Problems with Utopias: Utopias are Intensely Reactionary

The older I get, the more I am drawn to classical liberalism. But I have great respect for conservatism. Chesterton's conservatism--don't go knocking systems until you understand them or can argue cogently against them (arguing with jargon doesn't count)--is a strong bulwark against anarchy and self-indulgence. 

What amazes me about utopias is they are almost always intensely--and I mean, intensely--reactionary. They will often come about due to some revolution based on "CHANGE THE WORLD" idealism (Herland is unique here since it is based on necessity not idealism). But the end result isn't conservatism or classical liberalism but the kind of thinking that belongs in countries run by dictators and religious oligarchs. It is less about holding the course (conservatism) or respecting the individual (classical liberalism) and more about retreating to something almost entirely imaginary based on an almost entirely deconstructed imaginary past.

Take the current so-called "revolution" on gender. The end result is not a broadening of gender or understanding of human self-perception and sexuality but, rather, "girls must like pink stuff and dolls" while "boys must like trucks and sports." In the meantime, elite schools that push pronouns on little kids create psychological havoc. Kids are fully capable of liking multiple things at once. Being forced to parse dinosaurs, sports, and unicorns is, well, weird. 

They are right. It is weird.

My generation asked questions like, "Is it okay for men to cry?" and "Hey, what about women astronauts?!" Simplistic maybe, but we were headed in the right direction. Expand, not retract.

The categories being fed these elite kids are more reminiscent of Victorianism than anything in the last fifty years. 

Gilman does the same. To be honest, I've never fully understood her take here, since she suffered post-partum depression after the birth of her daughter and wasn't really an Earth Mother type. Yet Herland is entirely devoted to a biological imperative. The purpose of women is Motherhood, and yes, the "m" is capitalized in the book. 

Perhaps Gilman felt guilty about her own lack of motherliness. She may have embraced the idea of Utah polygamy whereby a woman could go to college while other women watched her kids. Or perhaps Gilman wanted to make her utopia palatable to her audience. Or perhaps she truly embraced the idea of improving future generations: bringing them up should be done right. 

To Gilman's credit, she pairs Motherhood with Fatherhood. 

And Terry objects. 

Interestingly enough, although his objections in the book are portrayed as somewhat sexist, they resonate with a modern audience. When he proclaims, "What a man wants from women is more than all this Motherhood," he sounds like a feminist!

His objections to Fatherhood are equally strident. 

Terry is arguing for the individual. 

So many utopias falter on the need to tell citizens what roles they must adopt. Like dictatorships and American Ivory Towers, utopias really like the idea that people have been properly pigeonholed.  

In reality, revolutions never go in the direction people expect. 

Chapter 15

His in Herland or Astyanax in Hiding