by Edd Doerr
Lisa Miller, writing in the Wash Post on 7/30/11, reported on the campaign by the likes of Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, and Penny Nance of Concerned Women of America to redefine the word "feminism" to include women who oppose reproductive freedom of conscience/choice and who believe that women should "submit" to "hims and hymns". This is clearly a sad, sick joke.
One should ask, if by some almost infinitely improbable accident Michele Bachmann (who stated recently that the battles of Lexington and Concord occurred in New Hampshire) were to occupy the White House, would she be "submissive" to her goofy hubby, the guy whose "clinic" has accepted federal funding to "pray away gay"?
Real feminists support reproductuve freedom of conscience.
Yes, absolutely. And "real humanists" support non-establishment of monotheism also, we don't take it off of the agenda because it is easier and more convenient to surrender to the widespread anti-atheist intolerance that infects the larger theist community than to confront it head on.
ReplyDeleteSubmission to "Hims" would certainly be inconsistent with feminism, but I don't see how submission to "hymns" or taking a pro-life stance is necessarily inconsitent with the advocacy of women's rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes, which is how the Oxford Dictionaries define feminism. It may be difficult to submit to hymns or be pro-life and be a feminist, but I do not think that it is impossible.
ReplyDeleteI have lived and worked 28 years in Belgium, 2 years in Germany, and 1 year in France. I think that my views on Atheism are radically different from the writers on this blog and from the numerous groups of American atheists/secularists/ humanists/ naturalists etc. In Europe I said at most twice that I was non-religious or atheist. (once to my mother and once to the German IRS for taxes purpose.
ReplyDeleteI am really not interested in American churches and religions.
I am interested in the Danish type of Socialism, in Equal Rights for women, Anti-Racism, Affirmative Action, Anti-Imperialism, science, the Universe, and many other things. I have paid dearly for some of my convictions.
When I say I am an Atheist I say exactly, and only, that I am almost certain that there are no gods. I do not consider atheism a "movement" or an ideology. I am of course much more than an Atheist. For instance, I am an atheist who has a French accent. There is no relation between these two attributes.
Mary: Not totally impossible, just highly improbable. Do you really think that women should be denied freedom of choice?
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ReplyDeleteEdd, I didn't say that. I said that I think a person can be pro-life and a feminist. Not that I am.
ReplyDeleteIn the US, being "pro-life" connotes being against legal abortion, i.e. against women's right to choose, which clearly is anti-feminist even per the OED definition. The furthest feminists can go in this direction is the Clintonian "safe, legal and rare."
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