For Today's Progressives, Women Need Protection—and Can't Have Their Own Opinions | Opinion

We've been treated to a fascinating window into the progressive view of modern marriage in recent days, and it turns out it's positively retro. Progressives seem to believe that husbands should control their wives' opinions—and physically assault men who impugn their wives' honor.

Those are the twin lessons of two stories that made headlines last week. In the first, it was revealed that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas's wife Ginni Thomas sent controversial text messages about January 6 to Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows—for which Justice Thomas may face professional repercussions. Then, during Sunday night's Oscars ceremony, actor Will Smith's slapped comedian Chris Rock over a joke Rock made about Smith's wife—for which he has been lauded by progressive politicians.

Taken together, the stories reveal that underlying the grandstanding of progressives on issues of gender equity and respect for women is an outdated view of a woman's place, which it turns out is not in the public square but hiding behind her husband, who should make sure to moderate her views.

You could see this clearly on display for all of last week, during which the liberal media excoriated Justice Thomas for his wife's opinions. The New York Times breathlessly covered Ginni Thomas's texts as though she were simply an inconvenient appendage of her husband, rather than what she is: a conservative political strategist in her own right who happens to be married to a Supreme Court Justice. "Justice Thomas ruled on election cases. Should his wife's texts have stopped him?" read a Times' headline last week. The article quoted Democrats arguing that Ms. Thomas's texts were grounds for Justice Thomas recusing himself from cases concerning the election and its aftermath.

Ms. Thomas texted Mark Meadows to "release the Kraken and save us from the left taking America down," and wrote that "I can't see Americans swallowing the obvious fraud. Just going with one more thing with no frickin consequences."

Are these good opinions? No. And yet, they were privately expressed opinions in the context of Ms. Thomas's own professional life. It is now apparently the progressive view that a man is responsible for what his wife believes. Justice Thomas "needs to recuse himself from any case related to the Jan. 6 investigation, and should Donald Trump run again, any case related to the 2024 election," Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon, told The New York Times.

If this is the expectation, where is the line? If the spouse of any Supreme Court justice holds professional opinions about any event related to cases the Court is hearing, the Justice must then recuse themselves?

This would render not just Ginni but any Supreme Court spouse incapable of carrying on a professional career. Is Ginni not allowed to have opinions about cases in her personal capacity?

These don't seem like healthy questions that self-proclaimed feminists should be forcing us to clarify.

But it's not just that a husband must control his wife's opinions; he must also defend her honor, according to 2022's feminists.

After Chris Rock made fun of Jada Pickett Smith's shaved head (the actress suffers from alopecia, a medial condition that makes you lose your hair), Smith stormed the stage and slapped Rock across the face before returning to his seat and unleashing a series of expletives at the host for daring to mention his wife. In his acceptance speech minutes later for Best Actor, Smith opened his remarks by explaining that the character that earned him the honor, Richard Williams, "was a fierce defender of his family." He went on to say, "I'm being called on in my life to love my people and protect my people."

The question is: protect them from what? Rock's offense was an off-color joke about Smith's wife's hair. Smith's reaction—a physical assault—felt like it came right out of a 1950s Western movie, not a progressive black-tie event in 2022.

And yet, it was progressives defending Smith. In a since-deleted tweet, Congressman Jamaal Bowman called it a "teachable moment," explaining "don't joke about a black woman's hair." Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley, who also suffers from alopecia, deleted her tweet, too, that said, "Thank you #WillSmith Shout out to all the husbands who defend their wives living with alopecia in the face of daily ignorance and insults."

And they were not alone. "Chris Rock's one 'joke' was rooted in misogynoir, texturism, & ableism. Degrading a Black woman, in a room full of her peers, on live TV. The fact ya'll don't see that as violent is beyond me," read one tweet liked over 100,000 times. "Actually 'mean words' absolutely can be and are violence," tweeted Yuh-Line Niou, a New York State Assemblymember.

To hear modern progressives tell it, women are no longer allowed to hold their own opinions or perhaps even have their own professional careers. And they need their husbands to physically protect them from dishonor.

Modern marriage was supposed to be structured so that women do not have to rely on their husbands to physically defend their honor; they are strong and independent enough to defend themselves.

It appears we've traveled back in time.

Taken together, the stories—and the responses to them—reveal what happens when tribalism trumps anything resembling a coherent ideology. This is progressivism in 2022, but there's nothing progressive about it.

Bethany Mandel is an editor at Ricochet and cohost of the LadyBrains Podcast. Her writing has appeared in the New York Post and The New York Times. She is homeschooling her five children.

The views in this article are the writer's own.