Drag queens won’t win the next war

OPINION:

The model and actress Emily Ratajkowski, who is said to have 30 million followers on Instagram, kvetches that she seems to attract only “emasculated men” — by which she means guys who can’t handle a “strong woman” like her.

A product of the Sexual Revolution, Ms. Ratajkowski believes the essence of femininity is strength and confidence, while a man who isn’t attracted to tough babes is “emasculated.”

She wants a man who’s confident but also deferential.

Women like Ms. Ratajkowski are perpetually aggrieved. They expect the impossible and then feel cheated when they don’t get it.

Society is at war with what are sneeringly referred to as traditional male values.

Except for action flicks, men in movies are usually hesitant, weak and ineffectual. Witness “Forrest Gump,” who was symbolized by a feather drifting through life wherever the winds of fortune took him.

In movies like “About Schmidt,” aging white men are sad sacks who, in the end, achieve a measure of redemption by recognizing the meaninglessness of their existence.

You’re not going to get a script past Hollywood’s feminist censors without strong female characters. 

Women must never, but never, be shown needing male protection.

Traditional masculinity is now defined as a disease.

The guidelines of the American Psychological Association assert: “Socialization for conforming to traditional masculine ideology” — note the condescension — “has been shown to limit males’ psychological development, constrain their behavior, result in gender role conflict and negatively influence mental health.” Is that what you really think?

Also, we are told, research suggests that teaching boys to be “self-reliant, strong and to minimize and manage their problems on their own yield adult men who are less willing to seek mental health treatment.”

So, the key to mental health is teaching boys to whine.

The #metoo movement terrorized a generation of men. Decades earlier, Justice Clarence Thomas almost lost his fight for a seat on the Supreme Court because he supposedly pestered Anita Hill to go out with him.

Then along came the Brett Kavanaugh nomination and “believe women.” The jury in the Johnny Depp defamation trial ignored this absurdity, and Amber Heard is millions poorer.

Men frequently reject the roles that feminism has assigned them and are fleeing matrimony. In 1960, 45% of males ages 18 to 24 were married. Today the figure in 9%. Who wants to get hitched to a competitor?

Society stops working when men stop being masculine. Traditionally, a man’s job was to serve and protect — his woman, his children and his country. For women, it was to make a home for her husband and raise their children.

Men go to war to protect their families, not the sisterhood’s idea of equality. But President Biden’s all-woke military is working to eradicate any semblance of the warrior ethos.

At military bases, drag queen shows are all the rage. This past July, there was one at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, which featured a performance by “Harpy Daniels” as part of its “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Summer Festival.” 

Through the Freedom of Information Act, The Wall Street Journal obtained hundreds of pages of diversity and inclusion training material. 

Among other gems, the brass advised servicewomen that if they were uncomfortable having a person with male genitalia showering with them, it was their fault. Transgender soldiers should not be “required or expected to modify or adjust their behavior based on the fact that they do not ‘match’ other soldiers,” they sniffed.

Our politically correct Army is always ready to fight inequality, injustice and transphobia. The next time it’s deployed, a cadre of highly trained drag queens should go in first.

The woke never hesitate to throw women under the bus while claiming to be their champions. Allowing biological males to compete in women’s athletics is one example. Letting boys in skirts use the girls’ room is another.

I’m grateful that I was raised by a man who grew up in poverty, in a cold-water flat in Brooklyn. As a Jew in a tough, immigrant neighborhood, he had to fight his way to school every day. Dad went to work at 14, served in World War II and had his own business.

He had more guts and integrity than any man I’ve ever known. He was also gentle and kind.

Emily Ratajkowski would have called him a toxic male. My father, who was married for almost 60 years, would have laughed at the opinions of a model who goes through partners like Kleenex.

• Don Feder is a former Boston Herald writer and syndicated columnist.