A Conservative politician's campaign promise would protect women, but politicians can't fix what only women can. Don’t be the victim. Image by akiragiulia  from Pixabay Here we go again. Another politician addressing intimate partner violence, correctly, but as always, focused on males. I don’t know if Pierre Poilievre, the leader of Canada’s Conservative Party campaigning for this week’s federal election, actually cares about protecting women through stiffer jail ‘n’ bail penalties for accused batterers, or whether he’s simply courting women’s votes, but I sigh the way I would no matter which political leaning. Nothing that requests anything from women. Women don’t want abusers, of course, but many jones for them, out of a misplaced notion of what being a man is and failing to recognize that hyper-masculinity sometimes masks insecurity, signifying a guy prone to lashing out. These women are often ignorant of the warning signals . Others simply don’t know any better. Or don’t believe they deserve better. That no matter how hot or sexy he is, if he hits her, she should leave immediately without turning back. Other ways women harm and offer themselves for abuse is not learning or developing important job skills, ergo depending on a man. Having babies she couldn’t afford on her own shackles a woman to a man who poses a danger to her and their children, especially if they’re not his. Feminism fails women and girls again and again and again when it fails to teach them how to avoid abuse, rather than simply react to it. Don’t BE the victim. Poilevre’s plan His proposed new law would keep violent men off the streets for longer which is always a good thing. According to the Conservative Party’s website, he pledges to enact tougher conditions for those accused of abuse, and longer sentences for the convicted. Bail would require ankle bracelet monitoring and immediate imprisonment for breaking conditions. He would end the practice of downgrading a ‘crime of passion’ from domestic murder to manslaughter, a laudable change. ‘Crimes of passion’, like ‘gay panic’ and ‘trans panic’, remove the responsibility for emotional regulation. We shouldn’t be slaves to our emotional spikes, however justified. Poilievre says he wants to put victims first, rather than criminals. I can’t argue with any of that. The courts have long been lax on the accused and documented batterers, so Poilievre’s policies, if implemented, would definitely protect women and children more. But it doesn’t address the other  root cause. This isn’t a criticism of him or any other politicians attempting to protect the vulnerable from male rage. I admit my idea would be a a ridiculously risky policy push for a politician—to offer a program, something to address to women  what they can do  to avoid abusers—like become more emotionally and psychologically stronger and more resilient, so as not to take him back when he’s released, or find a new batterer to whack her around. " Did you ever notice   it’s the short guys who hit?” Michelle’s question came out of left field. My first thought was, What on earth makes you think I’d know? “No, I’ve never been hit by a man,” I replied in a steady voice, otherwise hornswoggled. “I’ve dated plenty of short men, but none of them had Short Guy Disease.” You know That Guy. The man who struts around overcompensating for his perceived lack of manhood because he’s not towering over you like a cactus in the Arizona desert. Who’s more hyper-masculine than thou and hits women because he thinks they’re secretly laughing at him. And because they’re weaker than he, and if he can’t get respect for his height, dammit, people and especially those bitches  will respect his superior strength. Not the kind of short man I ever went out with. Michelle believed this was normal , and part of every woman’s experience. She didn’t know I’d made conscious choices my entire life, thanks to my mother teaching me to never allow a man to control you, belittle you, insult you, make fun of you, or hit you. I doubt anyone ever told Michelle she shouldn’t allow men to treat her that way. I didn’t, that night. Domestic abuse wasn’t my interest back then. It didn’t affect me. I may have said something like, “I don’t allow men to mistreat me; if a man were to hit me, he’d be out the door in a heartbeat.” More likely I stuck up for short guys and the importance of avoiding those with Short Guy Disease. Feminists don’t talk about this. It’s verboten. A few years ago some do-gooder and always-clueless rights organization offered up another tired, pointless anti-domestic violence campaign  plodding on about Canadian ‘femicide’ (which amounted to 182 domestic homicides a year, hardly a concerted effort to destroy women in a nation of forty million). It did nothing to address male patriarchy, a major root cause of intimate partner violence, and, bien sûr,  failed to acknowledge that the much higher Indigenous IPV rate was the result of men also  responsible for their patriarchal personal behavior, and that genocidal history, residential schools, and other unjust treatment by white society is no excuse for smashing your fist into your wife’s face. This is one of the biggest problems with white feminism: They often   make excuses for non-white batterers. It’s always wrong, or it’s never wrong; dudes with a sad story don’t get a free pass. A real feminist and true social justice warrior would offer the slogan No Excuses, Dude! I wish some political party would step up and offer programs and resources to encourage women to take back their power with better partner choices. Fool you once, shame on him. Fool you three or four times, educate yourself until you can figure out why you jones for abusers , or what you’re doing to draw  men who seek willing victims, however unconsciously. It is consent, the first time you go back to him or fail to kick him out after the first offense. It’s giving him permission. The Two Women Marilyn Manson *Didn’t* Abuse - Why Not? The confounding question Researchers and anti-violence advocates continuously seek the answer to a question about which there are multiple theories but no definitive answers: Why does violent assault increase the likelihood of another assault? The heightened risk of ‘revictimization’ affects everyone, not just women. Your risk of being robbed again after an initial robbery increases nine times. Getting burglarized increases your risk four times. For a woman who’s been sexually assaulted, including in childhood, the risk for a second assault increases 35 times! No one can pinpoint exactly why violent attack victims are at heightened risk. With theft crimes, word may spread on the street that your house is an easy mark or that the homeowner doesn’t seem to have a gun. But what is it about rape and battery that increases a woman’s chance of a repeat, apart from living under the same roof as the perpetrator? The theories flounder. Maybe she learns silence, maybe the trauma causes her to revert to familiar patterns. Maybe she hasn’t learned to distinguish between consent and coercion. Maybe she doesn’t resist enough or say no early enough. No one knows. It’s as though she emits some sort of pheromone that advertises, “I’m a victim.” I’ve actually considered that as one possibility. I don’t really understand how pheromones work, even though I’ve read extensively about them. If you ask me why I fancy this man or that man, or why I chose some former partner in my past, I’ll give you a lot of logical reasons along with how compelling he turned out to be for reasons I don’t understand. Maybe I don’t respond well to some theoretical I’m heavily masculine and I’ll also beat you pheromone. Maybe there’s no such thing. It’s my  theory.  Maybe abuse victims don’t know how to set boundaries, or recognize misogyny, or signal low self-confidence with body posture and facial expressions. Research has shown that certain psychopaths are actually excellent judges  of victim potential simply by the way people walk; victims display unconscious body language that signify they’re easy marks. This is not to blame the victim; this is to empower her to make changes to repel abusers and attract better quality partners. If a woman was victimized early, as a young girl, she never had a chance to learn how to avoid abuse before the first incident. They, more than any other women, need education to teach them it wasn’t their fault but they still need to be extra-vigilant about how to identify early who is likely an abuser, who exhibits misogynist traits. What Can We Learn From This Woman’s Abusive Relationship?  - ‘Maria’ has no idea where she made mistakes and no one will tell her Now more than ever, women in North America and elsewhere need to be educated and made aware of the potential for abuse, even from men who never were before. Because domestic abuse rises with economic and household instability, which the current President has threatened to make a permanent state for everyone. Women must learn how to set boundaries and protect themselves and their children. With the decline of left-wing wokeness and the victimization culture it nurtured, common sense is making a comeback . Perhaps now is the time to address how women can lay down rules and boundaries early, and eliminate anyone who doesn’t respect them. Just say no - it really is that simple I applaud Pierre Poilievre’s proposed policy although I won’t be voting Conservative. PP, as we call him, doesn’t understand that Canadians are preoccupied with an increasingly hostile United States run by a cognitively deficient and aggressive old man; not chicks who like abusive dicks. In fact, Trump exhibits the personality traits  of a classic abuser, in his business and political dealings. A savvy politician would put forth a tit-for-tat proposal: My newest policy for reducing intimate partner violence includes tougher sentences for abusers and an education program for picking better partners. And oh, it’s not just for women, it’s for men too, since they also suffer IPV. As do homosexual and trans partnerships. The dynamics are frighteningly similar regardless of who’s doing the battering and who’s the receiver. Women, and others, possess untold power over abusers; they can just say no. An ounce of prevention. You have to recognize the warning signs and internalize  the values that rule over animal instincts because he’s just so damned dangerous and sexy!  A man who hits others may easily do the same to a partner; these men loathe weakness. Bullying has returned to the world with a vengeance; populist right-wing dictators gain power around the world. The weak, overly-feminized left is giving way to an equally unhealthy male dominant dynamic. That never works well for everyone, as I expect a lot of ‘anti-feminists’ are discovering now that they realize the price for a cardboard DEI-hating he-man President is the giant sucking sound of their mortgage and grocery bills depositing themselves into the pockets of the ultra-wealthy. Now’s a great time to practice anti-bullying skills and assert one’s self against the Andrew Tates and Amber Heards in our lives. To practice more powerful body language and to walk like someone who isn’t going to take another’s shit. To learn how men’s and women’s minds work, to study the more narcissistic and publicly abusive dynamics of celebrities with fraught relationships as case studies. To consciously refuse  to be someone’s bitch, whether one is male or female, (or used to be one or the other), or gay or straight.  It’s a choice. Did you like this post? Do you want to see more? I lean left of center, but not so far my brains fall out. Subscribe to my Substack newsletter  Grow Some Labia  so you never miss a damn thing! There are also Substack  and Spotify podcasts of more recent articles!

A 1970 grand fête at Leonard Bernstein's reveals the self-victimizing seeds planted for today's antiracist Uncle Toms The Black Panthers doing that Scary Negro thing. They were good at feeding poor ghetto kids, better at scaring white people. Photo courtesy of the State Governors’ Negative Collection, 1949-1975, Washington State Archives. CC0 2.0 image from Wikimedia Commons New York Magazine writer Tom Wolfe coined the term ‘Radical Chic’ in his hilarious, derisive dissection of an oh-so-fashionable- daaaaaahling party for chi-chi white liberals in 1970. Those who attended called it a ‘meeting’, (sounds so much more serious than ' party’ , you know) at Leonard and Felicia Bernstein’s posh Park Avenue apartment. Guests included Barbara Walters, movie directors Otto Preminger and Sidney Lumet, Julie Belafonte (Harry’s kid), and the rest mostly celebrity names from their time we’ve forgotten, or the insular New York high society socialites whose names we hoi polloi never knew. The purpose of the party/meeting (‘happening’?) was to raise criminal defense funds for the Panther 21, those flamboyant ‘revolutionaries’ of the early Black Power movement who were done with the well-dressed early civil rights ‘chumps’, those ‘Toms’ in suits ‘three sizes’ too large—Martin Luther King, Philip Randolph, James Farmer, Whitney Young, Roy Wilkins. The time for talk was over and the time for action was now. The Panthers, who whipped out their big guns and looked badass and mean and preached that the Black Man should use violence if necessary to defend himself from Whitey’s racist power structure, had been accused of plotting to blow up five New York department stores, some Connecticut railroad facilities, a police station and, for some weird reason (a hate-on for the White Man’s horticulture?) the Bronx Botanical Gardens. Wolfe was not invited but managed to slip in anyway like Jeffrey Goldberg on a Signal chat. He sat in a chair observing all that went on while taking notes in shorthand. Five months later, his essay Radical Chic appeared in New York Magazine, reviving the hubbub that had ensued days after the party when a fellow slick reporter, from the New York Times, reported it and drew hellacious wrath from social critics. Wolfe’s article lampooned the Beautiful People who seemed more interested in what we today would call ‘virtue signalling’, whose First World challenges included the very serious problem of trying to find white servants because it just wouldn’t do, darrrrrrling, to have Negroes serving at an affair like this! Wolfe’s scene-setting illustrates them with his frighteningly detailed knowledge of haute couture , ridiculously expensive imported furniture and architecture, and ingredients in fancy hors d’oeuvres that’s rivalled only by cheesy New York Boring Rich People novelist Domenick Dunne. He lampooned, further, Panther ‘mau-mauing’; a slang term with a murky etiology , meaning intimidation tactics designed to scare white folks. Mau-mauing consisted of violent rhetoric, divisive language and gun-waving, although Lenny’s guests left theirs at home. Scare honkeys, don’t actually hurt them. Wolfe went into greater depth of such tactics in a similar essay entitled Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers about bullying well-meaning bureaucrats—‘flak catchers’—trying to help poor blacks in San Francisco, hobbled by obstructive bureaucracy and corruption. The radicals chose a more moderately aggressive style to solicit the defense fund donations on this fine afternoon at Lenny’s, as Wolfe repeatedly referred to his clueless host. Just being the Panthers mau-maued the hoity-toity crowd plenty, nevertheless impressed with Real Panthers. Wolfe compared it to a century-old French idea— nostalgie de la boue , ‘nostalgia for the mud’, or an attraction to lowlife culture and degradation. It’s slumming for the rich, cultural appropriation for the privileged. Think of Marie Antoinette’s fake on-premise ‘village’ at Versailles. Think of middle-class white kids adopting ghetto lingo and rap talk and pretending to be ‘bangers. Think Rachel Dolezal. In all fairness, the Panthers had gotten a ridiculously bad rap for crimes whose alleged plots were found to have been instigated by undercover infiltrators. Their bails were insanely high—$100,000 in some cases, which is over $800,000 today. And they hadn’t even tipped over a cow or an old white lady. The Panthers had too-successfully mau-maued the entire U.S. Justice Department. They didn’t have to engage in violence; and they mostly didn’t, except against the police; they just had to convince white people they might, or they would, or that they had already, because there was no Google or Snopes back then to call them out on their radical affectations. All they had to do to pry moolah out of these bored rich shits was to talk like South American banana republic revolutionaries. These were the early seeds of black self-disempowerment and self-victimization exploiting white guilt to unravel the ‘Tom’s’ sense of maturity, cooperation with others and above all personal responsibility to seize the day and make the most of loosening racial discrimination bonds. Today’s ‘antiracism’ has since raised self-victimization to an art form. ‘Antiracists’ pretend to be violent and revolutionary, but are mostly a threat to statues; they otherwise threaten to ‘tear it all down’ and claim it’s the only way to fix a ‘hopelessly racist society’. Just like the Panthers did, yet didn’t. In 1970, testosterone-fueled youth rioted in cities around America without recognizing that tearing and burning down their own communities hurt only themselves, rather than a Bloomingdale or Bonwit Teller, which would have brought home black frustration to cloistered whites in their own ‘hoods. One young radical from that time, although not a Panther himself, was a fellow named Shelby Steele, whose own greatest act of defiance against the White Man was impudently sprinkling cigarette ashes on the rug of a college president as he and his young stud friends issued demands. Steele grew up to become a leading author and documentary maker who criticized his callow youth’s militants for relying on affectatious black rage to cajole handouts given to assuage white guilt rather than develop black communities and themselves. He condemned the militants’ intellectual laziness and self-crippling beliefs that he sees today in his weakened college students. He wrote a whole book about it: White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era. Black Power’s grandchildren now mouth the same tired lines from their middle- and upper-class homes, attending elitist schools that cost more per semester than their sharecropper granddaddy made in a lifetime. ‘Toms’, as black militants derided the earliest civil rights activists, dressed up for marches and protests, to demonstrate to the white system that black people were worthy of dignity and respect. Black Power thought that was for ‘chumps’ and, with the help of well-meaning white liberals, rich or not, worked together to disempower American blacks as they held out their hands once again like ‘Toms’ from decades past, asking white people for more favors. Steele preferred white help rather than white intervention to right the wrongs. Blacks were not, as the ‘Toms’ taught, helpless in the face of monolithic white power doled out in small, nonthreatening packages by liberal politicians and swanky celebrities and socialites. White help is holding out one’s hand to help someone up from the ground; she still has to engage her muscles to impel herself up and stand on her own. Although Black Power encouraged black pride and self-determination, it seemed to believe it couldn’t be accomplished without a lot of white intervention. Saturday Night Live satirizes ‘radical chic’ in a 1982 sketch about a whitey-hating black poet Anger, injustice and opportunity ‘Tom’-my guilt-tripping for money, like reparations, suggests an aggrieved group is childlike, incapable, simply, of handling their affairs themselves. Steele admired the MLK ‘Toms’ rejection of violence as a sign of their power of ‘moral witness’. These well-dressed Negroes embodying white respectability were cruelly beaten on camera; a little black girl in a pretty dress walked to school surrounded by towering white men protecting her from a lengthy, blocks-long gauntlet of screaming white faces. The middle-class optics didn’t look good on the six o’clock news. These ‘Negroes’ seized the day. These were adults, children, just trying to be normal Americans, prevented by suburban crazies deeply wounded at kids just trying to get an education like their own. What angered the Black Power militants was its passivity; lettin g redneck sheriffs attack you in your respectable clothes without fighting back. The anger they felt, Steele argues, “is chosen when weakness in the oppressor means it will be effective in winning freedom or justice or spoils of some kind. Anger in the oppressed is a response to perceived opportunity, not to injustice.” He further noted that anger escalated not with more injustice but with less injustice. Let that sink in for a moment. The less oppressed the Angry Black Person becomes, the angrier s/he gets, because “weakness in the oppressor calls out anger even when there is no wound or injustice.” [Last italics Steele’s] Sound familiar? Have you seen this white guilt-driven mini-movie several times before? Maybe even in one day? Lenny’s liberals’ hearts wanted to understand, others already did. Plenty of Lenny’s guests were Jews who already supported black civil rights because they identified with their struggles. They’d been shut out from polite society too; they had been pogromed and murdered too and excluded from all the good jobs. Ironically, the Panthers offered in return gratuitous antisemitism and anti-Zionism, which didn’t amuse their host and several of his Jewish guests. There was a place for militancy in 1970 America where many white people were still just wrapping their heads around the fact that maybe it was a little unfair that all the American Dream required was European genetics. But the militancy mindfucked white liberals to surrender their moral authority while they did the same to black communities to reject their power by re-assuming the victim role. The Tom. Black anti-white racism grew, as Steele noted, in direct proportion to each legal and policy reduction of genuine black grievance. Today’s ‘antiracists’ are so little oppressed they’ve had to invent ‘microaggressions’ to feed the cultural need for rage rather than recognize a helping hand is all most black people need anymore. Adults can stand on their own. As Steele noted, “We also have never allowed our performance in sports, music, literature, or entertainment to be contingent on whether or not others helped us.” The real story As I wrote this, Michael Shermer’s Skeptic Substack featured an article on recent research on American social mobility and fairness. Here’s a shocker: It’s better to be born into a rich family than a poor one. Regardless of race , kids from better-off families face more lucrative futures than kids in poor communities. The presence of black fathers is important, but, the research found that growing up in a neighborhood with many active black fathers mattered more than a two-parent household. In ‘hoods with a high percentage of fatherless single parents, kids do much more poorly and are less inclined to earn highly, regardless of color. The worst birth lottery disadvantage is poverty and disappearing dads. Not color. Pretending it’s all about racism lets whites off the hook so they don’t have to address the real root cause: Economic privilege . Asking the white power structure to do something real— change laws and policies that would result in reducing tax breaks for the middle class and wealthy, and raising property taxes to fund better schools, and elimination of elite private school legacy admissions (‘DEI’ for rich white C- kids ), would accomplish real economic equality. Social justice too often stops at the wallet. For everyone. Had the later black civil rights movement stuck with the messaging of the older black nerds in dorky suits, it could have lifted all the boats rather than leaving the rich to conclude the more money you have, the less tax you should pay, and dole out handouts as required, sometimes. Economic empowerment has to lift all boats. Not all America’s ‘oppressors’ are white, and not all the oppressed aren’t. Woke up and smell the opportunity! Did you like this post? Do you want to see more? I lean left of center, but not so far my brains fall out. Subscribe to my Substack newsletter  Grow Some Labia  so you never miss a damn thing! There are also Substack  and Spotify podcasts of more recent articles!

There's something deeply, desperately wrong everywhere and we may well be headed toward a highly unpleasant but highly necessary purge CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 photo by Mike Bitzenhofer  on Flickr. He knows changes aren't permanent But change is - Rush, ‘Tom Sawyer’ I just finished reading Neil Howe’s The Fourth Turning Is Here: What the Seasons of History Tell Us about How and When This Crisis Will End. Howe and his late co-author William Strauss first published it in 1997. It details what they identified as the cycles of history, based on the last five hundred years. Four periods, named after the four seasons, comprise the ‘turnings’ of a complete cycle of human history—a saeculum , or roughly one human life span of about 80-100 years. If you’re at all unclear on where we are today, we’re in Winter, the Crisis period—right on time, about eighty years after World War II, the last Crisis. Wars tend to factor heavily in previous Crises. Howe believes this Crisis (not necessarily war) will culminate in the early 2030s and is fraught with great danger but also holds great potential promise, if we manage not to fuck it up with, say, a turn toward totalitarianism. The book is long and complex and difficult to follow sometimes, but the last part, about the current Crisis, its potential resolutions, and what it may mean for humanity, and particularly North Americans, was the most engaging part. His predictions are self-admittedly speculative, and some seem downright insane, if hopeful, today: Such as that maturing Millennials may actually turn to embrace “rationalism, objectivity, and top down systemizing.” That would be a welcome change. He notes Millennials today probably wouldn’t believe in America’s ability to come together against adversity, and notes that “one lesson of history is that the real danger may be quite the opposite—that the nation pulls together,” with the caveat that the union can be brutal or reckless. There’s a new regime coming together in the world order one way or another and that could involve autocracy—right- or left-wing. I’ve watched my own country pull together for the last three months as scrappy, argumentative Canadians react to the direct threat from the land-, water-, and resource-hungry United States regime. So far I’m not seeing any Canadian brutality or recklessness. Maybe we’re saving that for the invading forces. Many of Howe’s more welcome predictions—all of which are carefully caveat-ed with words like ‘could’, ‘maybe’, or ‘possibly’—include a post-Crisis “epidemic of normalcy” which would repeat the conformity, conscious cooperation, and family focus that framed the last post-war era. Yes, Elon and J.D., Americans will start #$%^ing without rubbers again after what Howe calls the ‘Epkyrosis’ and what I call the ‘Enema’. This is the climax, the massive purge coming from a terrible event or series of them after which America, or the world, picks itself up and surveys the wreckage of whatever just happened. The very worst outcome would be war, especially if it goes nuclear. Another potential outcome is the possibility America could find itself “fatally undermined” by domestic division or a civil war that leads to outside intervention and conquest. Howe imagines a ‘worst case scenario’ in which America finds itself ‘torn into pieces’ or ‘occupied’. Not beyond the ken, as the MAGA/Trump administration works to weaken America, whether it intends to or not (or simply doesn’t care). A defeated, malfunctioning, and now, self-isolated  America, Howe notes, could bring down the rest of the world. (Watch it live right now on CNN!) There’s a good reason why Howe’s language is highly speculative, based on a reading of the past. So is trying to predict what will happen by this weekend. Our near future, and the new First Turning, could go so many ways. Howe notes how after the last post-war enema, polarization disappeared as Democrats learned to live with Big Business, and Republicans came around to the New Deal. He theorizes the same might happen to us, which makes sense when people have to pull together to do-or-die, and become tired of conflict. There’s the very real possibility, looming even right now with Trump’s threats to invade and conquer Greenland, that we might find ourselves in a major conflict before the year ends. One thing Howe got ridiculously wrong: Americans did, in fact, vote Donald Trump back into office. Public domain image  by mitsuecligsx on Pixabay The Enema works, Howe says, by, “sucking all surrounding matter into a single vortex of ferocious energy.” It occurs late in the Fourth Turning, and accumulates from “unmet needs, unpaid debts, and unresolved problems.” It’s a process in which the old order(s) which no longer function properly must be purged and changed. Humans don’t have much control over The Enema; the process has been set in motion and results in massive upheaval we can’t even imagine. It changes everyone radically; it’s traumatic and painful; it “shakes a society to its roots, transforms its institutions, redirects its purposes, and marks its people (and its generations) for life.” Those who survive the current Enema will certainly never be the same: Permanently psychologically and emotionally branded. This even includes a nuclear war. We will never stop talking about The Enema, no matter what it turns out to have been. As much as we dread the forthcoming generational and societal apocalypse, what would be worse, Howe writes, is if we don’t go through it. The Epkyrosis is the enema that humanity periodically needs. For myself, it’s helpful to think of it that way since I’m caught in the forthcoming Crisis at a much more advanced age than my parents. I can certainly see we can’t keep going on as we have been. We can’t stop the mighty forces now. It’s almost like a human’s very worst physical nightmare—a massive purge from both ends to rid the body of its toxins before it kills you. If you survive, you’re going to feel so much better—and more at peace. Buddhism teaches that resistance always makes a bad situation worse. What we can’t stop, we must accept and work with and do our best to help ourselves, and others, to survive. Thich Nhat Hanh wrote of his experiences as a young monk during the Vietnam War, building and rebuilding villages the Americans had bombed. It was a living embodiment of the lessons of impermanence—and regeneration. In America, we rebuilt the lives of the returning G.I.s. We rebuilt Europe. We even rebuilt Japan. The old enmities fell away and human beings came together to do what needed to be done. We are a hardy, persistent, and cooperative  species. Purge that shit I see the need. For all of us. What also arose out of the ashes of two very brutal world wars, along with hope, union and regeneration, was growing Communism and then the Cold War. Of the creation of Israel borne of the vicious antisemitism of the Third Reich and the Islamic world. It stoked further antisemitism which has spread like wildfire once again around the world, along with ferocious Islamic terrorist death cults. After the last Fourth Turning came the Spring, the First Turning of the new saeculum, which brought a golden age of growth and prosperity for many, and a new world order tired of war. The Awakening, the Second Turning arrived when the imperfections and failures of the Golden Age became impossible to ignore. The age of prosperity hadn’t been for everyone; black people and young women had been excluded while young people demanded the right to drop out of life, to the horror of their parents, who wanted them to finish college and start families like obedient Americans. American folk singer Malvina Reynolds tweaks conformist Americans in 'Little Boxes' The Third Turning is the Unraveling, the Fall, where institutions weaken, individualism strengthens, and the old civic order unravels. For those of us alive today, it began in the early 2000s, perhaps marked by 9/11. Others point to the 2008 financial crisis. Today, I look south to my mother country and I don’t recognize it. Nor do I recognize either the stodgy but sane Republicanism I grew up with in my family. I especially don’t recognize my former Democratic Party. It’s become the same, a coalition of identity-driven autocracy, authoritarianism and fundamentalism which those who still hew to it can’t see. They point their righteous fingers at the other side, the Republicans, the MAGAs, accusing them of their very same sins of which they themselves are guilty. They condemn Elon Musk for destroying the government, though they themselves have been tearing down America’s institutions for years. And the antisemites spread their moral disease like cockroaches in a cheap slum. I never knew you, depart from me, you who practice lawlessness! - Jesus, Matthew 7 Donald Trump is, right now, America’s enema, purging more than just the government, even as progressives and MAGAs clench their butt cheeks, resisting The Deluge. I watch the forthcoming Enema/Epykrosis not with pleasure—it will be traumatic for everyone, and will purge us all  of our moral rot—and people will likely die. A lot. Maybe me and you. But I take the Buddhist, or perhaps a revamped AA credo—I must accept what I cannot change, change the minds I can, and be prepared to head north into the Canadian hinterlands if the nukes start flying. Or the drones attack. "You maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!" - Astronaut George Taylor (Charlton Heston), Planet of the Apes The ‘Strauss-Howe generational theory’ is not without its critics. Some claim it’s more science fiction than science, although it’s clearly based on a speculative reading of generational history. Others say it  generalizes too much. That it’s pseudo-history, which I acknowledge. Predicting the future is often a fool’s errand, and five hundred years isn’t far enough back to go. Their focus is European-American history. How does this stack up for other parts of the world? For China, for example, the world’s oldest civilization? For Africa? For Southeast Asia? Or even until recently, a really isolated group of islands called Japan? The critics are correct that the theory is still too new, even at nearly thirty years old, to determine how reality-based it is, or not. And maybe one simply can’t effectively predict the future, especially when it involves eight billion wild cards. But I do see, even before I began the book, a potential global setup for war. Maybe a war within. On January 19th, I never dreamed the U.S. harbored imperialist fantasies of fellow First World allies. Now it’s severed those ties, and reordered the world. But I do believe one thing: We are all about to get a massive Enema. I’m with Howe that it’s needed and none of us should look forward to it with smug grins thinking it’s only for Them. I’m considering that I may not survive it. I don’t know. And neither does anyone else. But I think if I live, I will feel much, much better. CC0 public domain image  by Tip Yinan on Public Domain Pictures Did you like this post? Do you want to see more? I lean left of center, but not so far my brains fall out. Subscribe to my Substack newsletter  Grow Some Labia  so you never miss a damn thing! There are also Substack  and Spotify podcasts of more recent articles!

"GROW A PAIR" That's what we say to men when we think they're acting weak. "Grow some balls!" So what do we say when women are acting weak? We can't very well tell them to grow some balls. Women can't, of course! Women need to 'grow some labia'! They're the parts of the vagina that would have become the scrotum for the balls had she been born a male instead (and since she didn't, what would have been her balls are her ovaries). But I doubt you came here for a female anatomy lesson. It's time for us to grow some labia and woman up, show more strength, challenge ourselves more. Time to take more charge and responsibility for our lives, and spend less time blaming 'The Patriarchy' or systemic sexism. Those things exist, for sure, but at some point we've got to recognize the buck stops with the woman in the mirror and we need to claim our power (or reclaim it if we gave it away somehow!) So it's time for women everywhere to GROW SOME LABIA! I've written a few blog posts about how we can do exactly that and reclaim our power! Feminism The differences between victim feminism, which sees women as chronically aggrieved and victimized by men and 'The Patriarchy', and power feminism, which is more focused on one's self, achieving and claiming personal power and using it for the betterment of others. Dec 21, 2024 The Transfolk Who Really Do Need Our Support The experience of 'The Bearded Lesbian' reminds us some folks really do need to transition; and how LGBTQ can fail them I began following... Dec 5, 2024 American Feminists Don't Need A 4B Movement The South Korean feminism project will be dead in the water. Like it or not, we need men, and they need us. Maybe we just need to reform... Nov 24, 2024 Emma Watson, Emma Watson, Wherefore Art Thou, Emma Watson? The foxy fauxminist has gone missing in recent years. No movies. No fauxminist outbursts. Not even any trans love tweeted. I... Nov 17, 2024 Progressive Democrats Hate Women More Than The Right. Especially Feminists. Right-wing misogyny isn't How The Left Was Lost. It was women's, the primary administrators and executors of patriarchy and misogyny. The... Oct 12, 2024 A Frenchwoman Is Dead Serious About Holding ALL Her Rapists Accountable The Gisele Pelicot case highlights just how frighteningly high is the number of 'normal' men who have a penchant for, and might be... Sep 14, 2024 Let's Have A Grownup Talk About Privilege - With Curiosity Rather Than Outrage It's real. It's worth exploring even for the UnWoke. Its purpose is to open our own eyes rather than beat up others (and ourselves) over... Feminism Substack Subscribe to my FREE SUBSTACK NEWSLETTER for all my latest on power feminism, reclaiming your power, and the ongoing culture wars. Visit Substack >> Subscribe to my FREE SUBSTACK NEWSLETTER

WELCOME TO MY WEBSITE ABOUT POWER Big Girls Don't Blame The Patriarchy Explore The Blog LABIA POWER! About Me Grow Some Labia! is written by a liberal, feminist writer and social justice critic who teaches women and others how to reclaim their power and avoid partner abuse. She also candidly critiques far-left, progressive/woke/ social justice extremism. It's a place for people who lean left or right, but not so far their brains fall out. GSL's work can be found here and on Substack, Quora. And maybe a few other places. About Me The Latest From My Labia Power! Blog 5 days ago Daniel Penny: The Hero That Wasn't "He scared the living daylights out of everybody." The woke left damns Daniel Penny for trying to save others from a clearly disturbed... Jan 4 We Have To Think About Moderating X, Bluesky And Other Social Media The anoymous psychos who call for others' assassinations are a direct threat to democracy and public safety. Threats are NOT free speech.... Jan 1 Here Comes The 'Woke Right' And It Looks A Helluva Lot Like The Woke Left Brand-new management, same as the last! But the bipartisan UnWoke have the recent accumulated observation to help call out the... Dec 25, 2024 Roman Holiday - A Christmas Story Oh no! Not another Messiah! CC0 public domain Just what we need. Another bloody Messiah. The name’s Flatulous. I’m a Roman soldier in... Dec 21, 2024 The Transfolk Who Really Do Need Our Support The experience of 'The Bearded Lesbian' reminds us some folks really do need to transition; and how LGBTQ can fail them I began following... Dec 14, 2024 Is There Any Real Joy In Learning Anymore? Can students even experience learning something intriguing or unexpected? Or are they only told what to think? "Just kill me now!"... Explore The Blog DON'T BE THE VICTIM Take back your power. NOW. It started with abused women who didn't know they could say No to abuse. It morphed into taking back your power from political bullies and haters, including 'social justice warriors'. Don't Be The Victim GROW SOME LABIA "Grow a pair!" That's what we say to men when we think they're acting weak. "Grow some balls!" So what do we say when women are acting weak? We can't very well tell them to grow some balls. Women can't, of course! Women need to 'grow some labia'! Grow Some Labia I also take on the crazies from the right and the left. Subscribe to my FREE SUBSTACK NEWSLETTER

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