Rush Limbaugh: Yes, MoDo, Feminism Was a Cruel Hoax

Here's the Maureen Dowd column, as promised. I know you people think I've engaged in treachery here by promoting this a half hour ago and teasing you and holding you this long, but I assure you the things I led off this hour with came across the transom in the break at the top of the hour. Show prep never stops here. "Men Just Want Mommy." Maureen Dowd, the New York Times today. "A few years ago at a White House Correspondents' dinner, I met a very beautiful actress. Within moments, she blurted out: 'I can't believe I'm 46 and not married. Men only want to marry their personal assistants or P.R. women.' I'd been noticing a trend along these lines," writes MoDo, "as famous and powerful men took up with the young women whose job it was to tend to them and care for them in some way: their secretaries, assistants, nannies, caterers, flight attendants, researchers and fact-checkers. Women in staff support are the new sirens because, as a guy I know put it, they look upon the men they work for as 'the moon, the sun and the stars.' It's all about orbiting, serving and salaaming their Sun Gods.

"In all those great Tracy/Hepburn movies more than a [50 years] ago, it was the snap and crackle of a romance between equals that was so exciting. Moviemakers these days seem far more interested in the soothing aura of romances between unequals. In James Brooks's movie 'Spanglish'..." A movie I have not seen, doesn't mean anything, I'm just being honest here as a commentator. "...Adam Sandler, as a Los Angeles chef, falls for his hot Mexican maid. The maid, who cleans up after Mr. Sandler without being able to speak English, is presented as the ideal woman. The wife, played by Téa Leoni, is repellent: a jangly, yakking, overachieving, overexercised, unfaithful, shallow she-monster who has just lost her job with a commercial design firm. Picture Faye Dunaway in 'Network' if she'd had to stay home, or Glenn Close in 'Fatal Attraction' without the charm." Maureen, your life isn't a movie! But you get the drift here. There's bitterness here. There's bitterness seeping out from the word processor of MoDo. She's an achieved woman, an accomplished woman -- and as such, not desired.

But all these servants, all these "underling women" -- the secretaries, the assistants, the nannies, the caterers, the flight attendants, hell, even women who don't speak English -- they're the ones who are desired. "The same attraction of unequals animated Richard Curtis's 'Love Actually,' a 2003 holiday hit. The witty and sophisticated British prime minister, played by Hugh Grant, falls for the chubby girl who wheels the tea and scones into his office. A businessman married to the substantial Emma Thompson falls for his sultry secretary. A writer falls for his maid, who speaks only Portuguese. (I wonder if the trend in making maids who don't speak English heroines is related to the trend of guys who like to watch Kelly Ripa in the morning with the sound turned off?)" The claws, ladies and gentlemen, are coming out now.

"Art is imitating life, turning women who seek equality into selfish narcissists and objects of rejection, rather than affection." Could it just possibly be that the feminist movement was a "cruel hoax?" she is asking herself. "John Schwartz of The New York Times wrote recently, 'Men would rather marry their secretaries than their bosses, and evolution may be to blame.' A new study by psychology researchers at the University of Michigan, using college undergraduates, suggests that men going for long-term relationships would rather marry women in subordinate jobs than women who are supervisors. As Dr. Stephanie Brown, the lead author of the study, summed it up for reporters: 'Powerful women are at a disadvantage in the marriage market because men may prefer to marry less-accomplished women.' Men think that women with important jobs are more likely to cheat on them. So was the feminist movement some sort of cruel hoax? The more women achieve, the less desirable they are? Women want to be in a relationship with guys they can seriously talk to - unfortunately, a lot of those guys want to be in relationships with women they don't have to talk to."

Wrong, Maureen. It's what you want to talk about. We don't want to hear George Bush bashed. We don't want to hear conspiracy theories. We don't want to hear Michael Moore lionized and idolized and we certainly don't want to go through relationship analysis three hours a night. We don't want to be told how wrong we are, we don't want to be told how screwed up we are, we don't want to be told how we're knot caring. We don't want to be told all that. Maureen, men are real simple. Real simple, and by the way, as long as you're getting so deep into this, MoDo, you might examine (I say this with all due compassion and in an attempt to be helpful) examine your personality. All of you women who are out there husband-hunting, men are so simple. It's a crime you don't understand this. We just want approval. Pure and simple. They just want approval for what they do. It's not hard.

Let me answer a question here very quickly posed by MoDo in the New York Times today. "Was the feminist movement some sort of cruel hoax?" Yes, but not for the reasons that she is speculating. Feminism is not a cruel hoax because it prepared women to be equal with men and that's the way to get a man. Feminism was all about everything but getting a man. That's where it was a cruel hoax. You go back to the roots of feminism in the late '60s, early '70s. It was all about being happy without a man, without a relationship. That that imprisoned women. That that made them dependent. That that kept them barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen -- all these clichés. It was all about finding a career so you didn't have to have a man. You didn't have to depend on a man. That's what it was all about. That's the cruel hoax, and the real cruel hoax of feminism is if anything... If anything, the real cruel hoax of feminism is that men and women are so confused about how they are supposed to act that they are not themselves anymore around each other. Look at this stupid survey. This survey basically says men want a bunch of airheads as wives or spouses, partners, or what have you. That's not right. That's not right, unless the man is an airhead himself and wouldn't recognize somebody else as not an airhead.

If you see a guy walking through Kmart in a two-tone green leisure suit, I guarantee you the woman next to him he probably met in a bowling alley. People find each other. It's just... I don't know. I think so much of this boils down to something very, very simple. It's just that more... Well, I don't want to. I don't know Maureen's life well enough. I don't know it at all so I'm not going to even sit here and offer advice. But yes, feminism has been a cruel hoax. I will only tell you that this notion that men, in general, want a bunch of airhead, dippy, brainless, not even know how to talk partners is an absolute crock -- unless they are like that themselves. As I say, men are very simple. Let me expand on this by the way, just a bit, because it may need some. When I say, "Men are very simple, all they want is approval," there are some factors that go into this. If a man loves a woman, if he really loves a woman, she will be the focus of his life. Everything he does will be for her. Just a little approval. Not nagging, just a little approval. Just a little understanding of how hard the guy's working to make all this happen. May not be the richest guy in the world. May have some stumbles.

Now, if the guy is robbing banks, I mean, I'm not saying approve that. You know, everything here comes within some assumed norms, folks. Don't go to the extremes here to disprove what I'm saying. But it's really not complicated at all. It really isn't -- and of course you can't (interruption). No. (interruption) Mr. Snerdley wants to know if I'm asking, "Are you saying guys don't like subservient women?" No, I'm not saying anything in the generic, general sense because some guys do, obviously. But I don't think the majority do. I don't think the majority of men want subservient women at all -- and by the way, by [my saying] "all a guy wants is his woman to approve him," I'm not saying that she has to be subservient and bow down and say, "Oh, you're wonderful." You can call it respect. You can call it understanding, appreciation, what have you -- and if those are present, the woman's not ever going to have to ask for a thing. It will be there. You won't ever have to ask, won't have to demand that an anniversary be remembered, won't have to demand that a birthday be remembered, won't have to demand anything. But of course, folks, if you wanted to say, "Who am I to be talking about all this?" you're perfectly entitled. Who's next on this program? Jennifer in Mesa, Arizona. Hi, welcome to the EIB Network. Hello.

CALLER: Well, I think that Maureen Dowd's problem is in her attitude towards men, probably. The so-called underlings that she talks about, the nannies and the secretaries and things, are not women who see themselves as being above taking care of a man. And, you know, men are pretty simple creatures like you said. If you take good care of them you never have to ask them for a thing.

RUSH: Well, the key here in that list of... Let's go through this list that Maureen Dowd cites, because you have a good point.

RUSH: She says, "I've been noticing a trend along these lines as famous and powerful men took up with the young women whose job it was to tend to them and care for them in some way. Their secretaries, assistants, nannies, caterers, flight attendants, researchers..." What one characteristic there or title of all those -- secretaries, assistants, nannies, caterers, flight attendants -- stands out at you?

RUSH: No, which one stands out and sort of gives MoDo away, at least to me anyway.

CALLER: Well, because the nanny's job isn't to take care of the man, it's to take care of the children.

RUSH: To take care of the children so that the woman doesn't have to so she can go out and have a career too.

RUSH: And so a nanny is probably closer to what an ordinary guy thinks a wife is supposed to do, taking care of the kids, raising the family and all this sort of stuff. Why marry somebody if you're just going to go out and hire a nanny once you get a family? Now, some guys are fine with this but I doubt that Maureen -- I mean, I can't comment on Maureen. I don't know. We got to be very careful about commenting on Maureen, specifically her relationships, because I don't know anything about it, but all these jobs, by the way, secretaries, assistants, these women are paid to do this. A wife doesn't look at herself as being paid to do anything, and the moment these women stop being paid for it, they stop doing it, and if some guy does fall in love with his secretary, assistant, nanny, indicate remember, whatever, and marries her, guess what? She's not going to keep doing that because that's not what she's going to be paid for.

CALLER: Yeah, that's true -- and you know thesis professional, accomplished liberal women like Maureen Dowd tend to see caretaking of men as a menial task that's beneath them, that they shouldn't have to do that, and, you know, they just don't understand the nature of men very well, I think. Because there are plenty of professional accomplished women who probably do a very good job of taking care of their husbands and I would guess that they're not liberal.

RUSH: Could be. I think it's dangerous to generalize over any of this. I think some things you probably can, but a lot of this is specifically tied to each individual relationship because you got two individuals there. It really is. That's what this whole thing is. Maureen is sitting there thinking if there's a societal reason why certain women are not attractive to certain men, that there is a cultural reason and it always boils down to it's the man's fault and it's always because the man doesn't want to be challenged. When you boil it all down, the man doesn't want to be challenged. The man doesn't want an intellectual equal, the man doesn't want this -- and that's what leads to this question was feminism "a cruel hoax." Feminist leaders told them get equal and the world will open up to you and it hasn't happened that way. Also, here's Maureen. Here's one thing we can say. We can say she's unhappy. We can conclude she's unhappy. She's been unhappy since the holiday season. She hasn't gotten over it. Now she's unhappy. The holiday season has gone by. She's unhappy because there's no man out there -- and Valentine's Day is coming up, yeah, it's going to be a rough couple of more weeks, maybe three.

But nevertheless -- and then Rumsfeld hadn't quit. That makes her mad and makes her unhappy. Bush is still there, doing well. That makes her unhappy. I mean, all the elements of unhappiness are just encircling her, surrounding her, enveloping her, smothering her. However, you'd have to say at the same time she's one of the most accomplished and achieved women in American journalism. She arguably is an opinion leader by virtue of having a regular column in the New York Times. It would be very difficult for people who are not Maureen Dowd looking from the outside in thinking she ought to be on top of the world, as happy as she can be because everything in the career world she's no doubt sought she's got. Yet she writes openly here of her misery, and her unhappiness. Over what? Relationships. That tells me that the feminist movement was based on a false premise anyway. That you can find happiness outside of a relationship, without a man, blah, blah, blah, blah, no matter what you achieve it's still not enough, and the same thing is probably true for men. It's just that nobody ever stopped to think about that because it was never really a serious men's movement, politically, as there has been a female movement. Who is next on our show? This is Manford in Jackson, Michigan. Welcome Manford nice to have you with us.

CALLER: Yes, absolutely. In regards to this question about men and women and their relationships--

RUSH: I probably should ask -- we need to get some qualification -- are you married?

CALLER: It just seems to me that in every relationship, especially in a husband and wife, somebody has to have a final say when there's a disagreement over something. I mean, you know, we can sit and go back and forth, compromise, whatnot, but somebody has to make the final decision if there's irreconcilable disagreements.

CALLER: Now, what man, whether it is just our ego, you can call it macho, whatever, what man doesn't want to be the one making the decisions?

RUSH: I'm not trying to dispute you, but I know a lot of them that don't want the hassle.

RUSH: Well, do know how hard decision-making is for some people? Some people will do anything to avoid making a decision.

RUSH: I know. You know, I love these old-fashioned cliches, wive's tales, whatever you'd call them. One of my favorites -- the feminists hate this one by the way, I should tell you: "The guy who thinks he's smarter than his wife knows truly not how smart she is." What that means is, she's playing dumb to make the guy think he's the boss when she's actually running the show.

CALLER: Well, you know, that's probably kind of true, you know, because there are -- you know, a guy doesn't -- you know, what you say, men are simple creatures. We are, you know. We need some affection, we need some approval, some appreciation, and there's one other thing that we need --

CALLER: Okay. Anyway, if we really aren't in charge and we just want to think we are, and I don't think that if a lady who we know already going in, is some sort of big executive, high achiever, we're not going to really get that much chance at that, and I'm not saying that we want to marry an airhead or anything like that.

RUSH: Are you of the opinion that a high-achieving women is, by nature, a woman who controls things?

CALLER: But now that doesn't mean that there aren't other women who are controlling who aren't what you'd call, quote, high achievers in the business world.

CALLER: You know, I'm not excluding that. But my point is that you got a better shot of not running into that, but I don't think that men want to marry airheads either. I don't want to marry one.

RUSH: Except other mail airheads. That's what I meant by people finding each other.

RUSH: There's a simple way for men to understand women. Very, very simple way, just as I said it's very simple for a man to be understood by a woman, the approval bit that I just went through. At the same time, it's very, very, very, very simple for any man to understand any woman and it's this: Madonna was once somebody's cute little girl.

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, just one more thing on this Maureen Dowd column: Seriously, now, that I want to get into. I'm going to go through this, the first three paragraphs -- they're short -- of her column and then ask a question. She writes, "A few years ago at a White House Correspondents' dinner, I met a very beautiful actress. Within moments she blurted out: 'I can't believe I'm 46 and not married. Men only want to marry their personal assistants or P.R. women,'" Maureen Dowd says. "I'd been noticing a trend along these lines, as famous and powerful men took up with the young women whose job it was to tend to them and care for them in some way: their secretaries, assistants, nannies, caterers, flight attendants, researchers and fact-checkers. Women in staff support are the new sirens because, as a guy I know put it, they look upon the men they work for as 'the moon, the sun and the stars.' It's all about orbiting, serving and salaaming their Sun Gods. In all those great Tracy/Hepburn movies more than a half-century ago, it was the snap and crackle of a romance between equals that was so exciting. Moviemakers these days seem far more interested in the soothing aura of romances between unequals."

That leads me to ask this question: Why is it that a liberal like Maureen Dowd can get away with the assumption that women in service jobs such as secretaries, assistants, nannies, caterers, flight attendants, researchers and fact checkers are not the intellectual equal of men? Are not our economic positions in life just an accident of our birth and circumstances? Don't liberals just say that? But even without that question, where does this assumption come from that women in service jobs are not the intellectual equal of Maureen Dowd and other achieved, accomplished women? Where is it written that Tina Brown is smarter than your average flight attendant or more intellectual? Where is it written that Molly Yard or Patricia Ireland has more brains than a personal assistant? And what do we learn from this seemingly innocent little passage? We learn that the true class structures in this country often blamed on Republicans as being elitists and looking down on the downtrodden actually come from the left. It is the left that looks at somebody and says, "Hmm, black? Poor. Hmm, secretary? Stupid. Hmm, flight attendant? Bimbo." It's the left doing this. So maybe Maureen needs to reexamine what being an intellectual is.

Let's go to the end of Maureen Dowd's column. To go to the authority on whether feminism is a cruel hoax, she "asked the actress and writer Carrie Fisher, on the East Coast to promote her novel 'The Best Awful,' who confirmed that women who challenge men are in trouble. 'I haven't dated in 12 million years,' she said drily. 'I gave up on dating powerful men because they wanted to date women in the service professions. So I decided to date guys in the service professions. But then I found out that kings want to be treated like kings, and consorts want to be treated like kings, too.'" Wow, that sounds like it's going to be very difficult to be happy here, but I mean, if you're going to go to an actress as your source authority -- and also I just got a little note here from a very close friend. It says, "Far be it from me to control you, Rush, but I might suggest that you're not genuine if you don't share that some of your favorite people are accomplished women?" So I flashed back. I said, "I did that! I did that! I bunked all these studies as way too generalized and I stated I don't believe that men don't want achieved women. I said all this while you were in the grocery store buying quinoa," which is a left-wing dish that you can't find in a standard, good old fashioned American supermarket.

"Truth be told Rush is not a credible person to speak on all things marital."

I think Rush is a perfectly fine person to comment about a train wreck waiting to happen. I guess you have a problem with divorce. Do you know that it was Rush who wanted out?

Yeah. It was fabulously unromantic. I am entirely not kidding about this, this really is how we got engaged. I'm not very sentimental. Read on...

Me: I think we should get married.

Hubby: Seriously?

Me: Yes.

Hubby: Okay.

That was about three weeks after we met, and the day before he left to enter the Army. We got married when he came back from basic training.

Sometimes I wonder what possessed me to do that, because I am anything but a spontaneous person. But whatever it was, I'm very happy for it. My husband is perhaps the best thing ever to come into my life.

Okay, I'm off to bed. G'night, all!

I should imagine that we want the same thing from men as you want from us. We want a partner who loves us unconditionally, someone WITH whom to talk, dream, be silent, have fun, have a family, grow old, etc.

Um, you seem to take this criticism and carping a bit too personally.

No one is perfect and the one thing we too often do here at FR is point out others imperfections like we don't have any ourselves.

That's got to be the most random and completely unintelligible sentence I've read or heard today. You'd have an easier time trying to bait other posters into fights if your opening shot were a little more comprehendible.

Now I'm really off to bed. You're not worth going to my histology lecture groggy.

As a 40-something successful engineer bachelor, I can tell you why men marry the women Ms. Dowd mentions. They are the only ones available.

Personally, I would find a conservative (and more emotionally healthy) version of Maureen Dowd much more interesting than the helpless intellectual dilettante semi-employed fluzzies one often meets at the gym (the kind of women I gave up on long ago and will not waste another moment with). The problem is that successful single women in their 40s generally fall into one of three categories (at least the few I know do) :

1) Chronic workaholics who use their career as a convenient method to avoid forming any sort of relationship with anyone.

2) Man haters who while physically attracted to men emotionally loathe them.

3) "Liberated" women who still hold to the old cultural stereotype that the man should be the main bread winner, thus eliminating 98% - or more - of their opportunities.

Who is going to marry someone like that?

- Mark in Houston

Rush did a pretty good job of saying the right things, today.

It is amazing that we are still having the "Who's the Boss?" conversation. As someone has already said, all any of us wants is to feel loved and liked. Unfortunately, these two are not the same, and, equally unfortunately, few people are grown up enough to give unconditional love.

The 4 levels of Happiness are discussed in the book by Dr. Robert Spitzer, "Healing the Culture." Level 1 people are interested in the sensual things (filling their guts, being comfortable and accumulating things), level 2 is about being on top or recognition ("King of the hill" and competition), 3 is about living for others or a purpose outside yourself, and level 4 is realizing that God is in charge - "Thy will be done." Most people get stuck going back and forth between 1 and 2. Some who get to 3, focus on a Cause rather than truely loving someone else (or the Cause becomes so important that we forget to love people), and very few of us can let God be in charge.

(I probably vary between 1, 2, and 3, with a few seconds a year at level 4)

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