Sarah Palin: Feminist hypocrisy revealed

[_bcspace]

You'd think that, whether or not they agree with her politics, feminists would at least applaud Mrs. Palin as a living example of one of their core principles: a woman's right to have a career and a family. Yet some feminists unabashedly suggest that her decision to seek the vice presidency makes her a bad and selfish mother. Others argue that she is bad for working mothers because she's just too good at having it all.

In the Boston Globe on Friday, columnist Ellen Goodman frets that Mrs. Palin is a "supermom" whose supporters "think a woman can have it all as long as she can do it all . . . by herself." In fact, Sarah Palin is doing it with the help of her husband Todd, who is currently on leave from his job as an oil worker. But Ms. Goodman's problem is that "she doesn't need anything from anyone outside the family. She isn't lobbying for, say, maternity leave, equal pay, or universal pre-K."

This also galls Katherine Marsh, writing in the latest issue of The New Republic. Mrs. Palin admits to having "an incredible support system -- a husband with flexible jobs rather than a competing career . . . and a host of nearby grandparents, aunts, and uncles." Yet, Ms. Marsh charges, she does not endorse government policies to help less-advantaged working mothers -- for instance, by promoting day-care centers.

Mrs. Palin's marriage actually makes her a terrific role model. One of the best choices a woman can make if she wants a career and a family is to pick a partner who will be able to take on equal or primary responsibility for child-rearing. Our culture still harbors a lingering perception that such men are less than manly -- and who better to smash that stereotype than "First Dude" Todd Palin?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122143727571134335.html

[_Droopy]

in the Boston Globe on Friday, columnist Ellen Goodman frets that Mrs. Palin is a "supermom" whose supporters "think a woman can have it all as long as she can do it all . . . by herself.

Which is quite interesting in light of the fact that the concept of "having it all" was a major attitudinal and ideological posture of feminism in the seventies and eighties, and a major mass market book of the same name, penned by Helen Gurley Brown, was written in defense and celebration of the idea.

Interesting how things can come full circle in an election year. Goodman and the rest of the feminist Left are scared witless that the first woman president in history may be...gulp...a conservative.

This would not be a part of the natural order. Dharma would be upset and the balance of the universe disturbed.

I drool profusely in anticipation of 2012...

[_Yoda]

I was watching an interview last night with Geraldine Ferraro, and she stated that it was a given that NOW (National Organization for Women) would not support Palin in any way, shape, or form, because she does not support any of their policies.

I find this rather ironic. Obama received adulation for being the first African American Presidential candidate (and rightly so). Shouldn't Palin also at least receive a nod in this regard?

Good grief. Oprah won't even have her on her show because of her support for Obama. Oprah Winfrey has been a champion for women's rights since she started her talk show. This seems very hypocritical to me. If Hillary had received the nomination, she would have had her on in a heartbeat. She gushed over Gina Davis when she had her show about being the first female president!

[_Brackite]

Hi There, All Here,

Thanks for this Great News Opinion Article Piece here, BCSpace. I totally agree with this particular Paragraph in this Opinion Article Piece:

Mrs. Palin's marriage actually makes her a terrific role model. One of the best choices a woman can make if she wants a career and a family is to pick a partner who will be able to take on equal or primary responsibility for child-rearing. Our culture still harbors a lingering perception that such men are less than manly -- and who better to smash that stereotype than "First Dude" Todd Palin?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122143727571134335.html

in my opinion, Governor Sarah Palin is the right Lady, At the right time, to become the Nation's first Female U.S. Vice President.

As for me and My House, John McCain and Sarah Palin merit Our Full Support.

[_Droopy]

Its difficult to say what comes first for Oprah, her identity politics or her general leftist ideology. Oprah once threw George Gilder off her own show when he spoke about black criminality in American inner cities being largely the creation of the welfare state and the absence of the Black father in many homes. Oprah then apologized to her audience for inviting a racist to her show. At the same time, she won't touch Palin because Palin, although a woman, and a legitimate part of the gender tribe to which Oprah also belongs, is also a conservative, and hence, part of a despised outgroup.

I lost complete respect for Oprah a long, long time ago, and stopped watching her intellectually meager pop psychology oriented daytime talk show well before that. She's a brilliant busisnesswoman to be sure...but a typical entertainment culture airhead in most other respects, as well as an insufferable demagogue. It would arguably take an entire stadium full of Oprah's to even begin to approximate George Gilder's intellectual resources.

[_moksha]

So what about the prevalent school of LDS thought that would say Palin should be home suckling her baby and tidying up around the house?

[_MsJack]

This about sums things up.

The crazy liberal feminists who are screeching about how Palin isn't a feminist or (even funnier) isn't a woman remind me of a certain group we all know who like to screech about how Mormons aren't Christians. It's hard to pick a favorite deranged quote, but this one (from Margaret Cho) is way up there: "... to call [Palin] a feminist is as laughable as calling evangelicals 'Christians.'" I'm laughing, but it's probably not for the reasons Margaret would like people to laugh.

by the way, while I think Oprah's a partisan hack and stopped caring about anything she thought a long time ago, I don't disagree with her decision to not have Palin on the show during the election. Barack's appearances on the show were long before he was running for President, and she hasn't ever had a Democrat Presidential or Vice-Presidential candidate on the show besides him, so she is in fact being consistent.

[_moksha]

I doubt it is hypocrisy, but perhaps it is some form of uncaught satire for conservatives to lambast liberals when they point to Palin as not living up to conservative values about a woman's place being in the home.

[_EAllusion]

This about sums things up.

Really? Because the official line is completely the opposite. There have been individual Democrats who have offered this line of criticism, but on the whole this isn't what the party is saying. The Obama campaign specifically repudiated it. But if a few people saying this is all it takes, then the exact same criticism can be lobbed in reverse.

The crazy liberal feminists who are screeching about how Palin isn't a feminist or (even funnier) isn't a woman remind me of a certain group we all know who like to screech about how Mormons aren't Christians.

What makes Palin a feminist? I'm genuinely curious. Is being a working mother in a position of power all it takes? I'd agree that simply opposing liberal politics doesn't make one opposed to feminism, which is where some feminists have gone with this. And while abortion access was a major part of the feminist movement and is closely associated with it, that's not a litmus test for the more genetic feminist notion that men and women deserve equal rights, responsibilities, and rolls as their talents and desires allow for. There are things on the margins that suggest Palin might be anti-feminist, such as the incendiary "rape kit" story that may or may not be trotted out into the limelight at some point. She certainly is zealously part of a religious subculture that is anti-feminist, regardless of her personal views, which I think makes people suspicious. But as there is nothing to pin her down there there also is nothing to pin her down the other way either.

In another thread, you posted a picture of Palin working on the phone with kid in hand and noted this is what a real feminist looks like. I found that baffling. Indeed, there are few ways I see for interpreting that comment that aren't blatantly misogynist drivel that is antithetical to feminist ideals. Real feminists have children? No. Real feminists still embody the nurturing gender role even while working? No. One wonders what you were going for there. My most charitable interpretation is that real feminism doesn't mean one has to avoid having children and taking care of them. Ok, that's something of a strawman, but then you just missed the mark, as being a working Mom also doesn't make one a feminist, real or otherwise.

[_MsJack]

Really? Because the official line is completely the opposite. There have been individual Democrats who have offered this line of criticism, but on the whole this isn't what the party is saying. The Obama campaign specifically repudiated it. But if a few people saying this is all it takes, then the exact same criticism can be lobbed in reverse.

EA, it has been far, far more than "a few" voices on the left expressing the concern that a woman with five children including a Down syndrome infant and a pregnant teenage daughter can not perform the duties required to be Vice-President. I've seen this take dozens of times from major liberal pundits and blogs, and if you add in the related concern of whether she sought proper prenatal care during her pregnancy with Trig, then the list blows up in your face.

In fairness, yes, a few voices on the right have said as much, but the conservatives who say that have never claimed the feminist mantle nor have they ever advocated that women can "have it all." The left has.

I think it's a nice thought that Obama has spoken against some of these smears; I've praised him for it before. If he's sincere then that's very classy on his part. However, Obama is in fact a member of the Daily Kos (which has backed most of the smears against her) and has yet to call out a single leftist blog, pundit or group by name. Just today right-wing bloggers uncovered strong evidence that the Obama campaign is behind an anti-Palin YouTube ad campaign that was meant to look like the work of anonymous grassroots "concerned citizens." Is his campaign behind the smears supposedly being orchestrated by "individuals" in the Democratic party? I don't know. But my former faith in his ability to stay above it all is certainly fading.

What makes Palin a feminist? I'm genuinely curious.

As you said yourself, it's hard to pin her down one way or the other. One can just as validly ask what makes her not a feminist. She's pro-life, but pro-life feminism is hardly anything new with Feminists for Life having been around since 1972. She's a Christian of some sort of background with the Assemblies of God, but the Assemblies of God in the US are on the egalitarian side of the evangelical system where women can be pastors and leaders. The definition of a feminist is very general: someone who advocates social, political and other kinds of equality with men. There's little to suggest Palin doesn't fit that bill.

In another thread, you posted a picture of Palin working on the phone with kid in hand and noted this is what a real feminist looks like. I found that baffling. Indeed, there are few ways I see for interpreting that comment that aren't blatantly misogynist drivel that is antithetical to feminist ideals. Real feminists have children? No. Real feminists still embody the nurturing gender role even while working? No. One wonders what you were going for there. My most charitable interpretation is that real feminism doesn't mean one has to avoid having children and taking care of them. Ok, that's something of a strawman, but then you just missed the mark, as being a working Mom also doesn't make one a feminist, real or otherwise.

You're remembering wrong EA. I never described Palin as a "real" feminist. I do think that a working mother running for an office that has hitherto only been held by men is a powerful expression of feminism. What's more feminine than motherhood? And at the same time, what's a better way to advocate equal rights for women than to aspire to an office no woman has ever held before? So yeah, I think a picture of a woman cuddling her baby while she works on a Blackberry after giving her first Vice-Presidential nomination speech is a good snapshot of what feminism looks like.

That doesn't mean I think the Gloria Steinem crew aren't feminists. Just as I recognize Mormons as Christians, different from my own form of Christianity but still valid, I'm willing to recognize different brands of the broad concept of feminism.

And for the record, I don't consider myself a feminist.