Posted on 01/01/2002 3:03:51 AM PST by Dr. Good Will Hunting
In the hours after American Airlines Flight 63 landed safely thanks to the courage and strength of the flight attendants and passengers, there was a refreshing clarity about the sexes evident in the land.
Let's review: When Richard C. Reid leaned down and began touching lighted matches to his sneakers, it was a flight attendant who first attempted to stop him. She grabbed at his hands and he shoved her so hard that she landed, according to The New York Times account, four rows back. She yelled for help, and another flight attendant attempted to thwart Reid's shoe-lighting. Reid bit her on the hand hard enough to draw blood.
When she screamed, a number of male passengers, including the 6 foot, 8 inch NBA player Kwame James responded. Using anything at hand -- including plastic handcuffs, a dozen belts offered by other passengers and, eventually, sedatives from the plane's on-board kit -- four or five large men were able to subdue the "almost possessed" Reid.
The female flight attendants deserve high marks for their courage. But the episode does reveal that physical size and strength still matter in this world. It took the advent of real danger to reawaken our politically correct society to this truth.
Three years ago, my then-5-year-old son came home from kindergarten and looked at me sympathetically. "Mom, when you were a little girl, people didn't think women could be firefighters, did they?"
I knew immediately that his teacher, a lovely lady of decidedly liberal outlook, was instructing her charges on the wonderful progress of civilization.
"Well," I said, "I'm still not sure I think women firefighters are a good idea." I explained that women had been discouraged in the past from pursuing careers at all -- and this did not make sense. There is no reason that a woman cannot try a case, run a business or heal the sick.
But when it comes to tasks requiring physical strength, well, women are still smaller than men. And while many women have just as much courage, ingenuity and self-possession in emergencies as men, only the most unusual women have the strength to carry the average overweight American out of a burning building.
We've pretended for decades now that physical differences between men and women are insignificant, and where they exist, stand as a rebuke to men. Big dumb jerks. We don't need you to hold open doors for us! I can carry my own bag, bub! Except, it turns out, that when a 6 foot, 4 inch terrorist is swatting women away like mosquitoes, you do need men -- the bigger the better -- to overpower him.
What feminists have never understood, and have actually gone out of their way to distort, is that male strength has always been viewed, in Western culture, as a responsibility, not as a weapon with which to subjugate females. Women and men have traditionally taught their sons (in all but the worst families) that with physical strength must come mental and moral strength. Boys were taught the honorable use of their power -- not to intimidate but to prevent intimidation; not to bully but to protect. Despite reams of disinformation circulated by some feminists, husbands are the last people to beat or abuse women.
Perhaps the new climate of danger -- danger from evil men -- will quiet the anti-male agitation we've endured for so long. For the threat from evil men can only adequately be met by good men. Why not cheer when the manly virtues are called for and demonstrated?
Our admiration for Rudy Giuliani is not based upon his empathy -- though he showed plenty of it -- but rather for older virtues like command, authority, competence and leadership. The businessmen on Flight 93 who whispered their farewells to their wives and families, and then set down their cell phones to take on the terrorists were real men -- the best of masculinity. Were we proud of the female flight attendant who quietly boiled water to throw at the terrorists? You bet. But if it came to a fight, mano a mano, the men would have to take the lead.
As Peggy Noonan observed in Opinion Journal, Sept. 11 has brought old-fashioned virility back into style. God bless our men, who've taken so much undeserved abuse for decades, yet never stopped being men and gentlemen.
You could become a practical pistol competitor. Many women are better at this sport than men.
Why do associate everything with sex? It seems to be the focal point of your life. I've already told you I am a woman, so that is another one of your arguments refuted into irrelevance.
And why is it you can't show mervy to the unborn? Might infringe upon your right to screw without consequences? You make me sick.
To: JMJ333
the article was written by a women
I am sure you do have an appreciation for the male dominated, subservient type of woman who wrote the article. Is that the source of you hatred of women? You hate women because most of them will not bow down at your feet? They will not submit their bodies to your control?
115 posted on 1/1/02 12:08 PM Pacific by pcl
That is really disgusting. Kind of like your posts insinuating that male pro-life posters get a sexual thrill from anti-abortion discussions. I think you owe JMJ333 an apology. Nobody expects it though, that would be too honorable.
I highly doubt that you will find many Freepers objecting to arming pilots and flight crew. In fact it has been proposed by many on this forum in reponse to the terror attacks. It would certainly do more than seizing fingernail clippers! The people who want passengers to travel like defenseless sheep tend to be at more liberal sites, not Free Republic.
Maybe so. But even in my insanity I can recognize a woman hating man when I see him posting article after article about male superiority and article after article putting down women. You are obsessed with the topic.
Proably. He wears size 7 shoes too.
The article was not really about Baby Jesus. It was another of your many male superiority articles. In this case the article was dealt with you obsession to control female bodies. The post was a totally appropriate response to your misogyny.
God still love you.
She got no break because she needed none. The standards were "dumbed down" over a decade ago in reponse to lawsuits -- both real and threatened -- filed by "feminist groups."
Now, where did that come from?
I have a question for you: Why are you so touchy?
Is that supposed to explain your obsession with the sex lives of other people?
You are the one who talks about the sex lives of others. Look at your posts. I could find a dozen where you show your bitterness towards the sex lives of other people. Last night you admitted that your obsession with abortion was due to your obsession with the sex lives of other people.
If you want to hide your obsession with sex you should stop talking about it.
In all fairness, some of this has to be laid at the feet of the public ed system.
Not all women are devoid of logic. We just need to learn to celebrate those who have it. That's a much more sensible approach than giving up on an entire gender, especially since women have the vote and outnumber men. Eh?
Perhaps you missed that part about me saying she was a firefighter for over a decade, but became a firefighter about 14-15 years ago (she hasn't been able to be a firefighter for the last few years because she has rheumatoid arthritis and can't qualify because of her physical limitations). If there were any changes in the physical agility test, they post-dated her. As I said, she had to haul a 160-165 lb. dummy, haul hose up six flights, plus a number of strength and agility tests--and wearing a vest of 40-50 lbs (to imitate the weight of turnout gear, as she just reminded me). Some of the departments, as another freeper said, lowered the weight of the dummy haul to 125 lbs., but that wasn't the case when she took the test.
With all due respect, there's not a word in the article that indicates that the writer is either "male-dominated" or "subservient." Perhaps you are projecting your own experiences into a text that seems rather neutral overall?
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