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Culture War Roundup for the week of November 3, 2025

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Gentlemen of The Motte! We have often been led into discussion about What Is Wrong With Women Today? arising out of topics from directly dealing with the current crisis of male loneliness, female pickiness, and TFR decline to discussion of recent election results, leading to the happy dreams of an economic crash that will finally put women in their proper place:

Women might finally, F-I-N-A-L-L-Y be required to either suffer from economic destitution or make some concessions to men to obtain the support of a good one.

Well, you may be heartened and warmed to know that this is not a new problem, nor are the proposed solutions new either! Back in the November 1904-April 1905 issue of Popular Science Monthly, a learned gentleman (both a BA and an MD, so qualified to speak for both the arts and the sciences) diagnosed the ills of the day due to the pernicious habit of educating women, and shewed forth the path of ruin that society would continue to tread if matters were not taken in hand.

Alas, the gentleman of a bygone day was proven lamentably correct, but you can take solace from knowing you are not alone, and that women have been ever thus. I myself was introduced to this gem via a Tumblr post and I humbly link it here, while extracting some plums for the delectation of the superior sex. Though I am too agéd and raddled with the ill-effects of promoting independent mindedness in the feeble brain of a female via excess of schooling, mayhap it may save some younger woman from the travails of pride and neglecting her womanly destiny! (While the scholarly concern of the paper also touches lightly and briefly on the adverse effects of extending higher education to the common class of men as well, I am assured the audience of The Motte are of a finer fabric and thus well deserving of the benefits of this, and so at no danger of ill-effect):

HIGHER EDUCATION OF WOMEN AND RACE SUICIDE
BY A. LAPTHORN SMITH, B.A., M.D.
MONTREAL.

'You can not have too much of a good thing' they say, and the very highest possible degree of education for women is none too good or too great for them. But to those who look beyond the present and only a little way into the future a great danger is gradually arising, a danger which will go on increasing until it brings about a revolution the signs of which are already beginning to be seen and which will effectually put an end to the evil which is to form the subject of this paper. The author will limit himself principally to a discussion of the harm resulting from too high an education of women, because on that part of the subject he has had exceptional opportunities for observation and for drawing accurate conclusions; but, incidentally, he will take the liberty of questioning the advisability of affording higher education freely to the people at large, of the male, as well as of the female sex.

Brace yourselves for some hard biological facts which only a medical man can speak on with assurance: higher education renders women insane! Yes, due to the strain it puts upon the delicate female brain, the added stresses of maternity leave what reason a woman may possess overturned!

...He will endeavor to show, as he believes to be the case, that the higher education of women is surely extinguishing her race, both directly by its effects on her organization, and, indirectly, by rendering early marriage impossible for the average man.

First of all, is education being carried on at present to such a degree as to at all affect the bodily or physical health of women? This is a very important question, because the duties of wifehood, and still more of motherhood, do not require an extraordinary development of the brain, but they must absolutely have a strong development of the body. Not only does wifehood and motherhood not require an extraordinary development of the brain, but the latter is a decided barrier against the proper performance of these duties. Any family physician could give innumerable cases out of his experience of failures of marriage, directly due to too great a cultivation of the female intellect, which results in the scorning to perform those duties which are cheerfully performed, and even desired, by the uneducated wife. The duties of motherhood are direct rivals of brain work, for they both require for their performance an exclusive and plentiful supply of phosphates. These are obtained from the food in greater or less quantity, but rarely, if ever, in sufficient quantity to supply an active and highly educated intellect, and, at the same time, the wants of the growing child. The latter before birth must extract from its mother's blood all the chemical salts necessary for the formation of its bony skeleton and for other tissues; and in this rivalry between the offspring and the intellect how often has not the family physician seen the brain lose in the struggle. The mother's reason totters and falls, in some cases to such an extent as to require her removal to an insane asylum; while in others, she only regains her reason after the prolonged administration of phosphates, to make up for the loss entailed by the growth of the child. Sometimes, however, it is the child which suffers, and it is born defectively nourished or rickety, and, owing to the poor quality of the mother's milk, it obtains a precarious existence from artificial foods, which at the best are a poor substitute for nature's nourishment. The highly educated woman seems to know that she will make a poor mother, for she marries rarely and late and, when she does, the number of children its very small.

You see? It is more advantageous for women to be lightly educated to a basic level but remain somewhat ignorant and indeed be slightly dumb (but strong as ox) in order to better fulfil their wifely and motherly duties. Science has proven it! And who can gainsay what Science has said?

But read on! The dreadful custom of late marriage has both rendered women incapable of performing their natural functions, and imperilled not alone the health but the souls of men:

...But even supposing that the highly educated woman were able and willing to bear and rear her children like any other woman, she has one drawback from having a fairly large family, and that is the lateness at which she marries, the average being between twenty-six and twenty-seven years. Now, as a woman of that age should marry a man between ten and fifteen years older than herself, for a woman of twenty-seven is as old as a man of forty for the purpose of marriage, both she and her husband are too old to begin the raising of an ordinary sized family. Men and women of that age are old maids and old bachelors. They have been living their own lives during their best years; they have become set in their ways, they must have their own pleasures; in a word, they have become selfish. And, after having had one or at the most two children, the woman objects to having any more, and this is the beginning of the end of marital happiness.

...At a recent meeting of a well-known society of specialists for obstetrics and diseases of women, one of the fellows with the largest practise in the largest city on this continent stated that it was physically impossible for the majority of his patients to have a natural labor, because their power to feel pain was so great, while their muscular power was so little. On these two questions the whole profession is agreed, but I am bound to say that there is a difference of opinion as to the reason. Several of the most distinguished fellows of the above society claim that the generally prevalent breakdown of women is due to their inordinate pursuit of pleasure during the ten years which elapse between their leaving school and their marriage. This includes late hours, turning night into day, insufficient sleep, improper diet, improper clothing and want of exercise. The writer claims that most of the generally admitted poor health of women is due to over education, which first deprives them of sunlight and fresh air for the greater part of their time; second, takes every drop of blood away to the brain from the growing organs of generation; third, develops their nervous system at the expense of all their other systems, muscular, digestive, generative, etc.; fourth, leads them to live an abnormal single life until the age of twenty-six or twenty-seven instead of being married at eighteen, which is the latest that nature meant them to remain single; fifth, raises their requirements so high that they can not marry a young man in good health.

If your daughter refuses to wed straight out of high school (should you even permit her to attend such an institution), then it is her fault and none other if Roistering Ralph, a slip of a youth of thirty, engages in drinking, smoking, gambling, and patronising ladies of the evening. He, poor chap, cannot help himself; it is the duty of young ladies to lead, guide, and control the menfolk.

...We all want to be happy, and to that end we all want to be good ; and, I have already said, we want our children, especially our boys, to be good and happy. But those who know anything about virtue in the male know that the marriage of our young men under twenty-five, to a woman with a sound body about eighteen years of age, is almost, if not the only, means of preserving the virtue of the rising generation of men. People, and even mothers, speak lightly of their daughters at twenty-six or twenty-seven marrying men who have sown their wild oats; but one must reap what he sows and do they realize what an awful misfortune such a harvest has brought to the character of the man, and will almost surely bring to the health of the innocent woman? If one has any doubts on this subject they would soon be set right by the testimony of any physician who has made a specialty of attending men, or who has devoted his practise especially to women.

Over-education makes women picky, fastidious, fussy, and renders them unable to appreciate a good, decent man:

...Another way in which the higher education is making people unhappy is in the cultivation of the powers of analysis and criticism. When the power of analysis is applied to one's own self it is especially unfortunate, for then it becomes introspection, a faculty which is carried so far with some women that their whole life is spent in looking into themselves, caring nothing for the trials or troubles of those about them. This produces an intense form of egotism and selfishness. These people are exceedingly unhappy, very often suffering from what is wrongly called 'nervous prostration,' but which should rather be called ' nervous prosperity.' When the wonderful power of criticizing is applied to others it takes the form of fault-finding. Such a woman must have many victims ; will she make them happy?

Even if these harpies deign to wed, they then impose impossible demands upon their husbands in order to maintain luxurious and idle lifestyles:

...There is another aspect of the question, which is not often discussed, but which has an important bearing upon it. The very essence of cultivation of intellect to its highest point consists in raising the standard of one's requirements. A contented mind makes a man happy. Does a high education make one's mind contented, or does it make it discontented with the present, and ever struggle towards a higher ideal in the future? Is the woman who is versed in art and literature contented with a simple home, or must she be surrounded with objects of art and more or less costly books; and, if so, is she satisfied with her lot when she marries an average man, who is able to provide for her all the necessaries of life, but is not possessed of sufficient wealth to provide those things which would be useless luxuries to a woman of ordinary education, but which are necessities for her? Not only must the highly educated woman have an artistic home, large enough to hold her artistic and literary collections, and roomy enough in which to entertain her artistic friends, but she must have a certain number of expensive and highly trained assistants, to keep these large collections in proper order. In plain language, she must have servants to clean them and move them about without destroying them. Can such a woman, anxious and worried over the care of several thousands or hundreds of objects of art, devote the same care to the bearing and bringing up of her family as the woman whose ordinary education has made her feel no need of possessing such objects, but who, on the contrary, is content with a home and furniture which she herself is oftentimes alone capable of taking care of?

In short, better a content, submissive, stupid woman as wife even if she is inferior to you in social class:

There is no doubt that women can do everything that men can do, and a great deal more; but the knowledge of their ability brings with it an aggressive, self-assertive, independent character, which renders it impossible to love, honor and obey the men of their social circles who are the brothers of their schoolmates, and who in the effort to become rich enough to afford the luxury of a highly educated wife have to begin young at business or in the factory, and for whom it is impossible to ever place themselves on an intellectual equality with the women whom they should marry. These men are, as a rule, refused by the brilliant college graduate, and are either shipwrecked for life and for eternity by remaining single, or are only saved by marrying a woman who is their social inferior, but who, by reason of her contented mind, in the end makes them a much better helpmate than the fault-finding intellectual woman who is looking for an impossible ideal.

Women, do your duty to avert the perils of race suicide! Men, be stalwart as fathers to guide your daughters in the way they should go!

.... It is well known that were it not for the enormous immigration pouring into America day by day and week by week, the population of this continent would have died out ere now. And it is generally admitted that the original American people have almost died out. Even the foreigners who are so quickly assimilated soon learn the practise of race-suicide, although never to the appalling extent of the native-born Americans. As far as my experience goes, the crime is most prevalent among the highly educated classes, while it is almost unknown among those with an ordinary education.

  • -17

The least convincing kind of "fighting retreat unto death" Feminian sandstones apologia is when a righteous zealot shows us an antediluvian man predicting the coming Feminist future where he gets 9 hits and a miss, but writing about the whole thing in fakey middle english so the reader hopefully think's he's a tosser anyway.

Right just lemme take a note here.

Say you are looking forward to women being forced into destitution: a-okay to say.

Quote historical real actual content of the same kind: how dare you be sarcastic!

Interesting view of life you got there, mod.

  • -17

Say you are looking forward to women being forced into destitution: a-okay to say.

If you are making a serious point and not just sarcastically mocking women, yes. People have in fact been modded in the past when their incel-posting was basically just "bitches be crazy." On the other hand, people have been allowed to post all sorts of outside-the-Overton-window stuff without being modded if they are able to do so while following our discourse norms.

You know this. You know what the Motte is all about. You are not some naïf wandering in here and shocked to discover we have Holocaust deniers and white nationalists and yes, unironic anti-female emancipationists. Why do you pretend you don't understand how things work here?

You know I have modded people for being obnoxious and sarcastic while venting their spleen about how much contempt they hold women in. You've also seen me just today arguing with the incel-posters, as a non-mod, so your "interesting view of life" crack is petty and disingenuous. What view of life is it you are accusing me of holding, exactly? What exactly are you pleading for? A rule that people aren't allow to say hurtful things about women (but everyone else is fair game)?

Quote historical real actual content of the same kind: how dare you be sarcastic!

Look up at the top of the page. There's a rule that's been there forever:

Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

Now, if you want to argue that we don't always mod every single instance of sarcasm or mockery, and indeed that I have a sarcastic bone or two in my body, you're not wrong! But your post was just a long screed of pure unfiltered sarcasm and mockery. If you had really wanted to make that same point seriously, you could have. "Hey, look, your ideas are not new and they look pretty silly when phrased in early 20th century terms, don't they?" That would have been fine. But no, you were clearly upset at all the he-man woman-haters going on about how women and their ladybrains don't belong in the workforce, and so you worked up this (admittedly effortful, and even kind of funny) little polemic to mock them with.

And my warning was barely a slap on the wrist! A "okay, hah hah, now please don't do this." But like all the humorless scolds who think everything is funny when they do it and nothing is funny when it's done to them, here you are once more taking grave offense like I personally singled you out with my biased woman-hating agenda. You could take the rap and move on, but no, you obviously wanted more attention, so here it is. That's my explanation of why you got modded while the people posting things that outraged you did not. That's my "view of life." Happy to straighten that out for you.

here you are once more taking grave offense like I personally singled you out with my biased woman-hating agenda

You seem to be very thin-skinned about this, as if I did think you have a he-man woman-hater persona going on. Maybe you should work on that? I didn't think you had any particular dog in this fight, other than not getting the point I was making (which was 'look, your ideas seem pretty silly when phrased in early 20th century terms'), but you leaped immediately to "he-man woman-hater". You do seem to think I am going for you in particular, rather than the general attitude on here around "it's all the fault of women for not having babies the second they reach the age of sexual consent".

Hmmm. Were you being sarcastic there? Don't make me tap the sign:

Look up at the top of the page. There's a rule that's been there forever:

Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

Dr. Smith of 1905 was quoting the science of his day about the dangers of uppity women. We know better in regards to science today, so we think his views are quaint and absurd (women go crazy when pregnant if they're too smart?)

But there are plenty of guys trotting out just as quaint and absurd evo-psych twaddle about the nature of women on here. I'm not going to get into a screaming match if I can help it, but I am also not going to sit and take it like a lady. So yes, I'll mock that which is mockable because it is not worth engaging with on any other level than "this is risible".

You do seem to think I am going for you in particular, rather than the general attitude on here around "it's all the fault of women for not having babies the second they reach the age of sexual consent".

I really do just think people here who take a generally adversarial position against the whole site don't really grok that some of us do kinda identify with this place and how irritating it is to have people talk about how "the general attitude on" here is so and so when so and so isn't even an accurate representation of the handful of people they engaged with on some tired topic let alone representative of the general commentariat. So what do I do? Pile onto the push back you're getting with "actually that isn't really what they said" and confirm to you that the rest of us are at consensus? Argue on your behalf to prove I'm one of the good ones?

Do you even realize that the fact I am wasting time responding to your three (3!) responses to my one post is a gesture of respect that I fully realize will be both unappreciated and is largely undeserved? Yet here I am. Maybe it will be instructional to others who have similar complaints, if not you.

You seem to be very thin-skinned about this, as if I did think you have a he-man woman-hater persona going on. Maybe you should work on that? I didn't think you had any particular dog in this fight, other than not getting the point I was making (which was 'look, your ideas seem pretty silly when phrased in early 20th century terms'), but you leaped immediately to "he-man woman-hater".

I literally made the point you are claiming I did not get.

"He-man, woman hater" was, in fact, sarcasm.

I'm not going to get into a screaming match if I can help it, but I am also not going to sit and take it like a lady.

No one has ever asked you to take anything like a lady. You are being asked to follow the rules that apply to men, women, and Martians here on the Motte.

So yes, I'll mock that which is mockable because it is not worth engaging with on any other level than "this is risible".

Many people post things that are arguably not worth engaging in because they are so risible. I often feel this way, and I'm pretty sure everyone feels this way at times. And the rules remain: if you cannot engage without mockery, you should not engage. When someone posts something utterly retarded, sometimes I cannot resist the temptation to respond, and sometimes it's really, really hard not to respond with the derision I think their retardation deserves. But whether as a mod or a non-mod, I am required to stifle the derision, and you are required to do likewise.

Do I? I'm starting to wonder. Was that remark about hoping for an economic crash so women (and it wasn't specifying any particular set of women, rather all women which would include the likes of me) will be forced to choose between destitution (yes, that was the exact word) or 'making concessions to good men' - was that remark 'ha ha only joking', in which case it too should have earned the sarcasm penalty, or was it meant in all seriousness?

First of all, making a joke is not the same as sarcasm. The rule is not "You may not be funny."

And the "avoid sarcasm" rule is not even an absolute prohibition on sarcasm, it is an injunction against using sarcasm in place of plain and respectful speaking when responding to someone else. Stop trying to be a pedant just to rules-lawyer things to suit you. Those are the worst sorts of complaints to mods.

As for whether the poster was serious about wanting women to be forced to suck dick for food (that's my paraphrasing; see, that's an example of mildly sarcastic humor), I don't know, why don't you ask him? But here's my question for you: why does it offend you so much? I mean, beyond the obvious: yes, you're a woman and obviously the suggestion that you should be forced to trade sexual favors for survival is likely to offend you. Do you think you (or women as a class) are the only ones entitled to not be offended by someone's outrageous suggestions? When our Joo-posters go off about Jews, and their physical weakness and cowardice, their nefarious schemes to destroy Western civilization, their hatred of the white race, their sleaziness and bad faith dealings and genetic predisposition to start conflicts with everyone around them (this is not hyperbole, these are all things people have actually said on the Motte), do you want the mods to step in and say "Hey, you're not allowed to offend Jews like that?" I do not recall you ever objecting to those posts. When people talk about how ugly and psychopathic and perverted and delusional trans people are, do you think a trans person would be entitled to complain about being offended? When our white nationalists and just garden variety racists propose that black people need to be controlled and "husbanded" like livestock, or that we should not tolerate coexisting with them, would it be okay for a black poster to be as mocking and sarcastic as he wants to be in response? Or would you say "Hey, you need to engage with the argument even if you don't like it, you aren't allowed to just go off on someone because he offended you?" Or would you just say nothing because you don't actually care when someone who isn't you is offended?

Because we've lived the days of "sex for meat" and that's the damn reason feminism came into being in the first place. Hoping to exploit the misery of others is not what I thought The Motte was about.

Hey, I'd like to think so too. If you haven't noticed, a lot of people here do in fact want to exploit the misery of others. I think this is bad and those people are bad people. What's your point? The mods should start forbidding meanbad opinions? You seem to want an axial shift in how moderation works here, and while that might be worth discussing, it's hard to take the proposal seriously when, again, you only seem to notice when it applies to you personally.

How about if someone cheered on the idea of AI putting all the guys on here out of work, so that they will have to bend the knee to employers and scrabble for former white collar jobs with the cheap imported labour, which drives down salaries and workplace conidiations? Suppose I reacted to someone talking about their fears for their late career with "serves you right, you had it too good all along, now you will have to agree with whatever an employer demands of you if you want any kind of job"?

People have said more or less this, in different ways. Depending on how you say it: "Hah hah, you deserved it!" is definitely going to get modded. "Well, I think is a good thing actually and too bad that you're the one suffering for it but" is in fact allowed, even if the person suffering for it usually does angrily report the post.

Hoping for bad things to happen to those you disagree with is fine and will not get me into trouble, just so long as I avoid sarcasm, see Amadan's mod decision.

You are misunderstanding the difference between "fine" in the sense of conforming to rules and "fine" in the sense of moral judgment. Do I think it's "fine" to hope for bad things to happen to those you disagree with? No. See above. I think that is a base and vile impulse (not that I haven't felt it myself) and should be discouraged, but that's between you and your conscience and/or your priest/therapist/AI waifu/whoever.

Are people allowed, here on the Motte, to express the hope that bad things will happen to other people? Well, we moderate on tone, not on substance. If you can write an effortpost sans sarcasm on the topic, yes, though you might be narrowly navigating between the Scylla and Charybdis of boo outgrouping and inflammatory claims without evidence. Many Joo-posters crash here, trying to express that Jews are vermin and we should exterminate them without actually saying "Jews are vermin and we should exterminate them." And likewise, as I told you, some of our incel-posters have gotten rapped for not being able to prevent their seething contempt for women from bleeding onto the screen.

But hey, if that's the direction you want to go, some of our more artful accelerationists and doomers mostly get away with it.

You seem to be very thin-skinned about this

Pot, meet kettle.

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