Gloria Steinem on Sarah Palin
I met Gloria Steinem in a book when I was 17. I met her in person, and heard her speak, when I was 28. Both of these experiences were life-changing to me both as a woman and as a writer. She is my heroine, my role model. As the foremost leader of the U.S. women’s movement, her educated, experienced and brilliant voice is prized here on this blog. So, take it away, Gloria…(I’m sorry it took me so long to get you up here.)
Palin: Wrong Woman, Wrong Message
By Gloria Steinem, originally posted in the LA Times, September 4, 2008
Here’s the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing — the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party — are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women — and to many men too — who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the “white-male-only” sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.
But here is even better news: It won’t work. This isn’t the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It’s about making life more fair for women everywhere. It’s not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It’s about baking a new pie.
Selecting Sarah Palin, who was touted all summer by Rush Limbaugh, is no way to attract most women, including die-hard Clinton supporters. Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Clinton. Her down-home, divisive and deceptive speech did nothing to cosmeticize a Republican convention that has more than twice as many male delegates as female, a presidential candidate who is owned and operated by the right wing and a platform that opposes pretty much everything Clinton’s candidacy stood for — and that Barack Obama’s still does. To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, “Somebody stole my shoes, so I’ll amputate my legs.”
This is not to beat up on Palin. I defend her right to be wrong, even on issues that matter most to me. I regret that people say she can’t do the job because she has children in need of care, especially if they wouldn’t say the same about a father. I get no pleasure from imagining her in the spotlight on national and foreign policy issues about which she has zero background, with one month to learn to compete with Sen. Joe Biden’s 37 years’ experience.
Palin has been honest about what she doesn’t know. When asked last month about the vice presidency, she said, “I still can’t answer that question until someone answers for me: What is it exactly that the VP does every day?” When asked about Iraq, she said, “I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq.”
She was elected governor largely because the incumbent was unpopular, and she’s won over Alaskans mostly by using unprecedented oil wealth to give a $1,200 rebate to every resident. Now she is being praised by McCain’s campaign as a tax cutter, despite the fact that Alaska has no state income or sales tax. Perhaps McCain has opposed affirmative action for so long that he doesn’t know it’s about inviting more people to meet standards, not lowering them. Or perhaps McCain is following the Bush administration habit, as in the Justice Department, of putting a job candidate’s views on “God, guns and gays” ahead of competence. The difference is that McCain is filling a job one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency.
So let’s be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can’t tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.
Palin’s value to those patriarchs is clear: She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women’s wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves “abstinence-only” programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers’ millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn’t spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
I don’t doubt her sincerity. As a lifetime member of the National Rifle Assn., she doesn’t just support killing animals from helicopters, she does it herself. She doesn’t just talk about increasing the use of fossil fuels but puts a coal-burning power plant in her own small town.
She doesn’t just echo McCain’s pledge to criminalize abortion by overturning Roe vs. Wade, she says that if one of her daughters were impregnated by rape or incest, she should bear the child. She not only opposes reproductive freedom as a human right but implies that it dictates abortion, without saying that it also protects the right to have a child.
So far, the major new McCain supporter that Palin has attracted is James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Of course, for Dobson, “women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership,” so he may be voting for Palin’s husband.
Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.
Republicans may learn they can’t appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.
And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children.
This could be huge.
Filed under Politics | Tags: 2008 Presidential campaign, Barack Obama, Gloria Steinem, Joe Biden, John McCain, Sarah Palin | Comments (4)eve ensler on sarah palin: DRILL, DRILL, DRILL
From the Huffington Post
I am having Sarah Palin nightmares. I dreamt last night that she was a member of a club where they rode snowmobiles and wore the claws of drowned and starved polar bears around their necks. I have a particular thing for Polar Bears. Maybe it’s their snowy whiteness or their bigness or the fact that they live in the arctic or that I have never seen one in person or touched one. Maybe it is the fact that they live so comfortably on ice. Whatever it is, I need the polar bears.
I don’t like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.
But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story — connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.
I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country chose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.
Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God’s plan. She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin’s view, is here to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, “It was a task from God.”
Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist’s baby or not.
She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.
Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.
Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds of wolves from the air.
Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God’s name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything America has ever tried to be.
I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not just of the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and healthcare or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.
If the Polar Bears don’t move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, “Drill Drill Drill.” I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent. I think of pain.
Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?
Filed under Politics | Tags: Eve Ensler, Huffington Post, Sarah Palin | Comments (3)because i want everyone in the country to see this hypocrisy
Spread this around (oh, and I LOVE you John Stewart, always have):
Filed under News | Tags: Daily Show, John Stewart, Republican, republican hypocrisy, Sarah Palin | Comment (0)working mothers: in light of Sarah Palin
No, I have not lost my mind or closed my business to become a political pundit. But the political goings on are so infuriating at the moment…and being a working mom is part of who I am on this blog…and, I fall into this description of current events so perfectly:
“It’s the Mommy Wars: Special Campaign Edition,” as Jodi Kantor and Rachel Swarns put it so memorably in today’s New York Times, “But this time the battle lines are drawn inside out, with social conservatives, usually staunch advocates for stay-at-home motherhood, mostly defending her, while some others, including plenty of working mothers, worry that she is taking on too much.” Barclay Palmer
I’m a liberal Democrat, a card-carrying member of the feminist party…and a working mother that is worried Sarah Palin is taking on too much. Of course, I think that women should be able to work outside of the home (as I do), but I also think that mothers are critical to the development of their children – and she doesn’t just want to ‘work outside the home’ – no one can claim that the role of VP compares to a 9-5 or even an 8-6.
And, I hear myself and understand that it could sound sexist – that I expect this mom to stay home and raise her children, that I might not have the same expectation if it were Todd Palin. But, here’s the thing (or 4):
1. She is running as a MOM. George Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama did not run as DADS. They didn’t talk about how they were ‘hockey dads’ and ‘PTA dads’ – these ‘jobs’ were not listed as crucial items on their resumes, pertinent to their readiness for the job. Meanwhile, Sarah Palin is – in fact, it’s pretty much all that she has. Her mother of 5 status is flaunted like a badge of honor – it’s critical to who she is and maintained as critical to her identity and experience.
But, if she gets this job, she will be none of those things – she’ll be either absent as a mother, or absent as a VP, possibly as President. And from what she’s told us, she doesn’t even know what the job entails, so I’d hope she’d be around learning how to govern.
2. I believe that moms are special. Our bonds to our children are extraordinary – our closeness is essential. Father’s are special too – I’m not trying to put them down. But, there’s something that women possess, inherently, that is different. It’s one of the things that make women women, that makes me proud to be one. As you can see, it’s indescribable, but it’s there. I believe that men and women are different – that doesn’t make them unequal.
3. I know that being a hands on mom isn’t always possible – but this is a choice that Sarah Palin is making. She isn’t, for example, single and poor and needing to work 2 jobs to feed her family. Instead, she is looking at a job that doesn’t have set hours, that doesn’t have vacation time built in, where you can’t really bring your baby to work. She isn’t just wanting to be a working mom. She wants to be a working mom whose job is the Vice President of the United States! And, if old McCain kicks it, the whole story gets worse – either way, she’ll work until midnight and need to be in the office at 6am – sometimes she’ll be up all night. The world doesn’t click off at 5.
Also, I’m not, by any stretch of the imagination, saying that a woman and/or a mother can not be a world leader – I believe we can, wholeheartedly. But, I think that it makes sense for said woman to be at a specific place in her life – or rather to not be at a specific place in her life…like a mother of young children. Hilary’s daughter is grown, and even when the Clinton’s were in the White House, Chelsea was not a young child, much less an infant.
Not to mention this: it isn’t as easy as going to work and leaving your children somewhere – you need to find the right people, that you trust to raise your children.
4. My last point is harsh, but I’m going to say it anyway. She did this ‘incredible thing’ by birthing her Downs Syndrome child, a child with intense special needs. But isn’t part of that choice about taking responsibility for and being with the child? How will she have time to do this? I work full-time and my children do not have special needs, and I still don’t feel like I have enough time with them (and the guilt pounds on my heart every day…and I’m lucky that their other parent is with them when I’m not).
Before I had kids, I may have had a bit of a different attitude, or at least it wouldn’t have been quite as easy for me to be against her working as VP and having a family (maybe) – but now I have 2 kids and I work (a lot) and I know how it is…
Of course, this is all side-tracking us from the fact that this woman has no experience, that an administrator had to be hired to run the town (5,000 pop.) she was mayor of because she had no idea how to do the job, that she has fired or ruined anyone that has fought against her, that she is working for Alaska’s secession from the United States and that she has no experience that could prepare her to work with world leaders. (To read more, go here.)
I’m going to spend the next 9 weeks working very hard to get Barack Obama elected…and I’m starting by supporting Move On a fantastic organization working to energize and educate young voters. Read more about this citizens group and make a donation here. I just did because I will do everything I can to make a difference in this election.
Filed under News | Tags: Barack Obama, copywriting, Joe Biden, John McCain, Julie Roads, presidential election, Sarah Palin, working mothers, Writing Roads | Comments (14)Obama for President
I went to bed last night full of hope, and I woke up even fuller…full to burst.
Obama is Good. He had an intelligent rebuttal to every challenge and cheap shot the Republicans have thrown at him and he delivered with grace, with reality.
He laid out his plan and talked about how he would do it. Rich greedy white men everywhere are going to be pissed…but I say to them, you have been successful with the old regime, get off your ass and figure out a way to be successful with the new one. Don’t become one of the ‘whiners’. If you can’t succeed in a socially and morally responsible way, you don’t deserve your money.
Barak cuts to the chase. He makes sense. He takes responsibility and he urges us to do so as well. He doesn’t say it’s going to be easy, but he knows it all has to happen…and he’s going to lead us through the change – with honesty, vision, guidance, positivity, inspiration and the example of hard work, good morals and solid ethics.
He helps us remember that we can all find common ground. He isn’t one of the privileged few adding a notch to his belt by becoming president. He’s a real person who has always fought for what he believes, for what is right, for common decency.
‘We can not walk alone and we can not turn back.’
You said it, Barack – thank you for your courage and for your fortitude.
If you haven’t heard Barack Obama speak, or if you are undecided or considering voting for McCain, I urge you to watch this video of his acceptance speech at the 2008 DNC.
To read the speech, go here. And, if you have anything to give, please donate here. This is OUR campaign, we make the difference and as a result, Barack is not beholden to anyone but the American people. Not big oil, not corporations, not special interests…but to US.
UPDATE: This just posted by the Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 29, 2008
Shocking Choice by John McCain
WASHINGTON– Senator John McCain just announced his choice for running mate: Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska. To follow is a statement by Rodger Schlickeisen, president of Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund.
“Senator McCain’s choice for a running mate is beyond belief. By choosing Sarah Palin, McCain has clearly made a decision to continue the Bush legacy of destructive environmental policies.
“Sarah Palin, whose husband works for BP (formerly British Petroleum), has repeatedly put special interests first when it comes to the environment. In her scant two years as governor, she has lobbied aggressively to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, pushed for more drilling off of Alaska’s coasts, and put special interests above science. Ms. Palin has made it clear through her actions that she is unwilling to do even as much as the Bush administration to address the impacts of global warming. Her most recent effort has been to sue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to remove the polar bear from the endangered species list, putting Big Oil before sound science. As unbelievable as this may sound, this actually puts her to the right of the Bush administration.
“This is Senator McCain’s first significant choice in building his executive team and it’s a bad one. It has to raise serious doubts in the minds of voters about John McCain’s commitment to conservation, to addressing the impacts of global warming and to ensuring our country ends its dependency on oil.”
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The Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund (www.defendersactionfund.org) provides a powerful voice in Washington to Americans who value our conservation heritage. Through grassroots lobbying, issue advocacy and political campaigns, the Action Fund champions those laws and lawmakers that protect wildlife and wild places while working against those that do them harm.
PASS IT ON.
