Last week, chess player Shakhriyar Mammadyarov expressed his opinion on his YouTube channel’s show “Persona” that women are weaker than men in many areas. This statement was harshly criticized on social media and was seen as contrary to the concept of gender equality.
Perhaps, a few years ago, say 5-6 years ago, I would have joined the campaign to criticize Shakhriyar Mammadyarov and might have even been one of those who “lynched” him. However, age and life experience allow me to analyze what is happening without emotions, calmly and impartially. In this sense, the generalized statements of the chess player about women do not bother me as a woman, and I even want to thank him for publicly expressing his conservative views.
The fact is that it is absolutely necessary to loudly express opposing opinions that do not align with the standards of “neoliberals” so that those who lynch dissenters on social media and subject them to psychological violence do not dominate society. “Neoliberals” spread a dangerous virus of the idea that everyone should think alike. They are intolerant of opinions that do not support their stance and, instead of engaging in a normal polemic, exhibit infantile hysteria, considering themselves morally superior to everyone else and unable to digest differences. As a result, a situation has arisen in the West where even the most respected intellectual is forced to remain silent if they disagree with the “neoliberals,” fearing a massive attack, job loss, and social exclusion. Many times, both abroad and here, when a public figure expresses a conservative opinion, feminists and supporters of gender equality apply emotional and psychological pressure on that person instead of conducting a logical, cultured discussion. Or, for instance, Azerbaijani immigrants may rejoice in the liberation of Karabakh in private conversations but curse the war in their social media posts, fearing deportation from the countries where they have sought asylum. Such behavior is a new form of Nazism in a “neoliberal” guise. One of the factors preventing our “neoliberals” from moving from the virtual world to reality is the dominance of mental conservatism in society.
As a journalist, I began my active career at “525-ci qəzet” (“525th Newspaper”). During my career, I wrote many critical and rebellious articles against conservative values and the institution of elders. However, my observations of the impudence of modern “neoliberalism” and its attempts to suppress diversity of opinion, as well as analytical articles I read, gradually dissuaded me from this rebelliousness…
Most people who criticize Shakhriyar Mammadyarov for his statements call him a sexist and a person with primitive thinking, emphasizing his disrespect for gender equality in their angry texts. I listened to the part of Shakhriyar Mammadyarov’s interview in question; he calmly, without any insulting tone, shares his thoughts, does not oppose women’s right to education and self-realization in desired fields, but merely makes a generalization. The main argument of his opponents is that for centuries men have not created equal opportunities for women, so they have not been able to show their talents and strengths. When it comes to art, as a film critic, I can say: compared to other art forms, cinematography is very young. In the years when the cinematic language was developing and being recognized as serious art, many women’s rights were already recognized, and they were active in this field. If I were to compile a list of the ten, twenty, or even fifty best directors in the world, not a single female director would be included. Of course, there are women directors with excellent films: Kira Muratova, Larisa Shepitko, Chantal Akerman, Liliana Cavani, Margarethe von Trotta, Agnes Varda, Agnieszka Holland, and others. However, the collective work of all these women directors would still lose to the work of Buñuel or Antonioni in terms of artistic criteria, cinematic language, and interpretation. Or in the field of acting, I could name dozens of brilliant actresses. Here’s an interesting fact: Renée Jeanne Falconetti’s performance in Carl Dreyer’s “The Passion of Joan of Arc” is still considered the best acting performance in cinema.
Now, to ensure gender equality in cinema, they artificially push female directors, regardless of talent, into prestigious festivals. As a result, films like “Titane” and “Happening,” which are genuinely low-quality and irrelevant to art, win awards…
When it comes to creating equal opportunities for both genders, women must also be prepared to serve in the military and work in tough jobs, and their biological, anatomical, and physiological characteristics will not be considered. Recently, a law was passed in the Netherlands that requires women to serve in the army based on gender equality. At this rate, the situation will reach the point where women will suffer not from gender inequality but from gender equality.
Looking for signs of sexism in everything has already reached the point of absurdity. In the West, a woman can scold a man who helps her carry a heavy load, seeing it as an insult to her personality and a violation of her rights. Some women believe that gender equality arises when they behave like men and mimic their manners.
Due to the excessive obsession with gender equality, women and men are losing their natural characteristics inherent in their nature, trying to turn gender equality into genderless equality, while medical science is trying to figure out how transgender women (men who have become women) can gain the ability to give birth.
When such situations arise (I mean Shakhriyar Mammadyarov’s interview), I return to Russian theater director Konstantin Bogomolov’s manifesto “The Abduction of Europe 2.0,” which caused many discussions a few years ago. According to the author, the ideology of the “new ethics” formed by the West forces everyone to speak politically correctly, preventing them from expressing their thoughts, ignoring the complex nature of a person – their dark sides and flaws, limiting freedom of feelings, and ultimately creating soulless people without differences and contradictions:
“The West declares itself a society “oriented” toward the realization of personal freedoms. In fact, today the West is waging an ongoing struggle against the human person — that complex and difficult to control energy. In the course of this struggle, the functions of the courts and prosecutors and the isolation cell have not been eliminated, and yet they have been largely delegated from the state to society. The state itself, in the form of its police and security services, has indeed been “humanized.” Meanwhile, the nominally progressive part of society takes on the role of the new storm troopers, and with their help, that selfsame state becomes surpassingly effective at combatting dissent.
…Feelings and thoughts had always belonged to the private sphere. Keep your hands to yourself; but as for your heart and your brain – these were left free. Such was the unspoken social contract of European civilization. It understood that man is a receptacle full of emotions and ideas; it understood that hatred — the flip side of love – may be a difficult and dangerous thing, but for all that is something necessary and an important part of the human personality.
…In the New Ethical Reich, a person is trained to love and deprived of the right to freely hate.
No longer can you say: “I do not love …,” “I do not like …,” “I am afraid of …” You must get your emotions in line with public opinion and social values.”…
The new ethics also state that you can think whatever you want inside, but it is forbidden to voice it aloud, and your internal censorship must always be vigilant. You must not make mistakes, and the moment you make a mistake, you will lose everything. Neoliberalism, which does not recognize a person’s right to make mistakes or to voice their beliefs, has been giving Shakhriyar Mammadyarov Azerbaijani-style advice in recent days: an intellectual must think a hundred times before speaking, know the weight of his words, and so on.
Shakhriyar Mammadyarov deserves thanks for not “weighing his words,” for thinking differently, and for voicing his beliefs without fear.
