Men vs Women: Come on–who would YOU trust?

When Roger Goodell and the NFL do  something right in the metastasizing Ray Rice-Adrian Peterson-Who Else Will It Be Tomorrow?-We Don’t Care About Domestic Violence Or Child-Beating But Our Sponsors Think We Should So We’ll Pretend To fiasco, do let me know.

Among the more sinister botches was the league’s cynical PR move of appointing four women to explain to him and the other suits that it’s really bad for a sport that sells role models and heroes to have those key products smacking around small children and women. Anna Isaacson, the NFL’s vice president of community affairs and philanthropy, was given an expanded role as vice president of social responsibility. Lisa Friel, the former head of the Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit in the New York County District Attorney’s Office; NO MORE co-founder Jane Randel; and Rita Smith, the former executive director of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, were also hired to address the problem, which, as everybody should know, only that kinder, more generous, more nurturing, rational and generally more civilized gender even recognizes as a problem.

This is female superiority fantasy, of course, but the media and, naturally, women themselves are grabbing it and running for the goal line. On this morning’s Sunday talking head blab-fests, I must have heard six or seven pundits, most of them women but not all, take a breather from their non-stop condemnation of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to express relief that women were finally on the scene to straighten things out for their poor, idiot brothers.

There is no indication, anywhere, that men are less capable of comprehending what is wrong with domestic violence, more rational in dealing with it than women, or more competent to analyze the issue:

• Janay Rice not only stayed with her abuser, but married him, and is now defending him. Last I checked, she was a woman.

• The news media is full of women telling their sad stories of loving, being beaten by as staying with abusive men, a pattern which makes the problem more pervasive, deadly and worse.

• Research suggests that women abuse their spouses as often as men do, but because they are not as large and strong on average, do less physical damage. That doesn’t make it any less despicable.

• Peterson’s mother has been enthusiastic in telling reporters how good a father he tries to be despite clobbering his various children with tree branches. I’m pretty sure she’s female. She also notes that her son was similarly brutalized, presumably with her knowledge and coorperation

• There have been plenty of women at recent NFL games protesting the suspensions of Peterson and Rice. Polls have found that a majority of women who call themselves NFL fans will not curtail their football worship because of this scandal. Translation: women can be as insensitive and foolish when it comes to football as men are.

• Despite a flurry of scattered articles (including here) in the last few days pointing out the utter hypocrisy of the embargo on criticism and publicity of women’s soccer icon Hope Solo’s pending charges for beating a woman (her sister) and a child, the women calling for action in the NFL against the male batterers have failed to make a similar case against U.S. Soccer. Well, at least Goodell didn’t appoint Solo to his all-girl band. I’m sure it occurred to him.

I object to being lumped with the violence-addicted incompetents running the NFL and its teams because I am a male. The NFL’s lazy, manipulative move of appointing  all-woman anti-abuse shock troops misleads the public, enables feminist, anti-male bigots, endorses misandry, and embraces an unethical double standard. The NFL has certainly disgraced itself in this issue, but so have many women, including every one I heard declaring that  pro football was on the right track now that the non-testosterone-addled were on the case.

Some have even suggested that Condoleezza Rice should replace Roger Goodell. Why? Her total qualifications would appear to be that she’s female, and black, like all the suspended abusers so far. She was a complete failure in her various positions in the Bush Administration; she’s never been married or had a child, and she has no special credentials in the field. Her one big opportunity to prevent mass violence—remember the Iraq invasion?—was not exactly a ringing success.

But she’s woman! Hear her roar.

Should women play a prominent role in getting the NFL’s policies and image on track? Sure, why not—not that an all-male group couldn’t do the job too, but the optics of a diverse group do matter to credibility.  But domestic abuse and child abuse are not just male problems, women are not a superior race, and the efforts of the media, feminists, and Hillary Clinton supporters to enshrine the false idea in our culture that men are inherently nasty, brutish and dumb are irresponsible, unfair, and though they will never admit it, bigotry.

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Sources: USA Today1, 2; US News, Jezabel, RH Reality