Thank God for Hamilton Beach.
The company known today for toasters and coffee makers invented the first retail electric vibrator in 1902.
Some three hundred years before Christ, the Greeks recognized what would come to be called “female hysteria”. They considered the condition to be horrific, the onset of which was of no fault to the victim: the uterus wandered listlessly throughout the body, strangling the victim and soon she succumbed to all manner of disease.
The word hysteria even derives from the Greek “hystera”, meaning “uterus”.
The prescription for these poor women was simple: have sex immediately. Women already married were encouraged to have intercourse, while single gals were advised to get married as quickly as possible. If neither means was available, a midwife would be contracted as a last resort to perform the arduous, often hours- long task of “pelvic massage” to assist the patient in achieving orgasm, therefore relieving her symptoms.
Thus, the first noted girl- on- girl action in the history of mankind.
Victorian England, on the other hand, describes the afflicted with all the compassion the age of proper society has ever displayed for women: she was certainly a deranged person who suffered as a result a mental problem, likely due to her inability to attract a man.
The list of symptoms was, at one point, 75 pages long; nearly any sickness could fit the bill, making it a very lucrative business for physicians of the day, as ongoing treatment was often necessary. Among the recognized symptoms were sudden fainting, nervousness, insomnia, shortness of breath, irritability and “tendency to cause trouble”,
The affliction prevented, at least in the eyes of the medical community, women from functioning in daily society.
And if the description of these symptoms didn’t keep women off the streets, its initial treatments surely did: afflicted women were primarily prescribed bed rest, bland food, seclusion and sensory deprivation.
It was the perfect way to keep women quiet, unlearned and out of the way.
But if women’s needs couldn’t be met on some regular basis, proper Victorian society would come to a standstill: there would be no women on the arm at public appearances, housekeeping or child- rearing, and women would soon break from their proper unobtrusiveness and turn into flesh- eating maniacs, unless a convenient solution was found.
As the treatment was very labor- intensive on the physicians’ part, doctors came up with all manner of inventions and procedures to “assist” women, lest lose them to midwives, (who took money from the male- dominated medical community) until finally, a handheld device could be used in the privacy of one’s home- a subtle beginning of what would become the feminist movement.
The vibrator was the 5th household device to be electrified, behind the sewing machine, fan, tea kettle and toaster.
So it would appear women’s needs had already been deified for centuries before the 1980’s, when vibrators (and an amazing array of other sex toys) became more accessible in mainstream society, but were still hidden behind blacked- out windows of something called an “adult bookstore”, a misnomer made popular because women are masters of bullshit.
Our country forced an evolutionary change in an unnaturally short order as the male/ female roles of hunting and gathering had swapped: women hunted for pornography to admonish during the massive anti- pornography movement of the 1980’s. They hunted for corporate deals and clothing sales, and began to tout some of these hunting events as holidays like Black Friday. They even hunted for themselves; hence the popularity of self- help books; hence the rise of “Women’s Studies” sections in libraries.
Men became gatherers of NO MA’AM memberships. They gathered around Cliff Clavin homilies. They gathered up their own balls out of sheer panic.
There is no section, however, entitled “Men’s Studies” in any library anywhere in the world.
The changes even became apparent in the way each gender does it shopping: women hunt for deals, men gather whatever package is closest and shiniest.
Ever see a man compare prices in a store?
That’s because it doesn’t happen.
Women only just received the right to vote in 1920, and many still don’t earn equal pay as their male counterparts.
So, how did this change all happen?
Simple: breasts and Anita Hill.
Words never before heard in the same single sentence, I assure you.
Yet the thought of either one brings a man- willingly or begrudgingly- to his knees in utter subjugation.
Breasts arouse men; want of these controls their purchases, self- confidence, gym schedules, hairstyles, ring tones and choice in car air fresheners.
Anita Hill makes men scurry and scares them stupid, fearful of approaching any woman unless she first overtly displays physical interest. This process does, however, totally confuse a man’s super ego, which deems her aggression as a red flag, and his id, which tells him to spread his seed and go for it.
In late 1991, Hill was called to testify during a Senate confirmation hearing for her former boss Clarence Thomas, who had just been nominated to the Supreme Court. While any confirmation hearing is an automatic dirty- laundry fest, this was one for the books- quite literally.
Hill claimed to have been victimized during her employment as a legal advisor to Thomas nearly a decade earlier, when he barraged her with sexual remarks and stories of his own prowess.
Historically speaking, bragging is often how a male found his mate; a woman spurned or embraced a man based upon an emphatic wardrobe (codpieces, anyone?) or his stories of victory. Unless you were Sir Lawrence Olivier, in which case you’d need only to grab a woman and kiss her hard.
But Thomas never grabbed Hill and kissed her hard. Hill’s claims didn’t include any physical abuse. It didn’t include rape. It didn’t include unwanted physical contact of any type.
Her claims did, however, forever change the landscape of male/ female relationships with two little words: sexual harassment.
Two little words that forever changed the way we counseled executives, the way we taught health class to junior high students, and the way we qualified soldiers; because being a trained killer doesn’t mean you can’t be posh.
Two little words created an entire industry on the dangers of dirty talk.
Two little words that completely outshined the details of Hill and Thomas meeting, dining and talking on the phone on various occasions after Hill claims she was harassed, and subsequently fired.
Thanks to the Hill debacle- and with the man- hating support of Ms. Magazine and Barbara Boxer- women have become conditioned to feel threatened when a man opens a door or offers to pay for dinner.
It leaves women with little choice but to portray a biologically unnatural aggressiveness, and leaves men feeling unnecessarily un- masculine because he no longer has a bear to kill or a log cabin to build.
The importance with which masculinity is held by society had become clear once television shows like Ice Road Truckers or Dirty Jobs began to air not on regular television, but the pay- services of cable television’s Discovery and History channels; because masculinity is modern day oddity to be gawked at right after the documentary on the world’s oldest conjoined twins.
Think about it- what’s the last Dirty Harry movie you saw that wasn’t a Dirty Harry movie?
Die Hard: With a Vengeance was way back in 1995.
T2 was even further back.
And John Wayne is dead- along with any male character who kept his house in order in such fashion.
Women saw to it.
Women didn’t like rock music that portrayed sexual acts they themselves weren’t willing to participate in. So they hopped on the Tipper Gore band wagon and labeled them as dangerous and Satanic.
Women don’t like the smell of smoke. So they banned smoking in public places.
Women don’t like what processed foods did to their bodies. So they insisted on nutritional labeling; even on bottled water.
Women didn’t like their husbands looking at other women’s bodies, but they enlist the pride into seek and destroy missions with the oddest inconsistency.
A Seattle area drive- thru coffee shop called Knotty Bodies was forced to close down after several parents complained their children could see the bikini- clad baristas as they walked to school. This calamity was, however, utterly void of any supporting studies showing the damage bikinis can have on children at the beach.
Then there was Super Bowl 38: Janet Jackson’s breast, despite being covered with a pasty, turned into a fiasco designated “Nipplegate” that resulted in half a million complaints to the FCC, who launched an immediate “investigation” to determine how many people were offended by the snafu.
The investigation resulted in an increase in the allowable maximum fine for indecency- $550k fine for CBS, who was then kicked out of Viacom, and MTV being banned from further involvement in production of future NFL half-time projects.
Talk about overkill.
Later that same year, the sexual depravities of Draw Together or Desperate Housewives premiered on primetime television. Local and national news shows plastered the obscenities of Abu Ghraib and footage of terrorists beheading hostages.
The morality attack dogs barely raised eyebrows. Not even for the “GoDaddy.com” Super Bowl ad, which I’m still too young to watch.
Women missed the point of the GoDaddy.com commercial, by the way. Sure, it was appealing to men, but it was also a message to women: flaunt what ya got for your man.
But years of feminization has taught women to dress for themselves, not their man or anybody else. Modern women have been taught to dress for their taste and comfort, and they do at great length. But instead of taking initiative to spice up the bedroom once things get stale, the problem is quite literally laid in the man’s lap. If a man isn’t capable of rising to the occasion, then screw him if he can’t get a boner right.
It’s an insult thinly disguised by Smiling Bob.
Why advertisers couldn’t find a more heterosexual- looking male will probably never be clear, but quality family television time has been inundated with Enzyte, Viagra, Cialis and Entenze commercials ever since the FDA relaxed prescription drug marketing in 1997. These spots undoubtedly did more to create more questions for the “Under 10” group than it did to answer questions of men wondering, “What kind of guy would ever sit in a bathtub on the beach?”
Women are often stereotyped as a “ball & chain” for berating their men when he stinks up the house with his cigars. They get angry when he leaves his beer cans on the floor next to his Lazy Boy. They criticize his shirt & tie combo, his friends, his job and his mother.
Now his penis isn’t even good enough.
At the rate we run these commercials, you’d think the extinction of the human race was right around the corner.
But these commercials aren’t for men, though- they’re for women. Sexuality was the last uncontrolled area of human existence: it was now, just as bike helmets and car seats for 8 year- olds, a controlled substance. Gone was the passion created by spontaneity that is became such a peculiarity so revered and sought after, the success of reality TV was just a huge mistake waiting to happen.
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