The Seattle Times, June 10, 1997 - Ah, Toronto, where ogling is virtually a crime, and women go bare-breasted.
Bare what?
Yes, it's true, pop feminist boobs are coming out in support of yet another double standard: first, via the White Ribbon Campaign, they demand the right to penalize men who look at women; now, they demand the right to doff tops and sag in the sun for all men to pretend to not see. (And pity the poor fellow who fails to avert his eyes.)
Well, let none say The Backlash! is opposed to women's liberation. If some babe wants to bare her breasts, we say show some support (but lend no hands). Stand up and uphold her rights (but don't drop trou and salute). Above all, don't avert your eyes. If it is a woman's right to be a sexual being, to look at and appreciate others as sex objects, then it is also her right to be looked at and appreciated as a sex object, and as enlightened men, we must respect all her rights.
Working Woman, March, 1997 - In 1987, feminist author Tara Roth Madden pointed out, in Women vs. Women, that the pay gap between women and men does indeed exist, but it is of little consequence to most of us: "The trouble begins at about the $75,000 to $100,000 salary level and seems to get worse the higher one looks."
For this, and other honest insights, feminists rewarded her with ... accolades? Praise for the courage her honesty took? Hardly. The pop feminists decision makers in publishing houses everywhere rejected her book (17, in all). Even after she found a publisher, virtually none of the bookstores were willing to carry it on the shelves, or even order it (I tried).
Years later, during interviews or personal appearances, whenever I referred to her, the pop feminists met me with equal derision. (If not more. At least she found a publisher.)
Now, there is so much incontrovertible proof that this is true, that they can no longer deny it. So, as in so many other instances where, rather than admit they've been guilty of blind fanaticism at best, and flat out dishonesty at worst, they embrace it as if it were a discover they made all by themselves:
As most publications, including Working Woman, continue to point out, women make seventy-five cents for every dollar earned by a man. Which leads us to wonder why women earn less. But on closer examination, we discover that they don't, really. Women are rapidly closing the gap on their male counterparts in the same jobs with the same credentials. the twenty-five cents gap is created almost totally by inequities at the very top of the compensation scale.
Well, hallelujah.
People, June 9, 1997 - What do Donald Trump, Joe and Michael Kennedy, Charlie Sheen, Eddie Murphy, Frank Gifford, Marv Albert, Martin Lawrence and Billy Bob Thornton all have in common?
They're all wealthy (or well-off), powerful (or well on their way), and famous? Yes, but what else?
Every one of them has been featured in People magazine under a cover article titled, "Men Behaving Badly"? Yes, but what else?
All of them actually have been behaving badly? Yes, ... but what else?
Glad you asked. Women adore them. Could there be a connection? Susan Forward, author of Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them, and, more recently, Emotional Blackmail, thinks so:
Someone like Eddie Murphy or Hugh Grant, whose career is doing well and who has a gorgeous wife, they just get so damn jaded. They see a diamond in Tiffany's window and don't think of getting caught; they just take it.
She might be right. All the adulation may have turned good boys into bad men. On the other hand, maybe it was being bad got them all that adulation in the first place. Singer Gloria Estefan may not have Dr. Forward's credentials, but she might have had something more insightful to say when she sang, "Bad, bad, bad, bad, boys, they make me feel so good."
The Associated Press, May 22, 1997 - Dorothy Mae King gets 3 1/2 years in prison after finding her guilty of killing to of her sons, the first in 1964, the second in 1967.
The Associated Press, May 26, 1997 - In Chicago, Dianna Meeks' baby son "died of malnourishment while she was having her nails done at a salon."
The Associated Press, May 21, 1997 - Two teenage girls tried to kill a cabbie after running up "a $379 cab fare from Duluth to St. Cloud."
The Associated Press, November 25, 1996 - Chicqua Roveal threw her three young children off the roof of their 14-floor apartment building, and then jumped to her death.
San Jose Mercury News, May 15, 1997 - Sara Anne Melo, "who has two daughters, ages 2 and 6, and a 4-year-old son," concealed that she as pregnant by telling everyone she was just gaining weight. Then, she delivered the baby herself, put him on the floor, "fainted," and when she awoke, he was dead.
Hamilton Spectator (Burlington News), May 28, 1997 - Bertha Juarez has been charged with "attempted murder, aggravated assault and possession of a dangerous weapon in connection with an attack on her six-year-old son, Eduardo. ... The child's father was also cut, reportedly while trying to defend the boy."
Thank the Goddess women aren't violent.
Reuter Information Service, May 21, 1997 - In Denmark, according to Danish actress Annette Sorensen, it is common to leave babies unattended outside. Or, that was her excuse for leaving her 14-month-old girl sitting on the sidewalk in her stroller while her mother and American father, Exavier Wardlaw, went into a shop for a drink.
The mother's attorneys said Sorensen did not think twice about leaving the child outside the restaurant because it was common practice in Copenhagen.
Criminal charges against Sorensen were dropped provided she leaves the country. Wardlaw, however, will not get off so easy, and is due back in Criminal Court on June 4.
Equal justice?
Associated Press, May 22, 1997 - After his father's funeral, Paul Prioli walked out of the church and into the arms of police, who arrested him for owing his ex-wife alimony.
Of course, that's not what the charges were.
Prioli, a chef who has been living in Florida for several years, was taken to Barnstable Family and Probate Court to face a contempt complaint.
Interesting how, when a mother is in violation of court-ordered visitation, it's not enforceable contempt, but when a father is in violation of court-ordered alimony or child support, it is.
Justice isn't blind, just biased.
The White House, May 21, 1997 - Vice President Gore announced that the U.S. Postal Service is releasing 200 million postage stamp booklets with the National Domestic Violence Hotline number (1-800-799-SAFE) printed on the covers.
"Domestic violence thrives on isolation, silence and denial," said Vice President Gore.
For battered men as well as women. Their isolation and silence, and the loud denials of pop feminists.
We're interested to know the stories of men who have called the Hotline. How was your plea handled?
Rolling Stone, May 1, 1997 - Gwen Stefani, singer for the rock band No Doubt, is known for more than just their hit song, "Don't Speak" (her brother wrote the music and melody), she's also on her way to becoming a pop feminist icon for her song, "Just a Girl."
The recorded version works through simple, sustained sarcasm - I'm just a girl, all pretty and petite/So don't let me have any rights - but onstage, the song explodes. ... "I'm just a girl in the world 'cause that's all that..." -- her voice begins to erupt -- "...you'll let me be," the theater explodes.
M-hm. A powerful lament exploding out of a deep well of experience? Actually, Gwen's highest ambition was to be a housewife, but brother Eric pushed her into singing and, ultimately, international stardom. Says Stefani, "everything that I am is because of him." Poor little oppressed pop star. Meanwhile, back in Anaheim:
Four people have fought together to make all this happen; most of the time it is only one of them who is feted and fawned over and praised. In Tel Aviv I watch the other members seethe as they line up together and a photographer comes closer and closer until, quite obviously, only Gwen is within his viewfinder. ...
"I understand it intellectually," says Tom (Dumont, the guitar player), who seems most entertained by all this but who also is fairly unashamed of the discomfort it causes him. "But I just feel like I'm second-class, I'm shit compared to her. I feel I'm just a lesser person, I don't look as good, and I'm not as bitchin' as she is in everyone else's eyes. I think a certain part of me -- the reason I wanted to be a rock star when I was a kid, I thought that would be a way for people to like me. And now that I'm here, I'm not getting the payoff that I was always expecting."
I can just hear Ireland and her buffoons (both male and female) at NOW chanting, "Now YOU know what it feels like."
Now? This is his life, this is how it has always been for him. What's this "now" stuff? What pop feminist bigots really mean when they say stuff like that is, they're pissed off at some other guy, and are generalizing their hatred for him to include all men. Which is why there will be a backlash.
The Seattle Times, June 3, 1997 - Few American men conform to the pop feminists stereotype of all men.
Only about 3 percent of American men possess the kind of privilege and power pop feminists attribute to all men. It's this 3 percent who passes, interprets and enforces the laws pop feminists insist women need to protect them from all men. So, who better to experience the sting than such members of this elite 3 percent as President Clinton?
The Supreme Court has ruled that Paula Jones's sexual harassment lawsuit against President Clinton does not have to be deferred until the end of his term.
Many will recall how pop feminists like attorney Gloria Allred attacked Ms. Jones when she came forward with her allegations. An embarrassing faux pas. Now that the pop feminists' presidential darling will have to face the fire just like any other citizen, what will he do?
Clinton lawyer Bob Bennet has warned Jones' past is fair game if her sexual misconduct suit against the president goes to trail, and he is interviewing her ex-boyfriends.
They're going after the devil in Ms. Jones' past? Doesn't pop feminist dogma insist the past is off limits, except when it's a man's past? Indeed it does, and the femigogues have no choice but to draw the line, or lose all credibility.
In a significant turnabout from its pro-Clinton stance, National Organization for Women head Patricia Ireland said, "I urge President Clinton to rein in his lawyers on this."
Stay tuned.
National Organization for Women Action Center, May 22, 1997 - According to the National Organization for Women, "gender bias is a factor in the court martial of Lieutenant Kelly Flinn."
If you're concerned that gender bias is a factor in the court martial of Lieutenant Kelly Flinn, be aware that most service members who are guilty of sexual misconduct, lying and fraternization have not received court martials but "non-judicial punishments."
As usual, they're obsessed with sex. The principal charge against Lt. Flinn is refusing to follow orders. (Her CO ordered her to stay away from Airwoman Zigo's husband. She didn't. Says Flinn, "I figured at least I'd salvage my relationship with Marc (Zigo).") In the military, disobeying an order is a far more serious crime than sexual misconduct, lying or fraternization.
All other things being equal, however, it's a good point. What about all those men who have received little more than a slap on the hand? The answer lies with the laudable efforts of those who have struggled, under the sometimes tattered banner of feminism, to exorcise sexual impropriety from the military:
In the relatively few cases where marital cheating is exposed, commanders have traditionally meted out some punishment -- a small fine, say, or a letter of reprimand. Even when the adultery is accompanied by lying or an attempted cover-up, the penalty has commonly stopped short of a full-scale court-martial and dismissal from the service.
Lately, however, the air force has been more strict. Tailhook sent a shock through all branches of the service. In the air force, the number of courts-martial for adultery, while still small, grew from 36 in 1990 to 67 (60 men, 7 women) in 1996.
-Newsweek, June 2, 1997
Flinn is not the victim-of-sexism poster girl NOW is trying to make her out to be, but just another member of the service who, in these more sensitive times, got caught with her pants down. As is typical in cases where a woman gets caught in a feminist net cast for wayward men, the pop feminists cry foul. What more proof of their bigotry do we need?
It gets worse. Some, like her parents, are trying to portray her solely as a victim of Marc Zigo and the Air Force. Not that Marc Zigo is anything other than a louse of the lowest sort. (Not only is Gayla Zigo a babe, but, unlike Flinn, she's working her way up through the ranks, and Flinn knew Marc was married when she first began having sex with him.)
Now, really, if someone is responsible enough to fly a plane armed with nuclear weapons, then they're damn well responsible for who they choose to sleep with, which orders they choose to ignore, and which lies they choose to tell.
What am I saying? Men are always to blame! It's always our fault.
Working Woman, May 1997 - For decades, feminists have been demanding pay equity. For equalitarian feminists, this has always taken the form of gender-blind standards; for pop feminists, end-result standards.
With few exceptions, no where have pop feminists found more to fault than in science and technology fields like engineering. Until now:
Even better news: According to the Society of Women Engineers, average earnings of female engineers under age 30 are about $2,000 a year higher than those of their male colleagues.
Demonstrating, once again, the pop feminist definition of equality: More for women, less for men, unless it's dirty and/or dangerous: "Not many women want to hang out on an oil rig or navigate a mine shaft." So, where are female engineers making their home? Where it's safest and less demanding:
In fact, the majority of women engineers choose to make a career in large firms that specialize in electrical, mechanical, or industrial work. One reason is that larger firms offer more family-friendly scheduling, better benefits, and security.
There's nothing wrong with this dichotomy. A few decades ago if someone had suggested women are less inclined than men to choose risky careers, they would have been met with a yawn. "So what else is new?" What is wrong is how pop feminists gloss over the natural differences between the sexes, denigrate "patriarchy" for the economic fact that people (usually men) who work at dirty and/or dangerous jobs generally command (require) higher prices (salaries and wages) than those who work in relatively safer environments women generally favor.
To demand fairness is reasonable. To protest every disparity as evidence of unfairness is petulant and, when the protesters cheer over disparities in their favor, dishonest.
The American Spectator, May 1997 - On the subject of the Violence Against women act, Professor Jeremy Rabkin notes some minor flaws in the reasoning behind the Act:
It is true, as VAWA advocates proclaim (and as President Clinton emphasized in a 1995 proclamation on "National Domestic Violence Awareness Month"), that women are relatively more likely to be killed by family members or "intimates" than are men. But the notion that family life is a special danger to women is a twisted feminist fantasy. ... In absolute numbers, moreover, far more men than women are killed each year by family members or "romantic partners." "Domestic violence" takes less of a death toll among men only in percentage terms, because men are, overall, three times as likely as women to be fatalities of violence. If anyone needs protection from "violence," it is men.
If we are going to obsess about "gender bias," the most evident bias in the jury system is anti-male. According to another recent study by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, men who kill their spouses are far more likely to be convicted than are female spouse-killers (only 6 percent of wife-killers are acquitted, compared with 27 percent of husband-killers). Men also tend to get much longer prison sentences for such crimes (the spouse-killing average is sixteen years for men, six years for women).
"So what?" we can almost hear the New Rage women at NOW snort, "they're only men. Not even real human beings."
S.F. Examiner, February 14, 1997 - An article about a program to deal with domestic violence in same sex relationships reveals training that may go far to neutralize the assumption men are always the aggressor in heterosexual relationships:
Susan Breall, managing attorney with the district attorney's domestic violence unit, said police officers are now routinely taught to recognize the primary aggressor in domestic violence cases.
An investigation checklist given to San Francisco police officers during training includes specific questions that should be covered. ... "Don't just book the winner ..." accompanying material cautions. "Remember, size differential is not determinative; the larger of the two parties is not necessarily the primary aggressor."
How true.
L.A. Times, March 11, 1997 - Pop feminists seldom seem to approve of male-only meetings. When Robert Bly began holding his gatherings of men, they grumbled. When the Promise Keepers assembled, they grumbled some more.
Meanwhile, in 1990, a female anthropologist began organizing all-female meetings of "prominent anthropologists at UC Santa Cruz to discuss female biology and evolution."
Personally, I think this is a fine thing. Sometimes, women and men just need to get away from one another, let their hair down, and relax with their own kind. However, one remark reminded me of how good women can be at excluding others:
(Zihlman) concedes, however, that she did set out to organize a meeting she herself would want to attend. And she had attended too many scientific gatherings where male scientists shouted one another down, constantly interrupting and dominating the conversation. "It was very stressful", she said. "I wanted people to be comfortable."
Comfortable, indeed. A few years ago during one of her lectures at the University of Washington, Naomi Wolf went out of her way to insult the men in the audience. Without exception, every man there listened with respect. We laughed at most of her jokes (demonstrating, perhaps, the truth of the pop feminist assertion that the male sense of humor is less developed than women's), applauded well-made points, and graciously listened during the question and answer period ... until she pointed out how she had purposely ignored men and had called only on women to show us men what it felt like to be excluded.
If she had said nothing about it, most of the guys probably would not have noticed for one simple reason: the kind of men who demand attention don't go to Naomi Wolf lectures. Indeed, the kind of men who go to Naomi Wolf lectures are accustomed to being ignored because that's how women treat such men.
There's a lesson in that. The question is, who has more to learn from it -- men, women, or pop feminists?
Toronto Globe and Mail, December 2, 1996 - Four years ago, when the Canadian government began cutting jobs, feminists worried the ax would come down on more women than men. Has it?
Women have accounted for only 20 percent of the job losses in the public sector. Their share of government jobs, broadly defined to include all three levels of government -- Crown companies, educational institutions and hospitals -- has risen from 50.5 percent in 1992 to 52.2 percent this year.
One might think this would satisfy pop feminists. Then again, by now, we should no better. "Last week, for example, Nicole Turmei of the Public Service Alliance of Canada said women are being hit disproportionately by job cuts in government offices, hospitals and schools."
Typical. When the statistics favor men, that's unfair; when the statistics favor women, it's still not enough.
The Associated Press, May 19, 1997 - We've all heard the story many times. Some judge comes down hard on a poor as dirt, down on his luck dad who's way behind on his child support payments to an ex-wife who has remarried and is living in the lap of luxury with her well-to-do new hubby. "Pay, or else!"
Pop feminists rally to condemn him as yet another deadbeat dad trying to skip town on his obligations. Like vultures, they hover, gloating over his sagging shoulders as he wearily trudges from one garnisheed paycheck to the next. "Now he knows what it feels like," they cackle, "suffer!"
Enter a "man bites dog" case:
A woman who earns about $1,000 a month has been ordered to pay $10,000 in back child support to her millionaire ex-husband.
"I do not need the money to support the children," Steven Scroggin, the father of three teen-age children with ex-wife Lisa Stiller, said Monday. "I do think she needs to make some contribution to their living. She brought them into the world. She has an obligation to make payments."
Were we like the pop feminists, we might be tempted to cheer. "That'll fix her; now she knows what it feels like." We can do better than that.
With the help of hungry divorce lawyers and prejudiced judges, pop feminists have succeeded not only in making a mockery of marriage, but in making paternal love a battlefield. Rather than respond in kind, we should refuse to make maternal love a battlefield and demand an end to family court idiocy.
If one parent has much and the other has little, it is reasonable to expect the one who has much to shoulder the greater burden. Reasonable, maybe, but when have pop feminists ever been inclined to listen to reason?
New York Daily News, May 20, 1997 - Another female graduate of the Air Force Academy has been caught with her panties down, and, as in Lt. Flinn's case, she's crying sexism:
"Our cases are linked by the fact that we're both women and they're slamming us," Lt. Crista Davis said yesterday by phone from Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana.
"We knew we were wrong but if we were men, it would have been handled differently" with counseling and reprimands, said Davis, a communications officer now assigned to administrative duties pending hearings on her court-martial next month.
Her paramour, Maj. Greg Russell, is also in hot water and, like Davis, has been assigned to administrative duties pending a final decision on his status. Unlike Davis, however, last year an Air Force Sanity Board found him legally insane. For having sex with Davis?
Maybe. Davis, as it turns out, "sent a series of increasingly obscene letters to Russell's wife seeking child support for the baby born last December." She sleeps with a man, then attacks the man's wife. Sounds like Amy Fisher has a sister-in-spirit.
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