It’s something that I actually believe. Throughout human history, the instinct which builds communities, provides mutual support, etc. has been as strong as the instinct which produces war, famine, pestilence and death — the famous four horsemen and all. It just doesn’t get as good a press. The sternest exposition of this point of view that I know of was The Seven Samurai. If you don’t go for Jesus, you might try that.

The meek shall inherit the earth? I think Jesus meant they shall inherit a place in Heaven. Cockroaches will inherit the the earth and there is nothing meek about them.

A while back, I saw a piece — it may have been on Salon, or OpenLeft, I can’t remember — that asked the question Does having daughters make a man more liberal? It sounded like one of those things that are written to generate a shallow controversy, and I didn’t bother reading it. I thought about the title afterwards, though, and reflected on some of my experiences with my own daughter. Men raised in our society — men of my age, at least — were horribly unreconstructed in our youth. We adapted as well as we could to the changes women demanded of us, but generally made a hash of it.

The sexual power struggle was distraction enough, but adding the social struggle on top of it often led to an uneasy truce with our wives. Love, if you like, was always conditioned by a kind of shell-shocked wariness, and no small amount of doubt. When my daughter got to a certain age, though — I think she was about ten or eleven — everything began to fall into place. She had no reason to be wary around me, nor I around her, and suddenly everything my wife — by then my ex-wife — had been trying to communicate to me began to make sense. She saw the world differently. It was that simple, I suppose, but sometimes the simple things are the last things we get around to understanding. It was a great revelation, and I’ve been glad ever since that I had the chance to experience it.

In fact, Dr. Tiller, I have read, wore a button that said “Trust Women.”

None of those who have smeared his reputation or contributed to creating the environment that led to his death ever could or would wear such a button. They would feel unmanned, if they did.