"The spectacle was almost too on the nose: Here was the nexus of women's (limited) history within the executive branch, once home to Jacqueline Kennedy's Rose Garden and Laura Bush's restored movie theater, now totally demolished. Donald Trump has made clear his wishes to put a new ballroom in the East Wing's place. But his planned additions to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue also include the installation of an Ultimate Fighting Championship octagon for America's 250th birthday celebration."
"Andrews's thesis, published by the online magazine Compact, is that everything wrong with institutions in America comes down to the growing influence of women. Women, she argues, have implemented "wokeness" across the land, and her evidence for this is the outrage over Larry Summers's comments about whether women might have less natural aptitude for math and science, which led to his resignation as president of Harvard University in 2006."
Growing female influence is presented as reshaping institutions by privileging empathy, safety, and cohesion at the expense of rationality, competition, and risk-taking. Examples cited include the reaction to Larry Summers's comments and his 2006 Harvard resignation, and the social upheaval of 2020 framed as an "eruption of insanity." Cultural symbolism, such as demolition of the White House East Wing and plans for entertainment-driven additions, is used to illustrate broader civic shifts toward performative spectacle. The argument links expanded female representation in professions to a spread of "wokeness" and predicts further institutional weakening if trends continue.
Read at The Atlantic
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