What the Hell is the Meaning of Life?-- revised version

By Marty Nemko

When I was a teenager, I thought money was the answer. So, I took after-school jobs, and tried to buy my way into contentment: clothes, nice car. That didn’t do it.

Then I tried noble work—teaching in the inner-city. But the problems those kids faced were so big, so multi-dimensional, that despite my trying hard, very hard, I felt I wasn’t making much difference.

Next, I tried prestige: got a Ph.D. from Berkeley, became a professor. But in my social science field, I often felt like an emperor with no clothes. So much social “science” is poorly substantiated, politically motivated theory. My students ate it up but I felt I was often feeding them ersatz food.

I’ve been trying the values route: focusing on what did I most value: work. To that end, I decided to be a career counselor. I believed that helping people find right livelihood would make my life feel meaningful. But now, 22 years and 2,800 clients later, despite a 96 percent client satisfaction rate and the San Francisco Bay Guardian naming me “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach,” that sometimes feels empty too. Some of my work—helping people to make the most of their current job—feels good. That helps them live up to their potential, and, in turn, their employer to provide good products and services. But too often, my clients come away with a plan they’re excited about but fail to execute. Even when a client lands a good job, I too often wonder if my efforts to package the client yielded a net negative to society: Some more deserving person, who couldn’t afford a career coach, didn’t get the job.

I particularly value meritocracy. I believe that more good accrues from ensuring a meritocracy than nearly anything else. 30 years ago that would have meant dismantling the ol’ white boy’s network. But alas, today, the ol’ boy network has largely been replaced by the Diversity Industry, hell-bent on ensuring that women and minorities receive undeservedly positive treatment. I truly believe that any benefits of "leveling the playing field" are far outweighed by the disadvantages.

Here's just one of countless examples of reverse discrimination and double standards that I could cite: When women and minorities have a deficit--for example, the so-called underrepresentation of women in engineering--a massive redress effort is initiated. But if men have the deficit, even the ultimate deficit--they die 5 1/2 years younger and spend their last decade in worse health than women do--not only is there not redress, but over the past 50 years, the vast majority of gender-specific health research and outreach has been conducted on women. A 50-year review of PubMed, which indexes the 3,000 major medical journals finds 43 articles on women's health for every one on men's. Regarding outreach, think of all the breast cancer pink ribbons you've seen over the past decade. Millions more men die and die earlier of sudden heart attack (Think Tim Russert,) yet where are the ribbons for that?

The Diversity Industry is so powerful, it has shut off dissent. I have tried prodigiously to protest the rampant reverse discrimination against men and whites, to no avail. When I write politically correct letters to the editor, they’re routinely published yet when I write to protest reverse discrimination, my letters are always censored. I’ve had 500 articles and columns well published, yet when I write about reverse discrimination, the pieces are deemed unworthy of publication. I’ve written a screenplay on the topic, Affirmative Actions, which the London Daily News said was “Sure to trigger a bidding war” yet no film studio would touch it. My first five books, politically correct, have been published and critically and commercially successful, having sold over 200,000 copies. Yet, when I wrote what I believe is my best book, the politically incorrect The Silenced Majority, it was rejected by 28 of 28 publishers, told again and again that the book is excellent but that feminists on the publication board have or would quash it. Self-publishing isn't worth it--I'd get too few readers but all the career-devastating media opprobrium. When I dared opine that the effects of uncontrolled illegal immigration are a net negative, a computer programmer with a blog called "Anarchogeek" admitted to "Google-bombing" me with the term "Marty Nemko is a Racist," so that since, 2006, if you google "Marty Nemko," that link appears near the top. That horribly untrue yet devastating libel has had untold effects on my career, yet I have been unable to get him to desist. So, I’ve been totally censored and censured--so much for living my values. Today, it seems that’s permissible only when your values are politically correct. I worry about a society that censors and censures benevolently derived thought that doesn't conform to the orthodoxy. Censorship from the Right hurt us in the McCarthy era. I believe it's hurting us even more from the Left today.

Many people find the meaning of life through relationships. While I have a decent marriage, I’m not sure the meaning of life, at least for me, fully resides there. And my only child, who is an ardent feminist, refuses to talk to me, in large measure because of my views on reverse discrimination and related matters. So, I won’t, as so many parents do, find enough of life’s meaning through my family.

Many other people find the meaning of life in religious faith. But I can’t find meaning in a God that would, for example, allow thousands of babies to be born every year with horrifically painful diseases and then die months later leaving bereft parents. Books like Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion and Christopher Hitchens' God is Not Great provide many additional sound arguments that that there is no God worth praying to. I'm unalterably sold.

Is that all there is? I'll soon turn 58, with signs of aging starting to creep in that remind me that the coming decade will probably be my last substantially productive one. I want to live as meaningful life as possible in the time I have left. How the hell do I do it?

Here’s my current thinking, subject to revision. It comes down to: spending as much time as possible using my best skills (writing and speaking) to make a difference in something I care about that few others do.

My current choices are to try to improve undergraduate education (It deserves much more scrutiny), and to improve the education of boys and young men, especially the intellectually gifted, because the Feminist Machine is less likely to shut that down, mainly because even man-hating feminists have sons they love.

Alas, I'm finding that for the first time in my life, I'm lacking the powerful drive it takes to tackle an unpopular cause. I am still plugging away at the undergraduate education problem, and I did pitch a cover story, "Saving Our Young Sons" to my boss at two major magazines for which I write, but both have demurred, after which I sent it to 20 important periodicals. None have responded, let alone published it. And I wrote a boy-positive movie treatment--I couldn't even find an agent. But in the past, I would have done much more: I'd have written the books, Saving Our Young Men and America's Most Overrated Product: A Bachelor's Degree and sent them to a zillion publishers and spent every possible moment writing press releases and white papers to educate the media on those issues. But I just can't seem to make myself do it.

So, my newfound lazy side is wondering if I should reduce my efforts to enhance the meaning of my life to just being nice to everyone possible. So, I give lots of heartfelt praise, make rich conversations with the Trader Joe's checkers, give free advice to strangers who email me, buy a casual friend an unnecessary gift, etc. I don't expect anything in return--I rarely get it. I try to take pleasure in the giving itself. That approach to life ensures I do some good, it doesn’t require Herculean effort, and I feel good no matter how other people respond. Oh, and I do get great pleasure from loving my sweet dog, Einstein, whom I got from the pound, perhaps saving his life.

At the end of the previous version of this article, I asked, "But is that all there is? Any suggestions?" Today, I got one email who said I needed psychiatric help and shouldn't be allowed to publish any more in the Chronicle of Higher Education, where I'm currently their Guest Blogger. Previous to that, however, I've received over 100 kind emails, none offering any new suggestions, but all reminding me that there are many good people out there. And that, in itself, makes my continuing 80-hour workweeks feel more worthwhile. Thank you all.