CBS News:
In an interview for @katiecouric, writer and activist Gloria Steinem responded to Sarah Palin calling herself a feminist, saying, "you can't be a feminist who says other women can't" have an abortion.
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I am often amazed that women do not understand how incredibly important it was to women to gain control over their bodies. In the not too distant past American women were considered property that a father could trade to another man for money, or influence, or even to cement a business transaction. The children she raised were her husband's children and if he died she might be forced to marry his brother or somebody else picked by his family. Love never even entered the equation.
Roe vs Wade gave women legal control over their own bodies, NOT just the right to terminate a pregnancy.
THE RIGHT to choose is just one aspect of a much larger issue of reproductive rights--women's right to control their own bodies and reproductive lives. Although in recent decades the battle has centered around the right to abortion, this includes more than the right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy--but also the right to have children in the face of racist sterilization programs that targeted African Americans, Native Americans and disabled people in the U.S. throughout much of the 20th century.
Latinos were often obliged to sign consent forms in English instead of Spanish, and were frequently sterilized without their knowledge. By 1968, one-third of all women in Puerto Rico--still a U.S. colony--were permanently sterilized. Today, racist sterilization programs continue to target Black and Brown women and men in poor countries around the world in the name of "population control."
Reproductive freedom is also about abortion rights for poor women. Even when abortion is illegal, wealthy women have--and have always had--the money and private doctors to obtain abortions, while poor women face the choice of carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term or risking their lives with unsafe, illegal abortions.
"Racist sterilization" and the "rights for poor women" are clearly two issues that Sarah Palin does not relate to. She is currently of the elite and simply will not even attempt to empathize with those who are of a different ethnicity or social class. It speaks volumes about her abilities as a leader, but also about her true understanding of "feminism".
And the real scandal is that Sarah is also a hypocrite. Doctor's offices DON'T use white out on the patent's bills. Everybody with a brain knows what really happened.
And I am pretty damn sure THAT choice had nothing to do with protecting the life of the mother. Did it Sarah?
What they dont get is that its a right to choose,it does not mean that women will be running off having abortions willynilly. I would not have an abortion(if I was young enough to get pregnant again!),but I should have the rights to choose what I do with my own body!
ReplyDelete"you can't be a feminist who says other women can't"
ReplyDeleteThat's goddamned right! Feminism, at its essence, strives to abolish ANY and ALL forms of oppression, including that which Ms. Palin seeks to impose upon free-thinking individuals (especially women, it seems) everywhere, be it Christofascism or her positively tortured perspective on abortion. Palin's vision is one of ideological bondage, uneducated patriotism, and subjugation...nothing more. Then again, it's kind of hard to tell the difference between the three anyways.
Thanks for posting the video: it made a well-articulated point.
"Anti-choice" means rich women go to Sweden/Canada and poor women go to back alley abortionists. To stop abortions US govt would have to demand pregnancy tests at our borders for any women leaving the US.
ReplyDeleteThis fact shuts the random mouthings and idiotic drivel of every pro-lifer I meet.
I beg to differ... Sarah Palin is a feminist because she said so!
ReplyDeleteSarah Palin is also an energy expert because she said so and because she received her degree in oil from Wasilla HS!
Sarah Palin is also an excellent mother because she said so and because she raised beautiful behaved respectful children and she shows them everyday how to interact with people by not being afraid to talk to people face to face and she also shows them how to work hard for a buck.
Thanks for this Gryphen. Palin is a blot on the landscape. The ground hog in my back yard eating corn is more of a feminist than that twittering twit.
ReplyDeleteWell, she could have been defending her own life. If Todd found out whose baby it was, she might have been in danger!!
ReplyDeleteTrack growing up looking just like a Menard must have been very embarrassing.
Angela, the groundhog is smarter, also too.
ReplyDeleteII
ReplyDeleteSP is such a hypocrite. So when she brags about how she "CHOSE LIFE" what exactly was her other CHOICE? No, Sarah, this is not another "gotchya" question to trick you. I am seriously wanting to know, if one is anti-choice, and life is the only acceptable option, how she can think it's ok for that choice to have been there for HERSELF to consider, however briefly, and ok for her revirginated daughter to have a choice, but not for anyone else.
ReplyDelete(oh dear, run-on sentence much? Sorry, no time to think it through better!)
Jill in OH
Thank you Gloria Steinham for speaking out.
ReplyDeleteNothing makes me more furious (well, okay, some things do, but not many!) than Palin yapping about being pro-woman and being a feminist. That idiot has set women's rights back about 50 years - every man that looks at her and thinks, "ooh, pretty! she can be in charge!" has been given even more ammo to be stupid and sexist. Hey Sarah, I'm pro-woman, but I'm anti-stupid - so sit down and shut up.
ReplyDeleteExcellent video, excellent commentary, and excellent comments by readers. Nothing left to say except "Thank You."
ReplyDeleteRight on, Gryphen!!! Ya gotta chuckle - in a sad way - at survey results showing a shift in the national psyche away from reproductive rights. Especially among young people. What's up with that? NOBODY IS FORCING ANYONE TO HAVE AN ABORTION! Even Evil Sarah says she considered terminating one (or more? pregnancies) and proudly 'CHOSE' not to. Operative word: "CHOSE". The first thing these "freedom-loving" hypocrites wanna do is take away someone else's freedom UNLESS bullets come out of it. And if it's the freedom of a woman or dark-skinned person they take away, all the better!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the head-up, Gryphen, but I gotta say: reading about that faker always makes me feel bad inside.
One thing Sarah and her bots don't get is that being pro-choice doesn't mean being pro-abortion. I am pro-choice; I am not pro-abortion. I believe government "isn't the solution" to the abortion question. IMHO, if a woman chooses to have an abortion, it is between her and God and none of my business. My uterus is my business, and I am the one who will have to answer to God for my decisions.
ReplyDeleteWho was the other woman in addition to Couric and Steinem speaking in the segment? Forgive me, Gryphen, I didn't recognize her...
ReplyDeleteYou've heard it before but here it is again:
ReplyDeleteSarah Palin is a liar, hypocrite, ignoramus, coward, quitter and fraud. And she always will be.
Real feminists don't parade around in beauty pageants - it's the equivalent of a dog show.
ReplyDeleteAnon 11:05
ReplyDelete"in a sad way - at survey results showing a shift in the national psyche away from reproductive rights. Especially among young people."
You are so right.I keep reminding the younger generation that the fight we fought helped women also access better paid jobs, social regognition, and in many cases it was parallel to the civil rights. In Switzerland, where I grew up, womens' right to vote on the federal level was only granted around the late 60's. In France in the 40's.Opening a bank account needed the husband's authorization as well as so many other admin. stuff where women were only 1/2 citizens.
Like for many other issues, younger generations always have a tendency of taking social progress for granted, my generation included. We need to keep up the fight, and show them how to fight, the same way my parents taught me how to fight. Never give up.Palin is anything but a feminist, she doesn't even understand the meaning of the word.
Wow, now I need a nap, or maby gin and tonic.
What I have to say may not be popular, but it needs saying.
ReplyDeleteA D & C is not the same as an abortion! Suggesting or even implying that someone may have had an abortion is an iffy proposition - unless the medical records are sitting on the desk in front of the person saying it's so. (as if - we never did get her medical records, did we...)
A D & C can be used in an abortion, but it is also used (or was) in the treatment of endometriousis, and also after a mother-to-be suffers a miscarriage.
The medical term for miscarriage is "spontaneous abortion" - as in the pregnancy ended all on its own, the baby died. It is not to be confused with an "elective" or voluntary abortion or used as a synonym for one.
Also, whatever may remain in the womb after a miscarriage must be removed or the mother risks a slow and painful death by peritonitis. That is the function of the D & C.
I'm just saying - it's far better to have provable FACTS, not innuendo. And implying some things is just probably not the best idea anyway. It could all too easily come back and bite ya in the "end.".
Besides, SP is the master of innuendo already...
What is warped about Sarah wanting to be a feminist is that she does not have to pick that word, and its meanings, to identify herself.
ReplyDeleteRemembering that the term feminist was born in the 1960's and 70's to specifically refer to women who were able to be successful in the man's world, and who sought legal equality with men in law, in business, in the bed room, who did not have to marry to have be socially acceptable and have the stigma of "something must be wrong with her, no man wants her, to not be rape bait to any and every male, etc. (We still are waiting for the Equal Rights Amendment which would recognize women on a legal-Constiutional level.)
If that concept, which that word refers to is a problem for Palin, then why doesn't she invent her own word instead of wanting to be called a word and a concept that she rejects. Except she wants to be like Gloria Steinem but without the desire to be equal with all other citizens of thie country.
And or its just another expression of her need to destroy what others have achieved. Sarah Palin Attila the Honey laying waste to half a continent.
Sarah is way past nuts into pathological.
Sarah Palin is just as much a feminist as Rand Paul is an advocate for racial justice. She has primarily gotten by on her looks, and seems to have done what she wanted with impunity as governor in Alaska. But now she wants to be a national leader, and all her shortcomings are exposed for everyone to see. If she were a true feminist, she would not have charged rape victims for their own rape kits and she would be trying to get by on merit instead of this phony facade of the tough, all-American, gun-totin' mamma grizzly. That's what she hopes will carry the day for her in place of actual, substantial knowledge and policies.
ReplyDeleteThe sad part is that her male lemmings only know how to chant about how "pretty and hot" she is--as if that were ever a reason to vote for anyone. The female lemmings keep attributing qualities to her that she simply does not possess. She is a horrible mother, a fake of a Christian, and above all, she is a quitter who doesn't seem to understand that if she couldn't finish her term as governor, she would be swept under by the enormous responsibilities of a president. As for her "Midas Touch" with candidates, she picks ones who are already leading by large margins.
She is dangerous because she is the disarming opening act for the assault that the far right wishes to make on reproductive rights, as well as other rights all citizens currently enjoy.
$P is no more a feminist than Phyllis Schlafly was. I was thinking about her "white-out" laden bill from her OB/GYN, I was thinking about when I did billing work for physicians while in nursing school. If this was a bill she was being sent, it would not have said "miscarriage", it would have been labeled a D & C. After all, a miscarriage is not a procedure, but a cause for a D & C. Insurance companies are not going to accept a bill for a miscarriage, neither would a doctor send you a bill for a miscarriage. If you've read "Going Rogue", her accounting of the sonogram that revealed the fetus was no longer viable simply does not ring true. Palin first describes her OB as having a mellow demeanor then she tells us the OB says to her very coldly, "there's nothing alive in there". I call total B.S. I don't know of any OB who would put it like that, especially a female OB. Palin goes on to say her OB said she had a couple of choices in "getting rid of it". Again, does NOT ring true, she's full of shit. I think she may have had an abortion and wanted to get this out there before it could be revealed by the media during a potential Presidential run.
ReplyDeletePalin lies so easily that I think she believes what she says, although it often changes from day to day.
Palin is not a feminist! I always had doubts about that and finally someone of authority agrees with me that Sarah Palin is a man! I feel so much better!
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry 5:04 sjk from the belly caint spell a lick! Everybody in Wasilla knows that "not " is spelled "knot"!
ReplyDelete"sjk from the belly of the plane said...
another paylin girl not in skool. "
5:04 PM