The truth about the NOW election
I want to talk about the future of NOW, and that’s going to be my next post. But first, it’s time to dispel some of the nonsense about the election:
#1: The real issue at the NOW election was that the organization is broke and going nowhere fast. Membership has nose-dived and so has revenue (which is primarily based on membership dues):
During the two year period from 2005 to 2007, total revenue declined $1,189,644 or almost 40%. For the past three years, NOW’s expenditures have exceeded income, and NOW Inc. has been forced to borrow money from The NOW Foundation to stay solvent…
During the last election cycle (2005-2009), NOW’s membership declined approximately 10% per year and current membership figures are probably around 60,000…
The current Membership VP (Latifa Lyles) and her five-member team are directly responsible for a catastrophic 40% decline in membership and corresponding decline in revenues that imperils the continued operation of NOW.
In addition, something like 28% of NOW’s membership revenue goes just to pay the salaries of the four people at the top (the president and three VPs).
#2: Latifa Lyles has been the Membership VP during this period of catastrophic decline. She was running for president on a record of under-achievement, to put it mildly. Terry O’Neill, on the other hand, maintained overall membership levels during her tenure as Membership VP a few years ago, enhancing outreach efforts and bringing in new members each year.
#3: Latifa Lyles was not the candidate of change; she was the hand-picked successor of Kim Gandy and Ellie Smeal (who is the power behind the throne, as it were). Latifa’s election would have meant a continuation of Ellie Smeal’s control and a continuation of the inside-the-beltway strategy NOW has pursued in recent years.
#4: Terry O’Neill ran on a platform of change: shaking up the organization, re-invigorating the grassroots, re-establishing vendor relations, restoring financial integrity, and re-building membership.
#5: Terry was supported by prominent NOW members, such as Patricia Ireland (past president of NOW and a board member), Olga Vives (the current Vice President of NOW under Kim Gandy), Carol Moseley Braun (former U.S. senator, former Ambassador to New Zealand, 2004 presidential candidate), and Susan Faludi (Backlash, Stiffed, The Terror Dream). She was also supported by many chapter presidents and state presidents: Endorsements and Testimonials.
#6: Terry’s team is every bit as young and diversified as the Lyles slate, with two women under 30 and a woman of color.
#7: Talk about not wanting to relinquish power: the NOW establishment (Kim Gandy and Ellie Smeal) was very intent on blocking any opposition to Latifa Lyles. Some of their tactics at the conference included:
- Refusing to seat delegations on made-up technicalities
- Refusing to credential members in good standing who supported O’Neill
- Confiscating materials from the opposition
- Refusing to recognize questioners
- Cutting the mike while members of the opposition were speaking
- Accusing the opposition of being “enemies” and “infiltrators”
#8: The NOW establishment (Kim Gandy and Ellie Smeal) flew in a bunch of non-voting attendees, attired in campaign colors, to run around shouting and cheerleading in an apparent attempt to give the impression of overwhelming advantage. Of the 575 attendees at the conference, only 406 were eligible to vote.
#9: NOW has not been “infiltrated by pro-lifers.” This is an absurd rumor. First of all, I don’t think there are any pro-lifers (or rather anti-choicers) in NOW. It’s a thoroughly pro-choice organization. Secondly, it’s not possible to infiltrate a NOW election. To vote at the conference, you have to be a delegate from your chapter. And to be a delegate, you have to have been a NOW member for at least three months, and you have to be selected as a delegate by your chapter president. There are a limited number of delegate slots for each chapter.
Furthermore, credentialing at the conference is strict: you have to show picture IDs, present your membership papers, get signed-off by a chapter president, and so forth. Kind of like the Department of Motor Vehicles, but more so.
The people identified at the conference as “Palin supporters” are not pro-lifers. In fact, they’re not even Palin supporters, as I’ll get to next.
#10: It was Kim Gandy who started the rumor that the financial data about NOW (see #1 above) was misinformation being spread by “Palin supporters.” This false accusation, repeated and amplified by Latifa Lyles, led to much of the fireworks at the conference. Patricia Ireland and Terry O’Neill publicly endorsed the financial data as accurate (which it is), thus forcing Gandy to back down. Other supporters and members of Terry’s campaign team, such as Carol Moseley Braun, reacted strongly to Gandy’s smear.
#11: The so-called “Palin supporters” are not followers of Sarah Palin, not Republicans, not pro-lifers, not any of that. They’re just O’Neill supporters who were vocal about questioning Gandy and Lyles. Many of them supported Hillary Clinton last year, so if there’s a common thread other than wanting new NOW leadership, it’s that.
I don’t know what most of them even think about Sarah Palin. It’s not a topic. (One of the women at the conference did go from supporting Hillary to endorsing Palin last year, and she did so for explicitly feminist reasons. She’s a lifelong Democrat, feminist, and pro-choice activist.)
At any rate, there is no Palinist cabal in NOW, nor was there any Palinist group at the conference. Nor any pro-lifers. This is all just nonsense.
#12: It’s perhaps worth stepping back and asking why Sarah Palin is such a reviled figure that the phrase “Palin supporter” is the mark of Cain. NOW itself, under the leadership of Kim Gandy, is part of the reason. NOW cooperated with the Obama campaign last year in spreading lies about Palin designed to make her seem even more right-wing than she is. Many of the things Palin is most reviled for — the rape kit smear, the abstinence-only smear, the anti-contraception smear — aren’t even true.
78 Responses to “The truth about the NOW election”
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myiq2xu says:
“A lie travels half-way around the world while the truth is getting its shoes on”
Keep this post handy Violet, I suspect you’ll be needing it again in the future. I think a zombie lie has been created.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:45 pm EST -
Violet says:
I was going to send this to you and ask if you wanted to help plug it, but I couldn’t find your email. I don’t know if the one you use to post here is your real one. Will you email me at violetsocks@reclusiveleftist.com?
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Gender2010 says:
#12 is interesting. Why is she so reviled? For her accomplishments (and there are many) or for her religious beliefs (many politicians have the same beliefs) or for her appearance?
#12 on this list is something any feminist who absolutely hates Governor Palin should think about.
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Ian Welsh says:
You have a post on this? Because this does not jive with what I recall and I’d like to see the evidence.
“Most of the things Palin is reviled for — the rape kit smear, the abstinence-only smear, the anti-contraception smear — are simply not true. ”
As for NOW, they decided being Washington insiders was more important than representing women, and they’re paying the price.
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Violet says:
You have a post on this? Because this does not jive with what I recall and I’d like to see the evidence.
Evidence for what? Post on what?
If you mean the Palin stuff:
http://www.reclusiveleftist.co.....kes-again/
http://www.reclusiveleftist.co.....-the-lies/
http://www.reclusiveleftist.co.....ad-speaks/
http://www.reclusiveleftist.co.....minder-14/ -
NOW the truth « The Confluence says:
[...] the National Organization for Women’s national conference last Saturday in Indiananapolis. Violet Socks tells it like it is: #1: The real issue at the NOW election was that the organization is broke and [...]
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Fredster says:
All of this sounds so much like what happened with Obama during the primaries. And all of it is so totally uncalled for.
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Edgeoforever says:
Interesting about 12.
It was very obvious to me that, like the Clinton smears(the racism memorandum), the Palin vilification was an Obama campaign coordinated effort. It started with Obama himself calling her a mayor and boasting that his “running his campaign” is more executive experience than her running a state, followed by “lipstick on a pig” and eventually passed on to underlings – such as NOW (Gandy acquiesced to Steven Colbert’s submission that “Sarah Palin is a dude”)
Like W’s successful smear campaign against France for opposing the Iraq war, the Palin hate also became a popular culture staple due to key players propagating the memes. Embarrassingly, NOW was one of them.
And, while I am not a political supporter of Palin I did and will continue to defend her from sexism attacks as, unlike Gandy I don’t think she is a dude – or as Colbert elaborated “has junk downstairs” -
SYD says:
# 12 says it all.
Thanks aain, Dr. Socks, for your clear mind and warriors heart!
SYD
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Northwest rain says:
Voting for Palin was not an easy choice for a lot of people — but given the choice of a proven MCP — with Palin we knew what we were getting. No one is perfect — The blogging boyz and girlz needed to make up lies — because that’s all they have against a politician who HAPPENS to be female.
As the days go by — I know that I made the correct choice.
What the Obama trained thugs did at the caucuses is unforgivable — his sexist behavior was and is unforgivable. Basically I don’t like liars — 0bama is untrustworthy — he has a personality disorder which should have disqualified him from any elected office.
I hope that NOW can grow up and do some real work. But basically I don’t care anymore.
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anne says:
They are repeating the lies about Sarah Palin over at IBTP. I thought radical feminists were supposed to see through this kind of misogynistic nonsense.
Interesting that pretty much the first target for the Obamabots after the election was a feminist organisation. The whole election was an attack on women and women working to achieve power, so I suppose it’s no coincidence. Obama and his cohorts know that his strongest opposition will come from women now they’ve neutralised the left.
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anne says:
Everybody seems to have forgotten that John McCain was actually the Republican candidate last year, not Palin.
Am I the only McCain supporter around? My support, for whatever it was worth, was for him not Palin. It was in support of him in part because he was prepared to put a powerful woman on the ticket and because he clearly respected Hillary Clinton.
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bluelyon says:
60,000 total membership? Holey smokes!
#7 reminds me of too many state Democratic party meetings I’ve been to, but most especially our last state convention wherein no dissenting opinion was allowed the light of day.
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Mary says:
Kim Gandy adopted Obama’s Alinsky techniques: name your target, make it personal, and attack , even if it isn’t true.
As such, she lost all credibility with her own membership.
She gained the “world,” but lost her soul as a feminist, when she abandoned principles for benefit as an “insider” (much like Rachel Maddow did, too).
And she has no one to blame but herself.
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Mary Wlodarski says:
It has been so long that if I was ever a member of NOW, I don’t remember it. Actually may join because of the O’Neill election. Most definitely this basically conservative old lady will bookmark your blog. Felt I was finally in the room with people who intelligently discuss “talking points” not just repeat them. I was appalled at the treatment of Sarah, voted for Barak and just cannot stand McCain. Oh if only I were actually as one dimensional as I am typecast!
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paper doll says:
Thank you for this post. It’s important the real history of this vote is out lined because lies and rumor is the oppositions favorite tools. Thank god that crew is OUT. At the very least we won’t have anti-woman stuff being pushed by NOW and therefore pushed by the MSM. NOW’s sole function in later years seemed to be to white wash the Beltways & MSM’s misogyny.
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fif says:
Thanks for that very clear and detailed review of what actually happened. Myiq is right: these lies get started, and they take on a life of their own. I can’t tell you how many people have cited that Eve Ensler email smear–filled with the above lies and several others–about Palin as definitive proof that she is pure evil. The irony: this is exactly with the far right did to Hillary & Bill in the 90′s. Will people never learn? I am going to wait until Terry O’Neill begins her term, and then I’ll join again.
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m Andrea says:
When is it safe to join NOW, so Terry will get the credit? When does her term officially start?
What interests me is that Gandy et all appear to be quite childish, disrespecting fweelings left and right, and yet they they don’t appear to care. At the same time, they screech that their own fweelings have been twiggered through vast amounts of disrespect and oh is that a national tragedy.
I’ve been thinking for some time that vanilla girls are hypocrites, and they can’t see this because they are emotionally stunted children. This has nothing to do with age, and everything to do with emotional developement. It’s the attitude of the “me generation” squared, and the only stage left for them is where they consume themselves. All reasonable people have to do is deflect their childish accusations while they make themselves look stupid.
The work that Violet is doing here is beyond “most excellent”, thank you.
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Gidget Commando says:
I thought Palin was way out of her league running for VP, and that her winking performance on the debates was embarassing and disrespectful. (I would have thought the same about a man who exhibited the same.)
However, I could positively SNORT FIRE when so-called feminists use misogynist BS against her. Disagree with her on the truth, if you must — IMHO, there’s plenty of substantive stuff for which to dislike her. But if you call yourself a feminist, act like one and stop using sexist, misogynist crap against another woman. Walk your talk.
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Sis says:
Her winking performance? She was winking at her father.
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M. A. Liginter says:
well said! keep up the good work!
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yttik says:
I wonder if we aren’t all addicted to misogyny, if it isn’t hard wired into our brains?? Perhaps some people become addicted to the high their brain chemicals produce when they’re hating on some woman? Seriously, it’s the only explanation I have for Hillary Derangement Syndrome and Palin hate. Or Britney Spears or Carrie Perjean or Paris Hilton. Regardless, we’re never far from getting our women hating fix.
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Puma for Life says:
Thanks for this post; very informative. I was a Hillary supporter and then a Palin/McCain supporter; I continue to support Palin and I am pro-choice (guess that is important to say). It will take quite some time for me to trust NOW in any way after this past election year. For now, I am a member of The New Agenda, which is non-partisan and does not care if you are pro-life or pro-choice. That whole debate is old and needs to go away for women. The most important issue is economic equality; once you have that everything else will follow. Because of that, the most important action we can take is elect a woman to the presidency. I agree with Dr. Long on that. Therefore, I will work for and support Palin if she decides to make a run for it. As for NOW, who cares what they think; they don’t speak for me.
I like this blog. Thanks again.
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quixote says:
The behavior of Gandy & Co is just weird. Last time I looked ( a l-o-o-o-o-n-g time ago) NOW had leaders who behaved in a professional manner. Some of this stuff would be odd in a high school class president election.
Although it does mirror the general Obot “anything goes” methodology.
I thought that was what we objected to when the Shrubbies did it.
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Monchichipox says:
I say this in jest but it would be a brilliant move. Want to raise a bundle of money? Want a frenzy of media coverage? What to become relevant again overnight? Do what every Republican under the sun wants to do. Invite Sarah Palin to speak at your next fundraiser/national gathering. The subject? Something we all find to be one of the major topics. How can pro abortion and anti abortion feminists work together towards understanding and a common goal. It would never happen but it would brilliant. Here’s a preview:
Sarah Palin wold probably agree to it but NOW. Not likely.
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yttik says:
I agree, Monchichipox, I think that would be a downright brilliant and radical move for NOW to make.
It would certainly strike fear in some hearts, LOL. Seriously, the day conservative and liberal women stand together, is the day the whole dynamic changes.
It’s really frustrating that women have not yet learned that sisterhood is powerful. As an example of how men practice gender loyalty, here’s John Kerry with the Mark Sanford situation, a man who is comedic fodder, ripe for the plucking. What does Kerry chose to do? Attack Palin:
“Too bad,’’ Kerry said, “if a governor had to go missing it couldn’t have been the governor of Alaska. You know, Sarah Palin.’’
http://www.bostonherald.com/ne.....position=0
Boyz have learned to stand together, they’re taught it from day one. Women not so much.
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Sis says:
What a despicable comment. What a loathsome and unethical man. And this is the man Amanda Marcotte backed? Damn right. Peas in a pod.
But rather than have her speak, why not a ‘chat’, open mike, in a living room kind of setting. We are feminist women, we don’t need to be adversarial even if we adamantly disagree with some of her stances.
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EricaLeigh says:
EOF said: “It was very obvious to me that, like the Clinton smears(the racism memorandum), the Palin vilification was an Obama campaign coordinated effort. It started with Obama himself calling her a mayor and boasting that his “running his campaign” is more executive experience than her running a state, followed by “lipstick on a pig” and eventually passed on to underlings”
Yes, I remember the first time he talked about her, when the Dems were still reeling a bit from the pick, he referred to her town as “Wah-Silly”
Jerk. And that goes for Kerry, too. I’m heading over to the Globe next.
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sharon says:
You know, I am seeing them emergence of a theme cropping up on this blog, and I like it, but it’s still in the wisps of fog, and needs a bit more development (hint hint, Violet).
One, I see women starting to lay down partisan and abortion lines, and want to come together against sexism and misogyny, somehow. The way isn’t clear yet, but it could get clear soon. Here in Santa Barbara, I belong to the Women’s Political Committee, where our aim is to get women of any stripe elected. We’re non partisan. It seems to me that feminism / NOW / etc has been too long cloaked under the Democratic / Liberal tent that it necessarily excludes some women, like Palin, and that hurts women overall. You can’t be a woman’s org if you don’t advocate for ALL women. I would, of course, be happy to exclude Ann Coulter from the category of women, for she’s a 3rd wave misogynist masquerading as a right-wing thinker but that’s just my opinion.
2. This whole notion of a national woman’s organization that participates in misogyny that is infiltrated by…feminists, and is up in arms over the whole thing…seems like fodder for an amazing documentary, but is also a sad commentary on the state of feminism. I love that Violet seized on what happened at NOW, but it rots that here we stand trying to wrest control and bring enlightenment to an organization that supposedly stands…for us as women. There’s a terrible irony when the people the org is supposed to represent have to take control of it from way-out-of-touch leaders that are throwing under the bus those they were supposed to advocate for.
3. Something in me longs for conservative, Republican, liberal, Democratic, Independent, (insert number here) wavers to lay down all differences and cross all kinds of aisles to come together as one incredibly powerful group of women with huge momentum behind it. Throw the abortion debate to the sidelines so that we can get women in office like never before, until we achieve parity in line with the population stats, and shoot down every sexist idiot on the media waves NOW.
That would be a mission I could sign up for. If there was an org that had that at its aim, I would throw myself into working for them.
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Sis says:
Well you know, this ‘let’s all get together and work on what we agree on’ didn’t pan out for the anti-pornography/anti prostitution feminists and the pro-pornography/prostitution women. (I won’t call them feminists), because we would have had to work hand in hand with people who are in my opinion, the equivalent of slave holders. People who make their living off of misery, torture, death and pain of our sisters.
Did anyone ask Malcolm X to do that.
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Beet says:
That Susan Faludi supported O’Neill is big for me, particularly since I didn’t see Faludi as particularly active in the 2008 feminist generation wars, and frankly she just seems too smart for that. Faludi’s writing is by far the best on gender dynamics of any contemporary writing.
On the other hand, if now has 60,000 dues paying members, why are only 406 allowed to vote?
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sharon says:
Hmmm. I am not sure this is a valid comparison. Malcolm X was trying to secure civil rights for blacks so they could do things like…vote. I wouldn’t say civil rights are the issue for women. What is the issue for us is that here in the postmodern era everyone has got so many names / categories / lines to fall into, that women are just divided up all over the place, and any military wonk can tell you – the divided are easy to conquer. The longer we keep ourselves locked into little categories that exclude other categories, the more likely we are as a whole to continue to be exploited, subjugated, demeaned, and divided.
By the way, that whole dividing think, like you just did above with women in the sex industry against women outside of it…is a very old patriarchal model: pit people into two camps against each other, let them fight it out, and see who comes on top. Never let it be known that the two camps could transcend their imagined differences, pull together and overthrow the power that pitted them against each other in the first place. That would be bad…
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Sis says:
Prostituted women (the term encompasses women in pornography too because pornography is just filming of prostituted women) *in* the sex industry are not who I or any anti-pornstitution feminist works against; it’s the patriarchy that benefits from their enslavement. Some prostituted women are so Stolkhomed and work for their slave-holdres. Some women in politics do the same thing.
Women being freed from sex slavery (and forced pregnancy) is our civil rights.
I get tired of what men do and achieve for themselves (never make the mistake that what Malcolm X et all did included you) being deemed more important than what women fight for.
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Branjor says:
Nevertheless, it seems to be happening, Sis, and I think that is a very good thing. Women need to stand together if we are to stand at all. Agree to disagree on whatever issues and work together for those we do agree on.
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anne says:
Sharon, many of the very vocal pro-porn/prostitution feminists are not in the sex industry and in fact wouldn’t dream of putting themselves in that position. Similarly many anti-porn/prostitution feminists have escaped from the sex industry and a few are still in it. The division you’ve just described there doesn’t relate to what Sis was saying at all.
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sharon says:
Sis, you seem to be engaged in some other fight whose outlines you’ve not really laid out clearly here. I might be coming from too much white privilege here, but it seems to me that since you can buy spermicide cheaply at the drug store at any age, the whole forced pregnancy and abortion debate might not be so salient as it once was. I also think that women choose to work in, or not, the porn industry. I don’t see that they need freeing as much as they need some enlightenment. These comments only pertain to this country, not to others, where the rules are different. My concern is getting the women in this country united, and ending the (seemingly) arbitrary divisions that keep us divided, and therefore conquerable.
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femina says:
I like the idea of inviting Palin to speak at a fund-raiser.
But, to fight this war, I put forward the scheme of all the women’s groups, new and old, coming together as allies and electing a Dwight D. Eisenhower to be the general of the allied forces. Please stop the exclusive turf-building and work together. Find your niche as groups, but speak with one voice with a trail of the many women’s organizations adding their names to the posts, articles, or videos. Hammer the media for guest spots. Continue your group’s mission but the missiles need to be large and long-range, and fired at regular intervals at the enemy.
As much as I, a second-waver, hope for success on all fronts, I have this nagging feeling the women’s 4th effort may go down in defeat. At this juncture, we have the momentum.
(With her tv show, magazine, and tv channel, it’s too bad Orah isn’t a feminist mouthpiece and mover-and-shaker.)
Also, too bad she accepted that other little job for Hillary would make a perfect “Dwight”.
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Sis says:
What “seems to be happening” Branjor?
Not in pornstitution.
But yes, it does happen to some extent with other parts of feminist advocacy, to a certain degree.
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samanthasmom says:
Sharon, I agree. If a safe, effective, widely available, and inexpensive birth control method that a woman controlled had become available sooner, I don’t think abortion would have been much of an issue for the second wave. We understood that before a woman could achieve economic and political parity, she needed to be in control of when and if she had children. Abortion was a means to that end, but certainly not the means of choice for most of us. A woman with safe, reliable birth control in her hand should be responsible enough to use it. I also hate the term “forced pregnancy” unless we’re talking about a woman who has been raped. I’ve only ever had consensual sex so no pregnancy would have ever been “forced”. I willingly participated. Both times. 8^)
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sam says:
Conservative and liberal and radical women are achieving fabulous momentum on anti-pornstitution issues around the world, and don’t let a scant number of industry lobbyists handed bullhorns by johns tell you otherwise.
One huge example: in January 2006 Bush signed the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act after Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) and Rep. Deborah Pryce (R-Ohio) joined with Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) to push the anti-trafficking legislation.
Also, Former Republican Congresswoman from Washington Linda Smith began the very influential anti-prostitution organization Shared Hope International, and they have a group of men whose personal religious faith has melded with their anti-demand commitment to produce several campaign directed at reducing men’s demand. They call themselves The Defenders USA, a title anarchist-radical me hates, but if I got stuck on that and their personal religious convictions we couldn’t work together. So I get over the name and applaud the in-the-streets work they do while appearing with them on anti-trafficking panels publicly and sharing data. http://thedefendersusa.org/about.asp
I haven’t had to agree with everything Shared Hope and their subgroup believes in to work with them, and I could write a book about how Portland’ s 3rd wave feminist organizations have consistently enabled the ongoing abuse of prostituted women instead of standing with me and conservative women like Linda to help women.
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Sis says:
I didn’t mean conservative and liberal (sic) women couldn’t work together on feminist issues. I meant, so far, no Stokholmed prostituted women and female patriarchy enablers (who call themselves feminists such as Feministing, Pandagon, Feministe) work with anti-pornstitution feminists to end pornstitution.
As for coming from white privilege, Sharon, yes, you are. But more interesting to me is that you are aware of your racism, but not your sexism.
A woman is forced to be pregnant when there is the expectation that she will always be available to service men’s sexual demands, that she cannot get reliable, cheap, available contraceptive wherever she lives, when she is cajoled, threatened and culturally pushed into having sex without contraceptive, when she does not want sex, cannot get an abortion when she does get pregnant, is forced to carry a pregnancy she doesn’t want because someone else decides she should (her church, husband or partner, mother, neighbours, community) cannot have a relationship with men (who control access to food, water and housing) if she does not give him children.
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yttik says:
I think hatred for the porn industry needs to be directed at the rape culture that allows it. The hatred towards forced pregnancy needs to be directed at the system that enforces it. And those who have an opposition towards abortion need to direct their outrage at the culture that disrespects women’s bodies so much that unwanted pregnancies still occur.
The problem is that women, regardless of our varied beliefs, too often simply declare other women the enemy, instead of declaring war on the patriarchy we all live under.
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sharon says:
Sis,
Where is it that the forced pregnancy scenario you’ve outlined occurs, exactly? Where is this battlefield you are facing where women cannot say no to sex, cannot buy contraceptive, and cannot choose to have an abortion once they have been raped or impregnated against their will? What country are you referring to? I know there are countries around the world where this is indeed the case, but I don’t know which one you’re up-in-arms over. Clearly you’ve got fire for this mission, but I am still unclear over what exactly the mission is.
You know, I am from the deep South, and grew up there post Civil Rights, but before the era of the Unity Pony. That disenfranchised time where a lot of things had changed, but attitudes hadn’t – that was my adolescence. I really hated that, and left the south as soon as I could, but not before I did a lot of work on Civil Rights. As a female in Corporate America, I then became completely schooled on the multiple ways in which women are subtly, and not-so-subtly, discriminated against in that world, and there is zero legal protection against it, because it’s for your ‘choice’ to have children that you are penalized in your salary and career. They hold against a woman the one thing she can do that men can’t – have children.
I still have no idea what cause you’re so up-in-arms against, Sis, but maybe you know a little more about mine.
Now can we move on to the how-we-work-together discussion?
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Carmonn says:
I would like to think that comments like Kerry’s will result in the Democrats overplaying their hand and cause a backlash; but then, I thought that when McCain picked Palin and the Second Great Outpouring of Misogyny occurred and the Democrats proved their problem was women in general, not any specific woman, that that was overplaying their hand.
The Democrats clearly learned teh lesson that there’s no such thing as too much misogyny, and perhaps they’re right about that.
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Sis says:
Exactly Yttik. But they control the women who are being prostituted, in all its permutations, including those who are marketing pornography (just another variation on being prostituted). The women in it, in all their variations of being in it, are victims.
I live Sharon, in the one North American country that provides abortion on demand for women. On the face of it. But women like this, somehow fall through the cracks. This woman had a ‘forced’ pregnancy.
http://www.thestarphoenix.com/.....story.html
Forced by seduction, hand or weapon, forced by culture, forced by incest, forced by lack of sex education (and who fights against that?), forced by the expectation she will put out, forced by no-one putting the father in jail. I refer you to yttik’s post on women’s ‘choice’. Forced by being told she’s bad, whichever way she turns, not a real woman, you’re a lesbian, I can do what I want with you if you tell your mother I’ll kill Fluffy. Etforcedcetra.
She’s just one example. In another province, the legislature caved and will now allow parents to take their children out of school or the class, if there is sex ed.
Forced.
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JeanLouise says:
Kerry’s just jealous because he doesn’t have a tenth of the personal appeal that Palin has.
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Sis says:
I think all these are examples of the same thing: patriarchy at work. Porn, rape culture and who owns my uterus. All the same entity.
“yttik says:
I think hatred for the porn industry needs to be directed at the rape culture that allows it. The hatred towards forced pregnancy needs to be directed at the system that enforces it. And those who have an opposition towards abortion need to direct their outrage at the culture that disrespects women’s bodies so much that unwanted pregnancies still occur.
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tinfoil hattie says:
Sharon, the battlefield of which Sis speaks is called “patriarchy,” and it happens everywhere, even in the good ol’ U.S. of A., and by the way – have you not followed the stories of pharmacists all over the country who REFUSE to fill women’s birth control prescriptions? For just one example.
Maybe some more privilege examination is in order.
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demholdout says:
Thank you, VS. I don’t know where else I’d be able to go to get the truth about what has been happening at NOW over the last several years as well as at this year’s conference. Thank goodness there are at least a few O’Neill supporters blogging about this and squashing the lies and racism accusations.
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femina says:
A NOW membership costs $35. I’m thinking about joining again to celebrate Terry O’Neill’s win. I no longer march (for ERA), but I’m exhausted with the talk and I want to be as supportive otherwise as I can be.
O’Neill needs at least 1 to 1.5 million marchers “on the mall” to be the least bit impressive. She’ll probably need to show such a mass of supporters for tv viewing at least once in her first term.
What else do I know — I’m a boomer!
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Branjor says:
***What “seems to be happening” Branjor?***
That women with different positions on abortion are coming together over common concerns. At least it is serously being talked about.
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Nora says:
We have the power to force change against misogyny right at our fingertips or our purses to be exact. Money moves the world apparently, more than issues. We must boycott advertisers or anyone making money off this crap and we must strike quickly. Letterman is an example of what we can accomplish. This is a tactic that worked well for AA organizations to fight racism. We should use it too.
I remember seeing a video of a song where the lead singer ran a credit card through the buttocks of a dancer in the video. We should boycott such videos. Let it be know we won’t buy the song, or video, refuse to let our kids buy it, and let our husbands, boyfriends etc know that we consider it necessary that they not buy it. We need to watch out for instances that we should fight, spread the word on the blogs and organize email campaigns. They may have free speech to say this crap, but we have the freedom not to boycott. We don’t need to wait for the most hideous examples, there are plenty everywhere.
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lambert strether says:
“A lie travels half-way around the world while the truth is getting its shoes on”
Well….
“A lie can run round the world before the truth has got its boots on.”
– (Terry Pratchett, The Truth)
Thanks for the post!
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Beet says:
Well, I have been boycotting male centered and sexist Hollywood movies for years, but it doesn’t seem to be working.
Probably because no one notices a one- person boycott…
@femina: For what it’s worth, I do think that Palin is likely to be the GOP nominee and the GOP nominee is likely to win in 2012. Unfortunately she will inherit a nation and world in tatters, so unless the one and sole thing you care about is electing a woman President, it’s not really good news. We may be in the early stages of the deflation of a massive debt bubble that has been building up for 60 years, and there is nothing anyone can do about it (except let default all bad debt, etc. but that would still be catastrophic). Read Hyman Minsky to understand…
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myiq2xu says:
Lambert:
Mark Twain
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femina says:
Beet — Except for the first sentence, my comments weren’t about Palin. I’m for building a huge women’s force and quickly.
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lambert strether says:
myiq2xu — Fair enough. OTOH, Pratchett’s The Truth is so relevant to the blogosphere we might consider adopting it.
The Truth Shall Make You Fret, and all that…
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sharon says:
Hattie and Sis,
My 12-year old daughter can go to the corner drug store and buy spermicide (not that I want her to, but she could). Any male can go buy condoms. I regularly do go to the drugstore and get spermicide along with cat food. It’s that mundane of a purchase. So, I still don’t get the ‘forced’ pregnancy thing. I will look at the link Sis provided, but I am just saying, in the US, or at least in CA, anyone can get birth control cheaply, from $1 for a condom to $10 for spermicide (12 uses), and it ain’t illegal nor is it particularly hard to find once you navigate past the sea of yeast creams and menstruation products.
Now, I’ve heard of pharmacists not wanting to fill pill prescriptions, but that can be dealt with too. If it’s a major chain store, calls to headquarters and the local press will fix that one. If it’s a local mom-and-pop shop, don’t go there, and tell others not to go there. Use capitalism to our benefit, yes? Protest if you want to, and let people know about this. I am getting a lot better at using the media to highlight issues of importance in my community.
Ladies, perhaps from my lofty position of privilege (unemployed high tech project manager, single mom, and flailing grad student attempting to turn writer and filmmaker), I can attempt to understand your arguments. Unfortunately, you’re running me off here with insults and categorical statements (that I am having a hard time digesting). And yet, I would be your sister in arms – so who is it exactly you are attacking?
It appears that no one is forcing me onto my back to get pregnant, but I’ve faced plenty of sexism and discrimination as a woman in the corporate workplace, beginning when I was a college student in engineering school. My first experience at 22 in the newly equal corporate workplace was sexual harassment. I got laid off last year because I was an outspoken, thinking woman, and that was too threatening for the Boyz, especially since I was one of only 2 women in the whole company, and the only one in a leadership position. I am now a neighborhood activist since I moved to a rough part of town Jan 1, and 2 weeks later, a boy was murdered in front of my house. I guess you could say I am the kind of sister that doesn’t take it laying down, so let me ask you politely to try not to kick those of us that would make good allies in the teeth.
It’s just a friendly discussion on how we get more inclusive and gain more momentum. -
Sis says:
This is not a suggestion you not post here. Although, I’d be surprised to see you last this long on a Black woman’s blog if you displayed there, racism of the calibre of your sexism here.
This is a suggestion you spend some time on this blog:
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m Andrea says:
Sharon, 60% of teenage pregnancies are the result of abuse.
http://www.americanprogress.or.....piece.html
You are somehow assuming that every teenage girl had a similar type of environment to the one in which you developed. Why you are making such a non-logical assumption, I can’t begin to understand.
To the list of your privileges which you do understand you have, you can also add: growing up in a well-adjusted mentally healthy environment where you are accorded some measure of basic respect. Many people do not have that privilege. Children who grow up in that type of negative environment tend to internalize unhealthy ways of responding to various situations, and it takes years and even decades to undo the damage. Meanwhile, they are easy prey, because they never learned appropriate tools for maintaining a safe space.
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alwaysfiredup says:
This is exactly what I mean. Sis, is it necessary to call Sharon sexist? She’s trying to have a good-faith discussion about her views, based on who she is and where she is coming from, and has nothing against you. Why do you have to call her names?
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sharon says:
Reading Sis’s comments, I am reminded of the way men get defensive with me when I try to talk to them about the sexist comment they just made, and why it’s bad. I am feeling about as attacked as they probably do when I finish with them. Sometimes, in spreading our message, we ended up annihilating (at least, verbally) those we’d like to enlighten and have join us. Kinda like the crusades. Sigh. I am learning to stop giving feminist dissertations on point, and instead work to point out why sexism is very wrong.
Anyway, Andrea, yeah I am familiar with that research. I did a program recently working with Latina girls in a local high school who thought it was ok to have their boyfriends give them black eyes, because hey, at least they had a man, and that’s what’s important. The school has a daycare on site and some of the mothers had 2-3 year old children, with either a beater-boyfriend, or an absentee one. It was a challenge working with these girls because the culture had instilled in them this idea that you have to take whatever men dump on you because having a man somehow leads to heightened status for a girl. In my mind, the rap hiphop culture sends girls the worst possible messages, but what’s really troubling is that they sign up for them, and don’t question it or fight it. I am a gen Xer, and sometimes working on this front, I feel like the pendulum of feminism never even happened, or swung all the way back to pre-suffrage times.
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sharon says:
Oh and sis, I just spoke at a black women’s conference in Dallas. Why? Because the organizer felt I was enough of a soul sister and had a long enough history of working with civil rights movements in Atlanta to be able to reach the audience with a feminist and empowering message. I also have a prominent black theologian female advising me on my dissertation on the ’08 election and women’s status on the national political stage. She’s helping me research the part about why the women of color in the election were invisible, running in a virtual media blackout, while the unity pony got 24 hour positive coverage.
But hey, I know you’ve made your judgment, and there I’ll let it stand. -
Sis says:
Congatulations on your dissertation.
Even people of colour disagree on many things. In my own case, I continually have to remind racists that native poeple are many cultures, and do not speak with one mind.
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Violet says:
Sharon, based on your comments here, I would echo Sis’s suggestion that you spend some time at the Feminism101 blog. I would also suggest that you stop making the argument that all girls and women in this country are empowered individualists with corner drugstores and complete control over what happens to them sexually so there’s no such thing as “forced pregnancy.” That’s an argument from ignorance, and you’ve made it repeatedly now. We all get it: you have no idea what you’re talking about.
As a feminist, however, I certainly welcome your interest in fighting other forms of sexist discrimination and in building a women’s movement.
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Sis says:
I’m not interested in any more back and forth with you on this Sharon. So I won’t respond on this topic further.
I sincerly think you should read the blog I linked. It’s not a sentence. After all, you seem to be very open to education.
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sharon says:
OK I am out of here. I think we’ve gotten caught in a classism discussion, rather than a straight out discussion on feminism, and unfortunately, it’s showing me how intolerant feminism can be of other voices. I know now why people back away from the movement and feel it doesn’t include them.
Violet, it was nice reading your pieces.
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Violet says:
and unfortunately, it’s showing me how intolerant feminism can be of other voices.
Intolerant? I’ve allowed you to post comment after comment with arguments on par with “if Haiti is so poor why don’t the Haitians just get jobs? And if black people are experiencing discrimination why don’t they just call the news media or switch where they shop? Make capitalism work for them!”
Just last night I was reviewing the election history of the Oglala Sioux in South Dakota. The first woman president was impeached because she bucked South Dakota and tried to keep abortion available on Pine Ridge. Most of the women on Pine Ridge have been sexually abused by their own relatives, and teenage girls are essentially forced to bear the children of incestuous rapes.
All over the country, not just on Indian reservations, girls and women are hemmed in by poverty and culture and religion and even geography, for chrissake (where I live the nearest drugstore is 10 miles away). And when people try to point this out to you, you huff off by saying that feminists are intolerant.
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SarahG says:
“To the list of your privileges which you do understand you have, you can also add: growing up in a well-adjusted mentally healthy environment where you are accorded some measure of basic respect. Many people do not have that privilege.”
I’m sorry, but that couldn’t be more condescending. You don’t know anything about her. And she may be naive, but that isn’t a sin. Racist? Sexist? Please.
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Sis says:
I choked on that sub-head. Then, I kind of laughed at the schtick. Then I though, geez, why don’t women think like that?
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samanthasmom says:
Sharon,
I was one of the first women at an all male engineering school 40+ years ago. I hope that my battles there made it easier for you to go to engineering achool, and that your battles will make it easier for your daughter. I, too, refuse to succomb to the victimhood mentality that many feminists seem to come from. By all means read the feminism 101 essays that you have been directed to, but know that some of them were written by a woman who is suffering from PTSD and has many other issues to deal with. That doesn’t invalidate what she says, but it does color her point of view. We’ve established that the patriarchy is to blame. I’m not sure rehashing that is worth much more time, but by all means if you have a few minutes, click on over there. There IS a CVS on most every corner in the USA, (I live in a very small town, pop 8,000, and we have three major chain drug stores.) I agree there is a problem getting women to go there. It’s a huge problem, and one worth working on. I personally would rather direct my efforts there than offer rides to an abortion clinic. I grew up poor, needed a full scholarship to go to college, and subjected myself to sexism and misogyny on a large scale for four years to get it. Although I have no experience with the hunter/gatherer society that rapes it women daily, or a culture that thinks its women should be pregnant at 14, my experience with the patriarchy is just as valid. Rather than fly to northern Alaska, I offer my help where my expertise lies. Do you belong to the Society of Women Engineers? We do a lot of cool things to reach out to girls. Young girls with “plans for themselves” are forces to be reckoned with.“You didn’t get “lured”. Women never get lured. They’re too strong and powerful for that. Now say it — “I didn’t get lured and I will take responsibility for my actions”. Susan Sarandon’s character in Bull Durham
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Toonces says:
This thread is convincing me that I can’t work with pro-lifers.
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Sis says:
This is just incredible that you would make such comments.
The writer on that blog has PTSD? Is this a side order of slam against mential illness now? /
“Although I have no experience with the hunter/gatherer society that rapes it women daily,…”
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Violet says:
It appears that samananthasmom is being spoofed by a racist, ignorant, hateful wingnut. Who thinks every American lives on a street with a CVS at the corner. Except the hunter/gatherers, of course.
I’m putting that IP on permanent moderation. If the real commenter samanthasmom comes back, she’ll have to contact me.
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Sis says:
I’ve lost track.
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Amy K. says:
This thread is convincing me that I can’t work with pro-lifers.
Don’t worry. The whole time you worried about pro-life people being unable to overcome their prejudices to work with pro-choice people, it was more than obvious you were projecting.
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Amy K. says:
Whoops, I got toonces and taggles mixed up. Sorry, toonces.
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teresainpa says:
wow…
That would be a mission I could sign up for. If there was an org that had that at its aim, I would throw myself into working for them.
Sharon I was going to say “are you me, because I concur with the comment that I copied from. I too hope that women can put the power of ALL women first and abortion arguments and party loyalty way back on the aggenda. I am now voting for women whenever there is one on any ticket and only when there are two women will I worry about their politics. I have certainly voted for some really poor excuses for democratic males. I have voted for men who had much worse records on abortion and women’s rights than Palin could imagine. If the republican party runs women against my senator Casey, she’s got my vote.
But as far as your claim that there are no forced pregnancies… I think maybe you are just being too literal. And I know there are forced pregnancies because I worked in a clinic where I met such women all the time. And BTW, it is 20 miles to the nearest pharmacy from my house and NO birth control method is fool proof. Young women are kept ignorant about how they work and when they do not and couple that with living in a place where abortion is 6 hours away or the local drug store is the only one and will not fill your pill perscription (some women, many in fact are allergic to spermicides)and some women/girls can not survive alone and their husband/boyfriend refuses to use a condom (often totally passive agressively)or will find a new women…. yes indeed it is forced pregnancy. In addition to that ANY pregnancy that continues after a woman decides she doesn’t want to be pregnant is forced.
Is it that you are anti-choice, or have you just been raised in a world where you imagine you have way more power than you actually do.. because believe me, it stinks to find out that your power right now is on loan from men. Hate to break it to you but it is and will continue to be until we have half the political, judicial, educational and economic power in this country.
So I hope that in the future you can drop the arrogant anti women (“women are only victims if they chose to be”) arguments you seem to be promoting. and join those of us who want the same things you want.
