The Miseducation of Women

This book doesn't have a subtitle, which is a pity. It would go something like: The Totalitarian Rule of the Feminist Educators. James Tooley's story is that education has been utterly wrecked by ruthless and aggressive feminists who have stopped at nothing less than an education system utterly subservient to their agenda. These "equity feminists" seem to think that the ideal life trajectory is that of a man: education followed by career. Why? They never seem to have thought of that. They (the Beaver, Friedan, etc.) just assumed that the grass was greener on the other side of the gender fence. Now, you could say, why not? If women want to live the life of a man, why not? Why not indeed? Tooley quotes Carolyn Graglia who was warmly encouraged by her teachers in the 1940s and 1950s, as a working-class girl, to go to college and become a lawyer. That was before the feminist revolution in education. But why do feminists force every single boy and girl onto their Procrustean bed? In Britain girls and boys must take exactly the same subjects in school until age 16, Tooley writes. Then, as soon as there is choice, the girls veer towards languages and psych. and the boys start to choose hard science. This book gave me something of an epiphany. I've been wondering for years: what is it that has wrecked the government education system of today? Surely we couldn't have have wrecked it merely with money and bureaucratic neglect? Tooley gives us the answer. It is the hegemonic feminists who have ordered everything in government education, down to the smallest detail, to educate girls to their agenda and make them into "independent women," the ideal of Simone de Beauvoir in The Second Sex. Their power, determination, and monomaniacal cruelty is breathtaking.