A simple remark about the purpose of life—procreation—was all it took to ignite a firestorm online. Within hours, critics labeled the speaker backward and out of touch. But the backlash wasn’t just about one actor’s opinion—it reflected a growing intolerance for views that challenge feminist orthodoxy.
In today’s article, Alexis Tarkalson explores how a movement born to promote equality has, in many circles, become a tool to shame, silence, and control. Is feminism still about empowerment—or has it become something else entirely?
Toward true equality,
Wendy Wixom, President
United Families International
Feminists Explain Things to Me
Alexis Tarkalson
Recently Timothée Chalamet, (popular actor known for his role in A-lister movies such as Dune and Little Women), said in an interview, “procreation is the reason that we are here,” and stated a childless life could be summed in one word, “bleak.”
Buzzfeed zeroed in on this outlook (despite the interview covering a wide range of topics and the procreation topic only meriting a single paragraph) and took to social media with his statement.
The female keyboard warriors came out in droves to attack his personal opinion in the comments and the most liked comment was particularly revealing.
It read, “men want kids the same way a five year old wants a puppy.” In essence, men aren’t mature enough, aren’t disciplined or enduring enough, and aren’t intelligent enough to understand what having a child means.
That person’s comment is why I have piggy backed on Rebecca Solnit’s ‘groundbreaking’ article–and book–”Men Explain Things to Me.” Her put down of the male population as being domineering, arrogant, narcissistic, and all-in-all dangerous is revered as a feminist manifesto.
A difficult personality is not a gendered phenomenon as she states. No, quite the opposite. Fourth wave feminism has completely commandeered the term “mansplain” for their own utilization (“femsplain”) and exceeded the self-proclaimed dangers of the patriarchy with their own radical movement.
There are many who make the case that feminism, as we know it today, is dangerous, both for men and women.
Feminization of the Left
Rebecca Solnit posited in her 2008 article, “But explaining men still assume I am, in some sort of obscene impregnation metaphor, an empty vessel to be filled with their wisdom and knowledge.”
Although unintended, she perfectly described what the 2025 feminist has become. The left side of the political aisle is filled with virtue signalers itching to explain their moral superiority to the “brainwashed right,” and the party that appeals to people primarily on the political left is filled to the brim with radical feminists.
But while men of both left and right ideologies have the capability to ‘mansplain’ their position, it is primarily the radical feminist ideologues who simultaneously seek to silence the opposition through dismantling free speech. A study performed by the Knight Foundation found 59% of women were more likely to state building inclusive societies are more important than protecting the population’s right to free speech.
Psychologist Cory Clark, in an article featured by Psychology Today, wrote, “Women are more supportive of illegalizing insults of immigrants, homosexual individuals, transgender individuals, the police, African Americans, Hispanics, Muslims, Jewish people, and Christians, and are more supportive of banning sexually explicit public statements and flag burning. In contrast, men evaluate free speech as more important than do women.” Feminists want to tell you why they are right and they want you incapable of responding.
A truly informative article by Helen Andrews titled, “The Great Feminization,” will teach you the dangers in allowing female domination in law schools in 2016, legal professions as a whole in 2023, left wing newspapers in 2018, medical schools in 2019, college instructors in 2023, and so on.
Since the encroachment of female empowerment and female majorities, we have seen these institutions become more and more woke.
As Andrews put it, “Everything you think of as wokeness involves prioritizing the feminine over the masculine: empathy over rationality, safety over risk, cohesion over competition.”
The Loss of the Male Identity
Solnit writes, “Women’s liberation has often been portrayed as a movement intent on encroaching upon or taking power and privilege away from men, as though in some dismal zero-sum game, only one gender at a time could be free and powerful.”
She doesn’t buy into any claims of male suffering by the hand of feminists. She claims, “feminism is not a scheme to deprive men but a campaign to liberate us all.”
That statement is hard to square with reality. The very premise of the fourth wave feminist movement is to devolve the characteristics that make a man a man into nothing more than caveman brutality that needs to be smothered and revitalized with feminine qualities.
We know men are killing themselves at rates four times that of women. We know men are falling behind in the education system, with boys less likely to graduate high school or get a college degree. We know prison systems and mass shooters are 90% male. We know boys are more likely to be victims of violent crime. We know boys and men are simply dying earlier than their female counterparts. We know sons fare worse under the father abandonment pandemic, with boys raised without their father experiencing even higher chances for suicide, overdose, obesity, etc.
This is not isolated to the U.S., as we see boys falling behind girls in 63 of developed nations.
Warren Farrell wrote an impressive book called “The Boy Crisis,” and went into pain-staking detail outlining the many ways in which our male generation is in danger. He is considered a pioneer in the women’s movement, and yet despite this, feminists are dismissive of his findings. The New York Times released an opinion article from Jessica Grose titled, “The Boy Crisis is Overblown,” calling Farrell’s concerns little more than a ‘myth.”
Once again, boys’ failing futures are diminished to nothing by the “femsplainers” of our day. Feminists like Solnit attempt to discredit men by attributing all violent natures to men. From her we see the rise of the feminist war cry, “Not all men but always a man.”
But let us remember that everyday in the U.S., about 2,800 women knowingly and unknowingly engage in an extremely violent and disturbing act, and every year 1,038,090 of these violent acts are perpetuated by women. That violent act is abortion. Not all women but always a woman.
The “Pick Me” Girl
Feminists not only silence and talk down to men, but also to women.
A “pick me” girl is a popular term on social media and is explained: “A ‘pick me’ girl typically seeks the validation of others, particularly emotionally unavailable men. They downplay their achievements or interests to appeal to male preferences or stereotypes. Socially, they value male attention over forming genuine connections with other women.”
The term has now become the feminists ‘mic drop’ when dealing with a woman who refuses to adhere to feminist ideologies. It has a taint accompanying it that dismisses the woman as being nothing more than a slave to male desires. Conservative women are now considered to be ‘pick me’ girls and brainwashed.
And if you are a successful career woman who advocates traditional ideals such as stay-at-home moms (think Erika Kirk, Phyllis Schlafly), then you are labelled a hypocrite. When feminists do this, what they are really saying is, “Women who support stay-at-home moms should be stay-at-home moms where we don’t have to hear from you.” A loud voice saying something they don’t want to hear must be deplatformed by any means necessary, even if that means saying, “You’re a woman who should have stayed in the home.”
Shout Down and Shut Out
While every person has run across that man who just loves to tell you all they know, the majority of us recognize they are merely annoying and not as dangerous as the ‘morally superior feminist.’ The ‘femsplainer’ is more dangerous than the ‘mansplainer’ because the former wants to shout you down and shut you out.
They advocate for LGBTQ domination, abortion rights, the androgyny of the human population, the dismantling of the marriage institution, the takedown of motherhood, and any religion that preaches contrary to these ideals. And they advocate for silencing your freedom to speech so you can’t respond to their woke rants.
Radical feminism has swept Western civilization and threatens to destabilize the foundational unit called the family. It’s time we call it for what it is, a disease that will not stop until it eviscerates all that holds us together as human beings.
Alexis Tarkalson graduated from Brigham Young University-Idaho with her degree in Political Science and an emphasis in American Government. She loves spending time with her husband and little boy, reading, hiking mountains, and learning new hobbies. The family unit is immensely important to her, as is protecting the associated rights, which is why she volunteers her time towards United Families International.