Watching the awkward exchange over feminism between the all-female co-hosts on "The View" this morning reminded me a lot of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' testimony about affirmative action during his confirmation hearings.
When asked where he stood on affirmative action, Thomas rather contemptuously dismissed its need or efficacy without ever acknowledging the huge role it played in his own path to success, and the nomination he never would have gotten without it.
Sadly, Barbara Walters took the Clarence Thomas position in this morning's discussion on feminism. According to Ms. Walters, Rick Santorum's statement blaming "radical feminism" for "convincing women that professional accomplishments were the key to happiness" was not "terribly off point" and that "feminists made women who stayed home and had children feel inferior".
Really Barbara? That was your take-away about the feminist movement of the seventies? If it was, than like Thomas, you will never give feminism any credit for your success, or the fact that the feminist movement made it possible for you to become the first woman news anchor on television. I'm sure you believe it was completely your talent and not fear of the feminist reaction that persuaded the network to stand behind you and show veteran reporter Harry Reasoner the door when he refused to work with you because you were a woman. After all, we know how daring and fearless networks are when it comes to change.
The truth is Barbara, that you have it completely turned around. Thanks to the feminist movement, women who had to work to either supplement their husband's paycheck or be the sole provider for their children were no longer made to feel like failures as wives and mothers. Feminists affirmed that women like you, who dreamed about attaining success beyond being elected president of the PTA weren't suffering from some kind of biological defect. Because of the feminist movement, women were not only allowed to reach their full potential, they were allowed to recognize that they had potential.
Just so we're clear, without the feminist movement, there would have been no Title IX: "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance..." That was enacted in 1972, after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 neglected to include women as a group who needed protection from discrimination. It took until Obama was elected president to mandate that women be given equal pay for equal work.
If the feminist movement had a flaw, it wasn't making wives and mothers feel inferior, it was leading working women to believe that they could do it all; work, cook, clean, and take care of their husbands and children, or in the case of single moms, their children without suffering physical exhaustion or a mental breakdown. While many men eventually got over the idea that they were "helping" their wives when they took over any small responsibility in caring for their own children, most women continued and continue to be responsible for the whole kit and kaboodle.
I expect a throwback to the 19th Century like Rick Santorum to make asinine statements about "radical feminists", but to hear a woman who is the living poster child for all feminism accomplished seconding his claptrap, is painful beyond belief. Worse than that, it is a betrayal of all that we have worked so hard for.