Elise

Elise:

I would just like to take a moment to point out that our friend Elise has been blogging again, including quite a bit of commentary on David Mamet's new book (which I haven't read, and am fairly certain not to read).

Her latest post is one that was written as a criticism of the Left, but that deserves a serious and thoughtful response from the Right -- and, indeed, from my part of the Right broadly considered.

A woman’s femaleness—and thus her sexual potential—is, in a patriarchy, always uppermost. A man can be a doctor, but a woman is a lady doctor. A man can be a lawyer, but a woman is a lady lawyer.

My sense is that it is true, even in the least patriarchal of societies, that sex has a fundamental place: in other words, that a man who is a lawyer is a man who is a lawyer even once we no longer deploy terms like lady lawyer.

This is because sex is part of one's first nature, as Aristotle puts it: the part of ourselves that we obtain from nature. 'Being a lawyer' is part of our second nature, which refines and (hopefully) improves upon our first nature; but it cannot supplant it. We should not expect it to do so, either for ourselves or for others.

Nor, indeed, should we wish to be able to blind ourselves to these basic differences. Over the last eight months, I've been reading a great deal of Hannah Arendt's work; and while I think I am ready to identify and explain just what it is about her approach that bothers me, I have also found in it a great deal to admire. She has a particularly convincing and persuasive argument that plurality should be recognized as the basic condition of the universe.

The fact that even our solitary consciousness divides itself when we are alone and in thought -- so that we can have a conversation with ourselves, and run the risk of falling into disharmony with ourselves -- is evidence that consciousness cannot operate properly without a plurality. There is a fundamental benefit, in other words, to having another consciousness with whom to compare notes; so fundamental that we are forced to replicate the experience even when we are alone.

Indeed, I think the argument is stronger than she makes it out to be, as she is trying to dissolve metaphysics and yet seems to have demonstrated a genuine metaphysical principle. This is an argument that approaches the mystery of creation; it explains why a unity (such as God is supposed to be by Augustine, Avicenna, and many others) would produce a plurality. The neoplatonic model usually asserts (as did Augustine) that it is simply 'abundant goodness' -- that the essential nature of the One is existence (which Augustine, Avicenna and Aquinas identify with the good), and that it 'has so much' existence that existence simply spills over.

God creates, that is, because He cannot do otherwise; it is His nature. Here is another way of approaching the point: a conscious mind, perhaps even a divine one, will instantly create a plurality when it is alone. Creation follows naturally from consciousness, not merely existence or goodness.

In any case, these are very high metaphysical arguments for taking differences seriously, and seriously valuing them. This is true even for our enemies, whom we are rightly told we should love. How fine it is to have a worthy enemy, who will push you to strive for your own best! How fine it is to have a wicked enemy, who gives as a free gift the opportunity to strike a blow for what is right and just! Life offers nothing finer. We rightly love the ones who give us that adventure.

We who are men should likewise love women, precisely because they are different from ourselves. The opportunity to learn from women is a great gift to men, precisely because it offers another and different view on the world (or, if you wish to continue framing this in the rather stronger and more useful theological terms, this divinely-blessed creation). They can see in places where we are blind; and vice versa.

This does not escape the perils of having a first nature that can be improved but not discarded. Rather, it accepts those first natures as part of the order of the world: and it accepts them in large part because it begins to see the benefit that goes with the hazard.

When Elise's favorite Lefist blogger writes, "As a feminist, I want women to be able to walk through the world as something more than just....", I understand and wish to accord with her. She should certainly have the right to be 'more than just...' her first nature, and should have the liberty to develop her second nature to its highest degree. I am glad to defend her rights in this regard.

I am furthermore glad to defend a space for those who share her first nature to walk through the world without being preyed upon by those who haven't properly tamed their own first natures. Valuable those these things are, they nevertheless are meant to be refined and trained by reason and discipline; though, those who will not are still valuable as enemies of the wicked type. Compartmentalizing sexuality isn't the same as denying first nature; it's an exercise of the virtue of moderation, which is surely the hardest and most excellent of the virtues.

This places me, I think, in the position of asserting that women have something uniquely valuable to offer humanity as women -- and that as a sort of metaphysical consolation prize for being unable to satisfy the desire for an escape from what her first author calls a 'ghetto.' Women can and should be free to walk the world 'not just' as women, but nevertheless as women. It is your charge and your honor to do it well or badly. I cannot and do not wish to offer men any greater freedom, for whatever that is worth.