Fear drives creation. For example, horror films often occur in cycles, wherein social fears of the time are reflected through genre tropes, such as “independent slasher films with movies like Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) [which] came at a time following the particularly bloody and brutal Vietnam War (Dewan). Audiences were seeing horrors of the war and subsequent riots in real life and on the news, as well as chaos and gore on screen in the film. As such, the horror genre works across time by constantly adapting to what events occur in the real world, attempting to both intensify the fear factor of its films, as well as help viewers process the societal fears they faced in reality by presenting them on screen. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941) and Rosemary’s Baby (1968) are no exceptions to this, the former reflecting concerns of evilness of man as Hitler rose to power and the latter reflecting fears of the occult and satanic practices, each utilizing the iconographies of their respective horror genre cycle and practices of the eras of film they were made in to enhance these fears” (Um). In 2016, home invasion films were in vogue, with entries to the genre such as “Hush”, “Don’t Breathe”, “Green Room”, “Mercy”, “Intruder” and “Purge: Election Year” (Romano). Horror genre films that stand out amongst their peers often reflect lasting fears and anxieties, such as zombie movies, which have reflected everything from racial issues, such as in “Night of the Living Dead”, to consumerism, a la “Dawn of the Dead”, and even fear of pandemics and illness, like in “28 days later”.
Science fiction “renaissances… occur during dynamic and fraught periods of technological and societal upheaval” (Dennis). Mary Shelley’s Frankenstien came during the first industrial revolution, as the Matrix originated during the rise of the personal computer and the internet. However, when the focus centers more on the impact technologies will have on our culture, and on social commentary above all else, it tends to be referred to more as speculative fiction than science fiction. Regardless, it’s easy to recognize how social anxieties are filtered through the films and books we consume. So what does the recurrence of the same theme over and over say?
Harrison Bergerson is a short story by Kurt Vonngut, which takes place “in the year 2081, [when] the Constitution dictates that all Americans are fully equal and not allowed to be smarter, better-looking, or more physically able than anyone else. The Handicapper General's agents enforce the equality laws, forcing citizens to wear "handicaps": masks for those who are too beautiful, earpiece radios for the intelligent that broadcast loud noises meant to disrupt thoughts, and heavy weights for the strong or athletic” (Wikipedia). The opening lines of the short story are “THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren't only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General.” In it, the parents of Harrison Bergerson watch a tv broadcast in which their son, who was taken away from them at age fourteen, storms the studio. He has been handicapped like everyone else, but as a result of them, they have only made him stronger and more extraordinary than those around him. His resistance is futile, however, as even as he frees several people from their handicaps, including musicians and a ballerina, he is quickly killed by the Handicapper General.
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World takes place in New London, in a so-called utopia governed by three rules: no privacy, no monogamy, and no family. Every aspect of the citizens' lives are ruled by the government, from their artificially controlled conception, to their childhoods in government raising centers, to their capabilities and designations in society. Because of this inability to control anything about oneself, John the Savage, born to a woman from the new world accidentally left behind and pregnant in the U.S., shakes up this New London as he opposes these issues, namely the anti-intellectualism, the consumerism which eventually ruins any possibility of individuality via making everyone everyone else’s, and the incompatibility of truth and happiness; doing so leads to his death. While Orwell’s 1984 posited that altering the past would allow for control over a populace, Huxley argues that degrading the individual was the key to population control.
More recently, we have movies such as Idiocracy, where the intellect of the human race has decreased so sharply that the most average man in the army becomes one of the most intelligent in the world when he wakes up from cryogenic sleep 500 years later; or They Live, which philosopher and psychoanalyst Slavoj Žižek describes as “one of the forgotten masterpieces of the Hollywood Left. … The sunglasses function like a critique of ideology. They allow you to see the real message beneath all the propaganda, glitz, posters and so on. … When you put the sunglasses on, you see the dictatorship in democracy, the invisible order which sustains your apparent freedom” (BBFC).
All of these stories center on the danger of giving the government too much control, which quickly becomes dehumanizing, even when in the hope of improving society. These also reflect fears of social manias, which gain power and prominence so quickly that it is often impossible to see how negatively they will impact the world, and those who do have this foresight are gravely punished. Additionally, they illustrate a fear of idiocy, and complacency, which brings us to ‘Mania’, Lionel Shriver’s newest novel, which tackles these topics with an all too relevant take.
‘Mania’ is presented as the memoirs of Pearson Converse as she chronicles the rise of the Mental Parity Party, and its impact on her family and the world around them through an alternate history. The Mental Parity movement posited that implying differences in intelligence was the last civil rights fight, wh
The novel begins with Pearson’s son being sent home from school for bullying. When she arrives at the school, the assistant principal tells her that her son called another child a slur.
“I’m afraid your son ridiculed one of his classmates,” the assistant principal informed me. “He employed language we consider unacceptable in a supportive environment, and which I will not repeat.” The official thrust her formidable breasts upward, dramatizing a haughty bearing in little need of emphasis.
“Well, most kids try bad language on for size-”
“Playground obscenities would be one thing. Slurs are quite another. This is a suspension level offense. Any similar violation in the future could merit expulsion.”
The second in command didn’t let me go without adding a warning. “I do hope he isn’t picking up this kind of derogatory vocabulary because it’s commonplace at home.”
“I assure you we’re very civilized.”
“Any number of civilizations of times past held views we find abhorrent today. I think you know what I mean, Ms. Converse. This is a forward-looking institution.”
By the gravity of the conversation, one might expect Pearson’s son to have used language that fulfils the definition of a slur, which differs from a mere insult. As noted in, “Slurs, Pejoratives, and Hate Speech,” “Slurring is a type of hate speech meant to harm individuals simply because of their group membership. It not only offends but also causes oppression. Slurs have some strange properties. Target groups can reclaim slurs, so as to express solidarity and pride. Slurs are noted for their “offensive autonomy” (they offend regardless of speakers’ intentions, attitudes, and beliefs) and for their “offensive persistence,” as well as for their resistance to cancellation (they offend across a range of contexts and utterances). They are also noted for their “offense variation” (not all slurs offend equally) and for the complicity they may induce in listeners. Slurs signal identity affiliations; they cue and re-entrench ideologies.” (Popa)
In other words, they must be specifically derogative to a person not based on personal merit or individual action, but based on broad membership with a group, which is not a choice. For example, racial slurs, or slurs based on sexuality or sex differ from merely calling someone a “tool”, or a “dick.” These insults are not earned, but bestowed, and it is very obvious when one is used incorrectly, because the association with a particular group cannot be divested. However, when Pearson gets home, it’s revealed that the ‘slur’ in question is not a slur at all.
“It was about a t-shirt,” Darwin said sourly at last.
“And?”
“Stevie was wearing one that said, ‘If you're so smart, why aren't you smart?”
I guffawed. “God that's lame! it doesn't even make sense.”
“That's what I said. Actually, all I said is that it was stupid.”
“The S-word.”
“I didn't call Stevie stupid. I said his T-shirt was.”
Stupid Stevie had to ring that in my day would have made it irresistible.
“Well …” I said. “When you wear a stupid shirt, that can’t help but suggest that you're a little bit stupid yourself.”
“I don't understand the rules anymore!” Darwin exploded. “Okay, so a person can't be stupid. You've explained why, over and over, and no, I still don’t see how, like, as of, like, one day back around the beginning of 5th grade suddenly a fucking doof head wasn't a fucking doofhead anymore.”
if I curse the kids only on principal, I had no place being pretty about my kids language at home.
“But, okay, I get it. I don't call anyone the S-word or a bunch of other words. But can a thing still be stupid, like a shirt? Can an idea be stupid? Can anything be stupid, or is everything intelligent now?
I squinted. “I'm not sure. Calling everything intelligent might get you into trouble, too.”
“This junk is all anyone cares about anymore! But it's not like we don't all know which kids are total pea-brains. The teachers are always calling on them and no matter what they say it's always, ‘Ooh, Jennifer that's so wise!’ And then when one of the thickos claims five times seven is 62, our math teacher says, ‘Excellent! That's one answer and a very good answer. So would anyone else like to contribute a different answer?”
I suppose none of this was funny, really; still, I couldn't help but laugh. I know I'm not objective, but mothers aren't meant to be, and my son Charmed the pants off of me.
“I swear, the teachers are actually afraid of the class dummies”, Darwin continued. “The dimwits are never called out for talking during lessons or not turning in their homework. I guess now not doing your homework is just a different and totally wise way of doing your homework. Meanwhile, the dummies are becoming a pain in the butt. They walk around with their noses in the air like they're so special, and they're always in the lookout for something you said that they jump on and take the wrong way. Like, Aaron told this girl Wendy that her new phone case was super dope. He was just trying to be nice and also to sound cool, but she punched him in the arm and reported him to the new MPC -” At my quizzical look, he spelled out, “Mental parity champion. I think all the schools have them. Anyway, Aaron's forced to apologize in front of the class, because Wendy and the NPC were both too clueless to know that ‘dope’ means ‘great’.”
“I have a funny feeling that you said is on the way out,” I said. “Listen, you don't say words like ‘thicko’ and ‘dummy’ at school, do you?” “Of course not. That will make me a dummy and a thicko, wouldn't it? But I don't understand why we can't stick up for what we think. I don't understand why we have to go along with this junk.”
I confess that I took pleasure in the cozy collusion of our heretical household. Yet I worried that my determination to preserve a sanctum of sanity behind closed doors put the kids in a parlous position. “There’s obviously something to be said for staying true to what we believe,” I said. “But we have to be prudent. Pick our spots. This new way of thinking about people is bigger than we are. If we stick up for what we believe in the wrong way, we don't accomplish anything, aside from doing ourselves a great deal of damage.” In due course, I’d have been better off delivering this speech to myself.
You mean we just have to go along with everyone else because we're outnumbered, or because, if we don't, we'll be punished. What's the difference between your ‘being prudent’ and being a ‘fucking coward’?”
“There's no difference,” I said heavily. “Now, get your coat.”
It should be obvious now that this book is a satire, and a clever one. While it can apply broading to a number of current social manias, I would argue it’s best reflective of the current gender ideology movement, wherein suggesting basic facts- that biological sex is immutable- is construed as hate speech, and while many people disagree with this ideology, many go along with it out of intimidation and fear of being punished. We use preferred pronouns, and coddle those who argue that their gender identity does make them different from regular men and women, that that difference is both oppressive and bestows upon them a righteousness that sets them above others. The atmosphere of fear that is created from giving these people so much power also gives others the impetus to identify into and support that group.
Those who hesitate or point out the obvious issues in ignoring reality in favor of a preferable lie are consistently painted as bigots and stalwarts holding onto outdated ideals.
The inciting book for the Mental Parity movement was ‘The Calumny Of Iq: Why Discrimination Against “Dumb People” Is The Last Great Civil Rights Fight’, which Pearson notes she never finished, and that few others did either.
If I'd never finished Carswell Dreyfus- Boxford's game-changing, era-defining magnum opus, That just made me like most people. It was one of those commonplace door stops that everyone bought and nobody read. At best, the ambitious got through the set-piece introduction of 40 pages, full of heart-rending antidotes of capable young people whose self-esteem was crushed by an early diagnosis of subparent intelligence. Once you adjusted the thesis that all perceived variation in human intelligence merely came down to ‘processing issues’, you could skip all the tedious twin studies, cohort graphs, and demonstrations of IQ scores being lowers by 15 to 20 points depending on whathaveyou. Initially, the “cerebral elite”- academics, doctors and lawyers, scientists- lampooned that notion that stupidity is a fiction as exceptionally stupid (whatever they say now). Yet, as the drive for intellectual leveling gathered steam, it was the sharpest tacks among the elect who jumped on the fashionable bandwagon first.
This in turn reflects that few people seem to actually research the ideas that they champion, especially if they serve a purpose that supports their already held ideology, similar to how the Sokal Hoax was published in part because it checked all of the boxes for what was academically in vogue, regardless of if it made any sense.
The Sokal Hoax was conducted by Alan Sokal, a professor of mathematics, and a scholar of physics to demonstrate “the lack of intellectual rigor evident in many academic journals. He accomplished this by submitting a gibberish article to Social Test, an academic journal of cultural studies, in 1996 (Sokal). Sokal wanted to determine if "a leading North American journal of cultural studies—whose editorial collective includes such luminaries as Fredric Jameson and Andrew Ross—[would] publish an article liberally salted with nonsense if (a) it sounded good and (b) it flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions” (Sokal). He called this paper, "Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity".
An excerpt from the paper reads as follows:
“It has… become increasingly apparent that physical ‘reality,’ no less than social ‘reality,’ is at bottom a social and linguistic construct; that scientific ‘knowledge,’ far from being objective, reflects and encodes the dominant ideologies and power relations of the culture that produced it; that the truth claims of science are inherently theory-laden and self-referential; and consequently, that the discourse of the scientific community, for all its undeniable value, cannot assert a privileged epistemological status with respect to counter-hegemonic narratives emanating from dissident or marginalized communities. These themes can be traced, despite some differences of emphasis, in Aronowitz’s analysis of the cultural fabric that produced quantum mechanics in Ross’ discussion of oppositional discourses in post-quantum science; in Irigaray’s and Hayles’ exegeses of gender encoding in fluid mechanics; and in Harding’s comprehensive critique of the gender ideology underlying the natural sciences in general and physics in particular”. (Spike Magazine)
Sokal notes:
“In the first paragraph I deride "the dogma imposed by the long post-Enlightenment hegemony over the Western intellectual outlook":
That there exists an external world, whose properties are independent of any individual human being and indeed of humanity as a whole; that these properties are encoded in "eternal" physical laws; and that human beings can obtain reliable, albeit imperfect and tentative, knowledge of these laws by hewing to the "objective" procedures and epistemological strictures prescribed by the (so-called) scientific method.
IS IT NOW dogma in cultural studies that there exists no external world? Or that there exists an external world but science obtains no knowledge of it?
In the second paragraph I declare, without the slightest evidence or argument, that "physical 'reality' [note the scare quotes]...is at bottom a social and linguistic construct." Not our theories of physical reality, mind you, but the reality itself. Fair enough: Anyone who believes that the laws of physics are mere social conventions is invited to try transgressing those conventions from the windows of my apartment. (I live on the twenty-first floor.)
Throughout the article, I employ scientific and mathematical concepts in ways that few scientists or mathematicians could possibly take seriously. For example, I suggest that the "morphogenetic field"--a bizarre New Age idea proposed by Rupert Sheldrake--constitutes a cutting-edge theory of quantum gravity. This connection is pure invention; even Sheldrake makes no such claim. I assert that Lacan's psychoanalytic speculations have been confirmed by recent work in quantum field theory. Even nonscientist readers might well wonder what in heaven's name quantum field theory has to do with psychoanalysis; certainly my article gives no reasoned argument to support such a link.
Later in the article I propose that the axiom of equality in mathematical set theory is somehow analogous to the homonymous concept in feminist politics. In reality, all the axiom of equality states is that two sets are identical if and only if they have the same elements. Even readers without mathematical training might well be suspicious of the claim that the axiom of equality reflects set theory's "nineteenth-century liberal origins."
In sum, I intentionally wrote the article so that any competent physicist or mathematician (or undergraduate physics or math major) would realize that it is a spoof. Evidently, the editors of Social Text felt comfortable publishing an article on quantum physics without bothering to consult anyone knowledgeable in the subject.
What concerns me is the proliferation, not just of nonsense and sloppy thinking per se, but of a particular kind of nonsense and sloppy thinking: one that denies the existence of objective realities, or (when challenged) admits their existence but downplays their practical relevance. At its best, a journal like Social Text raises important issues that no scientist should ignore--questions, for example, about how corporate and government funding influence scientific work. Unfortunately, epistemic relativism does little to further the discussion of these matters” (Sokal).
Sound familiar?
It should be. This is the type of language often used by postmodernists, which at this point envelopes most of the humanities in academia. Perhaps one of the most influential of our time is Judith Butler, who once wrote:
“The move from a structuralist account in which capital is understood to structure social relations in relatively homologous ways to a view of hegemony in which power relations are subject to repetition, convergence, and rearticulation brought the question of temporality into the thinking of structure, and marked a shift from a form of Althusserian theory that takes structural totalities as theoretical objects to one in which the insights into the contingent possibility of structure inaugurate a renewed conception of hegemony as bound up with the contingent sites and strategies of the rearticulation of power.” (Roberts)
This obfustication of language comes alongside a radical decrease in literacy and critical thinking ability. As reported on Snopes.com, "Literacy rate" is defined by UNESCO Institute for Statistics as “the percentage of the population of a given age group that can read and write.” A 2019 study ranked the US as 125th for literacy, while data collected by the U.S. Department of Education published in 2020 found that 130 million adults in the country have low literacy skills. In other words, more than half (54%) of Americans between the ages of 16 and 74 read below the equivalent of a sixth-grade level. According to an empirical study by Xiaohua Hu and Hongwei Zhang, published in the Journal of Language Teaching and Research, it was found that “...improvements in critical thinking are paralleled by improvements in reading comprehension. They believe that the presence of such a strong relationship may be due to the fact that critical thinking and reading are both cognitive abilities which have some identifiable cognitive skills in common…” In other words, if one goes up, so does the other; and if one goes down….
The wave of anti-intellectualism and performativity that Sokal was hoping to expose is the same that supports gender ideology, and in ‘Mania’, supports the Mental Parity Movement. It is the same rabid belief in the superiority of sudden change that creates this deep rift between those who still believe in the unfortunate reality of material differences and inequality, and those who prefer to chase the fiction that such thinking is based solely on social constructs. At a dinner party with Pearson’s best friend and her new boyfriend, Pearson notes:
“I'm astonished by how fast this new way of thinking about human intelligence installed itself, I said. “And I'm not quite sure who installed it. The pace of ideological change has been dizzying.”
“Funny,” Roger said, “that's not my experience at all. I'm always shocked when I remind myself what a short time it's been, because to me it seems as if we've banned cognitive discrimination for years and years.”
I was perplexed by Emory had yet to jump in - say, right here, maybe along the lines of ‘That's because I'm something horrendous is happening, time slows to a crawl’. But she just sat there, submitting to her new boyfriend's many claim-laying touches as he sat encroachingly close to her on the couch - a stroke of a cheek there, a brush of her shoulder there, three fingers on her knee.
“As for my experience in the classroom this fall,” I said, “if it were only the open admissions, that would be... difficult... challenging enough. But something else has changed.” I was sick of walking on eggshells in my own home, especially after picking bits of shell from my feet on return from the University multiple days a week, so I raised the frankness quotient at tad. “The students, especially the freshman, display inexplicable pugnacity. They all wear those ‘Iquit’ badges, which are now as ubiquitous as smiley face buttons when I was a kid. Because the badges are almost a requirement, they don't distinguish the zealots from the more passive students just swimming at the side. Still, the zealots have ways of making themselves known. They choose desks toward the front of the room. They sit there glaring, often with their arms crossed, positively daring me to try to teach them something they don’t know- as if they’re sure they know it already, or if they don't, it's not worth knowing. They’re smug, and they're surly. Also very touchy and on the lookout. Darwin told me the... that certain students display the same cunning, predatory watchfulness even in his primary school. It’s as if the purpose of going to college is to test the faculty and not the students.”
You’ll note here several running themes. One is the intrusion into the home, both from outside authorities such as the school, which insists it knows better than parents and presses that ideology onto it’s students; as well as the power held by those devoted to the cause over those who aren’t. This is followed by a pressure to ‘keep the peace’, not by restraining the rabid desire to tattle on others or impress your ideology upon them, but on those who dissent. The idea is that since you are overwhelmed, you might as well give up. In a way, those who privately disagree but who continue to publicly support what they know to be incorrect and wrong are even more dangerous than those who are outwardly oppositional, as it’s far harder to discern if, and how deep they might stab you in the back to save their own skin. The concept of the home being a place where one can speak freely, as a refuge, is decimated under the overwhelming pressure to submit.
Another theme is the dedication to ‘being kind’, and going with the narrative, rather than rocking the boat. This is both a misguided impulse, as it posits kindness and preventing hurt feelings are more important than the implications of doing so, which we’ve seen in the real world via the harm done to women and women’s spaces, and which will be revealed in the book later on.
The harm done to children is also a major point, as Pearson chose artificial insemination to have two of her kids, and chose the donor based on his high intelligence. As the rise of the Mental Parity Party decimates the efficacy of the school system, it also explicitly harms her children in various ways, including by depriving them of a sorely needed education and freedom of speech. On the other hand, her third daughter, Lucy, is raised in the midst of this social movement and is also irrevocably shaped by this ideology. In terms of gender ideology, this reflects the girls who decide to transition due to increased misogyny, as well as those who do it out of a fetish, or as an attempt to avoid being persecuted for being homosexual.
This is facilitated by the division of adults. There are those who are fanatic believers, such as Roger, who genuinely believes that differences in intelligence are a harmful lie; there are opportunists and cowards, such as Emory, who chose to play along in public, while hiding in private in order to save her own career, even at the expense of lending support to a harmful ideology; Wade, Pearson’s husband, believes that it is best to simply stay out of it and to keep his head down out of a misguided belief that it will remain someone else’s problem; and of course, there are true oppositionists, such as Pearson, who are vocal about their disagreement, even to their own detriment. You can find these same divisions in support of gender ideology, especially as in the last few years, the impact of equating sex and gender identity has become increasingly apparent and more difficult to deny.
In a large part, this stems from Pearson’s inherently oppositional personality, which led her to leave her Jehovah’s Witness family and to be adopted by Emory’s parents as a teen; her inability to go along with what she knows to be wrong, regardless of social punishment, but sets her apart from her peers, and causes her to lose everything. Although portrayed as an extremist by most who oppose her, she remains a very moderate and logical person, if somewhat steered by her own anger, even as there is a swing of the pendulum at the end of the book. There is no room for nuance, or disagreement. Any opposition to the Mental Parity movement, no matter how peaceful or bland, is viewed as bigoted by nature, even and especially when there are factual arguments involved. For example,
“That new book The Cognitive Pay Gap? Which also argues it’s ‘perceived’ intelligence that overwhelmingly explains income inequality? I think the author’s dismissal of discrimination by race, sex and sexual orientation is outrageous. He's fundamentally making a category error. Racial discrimination is not only real but genuinely unfair. Skin color bears no relation to ability. but the reason you don't hire a dummy for an intellectually demanding job is that he can't do it.”
In the same vein, we don’t allow trans women, or more accurately, trans-identified males into women’s spaces because it is a fact that gendered violence exists. It is a fact that allowing a man into a women's prison leads to rape. Ignoring this based on a misplaced belief that trans women are women ignores the reality of sex-based oppression, rape and domestic violence. It ignores sexual differences between men and women which impact how we live and interact with one another. Just as the steadfast belief that trans women are women has led to a myriad of problems, so too does the belief that intelligence differences are not real.
One issue is that the creation of an opt-in oppressed class wherein a claim to victimization is as simple as saying you were once called ‘stupid’, leads to the erasure of support for actual victimized groups. Over the course of the Mental Parity Movement, the battle for gay marriage is abandoned because everyone is so caught up in the new, more fashionable oppression; it also leads to President Obama only getting one term in office because, as Emory notes, “Nobody gives a crap about his being a black president. He’s a know it all president. It’s death. Even Romney has kept a foot on his own head- little words, Me, Keep you more money… Obama just keeps spooling out elegantly subordinated sentences with that arch, amused, slightly despairing look on his face. He doesn’t get it.”
What better reflection of how people of color- black, hispanic, indigenous, from the global south- all the groups with actual lived experience with oppression, are ignored unless they talk the party line that ‘trans women are women.”
Later in the novel, Wade, who is a tree surgeon, is forced to hire an unqualified employee due to the leverage the employee holds over him due to an accidental utterance of ‘idiot’. Because Wade is not a part of academia, and for the most part was able to avoid the impact of this ideology, he made the mistake of not caring until this point. However, this leads to a life-changing injury, as the employee doesn’t follow workplace safety, and ends up breaking his wrist and ankle. The surgery is done by a young man who graduated med school under this ideology, and thus was never tested for competency or ability; he ends up harming Wade further, leading to him never recovering from what could have been a minor surgery.
After attempting to teach her youngest daughter to read is relayed to Lucy’s school, it is rewarded by a visit from CPS, who notes that forcing her daughter to read is tantamount to abuse, even if it obviously is an important trait to impart, and leaves Lucy with the power to potentially get not just herself, but all three of Pearson’s kids removed from the home on claims of child abuse. This is an obvious reflection of gender ideology leading to broken homes, such as in the case of Sage Blair, a teen who ran away to meet an online friend, and after she was found, was not allowed to return to her grandparents home, who had a complaint of abuse lodged against them.
“They [the state authorities] would not even let me talk, hug, or see her the day after she went through the rape exam,” Michele told Reduxx, and added that the experience was, “heartbreaking, to say the least.”
Instead, they were required to appear in court that same afternoon, as they were being investigated for child abuse over alleged “misgendering.”
Michele and Roger would later discover that the investigation had been requested by the public defender, who had contacted two school counselors to testify against them. The counselors would argue that Sage should not be returned to her home due to a lack of a sufficiently “gender affirming” environment.
“Upon my arrival I was told my granddaughter would not be allowed to return to Virginia,” Michele had stated in May. “Sage was now being represented by a juvenile attorney and my husband and I were going to be investigated for ‘abuse’ because my husband and I called her Sage and not Draco.” (Lineham)
Just as misgendering is viewed as child abuse, so too was any attempt to improve intelligence, or even imply that intelligence existed. The targeting of kids, both as pawns to keep parents in line, and as converts to this new way of thinking can also be seen in the prevalence of preaching books, which discuss topics like, men having children, kids having gender identity, and the importance of respecting pronouns. Similarly, in Mania, Lucy receives a copy of ‘All my Friends Are Clever’ for her seventh birthday, even as she was unable to read due to the lax in educational standards. Lucy’s indoctrination is harmful in more ways than one, as after the collapse of the Mental Parity movement, a pendulum swing leads to an obsession with intelligence instead, echoing fears of the pushback to gender ideology leading to increased homophobia and misogyny. In this post Mental Parity environment, those who were raised under this ideology are now sincerely oppressed, as many are now incapable of learning the skills needed to catch up to where they would otherwise be. Illiteracy is high. Few know geography. And the antagonism against these people lacks the sympathy of understanding that the young people who grew up under this ideology did not ask for it. They had little control over it. They did what they were indoctrinated to do, which is hauntingly reminiscent of the ways that detransitoners are treated today.
The reality of intelligence is that there are differences in mental capability, just as there are differences in sex. Smart people differ from dumb people, just as women differ from men. In the case of intelligence, there is a needed hierarchy based on ability, and by not only ignoring the importance of capability, but in actively seeking people who best fit an identity, it leads to systematic collapse. In the case of Mania, this means people who are unfit to do positions such as doctor or engineer leads to major deaths from medical malpractice, and building collapses, but it also creates a broader impact by making it impossible to trust anything manufactured in the U.S. to work properly. When trans-identified people are placed in positions of power without the ability or merit to do the work, there forms an entitlement, out of knowledge that kicking them out would look bad, and thus, that they have almost free reign to do as they please.
Quite simply, some distinctions are important, regardless of if one wants to acknowledge this. Sex based oppression remains even when you try to remove the words to discuss it. Additionally, status quo often returns, and rarely displaces the targets of these policies, as it becomes easy to opt in to an identity that will allow one to be promoted; such as what Emory does, wherein she continues to spout the party line, until it backfires, and she switched sides; this occurs because she is intelligent, is a sell-out, and works out the obvious ways to game the system.
By controlling the language with which to refer to reality, the Mental Parity Party is able to effectively control reality. For example, language is used to heighten division between opposing groups, and to incite an environment of social division. Emory plays into this in her radio, and eventually, television broadcasts. One of her broadcasts is as follows:
“I’ve never been wholly on board with the term “dog whistle” as a metaphor for wink and nod prejudice. Only dogs can hear whistles. By implication, only the intended audience for these coded signals can detect the latent hate-mongering. Supposedly, the rest of us sit there in her innocence as if no one has said anything the least untoward. But in my experience, so-called dog whistles register planning to the ordinary human ear. Their messaging isn't subtle. We can all hear what the speakers are really saying loud and clear.
Ever since the mental parody movement roiled over our backward institutions and finally issued in a fair, more decent, more respectful public protocol, we've all recognized that a host of snubs and put downs have grown unacceptable. We know what those words are and how savagely they’ve been used in the past to disparage and dehumanize. But all social progress is doomed to be halting. After our one step forward, too many of our contemporaries are shuffling two steps back.
Start paying attention to friends, coworkers, even politicians who would never be caught dead using the kind of language that I'm hardly going to cite on this broadcast; NPR has strict guidelines that will prevent my doing so even if I were so recklessly inclined. But too many of our fellow Americans - seemingly biddable, seemingly polite, obedient to the strict letter the cultural law - have meanwhile been developing a whole new secret code to convey exactly the prejudice we're trying so strenuously to eliminate. Evasive, subtext laden phrasing functions as a “get this”- as a sharp but surreptitious elbow in the ribs.
I can't count the times I've heard the people we now call alternative processors flagged up in conversation, but they're always slowly identified as “unconventional”, “special”, “offbeat”, or “eccentric”. Folks also known as the “otherwise” may be described as having “exceptional intelligence”, by which the speaker really means, wink-wink, exceptionally low intelligence. True, this persecuted caste once slandered outright, in a raft of flagrant insults having grown repugnant is cause for celebration. But I’ve encountered this crafty new language many times at this very radio station. Nowadays, rather than be subjected to brazen ridicule, what the otherwise propose in the workplace is coyly characterized as ‘less than ideal,’ or ‘perhaps not the wholly thought out,” What they write might be described as ‘not fully developed’, ‘a promising start’, ‘in need of another go through’, or ‘just a little bit short of perfect’. What they say is gently dismissed as ‘a tad unclear’, ‘a touch garbled’, ‘reliant on weak logic’, ‘based on a dubious factual foundation’, or even - boldly, baldly, as ‘wrong’.
These aren't dog whistles. They're human whistles. We can all hear them. And sometimes the whistle is at its most shrill when no one says anything at all. There's a look- a conspiratorial meeting of eyes between members of what was, until so recently, a spoiled, protected elect. It means, “Oh, for pity’s sake”. It means “Not long ago, you and I would have been able to tell this inferior specimen to take a hike, and now, darn it, we can't”. It means “We recognize each other. The rules may have superficially changed, but people like us are still in charge. We will continue to reap most of society's rewards and have everything our own way”.
So I have a modest proposal. Let's retire the expression “alternative processor”, which I think we would all agree has acquired a taint. I'm even lukewarm on ‘the otherwise,’ which really just means the wise and that refers to the whole human race. If you ask which term we should use instead, I say let's not nominate any term. Human brains are all the same. Wisdom is the preserve not of the few but of the multitude. If there’s no such thing as people with measurably deficient mental ability, then we don't need a name for them at all.
In addition, it's time to stop letting soft, indirect prejudice pass unaddressed. When colleagues brush off suggestions from certain people as ‘poorly reasoned’ or ‘likely to have unintended consequences’, press them on what they really meant to imply. Don't cooperate with wink-wink bigotry, but make an example of these dinosaurs and so put everyone present on notice that even thinly discussed discrimination will not be tolerated. And if someone meets your eyes with that familiar look of frustration, which they imagine is mutual, don’t cooperate. Don’t flick your pupils upward, but glare back with a challenge: “What are you looking at me for? If you have some kind of problem with intellectual egalitarianism, you’ll find no quarter with me.”
How reminiscent of the claims that there is no such thing as being female. There is no meaningful distinction between trans women and actual women, because really, if you think trans women are women, then the trans doesn’t have to be said, now does it? See the headlines, the news reports, the impossibility of telling how many men are in women’s prisons, the rising female crime rates- this is happening now. And of course, anyone who might think to protest this for any reason will be called bigoted, for surely, there is an extra meaning to innocuous phrases like ‘trans women are trans women’ that spell out extra hatred.
To anyone who considers themselves ‘gender critical’, or a ‘feminist’, or perhaps just ‘sane’, I would urge you to read ‘Mania’. You’re blood pressure will rise. You will feel anger roil, just as it does for Pearson; no other book seems to have captured the feeling of watching the world go mad, and being told that you are the one to blame for knowing simple facts. This book does not deny flaws- Pearson has pride, in both herself and her children, and despite how Emory betrays her, she still seeks to hold onto that relationship; even when her relationship with her daughter Lucy is ruined, she does not deny that her own animosities played a role, just as a parent might still be to blame for a ruined relationship with a trans child, even if from an understandable perspective. Pearson is flawed. We all are too. It is part of what makes this satire so biting, and its protagonist so compelling. It’s warnings are also easily applicable to our own realities- namely, the importance of speaking up, and the danger of being complacent.
After all, those who think that the insanity is only temporary play their own part in these massive changes. As Pearson notes, “Social hysterias do not stand still. If they are not yet losing steam, they are getting worse. And this one was getting worse. Radical movements keep ratcheting up their demands, because nothing enervates a cause more than success.” And what better example of this in modern day America, than gender ideology?
Works Cited BBFC. “The Pervert's Guide to Ideology.” BBFC, http://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/perverts-guide-ideology-film. Accessed 30 April 2024. Dennis, Tracy. “Why Science Fiction Speaks the Language of Anxiety.” Psychology Today, 1 March 2022, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/more-feeling/202203/why-science-fiction-speaks-the-language-anxiety. Accessed 30 April 2024. Lineham, Graham. “A “Trans Teen” Was Removed From Her Parent's Care. Then She Was Sexually Abused.” The Glinner Update, 27 October 2022, https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/a-trans-teen-was-removed-from-her. Accessed 30 April 2024. Popa, Mihaela. “Slurs, Pejoratives, and Hate Speech - Philosophy.” Oxford Bibliographies, 27 May 2020, https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/display/document/obo-9780195396577/obo-9780195396577-0403.xml. Accessed 30 April 2024. Romano, Aja. “Horror movies reflect cultural fears. In 2016, Americans feared invasion.” Vox, 21 December 2016, https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/21/13737476/horror-movies-2016-invasion. Accessed 30 April 2024. Shriver, Lionel. Mania: A Novel. HarperCollins, 2024. Um, Emily. “How The Horror Genre Reflects Societal Fears Throughout Time.” Scribe USC, 24 February 2021, https://scribe.usc.edu/how-the-horror-genre-reflects-societal-fears-throughout-time/. Accessed 30 April 2024. Wikipedia. “Harrison Bergeron.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron. Accessed 30 April 2024.
I'm definitely going to buy the book! So funny, I put a review of this book in the circle GenderCritical, and it was deleted for being "off topic."
I guess they preferred it to be in feminist books instead? I wish there was a way to just move posts rather than outright delete them.
Dunno. Given that the book is meant to skewer gender ideology, I'd have thought otherwise! :-)
If it’s not obvious how it’s on topic then make a text post about it and how it is on topic.
Yes, I made a comment directly underneath it about the linkage.
We don’t consider comments on linked posts by original posters to be “part” of the original post. The OP has to stand on its own, regardless of comments, which is why you have to make your OP a text post instead.
The review specifically spoke about how the entire book is an extended metaphor for gender ideology.
Read it after the post here couple of days ago. ran through it in half a day. Wow. I love this book. I was a little worried it would be too resentful and seem like too much ranting- but lionel shriver does a great job making the case for defiance and oddly, moderation at the end. I kept going back and thinking through my own relationships and behavior after reading this.It shocked me how much of it rang true and its - a sign that things are seriously wrong when well written satire starts reading like journalism.