LEAN IN, Sweet Sherliot

Once upon a time little Lucy and little Lloyd were playing in the living room. Lucy got a doll house, and Lloyd got a toy tank. When they got to school, Lucy was heckled about how she dressed, and so became interested in fashion and makeup. Lloyd was shoved in the alley, and learned how to fight with brass knuckles. Now Lucy was always told, (everywhere she went), that she needed to lean on a man for security, and so finding the right one, (with the right prospects), was very important. Meanwhile, Lloyd was told he’d better learn to lean the right way or he’ll lose his teeth, and so he came to lean on people who got in his way. In the end Lucy married a rich man and moved into a nice suburban home with an SUV to drive around the little tykes she thought she needed to fulfill her destiny, while Lloyd took his tank to the bank on Wall Street, where he blew up both clients and competitors by making complex and strategic investments against their best interests while leaning on politicians to come through for him (after passing donations to campaigns under the table.) …Now you have the backstory of American culture. Enter Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer, with a new book and a profile on 60 Minutes, saying that women can (and should) become leaders like the 96% of Fortune 500 CEOs (who are men.) Questions: should women want to “have it all” like she does? What would that mean, and what does success mean? Women have recently fought to go into the front lines of combat, and have accordingly been granted this “privilege.” But is it a good thing to die in futile and expensive wars perpetrated by fat cat Generals who sit on ergonomically engineered Captain’s chairs while munching on pork rinds? Is it a good thing to be able to lie to your customers and sales force in order to sell more tainted drugs (or the company’s stock) in order to be a bigger and better “success?” Women are even now sitting on the front row at cage fighting events, trying to beat down the feminine instincts that have been instilled in them for generations. NEN would like to say that women shouldn’t envy men, or try to emulate them. If the world were all men, after all, the human race would now be extinct…and not just for the obvious reason. The second reason is that men are taught to compete and kill (on the killing fields, or symbolically in sports), and not to cooperate. So we would have nuked the planet, leaving it for the rise of the machines. And we will be doing so sooner than expected if women become like men. Sandberg is not saying that women should abandon femininity and sensitivity, but some of her followers are not getting this message, and what some take from it is to be more like men. But do you really want climb up on the tank, and level the competition, “ladies?” Do you see the word “bitch” as men see “bastard” (ie. something to put on a resume)? Besides this, where’s our protection instinct when women are outwardly as cruel as a lineman going for an opponent’s bum knee? We’ll nuke each other out of frustration, as suicide…unless you can somehow get in control and calm us down… Or is that the plan? Maybe there’s a drug you have in mind. Maybe– …No, wait. Now I sound like that clown on UFO Hunters. Anyway, just think about it. Do you really want to look like one of those powerful men in the funny hats at the Vatican? (By the way, the next Pope will be chosen by the Arizona Cardinals in a secret game that will be played at midnight at Sun Devil stadium in Phoenix, sponsored by Cardinal Shower Enclosures.)