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Who will talk to the old western males

2021-04-10T03:28:43.703Z


The saddest thing about the loneliness of this class of men is that, if they began to listen to what others have to say, they would become more valuable than they think themselves


Michel Houellebecq, after receiving the 2010 Goncourt Prize for 'The Map and the Territory' Photo: Fred Dufour / AFP / Getty Images

I suspect that white men over 60 are feeling more alone every day.

No matter their fame, their power or their prestige, they feel isolated and consequently they begin to speak alone.

Women, on the other hand, do not stop reviewing each other, talking and arguing between mothers, daughters, grandmothers, genealogies and generations.

But who are the old Western males talking to today?

I confess that when I read some of the best minds of this generation, I get the impression that guys, as they get older, just want to listen to themselves.

So I imagine what would happen if the smartest and most powerful intellectuals in the world were part of the dialogue that life offers them.

And I understand that the world would be a better place.

Maybe that's why sometimes I imagine that it happens, that the conversation between genders and generations is possible.

The following conversations have happened in my imagination, but they are not fictional.

The quoted sentences are verbatim.

However, the dialogues will never occur.

Dialogue number one

The sixties French philosopher Pascal Brucknert (72 years old) speaks in the pages of this newspaper: “I have been treated as an old Western macho.

Well, I accept the verdict.

I am.

It is a fourfold discrimination, by age, by skin color, by gender and by geographic origin.

It's another racism, ”he explains.

Australian Hannah Gatsby could answer you with this phrase from one of her legendary Netflix monologues: “I understand that this is a difficult and confusing time for you.

Everything is changing, and I understand it.

But I suggest that you learn to overcome your defensive attitude (…) You have to learn to leave space around you, learn to cultivate a sense of humor, to relax, learn to laugh ”.

Who wouldn't want to keep listening to this conversation?

Dialogue number two

Michel Houellebecq writes

Serotonin

turned 60 tacos.

His novels had always been provocative, but never so self-satisfied.

“The best thing, if I thought about it, was her ass, the permanent availability of her seemingly narrow but actually so treatable ass, you were continually in the situation of choosing between the three holes, how many women can say the same ?

And, at the same time, how to consider women who cannot say the same? ”.

Ruoxin Wang, a Chinese student who has collaborated in the exhibition

Mythological Passions

at the Prado Museum, and is cited in the catalog by the exhibition curator,

responds

: “I think it is necessary to address the fact that the history of Europe is essentially about abduction. and the rape of a woman ”.

I imagine that a mind like Houellebecq's rubs against the world as well as against his own ego, and I almost cry to tears as I imagine where he could go.

In any case, no one intends to speak to Ruoxin Wang about her point of view.

Still less any old intellectual of recognized prestige and plenty of testosterone.

There are dialogues that are born dead.

Dialogue number three (posthumous)

At the end of the 19th century, François-René de Chateaubriand wrote a confession that the Acantilado publishing house had just published.

In it, at the age of 60, he explains to a young woman why he must reject her as a lover.

“If you were mine, only your death and mine could take me away from you.

I would forgive you if you were happy with an angel.

Never with a man ”.

Antonio J. Rodríguez responds from his book,

The new masculinity of always

: "As long as men are not capable of kissing another phallus, machismo will not disappear."

I realize that the phrase of Chateaubriand, who died almost 200 years ago, is more current than that of the young Antonio J. Rodríguez insofar as it is better understood by the majority.

I think then that the old ideas of some old men are very well preserved.

And I think it's because there comes a time when older - and powerful - men start talking to themselves so that no one twists their judgment.

And if they are powerful enough, which is often the case, their loneliness can be heard far away.

It can be heard so much and so loud that it silences other voices.

By this I mean that it is important to dialogue with the old Iberian male, no matter how much he resists so many times.

With foreigners, with the dead and with the homelands.

So if at any point you come across one - in the press, on Twitter, in a novel, in politics, or in your company - and you retell your brilliant views that you have expressed many times before and that for years that it has not enriched or contrasted with other new ones, do not be afraid and talk to him.

There is nothing more valuable than dialogue with experience, when it is left.

You may think that the man in front of you has only listened to himself for a long time, but don't get confused and make an effort.

Well, the saddest thing about the loneliness of this class of men is that, if they began to listen to what others have to say, they would become more valuable than they think themselves.

Which is saying!

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2021-04-10

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