The (Anti-)Feminist Movement
By Tammy Bruce
FrontPageMagazine.com | July 14, 2003

For me as a feminist, there’s nothing more frustrating than watching the destruction wrought by the leftists who have hijacked the feminist establishment. The last few months have been a veritable Coney Island experience for the posers in charge. Hillary Clinton. Patricia Ireland. The “new” Ms. magazine. Need I go on? Yes, we may have to reach for the Pepto, but only at first. While it is entirely reasonable to get increasingly frustrated at the carnage wrought by cultural parasites, their folly serves as perfect examples for decent people about what not to let continue.

Let’s start with feminist elite darling Hillary Clinton. Just last week the book her three ghostwriters wrote for her, “Living History”(which would be more appropriately titled “How I Sold My Soul for Power and a Man with No Pants”) went audio and is close to selling one million copies. That’s not surprising. Millions of Americans love fiction. What is disturbing is the presumption that Clinton is the Grand Dame of authentic feminism. For those of us who would love to see a woman as president of the United States, it is appalling that the woman of choice for the feminist elite contradicts everything authentic feminism stands for.

Isn’t it just slightly ironic that those who chant and march for women’s safety and dignity are in a rapturous hysteria over a woman who has enabled placing specific women in her husband’s reach in danger while assaulting the dignity of women everywhere with her sycophantic support of a man who has cuckolded her in front of the world? Go, girl, go!

Let me be clear: Hillary Clinton is the anti-feminist. I consider her one of the most dangerous people in the nation, specifically because she has power and the reach to sell one million books. Because she has managed to enthrall a nation by pretending to be something she’s not. As a feminist, Clinton disgusts me because she single-handedly has managed to tell women the world over that no matter what your husband does—humiliate you, betray you, lie to you, abuse other women, sexually harass other women, intimidate women, even possibly be a rapist—you should not only not leave him, you should forever support and enable that behavior.

While on the topics of hypocrisy and moral relativism I would be remiss if I didn’t discuss ex-National Organization for Women president Patricia Ireland. I was guest hosting for a national radio program a couple of weeks ago and railed against Ireland and her appointment as the CEO of the YWCA. While conservative religious groups have understandably assailed this event, I know Ireland and was a leader in NOW while she ran it into the ground.

A caller into that program opined that it sounded like I had “an axe to grind.” You bet I do. It’s having watched Ireland hijack NOW and change a feminist organization into one of “social justice,” a code phrase among socialists for the leftists agenda, primarily focusing on “racism” and perpetuating the pit of victimhood. This debasement of NOW’s initially noble agenda of empowerment into one of promoting hopelessness and alienation has understandably repulsed millions of Americans.

After the YWCA appointment, Ireland refused to say whether or not she’s a Christian (she’s not), and then finally stated in the New York Times (April 30, 2003) that the YWCA was no longer a Christian organization, but one of—surprise!—social justice. That does not bode well for the tens of thousands of little girls and their families who rely on the YWCA.

The last piece of recent drivel regurgitated by the feminist establishment is the supposedly new and improved Ms. magazine. It’s neither, by the way. On the cover of the “Summer 2003” issue is Jeaneane Garafalo. (Where are they selling this tripe? Mars?) Garafalo is featured in a story with “Susan Sarandon, the Dixie Chicks and all your favorite free speech stars.” Really? They’re not my favorites. They’re not the favorites of the majority of feminists or anyone else in this nation. Is Ms. finally simply trying to prove how desperately hypocritical and out-of-touch the feminist establishment really is?

After all, who can forget the obscene attack on the free speech of a Jewish woman who dared to speak her mind a few years ago? She was attacked by the New Gestapo for using an unapproved-of word. There was a very public attempt to destroy that woman, professionally and personally, because she dared to speak her opinion about serious social issues, Gee, kinda like what Sarandon and the Dixie Chicks are claiming.

Was she featured in Ms. magazine? Is her case discussed in their article about the assault on freedom of expression? Of course not, because the woman I’m speaking of is Dr. Laura and the gang that flew into a jihad to destroy her was the gay establishment, along with the help of the Feminist Elite and hypocrites like Susan Sarandon. The double-standard is stunning, and exposes nothing less than the partisan leftist agenda that has been masquerading as feminism for far too long.

What would a truly feminist magazine have included in its content if its goal was to represent women in all our independence and uniqueness? While stories about Garafalo and Sarandon are fine, a story about Dr. Laura would have been welcomed. And what about a profile of Condoleezza Rice, the most powerful woman in the nation (okay, in the whole world) and who also happens to be black? Oh, but I forgot. Rice has committed two unforgivable crimes: she doesn’t live in either the black or feminist ghettos the Left has set up for her “type.” No, she’s her own woman; she is decent, doesn’t lie to people, and isn’t a victim. How dare she!

Instead of lamenting the current state of affairs, tell yourself, your mother, sister, daughter, that while there isn’t an authentic feminist movement at the moment, that can change. In the meantime, don’t be fooled--choose your own feminist heroes (like Dr. Laura and Condoleezza Rice), don’t expect (or want!) to agree with them on every single issue, but appreciate those women and so many others who are true to themselves and their principles. Lastly, look at appalling negatives like Clinton, Ireland and the individuals and myopic agenda featured in Ms. magazine, as benchmarks of what not to become.