Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow (About Silly, "Enlightened" Women)

Enlightening the Silly Women

Douglas Wilson

Blog&Mablog

February 7, 2015

The path of feminism has been a straight one, like the flight of an arrow. It has gone straight from women’s liberation to handcuffs by the bed. You’ve come a long way, baby.

Those whose ideas about individual sexual liberty are formed best while galloping with the herd are in for a real treat this Valentine’s Day. 50 Shades of Grey is due to be released to a breathless audience of sexual goobers. And that, incidentally, is no small feat — it is somewhat difficult for mouth breathers to be breathless like that.

Here on the right you may see that the Vermont Teddy Bear company has even gotten in on the action, manufacturing a gray little teddy bear with a sharp silk necktie and handcuffs. Nothing says “be my Valentine” like a little gray teddy bear with twisted desires. I was provoked by this image to go and watch the trailer for 50 Shades, which I did as my pastoral duty. The stupid, it burns.

In that trailer, Anastasia Steele, a mousy little nobody, asks Christian Grey, a demented but steely-eyed business magnate, to “enlighten” her. What does that mean? I will tell you what it means! It means that some dim bulb winds up tied to a bed! Yay!

Yay? This is consensual, right? Well, says the secularist eroti-despot, whip in hand, “I can tell you that for now if it makes you feel any better. We just do the consensual rape fantasies now as a catechetical preparation for the real thing later.”


It is as though the makers of this movie hired a team of biblical scholars to give them an outline of their target demographic.

“This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (2 Tim. 3:1–7).

So if you see a long line at that theater, or if you read a news story about how much they raked in on their opening weekend, just let that biblical phrase tell you everything you need to know about our enlightened and egalitarian times — “silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts.”