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Friday, September 12, 2008
Jonah Goldberg :: Townhall.com Columnist
Feminist Army Aims Its Cannons at Palin
by Jonah Goldberg
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But here's the fun part. Feminists are hooked on their own Kool-Aid; they actually believe the stuff they say. The shrill, angry women you see on MSNBC claiming to speak for all women actually think they do. But they don't. They speak for a few left-leaning women in faculty lounges, editorial boardrooms and that's about it.

Mainstream liberals have been in captivity for so long, eagerly accepting their ritual beatings, that they've gotten Stockholm Syndrome and convinced themselves that Gloria Steinem and Co. are the authentic voices of women everywhere.

Stop laughing.

The reality is that there is an actual reality out there, and it doesn't look anything like what feminists see beyond the rims of their ideological blinders.

For instance, immediately after the Palin announcement, the priestesses not only ruled it "sexist" for McCain to pick a woman but also said it was strategically dumb - "insulting to women!" - to think any real women would switch support from the beatified Obama to that old devil McCain.

Well, according to a Washington Post/ABC News poll, there's been a 20-point swing among white women from Obama-Biden to McCain-Palin. Did this "ideological brain rape" suddenly induce an epidemic of false consciousness?

Of course not. Nor are women mindlessly switching loyalties because there's a woman on the ticket. What the Palin pick has demonstrated, however, is that the Feminist-Industrial Complex is a fraud. Disagreeing with self-described feminists doesn't mean you're anti-woman. Usually it just means you're sensible.

And for that lesson alone, we should all be grateful.

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About The Author
Jonah Goldberg is editor-at-large of National Review Online.
 
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American Woman @ 10:41am
I hit a nerve. Madam, your comments belie your profound insecurity. My icons are Maggie Thatcher and Jeane Kirkpatrick. I wouldn't describe either one of those women as beautiful in appearance, yet that fact has no bearing on the value of each woman's opinions and beliefs. I would describe each as being endowed with a powerful intellect - a gift far more desireable than good fashion sense! You are suffering under a delusion if you believe that one's opinions and mind have any bearing on one's outward appearance. I firmly stand by my comments.

It's one thing to disagree vociferously with dissenting opinion, and perhaps you didn't learn this at fashion academy, there are rules of etiquette and discourse in life. Your position rings hollow because you are a hypocrite. Ignoring the substance of someone's argument and attacking his/her appearance is something liberals have been accused of doing to Sarah Palin in the column above. I don't like it from them, and I won't abide from you.

I'm not your enemy, but neither am I going to tolerate a double standard in the national discussion over women in public life. Whether I agree with someone or not, attacking his/her looks is beneath contempt. Yet, it is a common practice when women are involved. Perhaps you need to rethink your philosophy. As Jane Austen wrote, "Dress is at all times a frivolous distinction, and excessive solicitude about it often destroys its own aim."

Oh, and my original post was aimed at men here denigrating women based on physical appearance and confusing an opinion about a topic with the opiner's looks! A baconater is a fast food sandwich marketed to men.

Gestell, on ideological package dealing:
You are correct that many if not most of the feminists of the 20th century had more left wing leanings that rode shotgun to their other noteworthy social reform goals. Among these, the temperence movement, better treatment for the mentally ill, and female sufferage, along with initiatives in everything from health care to public schooling. But these are not the exclusive programs and advocacies of the Left. The Left for many decades has rode on the skirttails (rather than SHIRTTAILS, I guess) of other reform movements. Conservative Christian types were also abolitionists at an earlier time and then joined temperence movements and others. The package dealing of ideology is a dangerous thing. Some things go together naturally, yes. Example: Is public schooling, though certainly controversial for some of its more recent manifestations, really necessarily Marxists in outlook--or MUST it be. No. Of course not. And it was not always the reproductive system of liberalism, as one commentator noted. But it WAS mentioned by Karl Marx to be a compulsory way of inculcating certain ideas in the public. So is it by necessity left wing? Absurd.



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