Anna Quindlen-Still Needing the F Word

[realFedUp]

http://www.msnbc.com/news/979238.asp

Still Needing the F Word
Anna Quindlen

The point is not that the world has not changed for women since Friedan’s book. It hasn’t changed as much as we like to tell ourselves.

Oct. 20 issue — Let’s use the F word here. People say it’s inappropriate, offensive, that it puts people off. But it seems to me it’s the best way to begin, when it’s simultaneously devalued and invaluable.

FEMINIST. FEMINIST, feminist, feminist

While young women are given the impression that all doors are open, all boundaries down, empirical evidence is to the contrary. A study from Princeton issued at the same time as the Duke study showed that faculty women in the sciences reported less satisfaction in their jobs and less of a sense of belonging than their male counterparts. Maybe that’s because they made up only 14 percent of the faculty in those disciplines, or because one out of four reported their male colleagues occasionally or frequently engaged in unprofessional conduct focusing on gender issues.

Californians were willing to ignore Arnold Schwarzenegger’s alleged career as a serial sexual bigot, despite a total of 16 women coming forward to say he thought nothing of reaching up your skirt or into your blouse. (Sure, they’re only allegations. But it was Arnold himself who said that where there’s smoke, there’s fire. In this case, there was a conflagration.) The fact that one of the actor’s defenses was that he didn’t realize this was objectionable—and that voters were OK with that—speaks volumes about enduring assumptions about women. What if he’d habitually publicly humiliated black men, or Latinos, or Jews? Yet the revelation that the guy often demeaned women with his hands was written off as partisan politics and even personal behavior. Personal behavior is when you have a girlfriend. When you touch someone intimately without her consent, it’s sexual battery.

continued

[Lindacooks]

1. Anna Quindlen

is one of this country's greatest treasures, along with Molly Ivins. Every one of their editorials should be required reading in schools in this country.

[realFedUp]

2. Required reading in Congress certainly

I agree!

[Cheswick2.0]

3. congress too...but also DU

There are people here who need to read it.

[Classical_Liberal]

6. She's not a hypocrite. She thought Clinton should be arrested for rape

too.

[Cheswick2.0]

12. huh?

What does this have to do with Clinton? If she thought that then she was wrong, but that is a different issue isn't it flamebait?

FUYFAH

[Classical_Liberal]

17. No the issues are substantially identical

except one is a republican and ones a democrat. I just like consistency of opinion that's all. God Bless you too!

[The Backlash Cometh]

4. Feminist -- What our private schools are teaching the kids.

A private school kid my daughter is befriending said this about someone who was called a feminist: "Why does she hate women?"

I was a little surprised to hear it, but I understand the roots of the argument. There were issues that I had with hardcore feminists in the early 1990s, namely, that in promoting women to positions of authority, they often forgot that in displacing a man they also hurt a stay-at-home mom... But setting that aside, this is now the new century, what have feminist done to combat that image? It's this double-edged sword that keeps women from coming together as one large voting block.

[realFedUp]

5. I guess this is a topic that still needs to be taught

inside private and public schools.

Promoting a woman to a position of authority just
helps her and her family. It doesn't take away another
job from someone else. That's like saying that giving
a job of authority to someone of color is taking
away a job from a person of no color.

and for what feminists have done to combat ignorance
on this subject....I guess not enough for everyone here.
Maybe it's still the culture stupid.
Educate yourselves.

[The Backlash Cometh]

7. The problem is, some of us feminist WERE stay-at-home moms.

So we have first-hand experience that something did go wrong. You can chose to ignore it, but the woman's movement lost steam back in the early 90s. I'm asking a real question which can make a difference in the future.

[Cheswick2.0]

14. if the movement lost steam it is because of the backlash...........

from stupid conservative women who blame other women for their problems rather than the fact that our economic system has been destroyed by the greed of other conservatives and the blind allegiance to a broken capitalist system.

Look to yourself woman. I was also a stay at home Mom, BTW.

[The Backlash Cometh]

23. If it's that simple, why couldn't you get that message across to them?

Why did the Democrats fall silent on this issue? I know part of the answer. Because you had idiots like the so-called Democratic Chris Matthews bashing them on national t.v. and because you had FoxNews, for a long time, selecting gothic manly-looking women to represent woman's organizations.

Wake-up call for N.O.W. Find yourself some new P.R. people. I know you're a broad tent, so to speak, but you need to do a better job of reaching out to ALL kinds of women, not just your strong activist base.

[Classical_Liberal]

8. A person that thinks giving a women a job in authority

is displacing a man, isn't a feminist at all. She is saying a man has more of a right to that job just because he is a man, and not because he is better qualified. Some feminists are stay at home moms, but they don't begrudge women who aren't. Women who believe that aren't. Women doesn't automatically mean feminist. It never did.

[The Backlash Cometh]

9. I think the time-frame is important.

Also, perhaps, personal experience in what I hope was an isolated incident, but, sadly, I don't think so. I actually spoke with a N.O.W. member (in the early 90s) who recognized that they had a conflict. At the time, the push to put women in positions of authority was, perhaps, overzealous. And it played into the family values theme that the Republicans were pushing. Remember, not all women that were put in these positions, had families. While the men that they displaced, did.

Now it's ten years later. And I'm simply wondering if this conflict has been reconciled. Because, if it has been, then we should be hearing more unifying themes from women's organizations. Personally, I haven't heard anything from N.O.W. in a long time.

[Classical_Liberal]

10. Not all men have families, and nobody cares whether they

get favored over women who does. Pretty easy to poke holes in their theoretical family values theme.

[The Backlash Cometh]

11. I think you're missing the big picture here.

The point is that the feminist movement alienated a big chunk of women which once supported them. "The stay-at-home mom vote. Those votes have been going to Republicans and I believe that they can be regained if someone gives it more attention, than you seem to think it deserves.

[Classical_Liberal]

18. This is because of the republican spin

and the inability of feminists to counteract it. Not because of anything the feminists did themselves.

[The Backlash Cometh]

21. Yes, now we're on the same page.

But why haven't the feminist been able to counteract it? What have they done in ten years to try to regain those lost votes?

[Classical_Liberal]

26. The entire left has that problem

They certainly aren't being deliberately unsuccessful.

[Woodstock]

28. Where are the facts to back this assertion up?

A lot of women (and men) like the thought of staying home while the kids are very young - that has no bearing over one's philosophy.

[Cheswick2.0]

15. again with the ridiculous rationalization

"Remember, not all women that were put in these positions, had families. While the men that they displaced, did."

You have got to be kidding. Let's forget for a moment that men are not displaced by not getting the promotion they didn't earn. Let us talk instead about the insane idea that all men in the work place have families.

[The Backlash Cometh]

16. I was there Cheswick.

It was not pretty the way that white males lost their jobs through "creative attrition." Nobody really noticed it at first, because all companies were downsizing at the time, but it became a rallying cry for the right. And it has been my sorrow because the woman's movement lost steam about that same time. I would like to see them get back some of that steam, but it's not going to happen if you all keep trying to bury it under the rug.

[Classical_Liberal]

20. We're not burying anything, we just don't buy right wing arguments

.

[The Backlash Cometh]

25. Oh, enlightened one,

It doesn't matter what we think since our votes are already going to the left. What matters is broadening the base. How are you going to do that if you refuse to recognize that the right did a good job of framing the issues ten years ago? How are you going to convince "the other women" to vote Democratic?

[Classical_Liberal]

27. I recognize it. I wasn't the one that said women

were taking jobs that belonged to men.

[The Backlash Cometh]

31. I don't believe that is what I said at all.

Not that the jobs BELONGED to men, per se, but that being advocates of putting women in these positions of authority, created a vulnerability which the Republicans exploited.

[shimmergal]

34. Yes, and by "the men had families" reasoning, the people who _really_

should have gotten these jobs were single moms. After all, they have to support themselves and their kids alone. Whereas the "man who has a family" usually has a wife who _could_ take a job too.

In actuality, the single moms tend to get promoted less than almost anyone else.

[Cheswick2.0]

13. that is possibly the stupidest rationalization I have ever heard

Women shouldn't want equality because some woman who wants to stay at home won't have as big a meal ticket? Good grief!

[The Backlash Cometh]

19. And there, you have it.

Your thinking is the reason why the Right was able to get a foot in the door and take the woman's vote away from you. It wasn't about a stay-at-home mom greedily not wanting to work. It was about a woman making a tough choice for herself and her family to stay at home to raise a family because she felt it was the right thing to do. And which party was there to represent her best?

They split a vote that should have always been yours, because you couldn't see that this was about families vs single moms/women. The Democrats should have never allowed the Republicans to define the terms, but you did, because you're too stubborn to think any other way.

[Classical_Liberal]

22. You obviously bought their definition

since you think the cure was not putting women in authority. The problem is employers who don't pay people shit, not women in authority. You should clear up misperceptions not pander too them. There would be no point of ever creating a feminist movement if feminist said men had a right to jobs for being male.

[The Backlash Cometh]

24. Times are different today.

I'd like to believe that things have leveled off. The big push to meet goals is not there any more -- because we now have a better gender balance that didn't exist ten years ago. That's why I think the time is ripe to get back those lost votes.

[Woodstock]

30. Finding it hard to get past this statement

"...in promoting women to positions of authority, they often forgot that in displacing a man they also hurt a stay-at-home mom."

I can't imagine having said that you were EVER a feminist.

And newsflash: There are men who want to stay home with kids when they are young, too. This isn't a women only issue.

Both men and women having equal career opportunities and reasonable, flexible schedules means greater choices for every family. This is what Democrats have been promoting.

[The Backlash Cometh]

32. Fine. Perhaps this is the message we need to work

on getting across. Have at it, Tiger, because it's falling on deaf ears out here in ConservOlando.

[realFedUp]

29. Wow...quite a dialog...

[DEM FAN]

33. That Is What I'm Talking About.

:-)