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Culture War Roundup for the week of April 22, 2024

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That women get a "free pass" from violent conflict is basic common sense, a conclusion reached by any society that isn't actively suicidal.

In those societies, men had authority over women in return, similar to how parents protect their children but expect their children to obey them.

It's the modern notion that men are obligated to protect women, but women owe men nothing in return, that seems like a rough deal for men.

similar to how parents protect their children but expect their children to obey them.

Note that modern parenting does not expect this. Obedience is not demanded and disobedience is not punished.

Ukrainian social norms are not particularly like those of the modern west; it’s a strong candidate for the most conservative social norms of any country with a Christian majority and this is apparent from interacting with old country Ukrainians in a way it is not with old country Mexicans or poles or whatever. The idea that Ukraine does not have at least some degree of actual patriarchy to go with women being exempted from the draft is not, it appears, particularly based on fact.

I agree that Ukraine is fairly conservative at the moment, but the question is: for how long? Euromaidan was essentially Ukraine pledging allegiance to Western values. That was the cue for Russia to invade!

This can conservatively be interpreted as “Ukrainians turned away from Russia because they wanted economic growth similar to Poland after joining the EU” but it can also easily be interpreted to mean “Ukraine is now lost to the globo-homo neo-liberal monoculture of which liberal feminism is a fundamental part”. The fact that Ukraine receives the majority of its support from America, and within America from the pro-feminist Democratic party, rather than the Republican party that has the Christians and conservatives, doesn't bode well. I can easily imagine that the Ukrainian women that fled the country end up decrying the toxic masculinity of the men who chose to fight and die for their country (like American liberals would), rather than praising them for their service to their homeland (like American conservatives might).

I can link some of the new aid package grants as backup if you like. There's a lot of "$950,000 for empowering equitable feminist solar infrastructure stakeholder committees in Ukraine."
The country is going to look very different when the US is done with it. And not "richer," since most of the money will end up as kickbacks to western NGOs.

This is Ukraine. The gender studies grants will be stolen. I mean, probably a lot of the grants for normal stuff will be stolen, but Ukrainian elites are smart enough to get that the gender studies grants are ones that no one will even notice if it's all stolen because it doesn't do anything.

That's a feature not a bug. The purpose of these grants is to give money to people or causes without saying that's what we're doing.

men had authority over women in return

That's vague. Men had a higher legal status in some respects and in some situations, but a typical man in a typical historical society had absolutely no authority over any women, except his wife and daughters if he had any.

except his wife and daughters

Well, yes. That's the point. "Men had authority over women in return, similar to how parents protect their children but expect their children to obey them."

In case it isn't obvious, I did literally just say that both men and women should have obligations to the larger group they belong to, and only imposing obligations on one side is, indeed, a raw deal. I'm not seeing how that implies men's ownership of women, though.