Comments on: Bridging the Political Divide: How Do We Involve the “Common (Feminist) Voter?”

By: Meg

Meg — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 03:09:18 +0000

MadamaAmbi –
I totally agree on the need for feminists across the spectrum to trust one another, and your idea of coming together to form a comprehensive feminist agenda is a great one. Launching a “Seneca Falls for the 21st Century” is no small undertaking, though, and I’d love to hear from others about their thoughts on putting together a project like that. The main question may be whether something like that would have the effect itself of building trust and comraderie among the feminist community — which, as you point out, is very diverse in a multitude of ways and thus not everybody sees every issue the same way — or if those things need to be established before we can attempt something like that, and if so, how.

Marc,
Point well taken on NARAL’s focus on Stupak without a broader context. I thought the ad was important because it highlighted that particular issue for an audience that wasn’t necessarily plugged into the #stopstupak debate, but I do agree that it didn’t place Stupak in the “big picture,” which as you point out may have made the ad more effective.

By: MadamaAmbi

MadamaAmbi — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 16:02:35 +0000

Suzanne–exactly. Comprehensive. Comprehensive. Comprehensive. Treat the whole woman, whose medical/health issues are complex and unknown. Make all medical options accessible and affordable. Give her access to all options at affordable rates. We hear so much blather in this country about “free markets” and how we tamper with them at our peril (though I think many people are now seeing the hypocrisy and sleight of hand in that one), but we never hear “the whole woman.” Or Comprehensive or Bust.

Feminists and activists and womanists need to go on the offensive and stop playing defense. This is one of the reasons we’ve lost ground, imo. Recently I had a look at The Waxman Report: How Congress Works, and he makes the point that it’s well-known Republican strategy to turn any issue into a dollars and cents maze of technicality in order to move the discussion away from the human tragedy. Wake up, women. You have been farmed. Wake up Democrats: you have been outstrategized my entire life.

By: Suzanne

Suzanne — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 22:57:08 +0000

A woman called me several weeks ago after we met at a conference. She knew I was a publicist who worked on women’s issues. She said that she owed her new baby to health insurance that paid for selective termination. Yes, she owed her LIVE child to the fact that her health insurance paid to abort the dying twin she was carrying. This is a really visceral story, and that’s where we lose sometimes. When we get too technical and policy focused, eyes glaze over. It’s hard to argue with the fact that this woman would have lost BOTH babies without health insurance. With proper insurance, she has a baby AND she has her health.

By: Marc Chimes

Marc Chimes — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 19:09:04 +0000

Actually, I thought that the NARAL ad missed the mark. It was too close to the issue — The Stupak Amendment — and too far from what really matters. When it asked the question “Why?” it answered with something about restrictive health insurance. That’s not the issue or the answer. The answer to “Why?” is that they want to take away your right to choose. To choose health insurance, to choose an abortion, to choose how to live your life. They want to take away your right to choose. Perhaps a public awareness/issue valence campaign can start right there, with young women on television and on websites stating “I believe I have the right to choose…” You either do or you don’t. And it’s not a choice about amendments or insurance… it’s about autonomy and self-determination.

By: MadamaAmbi

MadamaAmbi — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:26:16 +0000

hi Meg–this is a very important discussion for feminists to have. I have been asking feminists and womanists and radical women of color everywhere online to step back and critique where we are and where we think we’re going. I mean that we should throw into question all of our assumptions about what works, that feminists, womanists and women of color from all different philosophies and corners of activism need to come together (not necessarily in a conference, say I, a partially-disabled woman) and lock ourselves into feminist process until we can agree on a common agenda, a 5 yr. plan, a 10 yr. plan, a 15 yr. plan and so on. We don’t need to make crown a feminist queen, but we do need a wide representation of thinkers across races, classes, genders, sexual orientation, ablilties, etc. I’m skeptical that discussing this via comments on blogs will do the trick–good conversation starters, but not the equivalent of locking ourselves into a room until we get the job done. My preference would be that we do it online via video with a way that many people can tune in and interact. Jaclyn Friedman and Center for New Words did this very successfully, and Fem2.0 also attempted this for their inaugural conference, but had some problems as I recall. I’m sure we have the talent in the feminist/womanist community to pull this together, but do we have the trust? It’s the trust that’s the problem. I realize that I need to write more about trust being the problem, but I have to leave it there right now, as I have unbelievably boring, banal and domestic duties calling me…