"Elect Respect" and the Problem of Effeminized Politics
A bevy of sometime-harassed women have had enough.
Founded by Burlington Mayor Marianne Meed Ward, what began as an aggrieved conversation has grown and matured into an aggrieved syndicate of conversations. As of now, Elect Respect includes “elected officials and candidates of all backgrounds who are speaking out against toxic behaviour and calling for a renewed commitment to respectful public service.”
Supporters are invited to “take the pledge,” which runs as follows:
As an ally to candidates and elected officials, and an advocate for democracy, I pledge to:
Treat elected officials and each other with respect in all spaces—public, private, and online.
Reject harassment, abuse, and personal attacks, and speak out when I witness them.
Focus debate and political discussions on ideas and policies, not personal attacks.
Help build a supportive culture where people of all backgrounds feel safe to run for and hold office, and engage in public life.
Call on relevant authorities for the protection of elected officials who face abuse or threats.
Model integrity and respect in public life, holding myself to the highest standards of conduct, and vote for leaders who model integrity and respect in public life, holding them to the highest standard of conduct.
Initially, the movement might appear somewhat redundant. After all, “preventing harrasment and abuse” is a goal which all municipalities already affirm in their by-laws — which raises the question of why any of this needs to exist in the first place. Yes, elected officials, along with the rest of us unelected unofficials, should be able to go about their duties without the fear of being called a cabbage head. And yes, this is a real fear I have.
Elect Respect, however, has very specific objectives beyond it’s apparent ones. These can be boiled down to three specific grievences:
The number of female MPs decreased in the last federal election.
Municipal councils are not representative of their diverse populations.
Rising toxicity against elected leaders discourages participation.
For these reasons, we are told, democracy is on the verge of extinction.
We’ll take each of these in turn, but for now simply notice that this is an activist movement. Which means it’s an ideological movement. Which means the above problems are only problems if you accept the premises and definitions underneath them. Those not convinced this is an ideological movement should ask why the Canadian Association of Feminist Parliamentarians were so eager to adopt the skeleton of the E.R. movement as a basis for their own “Parliamentary Civility Pledge” document.
On to the grievences.
The number of female MPs decreased in the last federal election
If you read the above list as a narrative, you’ll notice they follow a kind of insular logic: The number of female MPs decreased in the last federal election because the rising toxicity against elected leaders (particularly women and minorities) discouraged their participation, and therefore municipal councils are no longer representative of their diverse populations.
Thus, democracy languishes, bruised and battered, in a shallow grave behind the Panda Express. Or so the logic goes.
But hold on. The mere fact that the number of female MP’s decreased in the last federal election doesn’t necessarily indicate a problem. Perhaps more women wanted to start families. Perhaps rising childcare costs required one parent to stay home. Or perhaps — and I think most likely — the inherent environment of politics, which necessarily includes conflict, disagreement, and debate, and which frequently includes raised voices, blunt polemic, and, for lack of a better term, masculine energy — is just . . . not a hospitable environment for women. Nor is this a bad thing.
Let me put it another way.
I wouldn’t enjoy the arctic environment. But the issue isn’t the arctic environment. The issue is that I’m not built for such an environment — on any level. The solution to my uncomfortability isn’t to attempt to change the environment, but to accept that I’m not built for it, and to instead faithfully inhabit the environments I am suited for.
The feminists cried that men and women were the same and ought to be treated the same. But in the process of attempting to treat them the same, it was discovered that women weren’t actually built like men, and vice versa. The problem, of course, is that male and female environments haven been in flux, attempting to reflect the egalitarian hypothesis, for decades now.
Hence the mess we’re currently in. And hence why no one should declare an experiment successful until all the varied parts have stopped moving.
Men spar in discussions. They are more interested in a linear, objective approach to solutions than ensuring an emotionally satisfying process. Women tend to be more nurturing, sensitive, and hyper-focused on details, environment, and cooperation. There are exceptions, but these are generally demonstrable traits. Inserting men and women in a political environment is akin to inserting them into a combat situation. Men, no matter how much they may try to suppress it, are instinctively aware of their duty to protect women, as opposed to bashing them over the head with the butt end of a musket.
This is the problem.
We’ve tried to normalize an environment that is inherently unnatural. It would like me being upset that the arctic is so cold and bringing a million propane heaters to try to warm things up. I end up destroying an environment simply because I misunderstood the problem.
I am not saying it’s good that “toxicity,” if such a thing can be demonstrated, is a good reason for women not to get into politics. I am saying it’s a good thing that less women are in politics. Not because I think less of women, but because I think more of creational norms, and also because I prefer not living under gerry-rigged government because no one bothered to read the instruction manual.
Municiple councils are not representative of their diverse populations
The assumed premise here is that democracy only functions where there exists the maximum number of diverse representation. If women aren’t elected, than women aren’t represented. If gay asian surfers aren’t elected, than the gay asian surfing community isn’t being represented. And that’s a bad thing.
It should be mentioned that angst in the face of minimally diverse representation is a modern problem. In the past, there was general awareness that elected officials couldn’t possibly represent every respective demographic of their electorate. This is, in fact, the nature of representation. Electing one person means not electing another. Prior to the pathological individualism that haunts our current age, it was enough for a canditate to be human. The vote came down to who was more qualified to do the job, rather than who better augmented the identity spectrum of government.
Stephen Fletcher notes, “The electorate should not vote based on appearance of diversity, but on the diversity of the competency of the candidate.” As we have mentioned before, diversity, in itself, isn’t a strength. Having two professional bowlers, a welder, and a veterinary technician on your swimming team doesn’t make you a stronger team.
Democracy, and indeed, reality, is predicated on meritocracy. You don’t get a free pass because you’re a woman or a drag queen. You earn your right to leadership through the demonstration of competence. In other words, the mere fact that there are less women or minorities in politics is absolutely no indication that democracy is in trouble.
The moment, and I can see it now, that we start enforcing diversity quotas on city councils is the moment we have firmly and finally forsake democracy.
This leads to the final problem of:
Rising toxicity against elected leaders discourages participation.
One definition of toxic behavior states:
“While not a formal clinical term, toxic behavior is described as detrimental interactions that chip away at mutual care and respect, creating an environment where individuals feel drained, invalidated, or unsafe.”
Once again, we’re confronted with an accusation that lacks precise definition. In fact, the above criteria for establishing a toxic environment is so broad it could pretty much be applied to anything by anyone. Toxic environments, then, can be identified by how they make one “feel.” If I, or my identity, feel insufficiently validated, or worse — “drained” — I am justified in feeling unsafe. Even though no actual threat to my person exists.
This is what I mean when I say this movement is fundamentally ideological. It is not about observable realities, which can be proven or disproven, but about conforming to a series of amorphus metrics. Toxicity has become the ultimate trump card. It is the invisible, unanswerable accusation, which is what makes it such an effective weapon.
It’s remarkable to me that so many women who complain of toxic political environments are unwilling to articulate exactly what those toxic elements are. It’s “hard,” we’re told. There are “threats.” Our previous mayor, for example, spent much of her mayoral career harassing and disparaging people she didn’t like. She was, to borrow a term, the definition of a toxic individual. When she opted not to run in the following election, she spent an entire interview blaming her failures on everyone but herself. This pattern repeats itself again and again in national politics.
Yes, we need to deal with toxic environments. And one of the most toxic environments that currently exist are ones in which individuals harness their victim status to gain power.
In conclusion, the “Elect Respect” movement isn’t so much about establishing a gentler democracy as it is about the effeminization of civic discourse. It is important to mention that the accusation of effeminization isn’t an attempt to degrade the inherent dignity and beauty of true feminity. Rather, we would affirm with the brilliant Sinclair Lewis that to “become effeminized [is to adopt certain feminine behaviors), without having the virtues of being frankly feminine.”
A man becomes effeminized when he lays aside his God-given responsibility to lead and defend, and instead adopts the disposition of one in need of leadership and defense. A munciple council becomes effeminized when it rejects its duty of direct language, routinely concedes to emotional sabotage, and generally governs according to the emotional temperature of the room rather than by principles, truth, and data.
My recommendation, for those who are interested, is to reject the Elect Respect movement, and instead replace it with something closer to “Repair It With Merit” — where “It” is the current delapitated state of our cities, and where “Merit” is the prioritization of quality and competence over inferior metrics (i.e., “diversity”), the rejection of weaponized victim culture, and the recovery of objective binaries of good and evil in the public square (including, but not limited to politics), rather than appeals to subjective criteria.
Municipalities must reject activism, ideological capture, and emotional sabotage in all its forms.
Soli Deo Gloria