Month: June 2019

The Gentleman’s Times: Why Should A Gentleman Have A Study?

A “man cave” may seem like a great retreat.  But you’re a better man than that – or, at least, you should want to be a better man.

Do you have a man cave?  Is it piled high with empty beer cans of your favorite brews?  Is that the place you go to play video games and watch football?

Ditch it.  Build a study instead.

If you want a traditional girl, you need to become the traditional man of her dreams.  Back in the day, gentlemen were refined, educated, well-read, and continued their studies throughout their lives.  The completion of a post-secondary education was not the end of learning for a gentleman – it was only the beginning.  When time permitted, men didn’t just sit around the house doing nothing.  They retreated to their study (or library as some called it) and educated themselves well beyond what they had learned at university.

Why?

You’ve heard that knowledge is power. It’s true.  But gentlemen don’t cede their power to university professors who are paid to teach a very narrow sliver of any given field of academia.  Gentlemen achieve the degree necessary for the job they seek, then build upon – or dispute – what their professors taught them in college.

What did gentlemen read in their studies?  Masterpieces by the ancients – Socrates, Plato, John Locke, John Calvin, Marcus Tullius Cicero, Marcus Aurelius, the Bible, the Qur’an, the Bhagavad Gita, the Tipitaka .. you name it and gentlemen would study it.

Did you know that the phrase “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” from the Declaration of Independence of the United States is almost a direct quote from John Locke’s Second Treatise on Civil Government?  Did you know that the Founding Fathers of the United States disagreed on the implementation of Locke’s ideologies but all agreed that the principles of governance that Locke espoused made for a strong civil government?  Do you think GTA5 will ever teach you that?

Do you know the allegory of The Cave from Plato?  Can you apply it to your own life?  Are you brave enough to admit that no matter who you are or what you believe, you’re probably caught in your own echo chamber just like the people in The Cave?

Sure, you know E=MC² means, but do you deeply understand the General and Special Theories of Relativity?  Do you understand why Delta Factor is so important – and so controversial?  Bertrand Russel wrote an excellent summary called The ABC’s of Relativity.  I read it when I was 22.  I still have my 90 year old copy.  Written on the inside page in beautiful handwriting are the words, “N.L. Robinson. Dept. Pathology, Toronto.  Bought in London to read on the boat (Milwaukee) coming home.  Sailed Dec 19th 1929, arrived (New York) Jan 1st, 1930.″  If you can find a copy, perhaps you should pick one up.

Do you know what the Fatal Logical Flaws of argument are?  Did you know that prior to about the year 1960, the first person to use an ad hominem(personal/character) attack during even a private debate was immediately declared to have lost the debate?  It was a gentleman’s agreement and sore losers were rightfully shamed.

Do you know who first said, “never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake”?

According to Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, all warfare is … what?

Why do you need to know this stuff, anyway?  What’s it going to gain you?

A traditional wife, for one.  Traditional girls are not stupid.  They often play dumb to boost a man’s ego, but believe me, it’s a facade.  They’re attracted to an intelligent, well-read, refined gentleman.

But beyond a good wife, there is a world out there to explore beyond your beer cans and video game console.  Knowledge, wisdom, refinement, critical thinking … these are just some of the hallmarks of a gentleman.

Take advice from a man who once had a man cave: ditch it.  Gut the whole thing and build yourself a library or study.  Get a good desk and a comfortable executive chair.  Buy a decent quality desk lamp (banker’s lamps are excellent for studies).  Surround yourself in books.  Immerse yourself in them.

Become the gentleman your traditional girl adores and the man your grandfather would admire.

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Why Should A Gentleman Have A Study?  The Gentleman’s Times.  Copyright © Vintage In Stepford, June 21, 2019. All Rights Reserved.

A Glitch In The Matrix, or Do Some Things Never Change?

What is driving the return to Traditional Gender Role relationships?

It’s counter-cultural.  People are awakening to a new possibility – that the postmodernist cultural norms are unfulfilling and that in order to feel that we have worth in the midst of this hell we call ‘life’, we must find purpose for ourselves.  For men, that purpose is a natural inclination to lead, guide, teach, and to take responsibility.  For women, that purpose is a natural inclination to nurture, to care for others, and to empathize with those whom they love and – in the best cases – even with those whom they hate.

Postmodernism left us with the belief that rights are all that matters.  The post-postmodernist, post-feminist counter-culture (which I have dubbed “The New Counter-Culture”) has embraced the concept that rights are not the negation of responsibility.  On the contrary, obligations and responsibilities are what make our rights so meaningful.

The rise of postmodernism, and its bedmate, feminism, have long promoted that men and women are essentially the same.  Fraught with problematic dogmas, these sub-cultures have risen in direct correlation to a decline in women’s overall happiness and happiness relative to men.   The New Counter-Culture, on the other hand, is realizing a singular truth: if we do not recognize that men and women each have distinct natural inclinations that must be heeded, our lives are meaningless – and often unhappy.

There is a balance that can be struck.  We can believe in endless possibilities and unlimited potential for every individual.  At the same time, we must realize that each individual sees their unlimited potential and endless possibilities as something different.  For one person, unlimited potential may be building a business from scratch into a Fortune 500 company.  For another, it may be working long nights as a scientist in a laboratory trying to discover the cure for a fatal disease.  For another, unlimited potential may mean staying at home with children, worshiping the God of their choice, and serving their spouse.  The New Counter-Culture recognizes that all of these potentials are valid and that if we are to give their own lives meaning, we must pursue our personal vision of our own “unlimited potential.”

What is most interesting about the New Counter-Culture is that it is based not on new rights and responsibilities or even new means of interpreting the two.  No, the new counter-culture merely takes old ideas and breathes new life into them through the lens of instincts and natural proclivities – just as human beings have done for thousands of years.

A wise man once said, “what has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; and there is nothing new under the sun.”  That is the essence of the counter-cultural revolution we are witnessing today.

-VIS

“If ye meet a man on the road, count his fingers, lest ye deal unknowing with a fae.”

-Irish Proverb

(If you have ever heard the Irish and Scottish stories of dealing with fae, or ever read the Book of Enoch and read the stories of the Nephilim, or have investigated the rumours of the U.S. Military’s alleged encounter with the “Kandahar Giant”, or have listened closely to the stories told by Native North Americans about their struggles against the “red headed giants”, you’ll understand this proverb.)

-VIS