When Hillary Clinton Killed Feminism

[RiverLover]

NYT Op-ed
Maureen Dowd
2/13/16

When Hillary Clinton Killed Feminism


WASHINGTON — THE Clinton campaign is shellshocked over the wholesale rejection of Hillary by young women, younger versions of herself who do not relate to her.



Hillary’s coronation was predicated on a conviction that has just gone up in smoke. ....So this time, the Clintons assumed, the women who had deserted Hillary for Barack, in Congress and in the country, owed her. Democrats would want to knock down that second barrier.

Hillary believed that there was an implicit understanding with the sisters of the world that now was the time to come back home and vote for a woman. (The Clintons seem to have conveniently forgotten how outraged they were by identity politics when black leaders deserted them in 2008 to support Obama.)

This attitude intensified the unappetizing solipsistic subtext of her campaign, which is “What is Hillary owed?” It turned out that female voters seem to be looking at Hillary as a candidate rather than as a historical imperative. And she’s coming up drastically short on trustworthiness.

As Olivia Sauer, an 18-year-old college freshman who caucused for Bernie Sanders in Ames, Iowa, told a Times reporter: “It seems like he is at the point in his life when he is really saying what he is thinking. With Hillary, sometimes you get this feeling that all of her sentences are owned by someone.”

Hillary started, both last time and this, from a place of entitlement, as though if she reads her résumé long enough people will surrender. And now she’s even angrier that she has been shown up by someone she considers even less qualified than Obama was when he usurped her place.

....snip....

....What the three older women seemed to miss was that the young women supporting Sanders are living the feminist dream, where gender no longer restricts and defines your choices, where girls grow up knowing they can be anything they want. The aspirations of ’70s feminism are now baked into the culture.


The interesting thing about the spectacle of older women trying to shame younger ones on behalf of Hillary is that Hillary and Bill killed the integrity of institutional feminism back in the ’90s — with the help of Albright and Steinem."


....snip.....


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/14/opinion/sunday/when-hillary-clinton-killed-feminism.html?_r=0

Never underestimate women's intuition, no matter the age.

Bernie Sanders on Women’s Rights

[cali]

1. I have such antipathy toward Dowd that it amounts to a mental block

When I try to read her, I end up reading the same sentence over and over.

[RiverLover]

3. I've always admired her. She's a great role model for women.

She began in the 70s working for Time Mag and was one of the first females to cover sports.

She's one of the women who broke the barriers, and she wasn't married to a president/former president at the time.

[cali]

6. I don't like her writing style or her pedestrian snark

[RiverLover]

9. Ok

then.

Its settled.

[m-lekktor]

8. She is a novelty read for me, I don't take her seriously. nt

[RiverLover]

10. So this was wrong & shouldn't be taken seriously?

It turned out that female voters seem to be looking at Hillary as a candidate rather than as a historical imperative.

And she’s coming up drastically short on trustworthiness.

Unbelievable.

[m-lekktor]

14. and tomorrow she could write a scathing piece about Bernie, shreading him

If you are not familiar with Dowd I can't possibly explain her in a DU post to convey her essence. I despise HIllary CLinton and even if i might cheer Dowd in this instance that she trashes her I am too familiar with Dowds body of work to take her too seriously. She is a naysayer for hipsters!

I am glad you posted this and will read it later.

[RiverLover]

4. That's covered in her peice linked here in the OP. She nails it.

I just had to snip a lot so as not to tick off the NYT.

[Donkees]

11. excerpt:

"What the three older women seemed to miss was that the young women supporting Sanders are living the feminist dream, where gender no longer restricts and defines your choices, where girls grow up knowing they can be anything they want. The aspirations of ’70s feminism are now baked into the culture

The interesting thing about the spectacle of older women trying to shame younger ones on behalf of Hillary is that Hillary and Bill killed the integrity of institutional feminism back in the ’90s — with the help of Albright and Steinem."

[RiverLover]

12. Added that in to the OP excerpt, Donkees.

Its worthy.

[Bucky]

5. Whuy, back in my day we reshpected our elderzh, you young whippershnapperzh you!

But Steinem was generally right when she said "Women get more radical as we get older, because we experience ... not to over-generalize, but ... men tend to get more conservative because they gain power as they age, women get more radical because they lose power as they age."

Losing power makes you more radical, having power makes you more conservative. Bashing young feminists as boy-crazy is about as conservative as you can get, which can assure us that Gloria Steinem is not getting less powerful. I'm sure she'll get an invite to Bernie's inauguration ball. It's just sad that she can't see that Sanders is standing up for the powerless and Clinton is rubbing elbows with the powerful. The world hasn't changed, but Gloria has.

[RiverLover]

7. You should write an op-ed for the NYT too.

Good stuff!

It's just sad that she can't see that Sanders is standing up for the powerless and Clinton is rubbing elbows with the powerful. The world hasn't changed, but Gloria has.

[Hydra]

40. You nailed it

Power = comfort level, usually. Comfortable people naturally get more lazy and conservative about things.

"Everything's great (for me)! Why all the fuss?!"

[ms liberty]

13. I don't like Maureen Dowd much at all

But she's made some astute observations in this piece.

[farleftlib]

15. No fan of Mo Do here

but she does make several valid points. There is a palpable feeling coming from the Clinton camp that Hillary is being denied what she fully believes is her due. It's so off-putting. What I'd like to know is why did she get to jump to the front of the line? A female US president is overdue but HRC doesn't make the grade in my book. There are qualified women who have been in politics longer, who have paid their dues and who have gotten there through their own efforts and not because of who they are married to. The author captures the affront the Clintons evidently feel because it looks as though her second chance is now in danger of being thwarted.

Looking back, she became Senator from NY because of her husband and got SoS because she agreed to endorse Obama but that's what she should have done anyway. But somehow she wrung that promise from him. If she made concessions in the hopes of payback, automatic public support was not a bargaining chip either of them could expect. In my mind, the resume that she's so proud of is a list of favors called in, not personal accomplishments.

But I think Mo Do goes off the rails here when she brings up Lewinsky:

Bill lied and hid behind the skirts of his wife and female cabinet members, who had to go out before the cameras and vouch for his veracity, even when it was apparent he was lying.

Seeing Albright, the first female secretary of state, give cover to President Clinton was a low point in women’s rights. As was the New York Times op-ed by Steinem, arguing that Lewinsky’s will was not violated, so no feminist principles were violated. What about Clinton humiliating his wife and daughter and female cabinet members? What about a president taking advantage of a gargantuan power imbalance with a 22-year-old intern? What about imperiling his party with reckless behavior that put their feminist agenda at risk?

Most people were outraged that the Whitewater investigation was allowed to go on and on and on until they came up with Bill's zipper problem which was really well known by then anyway. People got over Gennifer Flowers and they weren't at all surprised that Bill had a mistress on the side after he got elected. Lewinsky knew what she was getting into when she went after not just a married man, but one who happened to be POTUS.

The problem, I think, is that Hillary wants to be elected as an "historical imperative" but she doesn't want the title for the promotion of women's ideals, but for her own self aggrandizement. She's as good a politician as any man but that's now part of her problem, in her quest to wield power, she has sold out to TPTB and she is obviously comfortable with this. So when she comes out of her 1% bubble and wants us all to raise our fists in the air and say "Yeah Woman Power" we know we'd just be serving her personal ambition, not becoming part of something we can all be proud of.

[m-lekktor]

17. what you wrote.

the very last sentence in your last paragraph:

So when she comes out of her 1% bubble and wants us all to raise our fists in the air and say "Yeah Woman Power" we know we'd just be serving her personal ambition, not becoming part of something we can all be proud of

is perfect!

[farleftlib]

20. Why thank you

That's way cool.

[RiverLover]

31. Its true. Thank you. Excellent points, well said.

[Divernan]

16. Dowd nails it re feminist hypocricy re Lewinsky & Anita Hill

Seeing Albright, the first female secretary of state, give cover to President Clinton was a low point in women’s rights. As was the New York Times op-ed by Steinem, arguing that Lewinsky’s will was not violated, so no feminist principles were violated. What about Clinton humiliating his wife and daughter and female cabinet members? What about a president taking advantage of a gargantuan power imbalance with a 22-year-old intern? What about imperiling his party with reckless behavior that put their feminist agenda at risk?

It rang hollow after the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas hearings. When it was politically beneficial, the feminists went after Thomas for bad behavior and painted Hill as a victim. And later, when it was politically beneficial, they defended Bill’s bad behavior and stayed mute as Clinton allies mauled his dalliances as trailer trash and stalkers.

The same feminists who were outraged at the portrayal of Hill by David Brock — then a Clinton foe but now bizarrely head of one of her “super PACs” — as “a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty,” hypocritically went along when Hillary and other defenders of Bill used that same aspersion against Lewinsky.

Hillary knew (back then) that she could count on the complicity of feminist leaders and Democratic women in Congress who liked Bill’s progressive policies on women. And that’s always the ugly Faustian bargain with the Clintons, not only on the sex cover-ups but the money grabs: You can have our bright public service side as long as you accept our dark sketchy side.

I'm a (retired) female lawyer a few years older than HRC. During Bill's impeachment proceedings, I knew many female professionals/feminists - both professionally and personally. None of us would have chosen to stay with/enable a serial adulterer husband - let alone blame the seduction victims of a man with the power of a governor or president. Spouse strays one time? OK - try to save the marriage. But cheating over and over and over and over again? Plus add in the repeated public humiliations. And let's be practical - she had to repeatedly tell her ob/gyn she needed to be tested for STDs. How's that for feeling humiliated? What kind of a masochist would stay in that kind of a marriage? Especially a woman equipped with an Ivy law degree who was quite capable of making a very well-paid living on her own.

[Betty Karlson]

21. Ah, but it's all about power and wealth with the Clintons.

Just lay back, close your eyes, and think of the White House.

[farleftlib]

23. Yes it is and it shows

This:

Just lay back, close your eyes, and think of the White House.

[Divernan]

24. She hasn't had to do that in decades

It's become a marriage of state or convenience, not - how to put this delicately - marital relations.

[Betty Karlson]

46. That is a very delicate way to put it indeed. Very delicate.

And you are probably right. Even Chelsea has become a convenience now!

[Betty Karlson]

18. K&R for truth!

[Nonhlanhla]

19. Maureen Dowd?

Oh please.

She doesn't get to define feminism for me.

[MrMickeysMom]

22. Why would ANY woman relate to her, young OR old?

If you're old enough to read for comprehension, then you would see who's actually stood behind women's reproductive rights and pay equity... no pandering... no "free trade agreement" job markets to compete with SLAVE LABOR.

No WONDER the women for whom all legislative decisions has been affected want NOTHING TO DO WITH HER.

[RiverLover]

30. Is this why people are so upset with her? Her scuffle with Obama, while he prefers DAVID BROOKS?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/10/obama-maureen-dowd_n_6652240.html



....Just fyi, on David Brooks, another NYT columnist, who Obama likes quite a bit~

Same-Sex Marriage Makes David Brooks Crazy
The 'New York Times' columnist goes on a weird, bitter rant against gay rights
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/same-sex-marriage-makes-david-brooks-crazy-20130402

But then, he cried last month because his conservative party is losing it.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/david-brooks-proposes-a-kinder-gentler-republican-party-20160121

And last year, he cried because poor people are so useless & entirely to blame for their circumstances
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/for-david-brooks-the-rich-are-people-the-poor-are-numbers-20150311

Seems like he's the one we'd have a problem with.

[MrMickeysMom]

45. I like this comment about David Brook's rant, which, who-the-hell-can-understand...

I read Brooks' essay. Speaking strictly as an English major and tutor in freshman composition, that was a fairly shitty essay. It reads like a first draft of a WR121 freshman's attempt to be controversial. On THIS essay, I'd be writing "Proof?" and "Cite!" and "Post hoc generalization" all over the damn thing. Grade: C-. Dude, didn't you study rhetoric? Like, where's your logos?

BTW: I'm 57, an honor student, and trans. Personally speaking: fuck you, David Brooks. Your goddamned morality has limited my opportunities for most of my life.

I've always thought the David Brooks presented himself as a columnist conflicted about liberal social values. A really confused individual who gets too much space, while Tabbi gets too little!

[Divernan]

25. Some great comments in NYT on this article

And this article finally pushed me into subscribing to the NYT so I'm not limited to the 10 free articles a month. I got 4 wks. for 99 cents, followed by a year at $1.88 per week for internet and smart phone. One year will get me through the primary election, the general election and the inauguration of President Bernie Sanders! And I don't always agree with the NYT editorial positions, but am now free to read their stuff and comment voraciously.

Anyhow, how about this comment?

You know, Hilary, Madeline and Gloria didn't create feminism all by their lonesomes. This old fogey from the 60s marched in a lot of picket lines and raised a lot of money for progressive causes. I was a foot soldier, and not one of the ones who had to have all the attention.

There was a great line in a play whose name I have shamefully forgotten about a reunion of old activists in which Swoozie Kurtz confronted her dismissive teenage daughter: "If you only knew the world we almost made for you."

Bernie knows that vision, and is still fighting for it, which is why it isn't just the millenials behind Bernie, despite the media's need to pigeon hole everyone. Yes, if I have to I'll hold my nose and vote for Hillary, but I am joyfully and hopefully voting for Bernie in the primaries. Wouldn't it be amazing if we elected a President who actually cares about and understands the working class and middle class, rather than another millionaire.[/blockquote

]

[RiverLover]

28. That's a good one. It IS so uplifting to see finally the media's attempts to 'pigeon hole' people,

Bernie, are failing to such a degree.

Its as if there's been a massive change in consciousness, sheeple no more.

And not a moment too soon.

[Merryland]

26. Thanks for posting this!

I think it was an excellent analysis.

[RiverLover]

29. Thank you. Such animosity for Ms Dowd has taken me by surprise. /nt

[Divernan]

34. MoDo criticized Clintons when criticizing them wasn't cool!

I have on the whole enjoyed her work. She's acerbic and she pokes fun at politicians on both sides of the aisle. But, hey, she won a Pulitzer Prize in 1999:
http://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year/1999

Maureen Dowd of The New York Times
For her fresh and insightful columns on the impact of President Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky.

And Fox News/Washington Times hate her!
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2015/01/05/new-york-times-columnist-maureen-dowd-self-destructs.html

Ms. Dowd provided what many thought was the coup de grace against Ms. Miller when she wrote that column about her then-colleague at The New York Times, excoriating Ms. Miller for her coverage of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction WMD) leading up to the Iraq war.

Ms. Miller, you see, had done the unthinkable. She reported what her investigation found on the issue, which also happened to be what the Bush administration and scores of other governments had also determined: Saddam was pursuing a WMD program and an untold number of those weapons were developed and undeclared.

As her fellow liberal colleagues piled on Ms. Miller, Ms. Dowd’s column, dripping in ridicule and moral authority, condemned the reporter for being a “stenographer” for the Bush administration.

Ms. Dowd complained Ms. Miller’s work “fit too perfectly” with what the White House had been asserting about WMD. In other words, Ms. Dowd accused Ms. Miller of being too close to her subject, essentially of colluding with others, of selling out to make someone happy or to further a shared agenda.

And from Wikipedia:
Dowd became a columnist on The New York Times Op-Ed page in 1995,[2][3] replacing Anna Quindlen,[7] who left to become a full-time novelist.[11] Dowd was named a Woman of the Year by Glamour magazine in 1996,[3] and won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize, for distinguished commentary.[2] She won The Damon Runyon Award for outstanding contributions to journalism in 2000,[12] and became the first Mary Alice Davis Lectureship speaker (sponsored by the School of Journalism and the Center for American History) at The University of Texas at Austin in 2005.[13] In 2010, Dowd was ranked #43 on The Daily Telegraph's list of the 100 most influential liberals in America; in 2007, she was ranked #37 on the same list.[14]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maureen_Dowd

[RiverLover]

35. Thanks for this Divernan.

She's pretty impressive, overall.

[farleftlib]

36. She has done that consistently

I remember a lot of it so I googled and found this:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/rubycramer/heres-what-you-learn-from-reading-20-years-worth-of-maureen#.jnoJJbpxp


Media Matters examined the pieces for allusions to 16 “negative tropes” — including characterizations of Clinton as “betraying feminism” (35 columns), “power hungry” (51 columns), “unlikeable” (9 columns), or “phony” (34 columns).

Those are definitely characteristics that mirror public sentiment. It's telling that attack dog Brock has taken exception with Mo Do's articles, accusing her of longstanding animosity against, and caricaturization of, Hillary Clinton. Brock accusing someone else of mud slinging is so precious.

I just can't get behind someone who portrayed Ronald Reagan so lovingly.

Thanks for sharing those.

[RiverLover]

37. Lovingly? She doesn't sound like a fan here~

https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1129&dat=19990924&id=nPFRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=K3ADAAAAIBAJ&pg=4337,1469115&hl=en

Although I remember her writing how Reagan would be left of his party today.

I agree.

[farleftlib]

39. Yes OK

I remembered it differently. It seemed at the time she portrayed him as an old uncle who meant well. He was much worse than that. I never got that kindly old gent vibe like I never got the claim that people wanted to have a beer with Bush Jr. Thanks for the reminder.

[RiverLover]

41. ...

[procon]

27. Women are "living the feminist dream"???

Really? We still can't get equal pay. The Glass Ceiling still keeps women out of power in business and politics. There's no national effort to pass paid family leave in support working women. There's no rush to pass the Equal Rights Amendment. In much of America, women have no say-so in what happens to their own bodies, and are even denied contraceptives and access to legal and safe abortion.

Women of color, immigrant women, women of different religions, are all subject to harsher restrictions that limits their choices in education, employment and impairs how their own girls grow up. Women certainly have no guarantees of "knowing they can be anything they want", but rather only what the authoritarian American patriarchy will allow.

[farleftlib]

32. I suppose they mean

that privileged white women are living it, everybody else not so much. Just as in health care and other social issues, many countries are light years ahead of us when it comes to equality. They wouldn't trade places with us for anything. And here it's considered pie-in-the-sky fantasy just to ratify the ERA. We are way behind the times in comparison to Europe, for instance. And even in post-recession America, working women overwhelmingly feel no matter what they do, they can't succeed because of the way the system is rigged.

From an article entitled: 11 Surprising Facts About Women and Poverty From the Shriver Report

4.) The average woman is paid 77 cents for every dollar a man makes, and that figure is much lower for black and Latina women; African American women earn only 64 cents and Hispanic women only 55 cents for every dollar made by a white man.

http://time.com/2026/11-surprising-facts-about-women-and-poverty-from-the-shriver-report/

[RiverLover]

33. Important info. Its just too bad a Hillary "feminist" put down women, saying they only liked Bernie

to be near the boys.

WHAT THE HELL?

Young women aren't like their generation any more. Not even close

They need to not kill feminism by such incredibly misogynistic remarks. Women, all ages except maybe -some- older ones, have their own minds.

[procon]

38. The same restrictions that fall on one demographic group affects all the others.

Women aren't monolithic in their views and opinions, alliances or political affiliations. Just as Sander's supporters assert that he is not responsible for the acrimonious tone of his most ardent fans, the responsibility for such remarks lays squarely with the speaker, not the candidates. You claim to be irate when someone else used inflammatory, florid rhetoric, but here you are doing the same thing, yeah?

Trying to tar women, any woman, with the regrettable remarks made by one, is unproductive and does not advance our stand because it ultimately harms all of us to be painted with that same overbroad brush.Regardless of your political leaning, it is inimical and parochially shortsighted to the important causes that we women, as an embattled under class of citizens, have to contend with on a daily basis.

[RiverLover]

44. Eloquently stated. Props.

Though I believe you missed the point of the article.

As a class we do still have a long way to go. But we have come a long way. I make as much or more in my position as males within my company. Years ago, I may not have even been offered the position because of my gender.

And to have these high profile (former) 'feminists' come out and say these things, vetted by the Hillary camp, which put down women. Well its hard not to blame who they were speaking on behalf of.

To vote for Hillary simply because she is a woman is as sexist as you can get.

And to vote for feminism in a vote for Hillary is not advancing the cause when Hillary is a corporate-bought, war mongering female who advanced with the formidable help of her husband, a former president. Not exactly scrapping her way up the ladder.

And don't get me started on her wanting US jobs to go to foreign countries where both women & men work for slave wages, and doing that so that her friends in large multinational corporations can make obscene profits, while the American middle class is gutted out.


Hillary's Biggest Challenge Isn't Just Bill's Outsourcing Record, It's Hers
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-white/hilarys-biggest-challenge_b_6175008.html

So its ok for foreign women to work for low wages there, but the jobs left here for women are mostly minimum wage service jobs that she might try to raise the hourly to $12 whole dollars. What is that?

I'm sorry, just her becoming president, the wife of a former president, is not enough to help women. And because she is so enormously powerful within the establishment that keeps women around the globe down, I don't see her helping women in any concrete way either. Just the opposite.

[One of the 99]

42. After all the lies Dowd told about Al Gore in 2000

and all the nasty, namecalling columns she has written about the President over the years; I have a big problem trusting anything she has to say now about anyone. Reading her column is like reading a spoiled teenager's slam book.

[JTFrog]

43. Good to see we finally have some people giving a shit about feminism.

No matter how misguided their efforts. At least they are paying attention.

[boston bean]

47. MoDo the 21st century Schlafly.

[Divernan]

48. Schlafly's an ultraconservative Republican;Dowd ranked an influential liberal

Schlafly and Dowd are polar opposites politically - with the exception that neither of them has much use for Bill or Hillary Clinton.

And from Wikipedia:
Dowd became a columnist on The New York Times Op-Ed page in 1995, replacing Anna Quindlen, who left to become a full-time novelist. Dowd was named a Woman of the Year by Glamour magazine in 1996, and won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize, for distinguished commentary. She won The Damon Runyon Award for outstanding contributions to journalism in 2000, and became the first Mary Alice Davis Lectureship speaker (sponsored by the School of Journalism and the Center for American History) at The University of Texas at Austin in 2005. In 2010, Dowd was ranked #43 on The Daily Telegraph's list of the 100 most influential liberals in America; in 2007, she was ranked #37 on the same list.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maureen_Dowd

Phyllis Stewart Schlafly (born Phyllis McAlpin Stewart, August 15, 1924) is a retired American constitutional lawyer, conservative activist, author, and speaker and founder of the Eagle Forum. She is known for her staunch social and political conservatism, her opposition to modern feminism, and her successful campaign against the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Her 1964 book A Choice, Not an Echo sold over 3 million copies as a push-back against Republican Governor Nelson Rockefeller and the Eastern Republican Establishment. She co-authored books on national defense and was highly critical of arms-control agreements with the Soviet Union.[2] Schlafly founded the Eagle Forum in the 1970s and the Eagle Forum Education & Legal Defense Fund, St. Louis. She is currently Chairman of the Board and CEO of Eagle Forum and maintains a presence on the lecture circuit. Since 1967, she has published a newsletter, the Phyllis Schlafly Report.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phyllis_Schlafly

[Divernan]

49. Faux "Feminists" blamed Bill's sexual victims

From the London Review of Books archive:

The second, which is vulgarly called ‘Troopergate’, has to do with Clinton’s sexual appetite as recalled by his former bodyguards. The third concerns Mena airport. Taking these in random order, we find that no member of the Clinton entourage doubts the essence of the trooper testimony. The Governor was, in the words of a local saying, a hard dog to keep on the porch.

This would scarcely be worth mentioning if the leaders of official American feminism had not rallied to his defence and rallied, furthermore, by pointing to the relative trashiness of some of the women who have complained. Excuse me, but it is surely uneducated and impressionable girls like Paula Jones – vulnerable to predatory superiors and working on short-term contracts – for whose protection the sexual harassment laws were specifically designed. As ever, it is the class element in this dismal narrative that bears watching.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v18/n11/christopher-hitchens/a-hard-dog-to-keep-on-the-porch