The Age of Anti-Heroes and Anti-Modesty

At the beginning of his remarkable book Honor: A History James Bowman defines honor.

Honor in men is bravery, the courage to stand in the line with your brothers even unto death. Honor in women is chastity. And if you think all that is old-fashioned then try calling a man a wimp or a woman a whore and see where it gets you.

So why is it that our liberal friends and their willing accomplices in the media and the popular culture make such a big deal about the anti-hero, the man who defines himself by standing against his brothers in the line? And why does it celebrate a “sexual life” for women that celebrates the idea of women acting much like men when it comes to sex?

Media critic L. Brent Bozell III notes the current glut of TV shows glamorizing prostitutes as smart, contemporary women. Writes Showtime of their hooker heroine:

She is smart, strong and confident and, like many modern women, she is struggling to balance her personal and professional life.

My guess that this is all going to collapse into a Return to Modesty. (Wow, that’s the title of a book by Wendy Shalit.)

But for some time I have been wondering what it is that women are advertising with their honor concept of chastity. I’m a man; I understand the honor as courage bit. But chastity?

A couple of nights ago I finally put it together. If you want to understand women then you must understand love. Chastity is the measure of a woman’s love and devotion.

We start with Lord Byron:

Man’s love is of man’s life a thing apart,
’Tis woman’s whole existence.

But sleeping around doesn’t do anything for a woman, not least because of the “loss” factor. Women mourn and grieve all lost loves, and the pain they cause pretty soon teaches them to love where they are, not where they might hope to be.

That is why Jane Austen in Persuasion makes Anne Elliot’s speech about womanly constancy the climax of the novel.

All the privilege I claim for my own sex... is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone.

The minx says this, of course, in the hearing of the worthy Captain Wentworth into whose arms she will fall within the hour.

Honor for a woman is to faithfully and generously love. All they want is for their love to be appreciated.

And that, boys and girls, is why Christianity goes down big time with women, especially right now in the Global South and in China where two-thirds of Christian adherents are said to be women. You love God and God loves you back. What’s not to like?

And that is also why the present age of anti-heroic men and anti-chaste women is going to go the way of the Dodo. Men love to be heroes, and women love to be chaste. They won’t be denied for long.