Of Mothers and Fathers

It may seem like a bad joke, but radical feminists sound like nothing so much as the thinkers they denounce as misogynists. In her most recent book, Adrienne Rich speaks of women’s “‘maternal’ or ‘nurturant’ spirit” as opposed to “rapism and the warrior mentality” of men. Who does this sound like if not one of the feminists’ favorite whipping boys, Rousseau, who writes that woman’s reign is “a reign of gentleness, tact, a...