I was wrong. I was lazy. I will fight.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

As a girl born into the tail end boomer/leading edge Gen X group, I grew up with the notion that the battle had been won. I believed that women had achieved equal rights and were granted dominion over their own bodies. I felt fortunate to be born into an age when everything had been settled by the strong, fearless women who came before me. I remember as a child seeing women on TV burning bras at protests and wondered why they were still fighting. I thought these rights were now written in stone and had no idea that they would be threatened. I was wrong.

As a mother of young daughters I don’t know how I can ever apologize enough to them. For it was my lack of political interest and complacency when I reached adulthood that caused them to lose rights that I had once known. I was initially dismissive of the zealots in this country trying to reverse the rights that women had fought long and hard to achieve. I focused on my own career and day-to-day minutia without deliberating on the fundamentalist’s agenda and coup of the Republican Party. Once I began to realize their true agenda, I made sure to vote against them on Election Day. This gave me personal satisfaction but falls far short of what is required to stop this onslaught against women’s rights. I was lazy.

As a woman I am wide awake now. I am mad at myself, my generation, and the traitorous women who feel the need to turn back the clock on women’s rights. My intent is not to wallow in what I should have done in the past but to channel my energy into stopping the erosion of women’s rights. I intend to continue voting for pro-women/pro-science/pro-medicine candidates while contributing my personal time and financial resources to women’s causes. While I can’t change the past, I can change the future. I will fight.

[MadMaddie]

1. And I will fight with you!!!

:pals:

[SharonAnn]

50. Be sure to fight smart! It takes money for candidates, volunteer

hours for work, maybe even you running for office. Do it! The other side is working hard to take advantage of you and all other women. They want to win and they want you to lose.

This is a serious fight to the death.

You have to go after it methodically and stay at it. Effective politics is real power. Without effective politics we have no power. It's that simple.

Get involved in your local party. Serve on a party committee. Contribute plenty to Emily's List, they're the best at identifying and supporting pro-choice Democratic candidates.

Stop spending time on anything that doesn't develop raw political power for you and your chosen objectives. It's hardball.

The good news is that they're probably not expecting it.

[rodeodance]

2. yes, 'it is won" set in for many of us.

[Iris]

3. Count me in.

[Avalux]

4. We are sisters then - Gen X apathy.....

I could have written your post myself. Hell, I didn't even vote until 2000. You wanna know what's so formidable about women like us, who up to this point have had a "so what" attitude? Now that we're pissed and motivated, we will not be stopped.

I also have daughters and THEY are the one's who've made me realize I must get involved - I want them and their children, etc. to have the same rights I do...I want them to realize a progressive United States that really works for the people and promotes equal rights.

We WILL change the future, and we'll fight together. :patriot:

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

9. The shock has finally worn off

Yes, I was apathetic for most of my adult life but as I came to realize what the zealots really wanted to do to women's rights, I was shocked.

Now I'm angry, motivated and dedicated to stopping this obscene erosion of women's rights.

[omega minimo]

24. It's understandable to think that "progress" means actually progressing...

"You wanna know what's so formidable about women like us, who up to this point have had a "so what" attitude? Now that we're pissed and motivated, we will not be stopped."

...and it takes time and hard life lessons (like the Reich Wing nightmare we're living in now) to realize (and we don't WANT TO BELIEVE IT!!!) that hardwon battles and rights and progress have to be protected with the "constant vigilance" Calimary mentions below. There are regressive and retarded ill forces that want to undo all the hard work that has gone before us.

So, with that formidable motivation and the righteously pissed awareness that WE AIN'T GOIN BACK, we can move mountains.

:grouphug: :hi:

[Hidden Stillness]

5. Now a New Era Can Begin

This is a very impressive post, and this will be the way the new era will begin. This is the light at the end of the tunnel. The bastards won some terrible victories over the past several years, but they also woke us back up and made people angry again. Now we all know the threat--if you didn't already--and at last, people are starting to realize that for all the years they worried about "liberals" and "feminists," that the real devil was exploiting the distraction, and destroying our whole democracy.

The beginning of the end of the horrible era is exactly that we now know it is a horrible era, and who caused it. "I was wrong" is the first step toward fixing it.

[OzarkDem]

6. Excellent post, thank you!

As a baby boomer who fought hard for women's rights in the corporate world, I'm so glad to see younger women become aware that advances for women were hard won and could be easily lost.

You have no idea how difficult it was to always be the first to sit in a management meeting, having to get your employer to write a letter of recommendation so you could get a credit card for charging business travel expenses; being the only woman (not a flight attendant) on the Monday morning businessman's flight, first to get pregnant and travel the sales territory, then return to work later, first to object to women getting passed over for promotion by less qualified men, having to pull strings to get a mortgage, etc., etc. I will tell you, the greatest ally women had in advancement of rights outside of health & reproductive issues was the NAACP.

But mostly it was hard because you knew how easily those things could be taken for granted and how easily they could be lost. Thanks for joining the battle, and encouraging others to do the same!

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

8. And I must sincerely apologize to those of you who fought the fight.

While I appreciated your fight, I was lulled into a false sense of security. I, and many of us who came after you, thought the war was over and women had reached equality. I never dreamed of a law like South Dakota's appearing on the horizon.

I ask for the forgiveness of all of you brave women and offer my sincerest apology. Although we are late to the battle, we will fight.

[Breeze54]

27. I'm glad because I'm getting tired!

really!

[GOTV]

7. Here's hoping you don't tire easily...

... many who fought in 2004 against Bush and lost have not been back.

By all means fight... but don't expect not to lose for a while. It takes a long time to turn a ship this big around.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

10. Change is in the air and I plan on hoisting the sail

Regular people are now becoming educated on the Rapturist RW agenda and it scares the hell out of most of them. Schiavo was the first wake-up call on how the zealots want to micromanage EVERYONE's life, then the realization of how close the Supreme Court is to actually reversing Roe, and, of course, the latest medieval South Dakothanger pro-rapist law is capturing the attention of educated women across the country.

Oh, and I won't grow weary.

[cap]

11. does anyone have any ideas on how to bring up issues

in the corporate world (preferably without losing your job :) ) --

So many women at the top say there isnt a glass ceiling... but there is...

How do we make our coworker and boss understand that something is desperately wrong?

Women need to work because our families are heavily in debt.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

12. I have a background in healthcare admin. where women are more equal.

I worked for some of the largest healthcare delivery systems and consulting groups in the country and was very fortunate in my career...it's one of the reasons I was so late to coming into the fight for women's rights. Healthcare seems to be one of the few businesses where women have good opportunities to break through the glass ceiling so unfortunately I don't have any real input into your question. Sorry.

[OzarkDem]

22. My advice may be dated

but you used to have to do it one at a time. If you made a group effort to approach top management about promoting more women, they usually panicked.

Just start making moves on your own. Figure out what level you aspire to and begin showing the qualities needed to get there. If you need extra training, education or special skills, get them. Take on special assignments or additional responsibility if possible, without getting taken advantage of. Also, dress to the level you're aspiring to, and make sure your work reflects the same. Be willing to take a lateral move if it will help your chances, but ONLY if it will help your chances of promotion.

If you feel comfortable, talk with your superiors and let them know you'd like to be considered for a promotion. If it still looks hopeless, consider shopping your skills somewhere else. Sometimes its easier for a woman to get a promotion by moving to another company (e.g. the competition). As I recall, women at the highest rungs of the corporate ladder didn't work their way up within the organization, they came in from outside, from another organization.

Apologies if this is all outdated. New rules may apply by now.

[RazzleDazzle]

26. No, no, no, no. ORGANIZE.

Don't get me wrong. Your advice is WONDERFUL -- but only for individual women who have no interest in helping all other women and regaining our rights. It's not an either/or situation, but followed alone, yours the route of the "token female." It could have been written by Helen Gurley Brown. It's not BAD advice, it's just individual advice.

ORGANIZE too!

Yes, of course they panic. And that's when you win. Then or soon after. Of course they're craftier at fighting us now, but that doesn't matter in the long run. There's strengh in NUMBERS, but only if those numbers are added together, not one here and one way over there, and one last week, and one next month and over there.

Women wouldn't have gotten ANYwhere relative to women's suffrage or 2nd Wave Feminism if we hadn't banded together and organized ourselves. It is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY.

My further advice would be to consider finding or founding NEW women's groups. The old ones (e.g., NOW) have become institutionalized and don't have anywhere near their old power or sassy attitude. They're old and tired, spent. Time for a GenX approach to the problem. We'll call it 3rd Wave Feminism. :D

[OzarkDem]

34. Good ideas

especially the ideas about forming new women's groups. It may be a good first step to do at your place of work, before you storm the gates of power. :D

In these times of scarce jobs, be careful, though.

[cap]

46. that's the kicker...

[RazzleDazzle]

47. If by "kicker" you mean job security,

that's PRECISELY why it's important to organize.

You organize in order to:

* have (more) strength in numbers
* research the "enemy" (your employer)
* research other companies or other industries (for example, if you want better pay, opportunities, training, benefits, whatever)
* research laws, organizations, etc., etc.
* pool your resources (e.g., hire an attorney)

and many other things, all of which if done right and effectively could make it more difficult for them to fire the lot of you.

But yes, it's probably the very first rule for activists anywhere: be prepared to suffer the consequences. And the corollary is: no guts, no glory. :D

[Hissyspit]

13. Very well said. K&R

[AtomicKitten]

14. You are a credit to your generation.

and your energy is sorely needed, especially now.

[mcscajun]

15. Glad to see young women waking up.

I'd like to say "better late than never" -- but that's overstating it.
You're not really late...just a bit tardy. :) Never would have been AWFUL...for all of us.

Those of us who had to struggle for every single scrap of recognition, every special assignment, every promotion (while we trained young men and watched them become our bosses), Thank You for picking up the gauntlet at last.

[calimary]

16. You're going to have to. Because it's not just YOUR RIGHT to have the

last word over what happens to YOUR body, it may very well also be YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE.

Even now, there ARE people, especially those who like to get their news from Pox and listen to limbaugh on the radio who are convinced that this country veered off onto the wrong track when women won the right to vote. I saw a thread here on DU, just a few hours ago, about that very thing - repealing women's right to vote.

BELIEVE ME, those rights we protested for and rallied and marched and did hunger strikes and (some of us who) got arrested and were reviled and belittled and sneered and smirked at, those rights are in SERIOUS jeopardy. They are on the critical list at the moment, with everyone who claims they're so "right to life" chomping at the bit to pull the plug.

You would think men, and some women, too, would have progressed beyond that, wouldn't you? That we've come so far and made such progress toward enlightenment, and that this had all been settled, wouldn't you? Well, it isn't. NONE OF IT. And now that circumstances and republi-CON "victories" in the polls have thrown a lot of big, meaty, juicy bones to the Xtians and other disciples of intolerance and other assorted Great Thirteenth-Century Minds of Our Time, these extremists feel they're owed, bigtime, because they did indeed help push these people into power. And now they want their pound of flesh. OUR flesh. The republi-CONS who are nervous about this deserve to be. These assholes are gonna be calling in their markers and their favors and everything else they think they're owed now, and IF YOU DON'T FIGHT, you better be ready to like wearing a Tali-born-again version of the burqa. Because IF YOU DON'T FIGHT, that's where we're headed.

For me, it's kind of a moot point. I'm now technically past the point of child-bearing age. BUT MY DAUGHTER ISN'T. And thank GOD, she's never been complacent. But surprisingly, I still have plenty of women friends who were just rock-solid SURE that Roe V Wade wasn't gonna be touched. "Awwww, it's NOT gonna HAPPEN" they'd say, so smugly, while they asserted that Clinton was the death of America because he lied about sex, and the Democrats were this and that and the other thing (never realizing that it's only a handful of Democrats who stand in the way between these same women and the fucking DARK AGES. "Awww... NOT gonna happen. It's NOT gonna happen. WON'T happen." That's all I heard. And all I could say was "oh YEAH? You SURE ABOUT THAT? Do you know who these people are, who backs them, and who gives them money?" "Naaaa... NOT gonna happen."

Now, they're smirking out of the other sides of their mouths because it damn well MAY happen. If we don't get a Democratic majority at least in the House of Reps in November, I daresay it WILL. You just watch South Dakota. You watch Mississippi. You watch Missouri. All the dominoes are ready to fall.

I hope to GOD it's not too late, but our side has been asleep at the switch for far too long, and NO ONE remained vigilant. And you know what happens when you dispense with the watchdogs and let your security people go and don't bother to keep somebody stationed up in the crow's nest. The Dark Side will survive - to fight again. COUNT ON IT.

As the battle-scarred wizard "Mad-Eye Moody" repeatedly warned his young students in the Harry Potter saga - "CONSTANT VIGILANCE!!!!" The bad guys aren't beat, even after you're sure they are.

I'm glad you woke up. I'm grateful that you did, not to mention RELIEVED! I just hope it's not too late. It was hard, trying to change things back then. Now, unfortunately, some of you and your sisters AND OUR DAUGHTERS are going to have to go through that anguish all over again.

I apologize for coming off sounding like a scold here. I take this part of it WAY too seriously. I'm one of those litmus test voters who decides EVERYTHING based on where the candidate stands on the choice issue. The Pennsylvania senate race this time presents a challenge because the guy most likely to get that ASS santorum out of there is anti-choice. But santorum ABSOLUTELY has to go. HAS TO.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

17. Scolding myself but moving forward.

I was just a regular 'hey, I vote' kinda woman thinking that was enough. I realize and honestly, sincerely do appreciate all those hard fought battles won by women of the past. I pledge to do more than just vote for women's rights and am sorry it wasn't sooner.

Pennsylvania MUST get rid of Santorum...he's a zealot with power. Casey :puke: is FAR from my ideal candidate but if there are 2 things I can say on the bright side: Casey can oust Santorum AND I would rather have him as my freshman Senator than, God forbid, the Governor of Pennsylvania.

[Breeze54]

30. Quick! What month is this???

National Women's History Month is MARCH!!

http://www.nwhp.org/

In 1981, the U.S. Congress passed a resolution establishing National Women's History Week.
In 1987, Congress expanded the week to a month.
Every year since, Congress has passed a resolution for Women's History Month,
and the U.S. president has issued a proclamation.

"Since its founding in 1980, the National Women's History Project has recognized
and celebrated the rich and varied contributions of women to the history and culture
of the United States.

1920 The Nineteenth Amendment,
called the Susan B. Anthony Amendment,
is ratified by Tennessee on August 18.

It becomes law on August 26, 1920.

Women gained the vote in 1920 after 72 YEARS of
the LARGEST civil rights movement in the HISTORY of the world!! :wow:

The Ninteenth Amendment
http://www.thelizlibrary.org/suffrage/amends.htm#XIX

Unbelievable that it took that long!! :crazy:

Who was...?
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/womensfirsts1.html
Rebecca Lee Crumpler ?
Arabella Mansfield ?
Victoria Claflin Woodhull ?
Belva Ann Lockwood ?
Sarah E. Goode ?
Alice Guy Blaché ?
Susanna Medora Salter ?

:shrug:

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/womenstimeline1.html

GROUNDBREAKING WOMEN'S HISTORY QUIZ..TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE!
http://www.infoplease.com/quizzes/whm2/1.html

[OzarkDem]

23. And not just reproductive rights

Don't doubt for a minute that changes in affirmative action laws could have a similar devastating affect on women's chances for higher education, fair wages and advancement in the workplace.

Those rights are just as important and equally in peril. They would have a severe affect on the economy and families.

[Breeze54]

18. A Big Hug for You!!!!

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

19. Very sweet! Thank you! (nt)

[salin]

20. am also a 'tweener'

very tail end of the baby boomers... went to work in DC after graduating from college - and while it was the Reagan era - tehre were a whole lot of liberals in and around the Hill where I worked (the House was solidly dem, and the senate kept flipping back and forth). The ERA had already died - and while I supported the ERA (though I didn't know about it until after the push to get it passed had already died out) I took comfort in what I now see as tired rhetoric that said that the Amednment wasn't needed, as the rights were already in place / covered by other Amendments. After a year or so in DC I realized that all of my liberal female friend would say... "I'm not a feminist... but I believe" and would state a bunch of feminist policy beliefs. It made me uneasy - this distancing from the word - this sense that the word had become a code word for "militant (gay - implied in the distancing but never spoken) feminist". Discomforted by this disconnect - supporting the cause but denying the tag - I decided I would NEVER claim that. So that experience pulled me into the fold - and made me pay attention more and take forgranted less those who opened doors for us.

It seems so long ago that I came to that awareness. I think that things, even among progressive young women, had gotten even worse in the intervening years (in terms of distancing from "feminism" and assuming the battles were over.) Glad to read your words - and I relate very well. Same as you I was only a kid when I saw the images of the bra burnings, and talk of the ERA. Had I not found myself in the middle of politics in DC at an early age - and personally confronted with the oddness of folks like me - embracing feminist issues - but claiming "But, I am not a feminist" ... I might be, like you, just becoming a lot more clear now, about how much can quickly be lost in terms of our rights, and questioning the comfortable belief that the battles were already over.

[SharonAnn]

49. ERA not needed because rights were already in place? NOT!!!

That's why they fought the ERA so hard. The rights were not all in place and the opponents didn't want to get them in place. And they've been trying to dismantle everything else they can get their hands on, like Title IX for equal sports opportunities in schools.

I'm siz months ahead of the official "Baby Boom" and have been on the leading edge of this stuff all my life.

Trust me, when anyone says a law isn't needed because you're already protected, they're lying! Becasue if that were true, then they wouldn't worry about another law guaranteeing those protections.

It's like the full page ad in the Knoxville newspaper today with a picture of children saying that the oil company Windfall Profits Tax would harm our children's future.

Puhleeeze! The only people who can afford to wage that kind of fight are those who have a serious financial interest in winning their side. Those people are not usually on my side.

[SpiralHawk]

21. Ahhh, about those burning bras: FALSE

According to snopes.com, the bra-burning Urban Legend is based on a false report that has been reinforced by what I would characterize as relentless rightwing, fear-based mysogynistic propaganda.

republicons are terrified of strong, independent, intelligent women, and more fundamentally are terrified by the concept of free will. Because their inner lives are so fragged, they embrace ther perverted stance of "control and domination" in the impotent hope that such infantile, grasping behavior will help them make sense of the world.


ORIGINS: One of the strongest images we've incorporated into our stereotype of the militant feminist is a mental picture of her ripping off her brassiere and flinging it onto a bonfire as a way of signifying a shucking of the yoke of male oppression.

This memory is constantly reinforced by numerous references in popular culture to bra-burning feminists, and it has thus been carried forward from a previous generation into this current one.

So entrenched is this mental image that folks rarely question its validity, instead accepting it as unchallenged fact.

http://www.snopes.com/history/american/burnbra.htm

[Breeze54]

35. I saw it on tv....

maybe everyone didn't do it but they did burn bra's.

[omega minimo]

25. Tweeners can remember the BEGINNING of the clock being turned back with

Reagan :puke: and the whole thrust of Repug anti-woman propaganda in the 80's. Younger women who were children in that era may need some help in coming to the realization that you have................. You are volunteering now to fight an intentional campaign against women's rights that is 25+ years old.

Great post, great turnout of cool people to join and welcome you. Thanks!! :grouphug:

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

33. Point well taken.

Truthfully I was minimally conscious of politics. Watched the news and scanned the paper and voted. That was it. I used to LOL at the religious nuts and just never thought they could convince anyone outside of their twisted little cult to turn back women's rights. As I posted: I was wrong.

Sorry for the tardiness but I will fight to reclaim what has been eroded and press for long term solutions to ensure the rights of women.

[RazzleDazzle]

28. Thank you. I'm relieved. But I have one request.

For those of you who will be re-fighting these old battles. SOMEhow, figure out how to make your gains absolutely, positively permanent.

For example, one of the failures on OUR part was not to see to it that our educational system featured women's history and rights and Feminism very, very prominently. Women's Studies curricula at the higher education leve were fine and good, but we needed age appropriate versions from kindergarten on.

Another failure, possibly, was not taking the radical religious right more seriously and therefore failing to include more direct oppositional fighting of them.

Others may have additional ideas, or different ones. The important thing is that women as full human beings must become absolutely key to our culture, and/or burned into our DNA as a species.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

31. Absolutely valuable points you make. Question for you:

Which current organization today is most active, effective and visionary about the rights of women? Maybe NOW will get re energized in the current political environment but they have seemed 'tired' in recent years IMHO.

[RazzleDazzle]

48. To my knowledge, there is none

As for NOW, they will always have a special place in my heart for what they did in the early days. But for the most part, once an organization becomes institutionalized, there's no going back. Can they still do good work? Sure. But it just doesn't have the oomph and spirit of those early years, and so it can't do the same kind of work of those early years. Let's not fault them too much. Let's say instead, they've matured and therefore their role is different now.

[rman]

29. Along similar lines

"For the first time in this century,
for the first time in perhaps all history,
man does not have to invent a system by which to live.
We don't have to talk late into the night about which form of government is better (smile)
...
Great nations in the world are moving toward democracy, through the door to freedom..."
Blah, blah, New World Order, blah blah.

- Poppy Bush, inauguration speech
(encouraging political apathy)


This illusion about some blissful status quo regarding political, economic and humanitarian achievements of our time is just that: an illusion.

[guidod]

32. It really angers me

that women are being treated like this. I promise I'll fight with you. Let's work on getting a law passed that says that all male republicans must be castrated in order to vote.

[Starfury]

36. Maybe someday we'll actually ratify the Equal Rights Amendment

Only been trying for 83 years....

http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/

[OzarkDem]

41. I'm ready,

as the rednecks say - "let's do her". Remember when ERA meant more than the name of a realty company?

Ladies in these states - there are bills to be passed that are currently in play:

Illinois, Florida and Arkansas

These are the states that have yet to ratify the ERA

The 15 states that have not ratified the ERA are Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, and Virginia.

[bobbieinok]

51. IA ratified ERA late 70s + then the RW put on a MAJOR national +

state campaign in 1980 to STOP THE ERA. There was a popular vote on the ERA in IA in the 1980 presidential election and the ERA lost.

From what I remember at the time, it was assumed that this vote reversed IA's pro-ERA vote.

One of the most disgusting features of the 24/7 antiERA in IA in the 1980 campaign was a TV ad played constantly in IA before the election. The video was from Gay Pride parades, shots carefully chosen to be most upsetting to MidWest sensibilities. The voice over was to the effect that a vote for the ERA was a vote for such sights on every street corner in small town IA (big town IA too, of course).

There were attempts to get stations to refuse to play the ad, but stations played it, citing 'free speech,' 'political dialogue'. They got LOTS of money for playing the ad, too, from national groups that were working VERY HARD to STOP THE ERA. A prominent group was a Mormon front group; this national campaign vs the ERA may have been the start of conservative christian groups working with Mormons on social issues (conservative christian groups DO NOT consider Mormons christian; raised as a SoBapt, I know the antiMormon and antiCatholic view held by many in that denomination.)

[Skittles]

37. I am 48 and I never, ever saw a woman burn a bra on TV

NEVER

[cally]

38. Your post gives me hope

Maybe if enough like you are waking up, we can save our rights. We have to. I'm at the tail end of the boomers and I know many of us took our rights for granted. I laughed at the religious right. I had no idea they would be controlling the country in a few short years. We better wake up and get organized.

[fortyfeetunder]

39. It's OK. It's not too late to see the light

I hope you can take this opportunity to educate your peers the real deal with women's rights.
I'm glad you saw the light and we welcome you with :hug:

[BlueIris]

40. Aw, man. This post is NICE. Good luck! You're in good company. nt

[bcoylepa]

42. write Napoli through this link

one way to fight back
here is a link on Napoli and the South Dakota Ban
at the end you can email his office - go for it

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rachel-sklar/welcome-to-senator-bill-n_b_17669.html

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

43. Thanks for the link...looks like it's a new entry at Huffingtonpost

What a sick individual that Napoli is...I'm pretty sure he's the one I saw on TV prior to the law being signed by the Gov trying to justify this sick piece of legislation. A repulsive little man.

[pat_k]

44. Impeach for Choice !!!

[Joey Liberal]

45. Good for you! n.t