AWFLs Under The Microscope

American Thinker 

As a psychologist, I have tried to understand the phenomenon of what is casually termed “crazy liberal women,” or “AWFLs” (Affluent White Female Liberals) — those obnoxious, shrieking, irrational, intensively hateful, intrusive women whose mouths are a verbal sewer and who are forever drawing attention to themselves.  One cannot view the women of The View, for example, without recognizing that there is something seriously wrong with them.

I may be able to shed some light on these creatures, but we should first examine some instances where they manifest their irrationality.

Overall

The appearance of these bizarre women and others like them, with their COEXIST bumper stickers, has been noted by sane individuals, with one writer calling them “a plague upon Western society.”  Not a hyperbole.  After all, it’s hard not to notice them, nor their corrosive effect on society.  (For example, Laura Helmuth as editor in chief of Scientific American, Kathleen Kennedy at  Disney, and Susan Goldberg at National Geographic).

One of the things about them that is interesting to me, as a psychologist, is their utter lack of self-awareness as to how bizarrely they act, even when it is patently self-destructive, as with those women with suicidal empathy.  In the rare instances they do become aware, it is a painful experience.  Phyllis Chesler, a prominent feminist and psychologist, admitted that many of her fellow activists who were the giants of second-wave feminism were insane — not flaky, but clinically psychotic (think Andrea Dworkin).  Long before I became aware of Chesler, I came to the same conclusion on reading the writings in feminist journals; they were unquestionably the ramblings of psychotic persons.  Along the same line, look at FEMEN, a group of French liberal women who demonstrate topless, put on a Hitler moustache, and give the Nazi salute while shrieking — all this as a demonstration against imagined Nazism.

Just think back on the Brett Kavanaugh hearings.  They are the women who suddenly “remember” having been raped 20 years ago by some prominent conservative.

Whether one excludes “persons of color” or not from the equation, the majority of persons in DIE are Affluent White Female Liberals.  The job description dovetails with the female instinct for sticking their noses into other people’s business, for telling others how to behave, and for nagging.

The “Karens”

And then there are the apolitical “Karens” — women who are likewise, aggressive, obnoxious, irrational, shrieking, and intrusive.  Unlike the AWFLs, they have become something of a joke.  Yet their similarity is striking.

However, there is one branch of this phenomenon that is not as blatantly dramatic, or rather is not as loud.  Think of the proliferation of female teachers seducing their students.  Think of those Western women who have converted to the anti-woman, oppressive Islamic religion.  Think of the countless cases of where a woman falsely accused men of rape (some still rotting in prison).  Think of the mostly single mothers who turn their children into transgender.

More specifics:

When a woman killed her children and admitted doing so, a group of women lined up each day outside the courtroom to support her.  When she was not acquitted, women threw ice in their bathtubs.

A woman proclaiming herself an artist silently whirls a metal bucket around herself.

A woman decided to have an abortion because she said she loved the baby.

In summary, I believe these are all linked.

Psychological Findings

In psychology and psychiatry, personality disorders are at times prevalent in one sex rather than the other.  For example, antisocial personality disorder is prevalent in men.  Such men tend to be overly aggressive, break laws, be resentful of authority, and have poor impulse control.  Prisons are full of them.  On the other hand, borderline personality disorder is prevalent in women.  These are women who are jokingly referred to by laymen as “flakes.”  Persons with borderline personality disorder are characterized by impulsive behavior, chronic feelings of emptiness, mood swings, self-harm, incapability of stable relationships, outbursts of anger and depression, and lower maternal affection.  They may switch sexual orientation.  In the 1990s, they were the ones who reported “repressed memories.”

Hand in hand with the above, women tend to score higher in measures of neuroticism.  They also score higher in superstition.

A plethora of recent psychological studies reveal relevant consistent findings: Liberal women tend to feel miserable compared to conservative women.  They are more depressed, are more obsessed with politics, are more anxious, and have more negative emotions.  Conservative women found more happiness in their marriages and in life in general.  Women who went through the indoctrination centers (colleges) tend to find it more difficult to find a good partner.  Over 50 percent of liberal women self-report having a mental illness.

To add frosting on the cake, conservative women are deemed more attractive, and overall, conservatives are physically healthier.

These facts would explain the phenomena of the AWFLs and the Karens.

In addition, Helen Andrews makes some relevant points regarding the connection between women and “wokeness,” one of her points being that as organizations became staffed with more and more women, “wokeness” became prominent.

But more importantly, these are the women that are in schools teaching our children.

A Clue from History

There is one problem with the above explanation.  Nothing like AWFLs had been seen before 2016 in the history of the United States — unless, of course, one includes the feminists of the ’70s.  Like rats swarming out of sewers, AWFLs and the apolitical Karens began to crop up right after the 2016 election, when Donald Trump won, and a totalitarian movement, centered on the Democrat party, coalesced and started to gain strength.

I see a parallel with another totalitarian movement, the French Revolution, where shrieking, obnoxious, intrusive, aggressive, trashy women fomenting violence became common — so common, in fact, that 7,000 of them carrying knives were central to the storming of the Tuileries Palace, massacring the guards.  They continued to be active thereafter, so much so that Dantonremarked that he was sick of those women.

We get another clue from George Orwell, who had been thoroughly immersed in the Marxist culture of Spain and Britain, when he wrote in 1984 (that excellent description of communism), “It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy.”

Putting Two and Two Together

Contrary to the delusional ramblings of feminists, for centuries, women have held a strict code of behavior, which they policed among themselves, and woe to any woman who broke that code.  Lack of adherence to decorum (e.g., becoming promiscuous, being loud and rude, acting like men, being bad mothers or sloppy housekeepers) resulted in unforgiving ostracism and widespread shredding of their reputation.  Thus, in normal times, women with borderline personality disorder or high neuroticism tended to hold it together, to have self-discipline.

Any time a totalitarian movement comes into being, with the automatic purpose of dismantling societal norms and traditions, those female restrictions are loosened, and the corrosive traits surface like a geyser in those particular women.

This is what we’re seeing now with the Karens and the AWFLs.

One Last Point

Being the best of the worst can have its advantages.  Take Elizabeth Gilbert.  Gilbert is the Greta Thunberg for married women.  She was a nonentity who catapulted to fame by writing her memoir, Eat Pray Love, where she comes across as clearly a bona fide neurotic.  She divorced her husband “to find myself” (whatever that means) and hopped from bed to bed, even going abroad in her search for meaning and men.  Later, she got into a lesbian relationship with a drug addict; Gilbert supplied her with drugs.  At one point, she considered murdering her “because she had taken her affection away from me” (translation: The lesbian was sleeping with others).  She also shaved her head.  Her memoirs are a monument to self-justification.

The memoirs resonated with some women and sold well.  Amazon reviews from women usually go like this: “A real life fairy tale!”  “This book sings the song of my soul”  “Inspirational, Thought Provoking, Great to Listen to or Read.”  “A Journey to Find Meaning in Life.”  “Struck a chord with me!”  Oprahsaid the memoir was “the bravest thing she’s ever read.”

Best of all, the first one was made into a sickeningly sweet movie.  (One man wrote a parody called Drink, Play, F---).

To those writers who try to break through the Berlin Wall of literary agents (95 percent women!) and note that Eat Pray Love sold 12 million copies, it is like the artist who is struggling to be recognized and seeing a banana duct-taped to a wall as art, sold for $6 million.

Yes, indeed, in the world that we live in, being the best of the worst does have its advantages.