Yeah I get it, as per the usual.  I don't ordinarily read the people who write editorials for the NYT, so thanks for that, I guess, but now I want to kick Douthat's editor in the head.

He wrote:

I have to be fair, because I’m writing one — in this particular tragedy, the killer’s motives really do seem to have a larger cultural significance.

If Douthat were an honest man, and of course he is not, he would recognize the real significance of what happened with this young man, which is this, no matter how much money his parents had access too, they were unable to help their very mentally ill son. That is a direct reflection on our society no doubt about it, but has absolutely nothing to do with feminism. As a matter of fact he even admits that the kid was mentally ill, why go further than that? Oh because he has to find a way to bring the culture war into his piece and to blame feminism and he does it because conservatives will believe him for sure! But the real gist of his story is he is basically saying if people were forced to get married to have sex this wouldn't have happened, which is, well quite insane actually, but typical of a conservative guy who is looking for the easy answer to explain the actions of a mentally ill man. Complexity is their enemy, simplicity is better for sound bites.

Post-modern feminism throws out old gender roles and replaces them with clearly defined goals of women as professionals who are in control of their domestic and professional life. It doesn't really define anything at all for men, just that the old way is done. It also assumes that patriarchy and male social dominance is a fact of life so it really provides little at all for men when we enter a society in which women are more upwardly mobile.

Feminism's assumption that patriarchy is behind everything naturally translates to assumptions of bad intentions on men by women who follow the ideology. Most men have experienced this while dating - it's a little like white people who make sure their car doors is locked when a black person walks by. I've had employers ask me, before I even said anything in an interview, if I "had a problem working under a woman" and had female acquaintances (they weren't friends after pulling this) assume the very worst intentions based on my gender.

I long gave up on the whole dating world - relationships usually come around naturally from shared interests and experiences - but when I did, that is when the bad assumptions of feminism were worst. The dating world feels like a police department line up, especially with women who assume the men they are dating are naturally malevolent. I also wonder if that assumption also leads to women staying with genuinely abusive men because they simply don't believe good men exist. Men are naturally going to become a bit resentful when they are treated like "guilty until proven innocent" criminals when they are only looking for work or love, just as women are resentful about being only represented sexually in media or taken advantage of in male dominated fields like auto repair.

Nevertheless, I think it's very dangerous to have this conversation due to Elliot Rodger. The man was psychotic and psychotic people have all sorts of strange reasons for their behavior. There was another murderer who called himself a "socialist" and God knows what Jared Loughner's politics were. We do need to have an open discussion about gender especially given the momentous changes in our society but we taint the whole argument by affiliating it with a murderer. The core of the conversation with someone like him should be renewing mental institutions and involuntary commitment because that is something that was clearly needed for him, Jared Loughner and Adam Lanza.

I don't know what in the hell Douthat is trying to say.  All I know is I'm not taking even a mili-inch of blame for what those man-boys think about women and sexuality.  And no other woman should do it, either.

They've built their own fantasy world around women, and subservience is their wet dream.  If we were all boobs and vaginas their happiness might be complete, but, as we keep trying to tell everybody, they are not the sum total of our parts.

There are some sick bastards out there and because they're basically cowards they buy into the myth that women are the weaker sex and thus should be ripe for abuse.  Douthat is right that men have to learn to respect themselves, but again it shouldn't be women who have to pay the price when they don't.

He'a right, too, that there is more emphasis today on sex than on intimacy or relationships--in life, in the movies, in music.  It's hard for young people to sort those things out in the midst of a society that seems so hyper-sexual.  So should women hide their sexuality and stay virginal until marriage because men can't control their own feelings?  Or should men get over themselves and learn to control their baser instincts? 

I would think after centuries of murderous misogyny there would be enough men who would be getting tired of making excuses for it and would finally do something about it.

Douthat shows his cards when he calls Jessica Valenti's article on how misogyny kills  "a splendid little culture war".    Tell that to the woman who was just stoned to death by males in her own family for marrying someone they didn't approve of.  Or the woman waiting in prison to be lashed to death for loving someone outside her country's religion.

Maybe I'm just tired and it'll make sense in the morning, but--not that it matters--I've read his last sentence over and over again and I don't get it:

But they might drain some of the swamps that are forming, slowly, because our society has lost sight of a basic human truth: A culture that too tightly binds sex and self-respect is likely, in the long run, to end up with less and less of both.