“Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.” ~ Cyril Connolly (1903-1974)

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids - Part Two

Ok, so with that thought in mind I move on to part two of this topic, and oh yes there will be a part three... just don’t you worry. 

As I was saying in part one, the people who make up the Father’s Rights Movement may not have started out where they have ended up.  They originally may have been honestly good fathers and what they have morphed into is the result of many abusers jumping onboard and running away with the movement.

Along these lines the men in the FR Movement have touted and tried to throw in the face of all women (feminists, non-feminists, mothers and every one really) a quote from Gloria Steinem... attempting to ‘prove’ that even SHE sees their side of it, that fathers need to be equal in parenting...  FR’s go on with that thought regardless of whether or not the father is abusive.

The quote I’m referring to is:  “Women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.”

As far as I can find Gloria Steinem actually said this sentence twice, once in an interview published in the NY Daily News and once in an article she wrote which was published in the Opinion Section of the LA Times.  The LA Times article is no longer available but I found the article copied here, so that I can still reference it.

In both cases the FR Movement refuses to take the quote in the context of what she was actually saying.  Taking shit out of context is one of my biggest pet peeves and in this case shows how totally twisted they have actually gotten it.

In the interview, which was for the occasion of her 75th birthday, she was speaking in a general sense of women’s equality.  What she actually said was: 

“We’ve demonstrated that women can do what men do, but not yet that men can do what women do. That’s why most women have two jobs — one inside the home and one outside it — which is impossible. The truth is that women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.”

In the article she wrote for the LA Times she was speaking about Sarah Palin running for VP.  What she actually said was: 

Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.

Republicans may learn they can't appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.

And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children.

She wasn’t saying that men should be equal in the home, thus supporting fathers being caregivers to young children then turning around and abusing them because they are not equipped to handle it.  What she is saying is that women have TWO jobs, which are impossible to juggle from a man’s point of view... but that women do it everyday.

Yes, she does state that Obama and Biden were campaigning on their belief that men should, can and want to be home for their kids.  She did NOT say she supports that... she specifically used the words “their belief”. 

So, Father’s Rights Activists.... I ask you this, where exactly does Gloria Steinem say you should be allowed to stay home and not work while your children’s mom does and pays you child support to abuse your kids?  I must have missed that.

I still stick to my opinion that most of those in the FR Movement are abusers trying to cram their ideological patriarchal power and control down everyone else’s throats.