The idiot

The intelligence of a man can be seen when he is capable of treating a woman as an equal; when he does not feel that his freedom is being curtailed because a woman in his office, or in a public encounter, expresses herself with greater intelligence than him; a man conveys self-confidence when he does not retreat when faced with female irony and he laughs – he laughs off his potential condescension, or the possibility that he has made a fool of himself. A man is no more a man for making sexist jokes; a man is no more a man if he gives the words of a male more importance than those of a woman; a man does not consider his masculinity to be lessened just because he admires a female colleague, because he reads female authors, because he is curious about female issues; a fair man asks why women are less represented in the worlds of work, art, painting, music and poetry. Poetry. Is it not the case that we feel more tolerance toward male mediocrity? A brilliant man should not feel threatened just because he has to share his brilliance with women. If a man has everything, where does this fear come from? This has already been seen in countries that are more advanced in terms of rights than ours: the famous furious reaction of successful men in the presence of women. What happened to you Philip Roth? What happened to you Norman Mailer? A fit of rage disguised as an authoritative opinion: we’ll only let them enter our club if they are on our level.

A brilliant man should not feel threatened just because he has to share his brilliance with women. If a man has everything, where does this fear come from?

It’s hardly surprising that women have developed an irony that, until very recently, was only to be heard in domestic conversations. All of us have heard older women in kitchens and during afternoon walks making fun of male infallibility. Now, that irony is a public commodity. How should Hillary Clinton react when a retweet on the Twitter account of that man with the hair, Donald Trump, states that a woman who can’t satisfy her husband can’t satisfy America? As far as I’m concerned, all Hillary has to do is smile and think, keep it up, you idiot, you’re going to make me president…

English version by Simon Hunter.