Recently in Anti-Feminism Category

Via Media Matters, I wasn't shocked to find that Rush Limbaugh was happy to mock the White House appointment of Adviser on Violence Against Women Lynn Rosenthal, but felt it necessary to point out his thoughts on what one who occupies the appointment would advise: "Put some ice on it."

It's a domestic violence adviser. What the hell kind of advice are you gonna get? About the only kind of advice - I mean we're talking about democrats here, right? We're talking about the party of Bill Clinton. So I assume If you're going to have a domestic policy adviser, the advice you're gonna get - put some ice on it. Your lip's a little bleeding and swollen - put some ice on it, as you leave the swanky motel room.

Domestic violence, domestic policy, same shit. Read the whole transcript after the jump; his complete inability to make sense shines through.

Note: A reader pointed out that this comment was meant to be a reference to Bill Clinton's allegation of rape against Juanita Broderick, in which in her story, she said Clinton told her to put ice on her swollen lip after the alleged attack.

Back in the good old days when no one - we swear! - had pre-marital sex.

I'm used to seeing moral panic "hook up" stories on Good Morning America (Is Oral Sex the New Goodnight Kiss?!) and Newsweek, but NPR?!

Sex Without Intimacy: No Dating, No Relationships

The hookup -- that meeting and mating ritual that started among high school and college students -- is becoming a trend among young people who have entered the workaday world. For the many who are delaying the responsibilities of marriage and child-rearing, hooking up has virtually replaced dating.

Here we go. Shit, there's even the obligatory Sex and the City reference! The radio segment takes a more complex perspective, of course, than your run-of-the-mill sex scare stories. But I was still disappointed to see the myth that young folks only just started having pre-marital funtime perpetuated by NPR.

As I've written before, 95% of Americans have premarital sex, and this has been true for decades. Even for women who were born in the 1940s, nine out of ten had sex before marriage. This is not something new, it doesn't come from the internet or texting (sorry, sexting!). What was also irritating is this thinly-veiled fear that young people are waiting too long to get married (the article is accompanied by marriage rate graphs) - yet another anti-feminist talking point.

But what struck me the most about the article that accompanied the radio segment was the poll they had at the end:

Talk about removing nuance from sexuality! As if "hooking up" was some sort of monolith. I imagine people's sexual experiences run the gamut from "fun" to "degrading" to - gasp! - feelings not easily explained by an online poll.

Related posts: Moral panic visualized
Girls aren't "going wild" after all
Spitting Game: A film about "hook up" culture
What's wrong with casual sex?

You know you're in for a treat when you see this headline! Not that I expect anything less ridiculous from the Daily Mail, but this one was just too good not to post about.

"Reporter" Neil Lyndon regurgitates all of our favorite misogynist standards, from feminism making women miserable to barely concealed rage against women who have the audacity to want equality.

Despite sexual and marital liberation, massively increased career opportunities and earning power, educational privileges and the wholesale demolition of the inhibiting conventions that restricted the lives of women in the past, today's women report themselves as feeling a low sense 'of life satisfaction and well-being'.

Well, men might be entitled to retort, welcome to the real world, sweethearts.

What you are complaining about is the very same life that you promoted and celebrated when you were swanking around chanting 'sisters are doing it for themselves'.

But perhaps what's better than Lyndon's own tripe, is the oh-so-telling accompanying art and content alongside the article.

In the middle of the piece, here are a couple of the related stories:

Why are women so horrible to each other?

Men told secret to a longer life is marrying a younger woman, but wives with toyboy husbands are MORE likely to die early

But my favorite is the picture of a man getting his head smashed in by a woman's high heel with this caption: "The selfish, conceited, man-despising yet predatory 'have-it-all' feminism of the Cosmopolitans was always a recipe for insupportable burdens for women."

The fear practically drips off the page; it's awesome. (I imagine Lyndon waking up every night in a cold sweat because of a reoccurring vagina dentata nightmare.) The thing is, pieces like this don't make me mad any more - they light a fire under my ass. Because they serve as yet another reminder of why the work feminists are doing is just so damn important. So thanks, "sweetheart," for the motivation; it's much appreciated.

Dr. Tiller's clinic in Wichita, Kansas has been shut down according to his family.

"The family of Dr. George Tiller announces that effective immediately, Women's Health Care Services, Inc., will be permanently closed," according to a statement issued on Tuesday morning by the family's lawyers. "Notice is being given today to all concerned that the Tiller family is ceasing operation of the clinic and any involvement by family members in any other similar clinic."

This is awful. And can someone explain to me why the NYTimes is so concerned about where all these murdering pro-life "activists" will go? I didn't realize that by balanced coverage we were going to highlight terrorist organizations as having a legitimate mission and goals.

Thanks to commenter Jovan1984 for the heads up.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised to see this headline: "Sex, drink and fashion. Is this the new face of American feminism?"*

After all, if there's anything the mainstream media loves, it's painting feminists - specifically young feminists - as vapid and sex-crazed. (See here, here, here, here and here.)

While I'm tempted to weigh in on this particular article and the many ways in which it got things wrong - especially since it touches on something I blogged about recently - I think there's a larger issue that's more important to get at. (Though damn it's hard not to say anything about the piece - especially the 6 bullet points at the end. Wow.)

There's a reason that the mainstream media continually covers young feminists in this way. Backlash is part of it, of course: framing feminism as a perpetual catfight or a watered down movement based on drinking and fucking is a great way to dismiss it. But it's also indicative of a media that has no interest in nuance or truthfulness when it comes to covering women.

When I read this latest article, I was reminded of something I wrote in The Purity Myth about the moral panic wackiness surrounding young women's sexuality:

The fact is, focusing on hyped-up problems that sell newspapers and titillate the imagination make it that much easier to ignore actual problems young women are facing, issues that take a lot more than a moral scolding to fix. For a young woman living in poverty, spring break isn't even an option, let alone a concern. For a young woman who has no health insurance, the "moral" debate over STIs won't do anything for her the next time she needs to see a doctor. And for a young single mother, hearing about herself as an unfortunate statistic isn't going to make her life any better or easier.

The same could be said about the media's feminism problem. Salacious headlines about feminists-gone-wild not only sell newspapers - they also make it that much easier for people to ignore actual feminist work that's being done. When was the last time you saw an article about youth organizations like the Pro-Choice Education Project, or feminist media like Shameless? Have you ever seen a mainstream media profile on any of the women here? Of course not. Because focusing on the truth of what feminists activists and media makers are up to would mean portraying women as thoughtful, socially engaged citizens. (Wouldn't that be ridiculous!) It just doesn't jibe with how America wants to see women, especially young women; they'd prefer to think we're all nekkid, drunk and stupid.

Now, I don't fool myself into thinking that this media narrative about feminists (or women) is going anywhere anytime soon. But that doesn't mean we can't do anything about it. When you see an article that relies on bullshit stereotypes about feminism, inundate the reporter with links to profiles of young feminists and youth-led organizations. Show them what feminism really is.

*Full disclosure: The reporter who wrote this piece contacted me via email for an interview, I didn't have the time to respond. (And now I'm really glad that I didn't!)

I really want to like Slate's newly launched "women's"* website Double X. They have some great writers and contributors on board, so I was stoked for the site's launch. And then...not so much.

Why? Well, let's take a look at the headlining pieces that the magazine chose to kick off with:

Whine, Womyn, and Thongs: How feminism has failed.

What's the Problem Now? Feminism's Dilemmas

Yes, Virginia, Feminism Really Is Dead.

and the slightly more optimistic...

How I Got Bored With Feminism: And why it still matters.

Oh, and the quote of the day? "'Feminism' had come to seem, well...just the teeniest bit tiresome." - Terry Castle

It seems my excitement was a bit premature! Here I thought that Double X might be a site for forward-thinking conversation about feminism and women's issues - alas, it's just a sounding board for warmed-over stereotypes and an oh-so-tired "those darn kids" take on younger women.

But what's even stranger to me than a supposedly progressive site for women that relies on hackneyed anti-feminist pieces is the response to criticisms of the site. Susannah Breslin writes:

Apparently, if you launch a website for women in 2009, the most important question is whether or not it's feminist. At least, that's what you'd think, judging by today's launch of the women-oriented website you're reading. Only, the funny thing is, I thought feminism was dead. I mean, didn't we kill it already?

Breslin, who calls feminism "cultural road kill," takes issue with the fact that recent criticisms of Double X assume that "the only way to judge a female-oriented site is by whether or not it's 'feminist.'"

Get over it. Get on with it. I hope the feminist mantle doesn't fit Double X. I hope this site is bigger than that.

Um, okay. But perhaps if you don't want folks to talk about your site using a feminist lens, you shouldn't launch said site with a series of posts asking writers to reflect on Betty-frigging-Friedan. Sorry, you don't get to publish a handful of feminism-is-in-the-crapper articles and then expect the responses and critiques to ignore feminism.

Who's smirkin' now, sucka?

Remember the anti-feminist lawyer who was suing Columbia for offering Women's Studies courses because, according to him, it's discriminatory towards men? His case (not surprisingly) was thrown out last week by a Manhattan judge.

This is not the only case Roy Den Hollander has pursued; he's also filed lawsuits against clubs that offer Ladies Nights (because of course that's feminism's doing?), and is pretty blatant in the acknowledgment that his sole purpose in life is working against the evil feminist machine, saying:

"What I'm trying to do now in my later years is fight everybody who violates my rights... the Feminazis have infiltrated institutions, and there's been a transfer of rights from guys to girls."

Holy eloquence. Is this dude really a lawyer? Also not surprisingly, when the judge dismissed his suit, Hollander "assailed the judge as [insert gasp] a feminist" and claimed that "[w]hen it comes to men's rights, judges act with an arrogance of power, ignorance of the law, and fear of the feminists."

There are too many contradictions there even worth repeating, but regardless you better be careful - that kind of talk may not bode well with The Feminists...

Binary gender systems are constructed. They rely on the repetition of dominant narratives via psychology, music, popular culture, film and of course children's books. This gem comes from a children's book called, "I'm Glad I'm a Boy! I'm Glad I'm a Girl! It is from the 1950's and I almost appreciate how blatantly obvious it is, since there is no question what it is trying to do. Gender-based messaging is much more subtle and nuanced these days.

You can see the whole book here. I am very glad no one read this book to me as a child, I probably would have set it on fire.

Whenever I see vintage sexism now all I can think of is Mad Men.

I was on the Laura Ingraham show yesterday morning to talk about The Purity Myth; it was a trip. One listener even called in to say that I was just pissed about not being a virgin anymore so I wrote the book to spread my sluttitude around. It was awesome.

If you want to listen (and check out my brand spanking new website!), click here.

I mean, I could have told you that. But not because I think that women are what ruined the country, specifically women's right to vote. Peter Thiel a very rich silicon valley libertarian who used to be the CEO of Paypal and is currently one of the main investors at Facebook. He has put forth an essay that suggests that women are in fact who ruined our country. Or at least women's right to speak for themselves and not vote like their husbands tell them to.

In his essay at the Cato Institute blog he writes (excerpted by Valleywag),

The 1920s were the last decade in American history during which one could be genuinely optimistic about politics. Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women - two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians - have rendered the notion of "capitalist democracy" into an oxymoron.

I guess he didn't get the memo. Women and gays are supposed to be friends!