudice supported by their own media, schooling, places of worship that stand against democratic values. These people are not one enemy or only one group, but instead reflect a fascist trend which posits that, in these uncertain times, we must suspend reasoning, dis-believe science and research, be suspicious of those different from us, set aside democracy, and instead join a mythic quest to “return” to a vague, or worse, impossible (!), set of values in this 21st century world. This trend denies complexity, refuses discussion, quashes debate and free speech, labels objectors as “traitors,” bullies our government, denies the value of journalism's “fourth estate,” listens to no voices but its own, despises intellect and humanism, and occasionally promotes violence toward people like you who will now choose to read Ecco's 14 points:

1. The first feature of fascism is the cult of tradition. In the mindset of a cult of tradition, there can be no advancement of learning. Truth has been already spelled out once and for all, and we can only keep interpreting its message, known only to self-designated “experts.” Citizens will be told that the truth can ONLY be found in one book, one religious tract, one theology, one ideology, one politics. All else is traitorous, thus exposing the cult of tradition as a prime example of the black/white or either/or logical fallacy (see “logical fallacies” at www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies)

2. Fascists reject modernism, even though modern technology and the latest police and military tools are matters of great pride to their regimes. The Western Enlightenment (the Age of Reason) is viewed by fascists as the beginning of modern depravity and decline. They complain mightily of the breakdown of_____?____ (family, moral authority, old-time religion, etc...it is easy to fill in this blank for anyone who reads a newspaper).

3. Facism's irrationality depends on action for action's sake, where taking action is often seen as beautiful and noble. Action must be taken without reflection, since thinking too much is cowardice and calls patriotism and masculinity into question. Thinkers and intellectuals are always suspect, frequently referred to as “effete,” “elitist,” “ivory tower intellectuals,” “eggheads,” or “snobs.” Hermann Goering is alleged to have said: "When I hear talk of culture I reach for my gun,” presumably because such conversation betrayed the cult of tradition and the refusal to reject modernism.

4. For Facscists, disagreement is treason. They reject analysis (“paralysis through analysis”) for it could threaten the cult of tradition and also delay immediate action. One must listen, believe, act.

5. Fascists always exploit the fear of what is different, most especially different culture, religion, race, gender, sexuality, and/or ethnicity. These are seen as threats, intruders, disrupters of some “natural” order and by-gone standards.

6. Fascism tends to rise when people feel angry and dispossessed. When whole nations embrace fascism, it is often because they cannot admit they no longer have wealth, power, and or prestige they once enjoyed; that their standard of living is perceived to have declined; that they feel “under attack” and want simple, decisive retaliations. More simply, their people are afraid, and yearn for simple solutions and a return to a simpler time. Fear leads to a rise in mystical religion-ism, a desire for isolation from the world, and tendency to turn to “strong-man” leadership. “Fascist” responses might also happen in the culture of an institution or corporation,...perhaps not harmful to a nation, but clearly harmful to those living within them.

7. People in fear tend to turn to the one thing that is a clear identity for them: being born in the same place. Fascism feeds this by urging exclusion of “foreigners,” radical punishments for those deemed “alien,” application of simplistic formulas for who is “us” and who is “them,” arguing for a strong military not merely for fighting invasions, but for “policing” the citizens – who are also urged to report suspicious behaviors to them. Fascists want citizens to live in perpetual fear, and believe that there are vast plots against them. The “enemy” is always embodied in a single word: “communist,” “socialist,” “Muslim,” Jew,” “liberal,” “traitor,” and ironically, “fascism” itself! It is instructive to recall that Hitler's German supporters acted for the “Fatherland.”

8. Fascism portrays it's enemies as powerful and devious, feeding people's fears that they themselves are not in control, or that the world is spinning out of their control. After all, if the enemy is not depicted as powerful and overwhelming, there is not so much to fear.

9. Because enemies are powerful, fascists depict life as a struggle for survival, never a quest for diplomatic solutions, detente, individual expression, change, a new way of life, or peace. Those who offer such solutions are depicted as weaklings and traitors. A problem all fascists face is that once so powerful an enemy has successfully been created, no final end to the conflict against it can exist, and, of course, people do grow weary of fighting with no end, no victory in sight. Fascism must constantly find new ways to energize fear and keep the “war” going: new incidents, new atrocities, new horrors, new threats.

10. Fascism's power does not come from open discussion, critical debate, analysis, or democracy; fascism comes to power from bullying and force, having created the conditions described in 1-9 above. But to win through bullying is to have contempt for the weakness of those citizens who have been successfully bullied; thus, fascists have nothing but contempt for those they have persuaded to follow them. Such contempt (these days often a mash-up of Machiavelli and SunTzu and Dick Cheney) justifies ever more strident and autocratic leadership. The weak must be guided, shaped, ruled, threatened, and then rejoice at having been saved and remaining subordinate. Every fascist “Caesar” is, however, constantly fearful of the “Cassius-ness” of individual humans making up the masses: “Beware yond Cassius. He hath a lean and hungry look. He thinks too much. Such men are dangerous!”

11. Fascism controls citizens through force, but also by creating myth. In the myth, dying for a cause is great and noble, death is not to be feared, and suffering is part of a grand quest,...often for a reward in some imagined heaven or an afterlife or an eternal fame. Thus, everyone is urged to be a mythic hero, and a test of one's loyalty is their willingness to die for a cause. Blood rituals, often secret and tailored to hierarchies of privilege, are often used to extract and affirm this willingness.

12. People grow weary of war and hard-to-attain heroism, so Fascism again resorts to human sexuality, which is a powerful influence. Typically, to be weak or rebellious is depicted as being infantile, a-”sexual, homosexual, girlish,” perverted, or sexually impotent. It is not a coincidence that fascist propaganda depicts mostly masculine figures, sexual symbols of machismo, and physical domination. In a fascist mindset, the gun is the most powerful (phallic) symbol of sexual potency.

13. For fascists, individuals have no rights...no rights to be unique, to choose, to think, to question, to change, to grow, to self-rule,...even to live. The people are seen as “us,” never individual “I” or “you”. People are required only to be of “The People,” the mass with one common and supposedly noble will.

14. Fascism “speaks newspeak.” Newspeak was invented by George Orwell, in his novel

1984, as the official language of “Ingsoc” (Eng-lish Soc-ialism). Fascists exploit language in order to limit reasoning and individual critical thinking. They reduce words describing their enemies to simple single words. They argue for action using slogans (“the time is now” or “take back our beloved country”). Worse, they strive to change the connotative or even the literal meaning of words, such as, for example, “conservative” or “intellectual” or “patriot.” “Newspeak” is especially dangerous in today's digital world, where words and slogans can spread with exponential speed over the Internet, where digital spying can identify individuals using taboo or suspect words or phrases in writing or in electronic conversation, and where words/phrases/whole chapters in textbooks can be altered forever within the time of several keystrokes.

Twitter twit

I have begun to realize that Twitter, the contents of which are often sophomoric, is designed to make people like me feel like high school sophomores again. By that I mean it is a competition to see who has the most friends. The emphasis is on "most" not "friends". This explains why it has quickly become a marketing tool for the famous and wanna-be-famous. Apparently one links oneself to a thousand sites, ever trolling for more "fans". The implied result is that one is fascinating and worth following so that the world can know, for example, what you had for breakfast.

Chicagoan Bob Sirott once described Twitter as this: "I am eating a cheese Danish." It may be about being famous for fifteen minutes every fifteen minutes, yet it is undoubtedly alluring, and I think it has surpassed Facebook as THE social site (I hesitate to use the word "networking" here...), because it is instant, like a shout of joy or a conversational interjection. It says (much more than the plodding Facebook post) "I am here in this instant in a place that is real and I am alive and I am me!"
So I suppose I am sad that few care that I am here, now, and alive. Yet, on top of that I am sad for the legions of the wanna-be-famous. What will the trail of twitters add up to when your star has fallen, or worse (?) has yet to ever rise? "I knew so and so...I was once somebody...I am still here in this instant...but it seems no longer to matter now that my "friends" who follow the once-great me are only Twitter sites for organizations, clubs, causes, and manufacturers.....where did all the people go?"
Oh well, I am just a twitter twit...who could never have boiled the preceding midnight ramble into 140 characters.

Musings about racing...

-->

I wonder if sports psychology has taken note of the special needs of race drivers in the way that physiotherapy has done? Being in professional sports is of
course, generically lonely, filled with down time and travel, with low job
security, frequent trades to other teams, moving oneself and/or family,
omnipresence of drugs and alcohol for self-medication and/or physical
endurance, the bad nutrition on the road, fickle fans who want super-human
and error-free performances, paparazzi (or perhaps worse, the obvious neglect
of the media), “stage-door” fans who want to notch their guns with more than
autographs, grueling and fickle weather for those who play outdoors, and the
strain placed on any long-term relationship attempts. Racers, however, have a
unique dilemma.
Racing, unlike soccer or even down-hill skiing, involves taking life-threatening risks. It involves trusting the thousand myriad parts of a dumb machine (and the expertise of those who maintain it), and also the dozens of driver’s personalities who will practice their skill only feet away from each other…all at three times the speeds most people drive. It is no wonder that drivers are a very “closed” and tightly knit community, but also that this very closeness brings on its own stresses. Friendships or romances in this setting are fragile indeed. Today’s friend disappears to race in Europe, becomes my most daring competitor who will know all too well my fears and hesitancies, becomes a part of a rival team, will make a mistake in setting up my car, will mis-quote me to the press. The stock response is that “we leave all that on the race track;” however, real humans don’t function with such a black and white compartmentalization of life.
Add to the list of stresses that fact that the owners and sponsors really don’t care very much about racers’ psychological needs. In the business of racing, it’s win or place and show the logos….or find someone who can win or place.
Consider, too, the worst stress of all: youth. Drivers in world competition grow younger and younger. In essence, many are going through adolescence….many of them still technically in school but often far, far from home. The twenty-somethings live with the stresses of that stage of development, and can become conflicted about their trajectory: “will I/can I find a stable relationship, put down true roots, be a provider for some significant other(s)?” Females in racing don’t lock away awareness of their biological clock either, and it goes without saying that living in a sport born of testosterone isn’t easy for women.
Are there any racer psychologists? Is social Darwinism the only life philosophy of the racing business? Can friends de-stress themselves during the long January nights in the small apartments a few miles from the shop, or all alone with the American TV blaring…wondering if they‘ll have a ride? Or…do even the women have to “man up” and deal with it alone?