The vision of the anointed: the left and social policy

National Review, July 31, 1995 by Thomas Sowell

A MERCATOR map shows areas near the equator relatively smaller than similar-sized areas nearer the poles. Because so many of the poorer nations of the world are in or near the tropics, their areas seem smaller on the Mercator map, relative to the nations of Europe and North America. ``In our society,'' a critic claimed, ``we unconsciously equate size with importance and even with power, and if the Third World countries are misrepresented, they are likely to be valued less.'' A maverick map-maker in Germany named Arno Peters agreed, denouncing the Mercator Projection as an example of ``European arrogance.'' Peters created an alternative map of the world, which the National Council of Churches has endorsed and published, and some United Nations agencies have switched to the Peters map.

Textbook publishers have been forced by the Texas Education Agency to include in their books a disclaimer concerning the accuracy of the Mercator Projection. The fact that most professional map-makers have been highly critical of the Peters map carries no weight with the self-anointed elite. ``The political implications of this map are true, whereas the political implications of the Mercator map are false,'' according a spokesman for the NCC's publishing organization. However, all maps necessarily distort the globe for the simple reason that there is no way to accurately represent a three-dimensional planet on a two-dimensional piece of paper. In map-making, as in other decision-making processes, there are no ``solutions'' but only trade-offs, which in this case permit one kind of accuracy to be achieved only at the expense of other kinds of accuracy. Finally, to complete the parallel with so many other kinds of misunderstandings by the anointed, maps exist not for symbolic or ideological purposes but to meet some concrete practical need. One of the most enduring and most important needs met by maps is for finding places, particularly for navigation by ships and later by planes. In the Mercator Projection, directions were made accurate -- at the expense of distorting the relative size of areas. Given that the users of these maps were far more concerned with arriving alive at their destinations than with comparing real estate, the Mercator Projection reigned supreme as a world map. Enter the anointed. For them, all this history and the scientific principles of map-making have been blithely ignored and an opportunity for moral preening created instead. WHEN someone says that a flock of geese is flying overhead, no one believes this means that it is an all-female flock, with no ganders among them. It is just that the female name -- goose -- is used generically to denote the whole species. With people, the male name -- man -- is used to denote the species, while ships and countries are usually referred to as ``she.'' How all this arose historically is lost somewhere in the mists of time. But just as no one means to exclude ganders when referring to a flock of geese, or to suggest that some female made the decision when Russia decided that she would invade the Caucasus, so no one intended to exclude women when the generic ``he'' was used. One can look through writings from centuries past and see general principles about ``man'' illustrated by examples of how mothers treat their children or how housewives manage a household. Simple and obvious as all this should be, a whole crusade has been launched, requiring that clumsy phrases like ``he/she'' or ``s/he'' or ``he or she'' be used, leading to such constructions as: ``When anyone decides that he or she should have his or her house painted, then he or she should go to a painter and ask him or her how much it will cost.'' This cluttering of the English language conveys no additional information, however much it may serve as a shibboleth identifying the anointed. It connotes also false information, namely that those who preferred a less cluttered way of writing were secretly harboring malign thoughts toward women -- or ``self-hate'' where these writers were women themselves. Trivial as such crusades may seem, they have been very successful in changing language in the media, in academia, and in government. Not only is the generic ``he'' taboo in many quarters, the speech-controllers have pressed on to new conquests, attacking such words as ``layman,'' ``craftsman,'' ``actress,'' and ``matron,'' and also proscribing such phrases as ``to master a language'' because they use a sex-specific word. The net effect of all this is that young women are led to believe that every use of the generic ``he'' in books of the past is proof of disdain or hostility toward women, when in fact such usage simply avoided forcing writers into strained constructions and awkward phrases. In short, the anointed help to make yet another group feel like victims and to regard the anointed as their rescuers. The symbolic function of such victim groups is much like that of team mascots.