Online Opinion Commenters

My post on pregnancy went up on Online Opinion on Monday. Fortunately for me I was in Kangaroo Valley with my brother and so I didn't have the chance to see the comments until Tuesday night...

Wow, I knew that there were plenty of men who were particularly defensive of patriarchy and who get their heckles up at the merest mention of feminism, but I was surprised by how agro they were able to get over the idea that I might have found pregnancy a confronting experience and dared to write about it on my own blog. Actually, more surprising was the fact that they think that I care about their opinion, but that is another story.

Anyway, I was particularly struck by this little gem of insight that just arrived into The Forum (the discussion about the post):

I am sure Cristy's feelings are real whilst she struggles to complete her Ph'd fighting against the patrairchial oppression and sexism and at the same time dealing with the change in her body image.

I recalled the other day a friend who was so desperate to have a baby, that she was prepared not only to put her health on the line, but her life as well.

Against medical advice she choose to continue her pregnancy, she even had a stroke which made her dysphasic and at one point she became so ill that she was admitted to Intensive Care, still she choose to continue the pregnancy.

Both she and the baby survived and she has a healthy boy. Fortunately for most western women they are not faced with such a life and death dilemma's.

And when compared to the third world we do not really have to worry much about the survival rate of our children where in the third world a large percentage do not even see their third birthday. We worry about luxuries such as child care and maternity leave, Ph'ds and careers.

I guess the work of the culture of patriarchial oppressors in this country has had nothing to do with improving the health outcomes and survival rates of our children.
Posted by JamesH, Thursday, 18 January 2007 3:47:16 PM

Of course, this raises many questions about the author. However, the most pressing for me is what on earth he is going on about in the last sentence?

Does he think that societies in the "third world" are not patriarchal? Is he really claiming that patriarchy is the reason that maternal health care has improved in Australia?

Why are sexist men so delusional? Do they have to spin these lies for themselves in order to continue to justify their hatred of women?