Socialism & Feminism Archive Carey Roberts is a social commentator on political correctness. He has been widely published in newspapers and through the internet. You can contact him at E-Mail. 1 2 3 Achieving Feminist Class Consciousness All Hail to the Panderer-in-Chief Fem-Think and the Civil Rights of Men The First Female President: The Fantasy and the Reality In Honor of the Heroes of Flight 93 Jim Crow Days for Men Kobe Bryant: Alice-in-Wonderland Justice Lady....Or the Tramp? The Laura Bush We Don't Know New Media Claims Bragging Rights in Rathergate Flap Olympic Media Misfire Party-Poopers at the UN Birthday Bash How We will Cure the Radical Feminist Cancer? Patriarchal Power or Marxist Mischief? PBS Propaganda Piece Purveyors of Deceit: Why PBS must Yank "Breaking the Silence" Restraining Orders for Abusive Grandmas? Rise of the Feminist Propaganda State The Unfolding AIDS Scandal at the UN UN Resolution 1325: The World Body goes on a Loony Streak Will the NASCAR Dads Tilt the Election? Winner of the Covented 2005 Award for Political Incorrectness Women Still Unequal before the Law Women Victimized by Feminist Fables Achieving Feminist Class Consciousness Radical feminism can be traced back directly to Marxism-Leninism. The feminist ideology, framework, and utopian aspirations all have their origin in the writings of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels (mensnewsdaily.com/archive/r/roberts/2004/roberts012704.htm ). Sometime visit the Women and Marxism website (www.marxists.org/subject/women/ ). There you can read exactly what V.I. Lenin, Joseph Stalin, and Mao Tse-Tung had to say about women’s liberation. Vladimir Lenin was the mastermind behind the early Soviet propaganda campaign. In his book The Birth of the Propaganda State, Peter Kenez concludes the Soviet state achieved its early successes because of the “ability of the political system to isolate the Russian people from information and ideas that would have undermined the message.” And that message was the gospel of class consciousness. The Marxist mantra was repeated endlessly: the worker was exploited by the evil capitalist, and the peasant was oppressed by the greedy landowner. This indoctrination strategy worked for several reasons. It motivated the workers and peasants. It channeled their anger towards the capitalists. And it vilified and demoralized the opponents of Communism. Lenin also pushed the class consciousness theme in his speeches to women, but with a new twist. On the occasion of the 1921 International Working Women’s Day, Lenin proclaimed that women were doubly oppressed -- both because they were victims of capitalism, and because they were slaves “overburdened with the drudgery of the most squalid, backbreaking and stultifying toil in the kitchen and the family household.” (www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/mar/04.htm ) “Drudgery of the most squalid, backbreaking, and stultifying toil”? An apt description of life in the Gulag, perhaps, but not of housework in the relative comfort of the home. But lack of historical accuracy did not deter the early feminists. Pick up a copy of Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex or Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics. You will read exactly the same arguments: Men are the unending oppressors of women and marriage is a legalized form of slavery. To achieve their vision of women’s liberation, the Matrons of Mischief pursued the age-old strategy of divide and conquer. First, the Sisterhood canonized the strong, self-assured, independent woman. This ideal became government policy when the Clinton administration launched its “Girl Power” program and UNICEF later started its “Go Girl!” initiative. To this day, programs to prevent osteoporosis carry the slogan, “Strong Women, Strong Bones.” But these campaigns carry an underlying message: “If you’re a strong woman, why would you ever need or want a man?” And when the Marlboro Woman message didn’t completely sink in, feminists went to Plan B: male-bashing. Male chauvinist pig. Misogynist. Insensitive. Over-bearing. Abusive. Batterer. And many others. At first, men thought the caricatures were funny. Then they tried to ignore them. But the end result has been to make men feel guilty and shameful. The steady drum-beat of those inflammatory messages served to turn the battle of the sexes into a gender war. The next step would be to conquer. And what was the target? Nothing less than the institution of marriage. Robin Morgan, who would later become the editor of Ms. Magazine, referred to marriage as “A slavery-like practice.” Germaine Greer argued, “If women are to effect a significant amelioration in their condition, it seems obvious that they must refuse to marry.” Kate Millett extolled the destruction of the traditional family as “revolutionary or utopian.” Persons who are interested in comprehending the scope of this relentless assault should peruse the Heritage Foundation report, Why Congress Should Ignore Radical Feminist Opposition to Marriage (www.heritage.org/Research/Features/Marriage/bg1662.cfm ). So what is the ultimate objective of this campaign of feminist class consciousness? Surprisingly, feminists have made little effort to disguise their goal. In her book Red Feminism, Kate Weigand makes this stunning admission: “this book provides evidence to support the belief that at least some Communists regarded the subversion of the gender system as an integral part of the larger fight to overturn capitalism.” (print.google.com/print/doc?isbn=0801864895 ) Subvert the gender system to overturn capitalism. Karl Marx would be pleased. Women Victimized by Feminist Fables Not too long ago, people knew the difference between truth and falsehood. Truth was based on verifiable facts and rational logic. And falsehood was the opposite of truth. But then radical feminism came along. The High Priestesses decreed that truth was a cynical ploy designed to dupe women to submit to male hegemony. Feminist philosopher Joyce Trebilcot once ridiculed the “apparatuses of ‘truth,’ ‘knowledge,’ ‘science.’” And feminist theorist Elizabeth Fee stated bluntly: “Knowledge was created as an act of aggression.” Not even Cartesian logic was safe from the onslaught. “We might begin to question the import of Descartes’ stress on logic and mathematics as the ideal types of rationality,” explained Linda Gardiner, editor of the Women’s Review of Books. Told to ignore reason and common sense, women found themselves vulnerable to the machinations of the mischievous matriarchs. Under the guise of female liberation, these feminist Pooh Bahs set out to indoctrinate women into a three-tiered mythology. It all begins with the Mother of all Myths: the belief that a cabal of men, termed the Patriarchy, has been scheming all these years to keep women down. We won’t dwell on the fact that history fails to support such a sweeping indictment (www.mensnewsdaily.com/archive/r/roberts/2004/roberts080404.htm ). Suffice it to say, in the feminist worldview all the ills of the world can be traced back to the dreaded Patriarchy. The Great Myth of Patriarchy in turn spawned the Four Lesser Myths. First is the claim that men “have all the power.” Must be nice to have the whole world waiting at your beck and call. Next is Gloria Steinem’s doozy: “A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.” Steinem was telling a generation of American women that barren spinsterhood would be good enough. Of course, Steinem later found her bicycle and married airline pilot David Bale – but let’s not worry about minor details. Third, there’s the feminist belief in the moral superiority of women (www.mensnewsdaily.com/archive/r/roberts/2004/roberts052704.htm). That concept is captured in the chauvinistic expression, “A woman can do anything a man can do, only better.” To the Sisterhood, that statement is not a joke, it is a central tenet of the gender catechism. But here’s the biggest whopper of all: the claim that feminism seeks to bring about gender equality. Let’s look at the record. What have feminists done to rectify the fact that men have shorter lifespans? Or are victims in 93% of all workplace deaths? To the radical feminist, gender equality is only a one-way street. The Four Lesser Myths of male omnipotence, female autonomy, feminine superiority, and gender equality create the foundation. Upon that base, feminists have constructed an ever-expanding superstructure of equivocations, half-truths, and outright falsehoods. The list is much too long to recount, but encompasses the full range gamut of issues including health care, education, the law, family relationships, and domestic violence. Like the Super Bowl hoax – the myth that domestic violence rises 40% on Super Bowl Sunday. Even though that hoary chestnut was refuted long ago by the Washington Post, the alarming statistic continues to be recycled. So exactly how do the feminist fables victimize women? Precisely because so many intelligent, caring women have come to accept the lies. They now believe they are victims. You might say they’ve been brainwashed. These women walk around with an attitude of entitlement, wondering why men aren’t interested in them any more. They are lonely people. And as long as women remain in the victim mode, they will always be vulnerable to the argument that they need more legal protections and services. Thanks to the Sisterhood, female dependence on men has shifted to female reliance on government largesse. Is that progress? But for a number of women’s groups, the feminist misrepresentations have reached the point of outright embarrassment. So they have launched campaigns to tell the world, “Look! The Empress has no clothes!” The Concerned Women for America sponsors extensive grass-roots activities that counter the feminist doctrine. And the Independent Women’s Forum has launched a national campaign to alert students to widespread liberal bias on college campuses (www.iwf.org/campuscorner/default.asp). The program is appropriately dubbed, “She Thinks.” A feminist who thinks – what a thought! Party-Poopers at the UN Birthday Bash Nearly 170 heads of state came to New York last week for the United Nations’ 60th anniversary. So organizers planned a gala birthday celebration fitting for the occasion. But soon after the World Summit started on Wednesday, it became obvious the party was destined to go bust. First, a little background. Originally, the focus of the Summit was going to be the Millennium Development Goals – MDGs – an ambitious blueprint for the eradication of world poverty by the year 2015. But then secretary-general Kofi Annan began to hype the event as a “once in a generation opportunity for the world to come together and take action on grave global threats that require bold global solutions.” Before long everyone was thinking how they could leverage the conference to further their particular agendas. Case in point: the rad-fems don’t like the MDGs because they don’t affirm the right to kill one’s unborn young. So using bully tactics that would put any big-city politician to shame, the feministas began to strong-arm delegates at the preparatory conferences to insert statements about the importance of “reproductive rights” -- UN-speak for abortion-on-demand -- into the final reports. They doggedly pursued this strategy at the secretary-general’s Advisory Body in January, with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) in March, the Commission on Population and Development in April, at a closed-door meeting on HIV/AIDS in May, and at a month-long ECOSOC meeting in July. [www.c-fam.org/FAX/Volume_8/volume_8.html ] Sometimes their methods became downright Machiavellian. For example, in June the UN General Assembly held meetings with hundreds of non-governmental organizations. But all the pro-family and pro-life groups that applied to attend were turned away. Ominously, Louise Frechette, who serves as Kofi Annan’s right-hand woman, hailed these closed-door meetings as “a significant new step in the way the United Nations relates to civil society.” [www.c-fam.org/FAX/Volume_8/faxv8n27.html ] By late July the feminists had laid their trap. UN commissions, non-governmental organizations, and Mr. Annan himself were all on record demanding that the MDGs support abortion rights. They only had to wait for the steel jaws to snap tight on the delegates who attended the UN Summit in September. But then the Bolton bombshell hit. Within days of his appointment by President Bush, Ambassador John Bolton called for hundreds of changes to the Summit’s draft agreement, demanding that it focus on reforming the inept UN bureaucracy and countering international terrorism. That came as bad news to the hairy-leg ladies who care only about abortion services for 12-year-old girls. So as the September 14 opening for the Summit neared, the negotiations became bogged down with scores of disagreements on 27 key issues raised by Ambassador Bolton and others. Once it got underway, the World Summit featured a mind-numbing 25 hours of speeches by 151 presidents, prime ministers, and kings. As the meeting headed towards its Friday wrap-up, it became painfully evident that the event was destined to be little more than a social gathering of aging apologists for the New World Order. Finally Canadian prime minister Paul Martin blasted the delegates whose speeches were filled with “too-often empty rhetoric.” At the end the delegates wearily approved a 40-page resolution that is long on heart-warming platitudes but woefully short on specifics. [daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/LTD/N05/511/30/PDF/N0551130.pdf?OpenElement Apart from the decision to establish a new Human Rights Council, the delegates failed to agree on details for countering terrorism, stopping the spread of AIDS, or reforming the UN Security Council. Even Mr. Annan himself ended up agreeing the final document was “watered down” and “disappointing.” [www.un.org/News/ossg/sg/stories/articleFull.asp?TID=49&Type=Article ] And no one had the courage to stand up to the Women of Woe, who succeeded in pushing through language about “achieving universal access to reproductive health by 2015” and promoting gender mainstreaming “in all political, economic, and social spheres.” Gender mainstreaming, if you hadn’t heard, is UN-speak for imposing the radical feminist agenda on the rest of us. Lamentably, the final declaration is silent about the importance of families in promoting social development. And to no one’s great surprise, it makes no mention of the needs of men, including shorter lifespans, a three-fold higher suicide rate, and laws in many countries that discriminate against fathers. So after many months of preparation and countless hours of late-night negotiations, the high-powered UN World Summit was unable to produce a detailed plan for making the world a safer, healthier, or fairer place to live. Although no one in the mainstream media dared to say it publicly, it’s hard to conclude the much-ballyhooed event was anything other than a colossal failure. And we’re entrusting these people with the job of eradicating poverty and bringing about world peace? How We will Cure the Radical Feminist Cancer? A malignancy spreads by invading its neighboring cells, taking over their internal control processes, and inducing the cells to assume grotesque shapes and sizes. This is an apt metaphor for radical feminism, which seduces intelligent, caring young women; plies them with warmed-over Marxist slogans; and turns them into gender crusaders who seemingly have lost all semblance of reason and compassion. By its own admission, radical feminism seeks to curtail or destroy the most cherished values of democratic free market societies: the traditional family, limited government, and the culture of life itself. Even the notion of truth itself has come under attack by postmodern feminism, which claims that truth is simply another tool for the patriarchal subjugation of women. “A set of subjective views has emerged as sacrosanct, beyond criticism,” Howard Schwartz concludes in The Revolt of the Primitive. “The result is that a vicious bias has triumphed over fact.” Left to itself, feminism will eventually collapse under the weight of own logical inconsistencies, social intolerance, and reluctance to assure the continuation of the species. But our generation would still have to answer to our children and grandchildren who one day will ask, “Why did you sit by and do nothing?” Thirty-five years after bra-burners captivated the nation’s campuses, radical feminism has become firmly entrenched in our society. In order to cure a cancer, you have to attack the root of the problem. The Sisterhood operates from three strongholds: the academy, the government, and the mainstream media. And this is where we need to apply the tincture of truth. 1. The Academy. Women’s studies programs serve as the base camp for feminists to recruit a new crop of well-educated women. Noting the factual errors and myths that pervade women’s studies courses, Christine Stolba issues a cautionary note that “revolutions often end up devouring their own children.” [www.iwf.org/pdf/roomononesown.pdf ] The cure? Students need to file lawsuits demanding that these universities establish men’s studies programs to serve the dwindling male student body. After all, Title IX of the Civil Rights Act was intended to benefit men and women alike. 2. The Government. Over the past 15 years our elected officials have enacted a bevy of laws intended to appease their female constituents. Problem is, many of these laws weaken the nuclear family, violate men’s civil rights, and make women beholden to government hand-outs. Case in point: the controversial Violence Against Women Act, which comes up for its five-year renewal in Congress later this month. The treatment of choice: Male voters need to start demanding that their politicians answer to their concerns and needs. And lawmakers need to consider whether their chivalrous instincts are unfairly biasing the laws they enact. 3. The Media. Our feminized society is seemingly addicted to stories that serve up a daily diet of victimization and gender grievance. Recently I came across this 72-point headline in USA Today: “Abuse Found in Military Schools.” The article goes on to recite this shocking statistic: “The report cited 2004 Pentagon data showing 50% of women at all three academies were harassed, mostly verbally but dozens suffering physical abuse.” [http://yahoo.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-08-25-academies-women_x.htm?csp=1 ] But exactly how did the Pentagon researchers assess abuse and harassment? Was bruising a female cadet’s feelings considered abusive? Was it exactly 50% of women, with identical percentages at all three military academies? What is the title of this report, so the reader can verify its conclusions? Why wasn’t anyone interviewed to provide balance to the doubtful claim of rampant harassment? And come to think of it, how many male cadets experienced any form of abuse? The answer to these important questions is left to the reader’s imagination. Bottom line, this article bears all the telltale signs of a journalistic snow job. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2004/1020roberts.html ] But that didn’t stop the USA Today editors from running the article on the front page of its August 26 edition. The treatment? The public needs to contact editors and tell them we’re sick and tired of being force-fed with feminist agitprop. Once we challenge the feminist cultural hegemony and remind them how many privileges and advantages the average American woman enjoys, the gender warriors may come to realize that much of their sense of oppression is self-inflicted. Thanks to the advances of medical science, cancer is now a curable disease. Still, surgery is always painful, and recovery may be slow. But this we know for certain: acquiescence to the rad-fems’ ever-escalating demands is the formula for the continued unraveling of the social order. Restraining Orders for Abusive Grandmas? The women's shelter activists have devised a nuclear first-strike weapon in their jihad to stop domestic violence. Insiders call it the TRO -- the "temporary restraining order." Here's how the ploy works. A woman who feels in the slightest way abused goes to a judge to request a restraining order (called an Order of Protection in some states). This is usually done at an "ex-parte" hearing, meaning the hearing is done in secret and the judge does not bother to invite testimony from the alleged abuser. The judge seldom demands any hard evidence to back up the woman's testimony. Because abuse is defined broadly in most states, the woman's request is given a rubber-stamp approval. Ten days later the woman goes back and requests that the temporary restraining order be made permanent. That decision has a devastating impact on the family: the father is permanently vacated from his house, the mother is awarded full custody of the children, and he is ordered to begin child support payments. Obviously this Kafkaesque system is ripe for abuse. And that's exactly what Arlene Soucie of Illinois, proud grandmother of two, recently found out. In November 2002 Mrs. Soucie's daughter-in-law decided to leave the family home, and opted to take along her nine-month-old grandson for good measure. "With the slow process of the court system, my grandson was concealed for 3 months. We missed his first Thanksgiving, first Christmas, first New Years, and his first birthday," Mrs. Soucie sadly writes. Finally the father, who works in law enforcement, was granted formal visitation rights. That's when the nightmare began. Somehow the mother got irate because dad and grandma wanted to see junior from time to time. And someone told her that under the Illinois Domestic Violence Act, causing a woman to feel even "emotional distress" is considered a form of abuse. "In October 2003, my son and myself were placed under an Order of Protection. We did nothing to break the law, we did not harass, stalk, intimidate, or try to annoy. Our only purpose was to pick up the child and deliver him back at the appointed time." Apparently the mother told the judge she found dad and grandma picking up the child to be "distressing." "The mother has learned the system and uses it to her advantage," laments the disillusioned grandmother. The abuse of restraining orders has now become widespread. In Massachusetts, 30,000 restraining orders are issued each year. Half of those do not involve even an allegation of physical violence. Elaine Epstein, former president of the Massachusetts Women's Bar Association, notes that "allegations of abuse are now used for tactical advantage" in divorce hearings. "Everyone knows that restraining orders and orders to vacate are granted to virtually all who apply," she admits. The June 2005 issue of the Journal of Family Violence features an analysis of all of the requests for restraining orders that came to the Massachusetts Gardner District Court in 1997. Author Steve Basile found that only 10% of requests from women were deferred or turned down. In contrast, 34% of requests from abused men were deferred or denied - a three-fold sex bias. In Washington state, attorney Lisa Scott writes, "Originated to immediately protect victims of severe abuse, protection orders have become 'weapons of mass destruction' in family courts. Whenever a woman claims to be a victim, she is automatically believed. No proof of abuse is required." In Colorado, Dr. Charles Corry explains how one judicial district employs a so-called Fast Track system in which "men are not allowed to consult a defense attorney before being pressured and cajoled to enter a guilty plea." Some judges seem to delight in turning family breadwinners into homeless vagrants: "Your job is not to become concerned about all the constitutional rights of the man that you're violating as you grant a restraining order. Throw him out on the street, give him the clothes on his back, and tell him, 'See ya around,'" boasts judge Richard Russell of New Jersey. Early next month lawmakers return to Washington from their August recess. One of their first orders of business will be to take up the Violence Against Women Act. VAWA is the controversial bill that fuels the ever-expanding use of restraining orders around the country. And as they ponder their votes, let's hope our elected officials don't forget about all the grandmas and grandpas out there who are looking forward to birthday cake and ice cream with their grandkids this coming year.     Winner of the Covented 2005 Award for Political Incorrectness Leftists believe the Truth is an intellectual fraud designed to prop up the existing techno-patriarchal-capitalist power structure. That’s why the neo-Coms will tell you with a straight face that Saddam Hussein was a courageous freedom fighter, and that the New York Times usually gets the story right. No wonder George Orwell once said, “In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” This year three stalwart truth-tellers stood up to a tsunami of prevarication to make the short list for the 2005 Award for Political Incorrectness. Our second runner-up this year is…Michael Kinsey, opinion-page editor of the Los Angeles Times. You may recall last February when Susan Estrich, former presidential campaign manager for Michael Dukakis, threw a temper tantrum because only a fraction of the LA Times op-eds were written by women. Mr. Kinsey curtly replied that if more female editorialists wanted to be published in his newspaper, then they would need to write better articles. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/0223roberts.html ] Bravo, Mr. Kinsey. The first runner-up is Mr. Ken Bode, ombudsman for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Last month Mr. Bode reviewed the PBS program Breaking the Silence and concluded the incendiary show was little more than an anti-father cant. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/1214roberts.html ] Well done, Mr. Bode. And the winner of the 2005 Award for Political Incorrectness is…(pan of vast audience with expectant expressions)… Phyllis Schlafly. This past year Mrs. Schlafly took on the federal government’s deepening alliance with radical feminism. In the process she debunked many of the Left’s pet explanations for family break-down. To do justice to Schlafly’s contributions, I have quoted from several of her columns. In January she started off the year with a column about “Children Made Fatherless by Family Courts.” The article revealed that “fathers are systematically discriminated against by family courts which nearly always award physical custody to the mother even when the father has committed no fault.” [www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/jan05/05-01-12.html ] Schlafly continued in the same vein in her February column about the “Fatherphobia of Family Courts.” In that article she took divorce courts to task for ignoring a “mountain of social science research” by failing to award joint physical custody to fathers. [www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/feb05/05-02-02.html ] In March she highlighted the plight of National Guard Spc. Joe McNeilly who was called up for service in Iraq. Upon completion of his tour of duty, McNeilly was greeted with the news that a family court, during his absence and without his knowledge, had awarded full custody of his 10-year-old son to his mother. [www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/mar05/05-03-02.html ] In May she turned up the heat, exposing how “Federal Incentives Make Children Fatherless.” Schlafly warned, “Follow the money. The less time that non-custodial parents (usually fathers) are permitted to be with their children, the more child support they must pay into the state fund, and the higher the federal bonus to the states for collecting the money.” [www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/may05/05-05-11.html ] Mrs. Schlafly doesn’t mince words, does she? And it only gets better. In her June column on “How to Celebrate Father’s Day,” Schlafly took aim at the feminist Big Lie: “For 30 years, feminist organizations and writers have propagated the myth that women are victims of an oppressive patriarchal society and that marriage is an inherently abusive institution that makes wives second-class citizens.” [www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/june05/05-06-15.html ] Then beginning in July, Schlafly took on the hotly-debated Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) which came up before Congress this past fall for a five-year renewal. In “Time to Defund Feminist Pork,” Schlafly wondered why the US Congress funnels “a billion dollars a year of taxpayers' money into the hands of radical feminists who use it to preach their anti-marriage and anti-male ideology, promote divorce, corrupt the family court system, and engage in liberal political advocacy.” [www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/july05/05-07-20.html ] Mrs. Schlafly’s pièce de resistance came in October. While our elected officials were buckling under the feminist intimidation tactics, Schlafly released an exposé with the sizzling title, “Time to Defund Feminist Pork – the Hate-Men Law.” First Schlafly ridiculed the feminist urban legends such as “a woman is beaten every 15 seconds” and Super Bowl Sunday is the “biggest day of the year of violence against women.” She deplored how VAWA rides “roughshod over the constitutional rights of men.” Schlafly then scolded our elected officials in Washington: “Shame on Members of Congress who lack the courage to stand up to feminist outrages.” [www.eagleforum.org/psr/2005/oct05/psroct05.html ] For 30 years the Leftists have waged a tenacious assault on society’s bedrock institutions, including fatherhood and families. As the rest of us silently stood by, feminists branded dads with epithets such as deadbeat, abuser, and patriarchal oppressor. And now Phyllis Schlafly has shed the light of truth on their evil scheme. PBS Propaganda Piece I’ve never heard of a Public Broadcasting Service documentary being slammed by two ombudsmen in the space of one week. But that’s exactly what happened to PBS’ ill-fated program, Breaking the Silence. The program, billed as an exposé of divorce courts, said that custody of abused children is often awarded to the abusing parent. Government reports reveal that mothers are more likely than dads to abuse and neglect their children [faq.acf.hhs.gov/cgi-bin/acfrightnow.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=70 ], and that mothers in fact are awarded child custody about 85% of the time – so the documentary producers did have a point. But the ombudsmen peered behind the green velvet curtain and said this time around, the Great Wizard was trying to pull a fast one. First Ken Bode, ombudsman for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting came out on November 29 with a report that charged the Breaking the Silence claims were “slanted” against fathers, “incendiary,” and plain “wrong.” [www.cpb.org/ombudsmen/051129bode.html ] That would be bad enough if we were talking about a Leftist love-in like NOW with Bill Moyers. But in this case we’re talking about a factual documentary. Then three days later Michael Getler, ombudsman at the Public Broadcasting Service, dropped the second bombshell, noting “there was no recognition of opposing views,” and concluded the show was an “advocacy, or point-of-view, presentation.” [www.pbs.org/ombudsman ] But the problem with Breaking the Silence is not just flawed and unethical journalism. Bode’s greater concern was the fact that the program “has been a launching pad for a very partisan effort to drive public policy and the law.” What was Mr. Bode talking about? Turns out a rogue outfit called the Mother’s Research and Reference Center [www.mrrc.info v] was in cahoots with PBS insiders and got advance copies of the program. Then the MRRC organized demonstrations and private screenings of the documentary for state legislators, judges, and local activists. The idea was to convince them to pass laws to make it almost impossible for dads to get even shared custody of their kids after divorce. At KVPT in Fresno, abuse professionals were made available to speak with distraught viewers. But the counselors probably didn’t have much to say about all those female teachers who have been making headlines for jumping in bed with their male teenage students. Or the mother who chopped off the leg of her 20-month-old son last week. [www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,17507324-421,00.html ] Remember, the party line says fathers, not mothers, are the child abusers. And in Alaska, PBS affiliate KAKM, forgetting it was a tax-exempt organization, promised they would provide free publicity for the activists. According to the local organizer, “The local PBS station has said they will help us advertise and promote our event because we will then in turn promote viewing of their screening date on 10/20.” That tidbit came to light last Tuesday, courtesy of Fox News columnist Wendy McEloy [www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,177893,00.html v], who invited readers to see the smoking gun for themselves at www.mrrc.info/Articles/DemonstrationInfo.html But the Mother’s Research and Reference Center didn’t appreciate all the publicity, so within days they yanked the incriminating paragraph. And a few days later, all 17 pages that documented MRRC’s mischief-making around the country evaporated in cyber-space. Well, not exactly. Because someone beat them to the punch and made a mirror of the original web page, which can be seen at www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/1207archived.html . Sorry girls, you’ve just been caught with your hand in the cookie jar. The rad-fems have devised a remarkable plan for family destablization: fabricate a bizarre accusation, get the media to believe it, whip the populace into a frenzy, and then pressure chivalrous legislators to pass laws that do away with fathers. In the 1980s, it was the myth of the deadbeat dad who callously abandons his family. Now we have a draconian (and costly) child support system that tosses destitute dads in jail when they fall behind on their payments. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2004/0310roberts.html ] In the 1990s, it was the ersatz epidemic of men who assault and batter their wives. Thanks to that canard, we have the billion-dollar-a-year Violence Against Women Act that makes divorce easy, profitable, and fun. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/0720roberts.html ] ersatz And now we have a bogus documentary that smears fathers as child abusers, with the aim of keeping dads out of their children’s lives after divorce. That’s the stuff of old-fashioned, in-your-face, Soviet-style propaganda. That’s what PBS did on October 20, 2005. So next time you want to get good, solid reporting about a controversial topic, you might do better by picking up a copy of the National Enquirer in the check-out line. Fem-Think and the Civil Rights of Men I have never met Ben Stein and harbor no ill-will towards him. But last week the former TV game show host wrote an article that somehow reminded me of the Holocaust deniers. Referring to the precarious situation in Iraq, Mr. Stein posed this question: are “we already eager to surrender to the man who murdered women and children”? [www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=9051 ] Women and children? If there’s anything we know about Iraq under Saddam Hussein, it’s that men suffered the most horrific cruelties. Remember the stories about Saddam’s infamous meat cutter machine? About alleged Army deserters who had their ears cut off? The children forced into combat? And the 600 civilians gunned down in Basra for not having ID cards? [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2003/0506roberts.html ] The victims were almost all male. I have to assume Mr. Stein is a reasonably decent fellow. So how did he get lured into this sad example of re-writing history to satisfy the agenda of the politically correct? The answer can be traced back to Fem-think, which insists that in patriarchal society, women are not only the biggest victims, women are its only victims. Despite the absurdity of that proposition, the gender warriors endlessly advance that idea. Repeat a lie a thousand times, and people begin to believe it. And now a major human rights organization, Amnesty International, has become beholden to that mindset. Fem-think at AI goes back 10 years when Amnesty began to release reports that highlighted the human rights violations of women. [www.renewamerica.us/columns/roberts/050604 ] Before long an unmistakable gender bias began to emerge. The 2001 AI report, Afghanistan: Making Human Rights the Agenda makes this statement: “During 2000, at least 15 people were executed in public, including one woman who was stoned to death.” Why highlight the tragic demise of one woman, and gloss over the deaths of the 14 men? Kosovo is another example of a recent civil conflict that killed thousands of innocent civilian men. One report from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe documented the widescale abductions, torture, and executions, and noted, “young men were the group that was by far the most targeted in the conflict in Kosovo.” [www.osce.org/kosovo/reports/hr/part1/ch15.htm ] But don’t forget, the notion of male victimization is just another example of patriarchal revisionism. So when the matter of the sex-specific slaughter in Kosovo was raised at a recent meeting of the Canadian section of Amnesty, the issue was met with derision and contempt. And a resolution calling for the group to “condemn all large-scale gender selective human rights violations of men and women” in Kosovo was soundly defeated. No doubt the correct-thinking AI delegates reasoned, “We certainly can’t approve that, it might distract from the good work we’re doing to highlight the human rights violations of women.” As human rights activist David Buchanan recently put it, Amnesty International has “flinched from clearly documenting large-scale patterns of male-specific conflict during armed conflict.” [www.gendercide.org/g_and_g.htm ] But Amnesty International is not content to merely ignore widespread violations against men. Or to sanitize reports of sex-specific atrocities. Now it has decided to actively suppress men’s basic human rights. Female-on-male domestic violence is just as common as the male-initiated variety. [www.mediaradar.org/ja_sex_differences.php ] But that didn’t stop AI from unveiling a campaign called Stop the Violence Against Women, its one-sided focus being only on the female sex. Now Amnesty chapters in Sweden and Ireland have published reports on domestic violence that are filled with tiresome feminist slogans about patriarchal oppression. And if anyone still doesn’t get the message, last Friday Amnesty celebrated its International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, designed to kick-start the perpetually downtrodden into a frenzied “16 days against gender violence.” [web.amnesty.org/actforwomen/index-eng ] In the United States, AI has gone on record supporting the Violence Against Women Act. The concern with this controversial law is not just that ignores half the domestic violence problem, the real problem is that it tramples on men’s civil rights. The Violence Against Women Act discourages the provision of treatment services to abused men. The law bribes local law enforcement agencies to implement mandatory arrest policies that are targeted to men. VAWA encourages prosecutors to adopt “no-drop” policies, even if the woman wants to drop the complaint. VAWA also encourages judges to hand out back-door restraining orders based only on the woman’s say-so. Referring to the widespread abuse of these orders, the Independent Women’s Forum recently expressed the concern that “their issuance and enforcement has troubling implications for civil liberties.” [www.iwf.org/specialreports/specrpt_detail.asp?ArticleID=815 ] So as Fem-think spreads and as we slide towards the Feminist World Order, what will come of the civil rights of men? UN Resolution 1325: The World Body goes on a Loony Streak Ten years ago a recrudescence of age-old ethnic tensions spilled over into the worst bloodbath that Europe had witnessed since World War II. The United Nations report duly noted the grisly details of the Srebrenica massacre: “The mortal remains of close to 2,500 men and boys have been found on the surface, in mass graves, and in secondary burial sites. Several thousand more men are still missing…Numerous eyewitness accounts, now well corroborated by forensic evidence, attest to scenes of mass slaughter of unarmed victims.” Apparently that report never made it to desks of the UN bigwigs in Turtle Bay. Because a few years later the Security Council came out with a resolution that made this surreal claim: “women and children account for the vast majority of those adversely affected by armed conflict.” [www.un.org/Docs/scres/2000/sc2000.htm ] Were the framers of the UN Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security blissfully unaware of the Srebrenica carnage? Was the Bosnian massacre a quirk of history? Or is it possible the UN Security Council got it all wrong? Last year political scientist Adam Jones came out with Gendercide and Genocide, a gem of a book that combs the historical record and comes to conclusions that will certainly jolt the smug complacency of the politically-correct. [www.gendercide.org/g_and_g.htm ] The tome documents historical cases when women were targeted for gendercide, including the practice of female infanticide, the witch-hunts in Europe, and war rapes. But, horrific as they were, it turns out those events are exceptions to the rule. Professor Jones recites the grim litany of human tragedies that have plagued our planet over the last 100 years. The Armenian genocide of 1915-1916. Stalin’s Great Terror. The 1971 liberation war in East Pakistan. Cambodia under Pol Pot. The Kurds in Iraq. Delhi, India after the assassination of Indira Gandhi. The tale of horrors continues to the present era: Peru, 1990. Sri Lanka, 1991. Bosnia-Herzegovina, 1991. Rwanda, 1997. Colombia, 1998. Kosovo, 1999. Kashmir, 1999. And of course, Srebrenica. The pages of history reveal an awful truth: in each case, it was innocent civilian men who were targeted for elimination. Jones concludes that “noncombatant men have been and continue to be the most frequent targets of mass killing and genocidal slaughter.” Why are men being targeted for this gender carnage? First, chivalrous social mores seemingly place a higher premium on the lives of women. As Leo Kuper put it, “While unarmed men seem fair game, the killing of women and children arouses general revulsion.” Second, civilian men in the 15-55 year-old age range are prime recruits for civil conflicts, so wiping out the male population becomes a pre-emptive military tactic. Some persons dismiss these facts, noting that since the perpetrators were men, the deaths of their male victims are somehow less consequential. Professor Jones evinces little patience for that attitude, branding it “bigoted and dangerous.” Consider the practice of female genital circumcision, a procedure that is performed by women. Has anyone ever dismissed the barbarity of this ritual with the riposte that “after all, it’s women who are brutalizing their own kind”? Likewise during the 1994 Rwanda genocide, Hutu women played a prominent role in the brutalization of the Tutsi populace. Pauline Nyiramasuhuko, the former Rwandan minister for family and women’s affairs, personally handpicked the “nicest” Tutsi women to be taken away and raped by the Hutu militiamen. Nyiramasuhuko was later tried for war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal. Did anyone in his right mind discount the anguish of those women who were raped at the behest of Ms. Nyiramasuhuko because she was female? Of course there are those who arrive at a vastly different interpretation of world events. Hillary Clinton once told an astonished audience, “Women have always been the primary victims of war” for the reason that “Women lose their husbands, their fathers, their sons in combat.” [clinton4.nara.gov/WH/EOP/First_Lady/html/generalspeeches/1998/19981117.htm ] Yes, imagine those cold-hearted cads, allowing themselves to be tortured and murdered, subjecting their mothers, wives, and daughters to such inconvenience. UN Resolution 1325 foreshadowed the pro-feminist hysteria that envelopes the United Nations to the present day. Just last month the UNESCO approved a resolution that proposes the UN should pay greater attention to the health of women -- but ignored the dire health problems of men. To make sure the irony didn’t pass unnoticed, UNESCO anointed its resolution with a grandiose title: the Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights. [portal.unesco.org/shs/en/file_download.php/b0f1e8f1dc4a4e8990faff370608cac2declaration.pdf ] Yes, human rights and sexism are comfortable bedfellows at UNESCO. Earlier this week UN ambassador John Bolton likened his first three months on the job as being “caught in a time warp, with discussions they could have had in the ‘60s, ‘70s, ‘80s.” Bolton then called for a “revolution of reform” at the world body. But given all the foolishness and falsehoods that regularly emanate from the UN, maybe it’s a little too late to be talking of reform. Purveyors of Deceit: Why PBS must Yank "Breaking the Silence" Scott Loeliger thought he had found the woman of his dreams when he married African-born Sadia. But after she assaulted Scott and spent a night in the Santa Clara County jail, Scott began to have his doubts. Just seven months after the birth of their daughter Fatima, their marriage was on the rocks. After the divorce was finalized, an enraged Sadia stormed into Scott’s home, assaulted his female roommate, and removed a screaming Fatima. As a result, the court awarded custody of the girl to her father. In 1997 a child abuse investigator in Tehama County, California interviewed 7-year-old Fatima and wrote, “she has been hit with her mothers shoe which left bruises on her arm, a wire hangar which also left brown marks on her arms or hands, and her mother has hit her with her open hand.” After Sadia attacked her babysitter one day, the frightened woman reported the assault to the local authorities. She later testified in court that Sadia would “pick up anything near her to hit Sara [Fatima’s cousin] if she is angry enough” and concluded, “I am afraid for the children and I am afraid for my life.” A year later the Tulare County Juvenile Court ruled that Sadia was guilty on eight counts of child abuse and had the children removed from her care. But a vindictive Sadia refused to accept the verdict. So she launched a campaign to alienate Fatima from her father. As Superior Court Judge Edward King noted in his 2003 decision, “the Court finds that the mom manipulated the minor’s attitude toward her dad and undermined the relationship they had developed over a three-year period. In fact, the mom destroyed that relationship in less than three months.” We know all this from a series of shocking documents that were revealed last week by columnist Glenn Sacks. Legal transcripts, court findings, and child abuse reports all pointed to a simple yet disturbing truth: Sadia Loeliger was a serial child abuser who would stop at nothing to take Fatima away from her father. [www.glennsacks.com/pbs/loeliger.php ] A year or so after Judge King handed down his decision, Sadia brought her story to Dominique Lasseur, an acclaimed New York City producer. Lasseur’s company was the beneficiary of a $400,000 plum from the Mary Kay Ash Foundation to produce an exposé how divorce courts often award custody of children to abusive fathers. And Sadia, a minority woman who could tell a compelling story in front of the camera, fit the script perfectly. So when the Public Broadcasting Service unveiled Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories on October 20, Sadia Loeliger was depicted as a sympathetic underdog doing heroic battle against a legal system that was biased against women. Not a word was mentioned about the eight counts of child abuse, about the babysitter’s frightened testimony, or about the alienation campaign. So was Dominique Lasseur simply duped by Sadia’s guile and charm, another unwary victim of her manipulative lies? It turns out that beginning in April of this year, Scott Loeliger repeatedly warned Lasseur about his ex-wife’s long history of child abuse. He pleaded that the footage about his daughter be cut. And he provided documents and photographs to back up his claims. [www.glennsacks.com/pbs/loeliger-producers-warned.php ] But Mr. Lasseur figured that in the court of public opinion, the self-assured testimony of an immigrant mom, pitched to a group of dewy-eyed women and set against appropriate background music, would prevail over the cold truth of child abuse reports, depositions, and court decisions. Loving dads who go through a divorce often face a hellacious struggle trying to stay involved in their kids’ lives. And Sadia Loeliger’s campaign to alienate a young girl from her father reveals one reason why. To date, PBS has refused to comment on the incriminating documents. Tight-lipped PBS execs will only concede, “The stories profiled in Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories document a statistically small but serious problem in our family court system.” This past Thursday, Ken Tomlinson was pressured to resign from the board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting because of his campaign to restore balance and fairness to the beleaguered network. In a September 22 speech to the Media Institute, Tomlinson commented, “This thing of balance is not rocket science – and that is why I had so little tolerance for public broadcasting’s inability to achieve balance.” Fairness, balance, and the truth – that’s what public television is supposed to be all about. The Laura Bush We Don't Know The First Lady recently weighed in on the faltering support for Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers. Asked on NBC’s Today show if sexism might be at the root of the criticisms of Miers’ legal qualifications, Mrs. Bush coyly replied, “I think that’s possible.” Excuse me, but somehow that remark struck a nerve. Because every time a woman hits a hiccup in the long march for female emancipation, it seems that someone trots out the specter of knuckle-dragging males trying to send their womenfolk back to the Cuissinart. If male sexism is rampant throughout the hinterlands, then why did the CWA -- the Concerned Women for America -- come out expressing wonderment that a woman who has never written a single article on constitutional law is now being considered for the high court? [www.cwfa.org/articles/9148/LEGAL/scourt/index.htm ] Are the CWA members male cross-dressers who have failed to connect with their inner feminine? But now that Laura Bush has raised the issue of sexism, maybe it’s time to turn the spotlight in the other direction. Don’t get me wrong, Mrs. Bush. I have a great love for books and a high regard for teachers and librarians. But during last year’s Presidential campaign, you seemed to revel in jokes at your husband’s expense. Remember that story about George stretching out his feet on the living room table, and Barbara ordered him to put them down? That one brought down the house -- but somehow I can’t imagine Bill regaling audiences about the time he ordered Hillary to remove her panty-house from the shower stall. And then at last April’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, it seems you ordered the Commander-in-Chief to sit down so you could crack crude jokes about you and other well-appointed ladies waving greenbacks at male strippers. Sexist? Probably not, but certainly in bad taste. Then there were your high-profile efforts to promote the rights of women in Afghanistan. Of course that’s important and good. But when you paid that visit to the Women's Teacher Training Institute in Kabul, were you mindful of the arrests, torture, and executions that the Taliban had visited on many thousands of innocent civilian men? Somehow it doesn’t make sense to call attention to the right of girls to get an education, but ignore the right of defenseless men to not be pulled out of their homes in the middle of the night, never to be heard from again. This past July you gave a speech in South Africa that decried violence against women. [www.state.gov/g/wi/50199.htm ] But what about violence against men? Surely one of your advisors warned you that the domestic violence issue has become distorted by the rad-fems whose aim is to convince women that they live under the constant threat of being brutalized by their husbands and boyfriends. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/0629roberts.html ] Then there’s your gender health initiative. As you know, the health of men is in pretty sad shape these days. Men die an average of five years before women. As a result, elderly widows soon end up in a nursing home, left to wonder how things might have turned out differently. When they find out those facts, most women I know say, “What can I do to improve the health of men, and especially the men in my life?” But instead, you opted to promote your Women’s Health and Wellness Initiative. [www.whitehouse.gov/firstlady/women.html ] Even more mind-boggling is your endorsement of the Heart Truth, the women’s heart disease awareness program that features fashion queens in showy red dresses. [www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/hearttruth/index.htm ] It’s well-known that men have a far higher risk of dying from heart disease than women. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/0202roberts.html ] Just last week I heard about a local man – a husband, a breadwinner, and father of three -- in his 40s who just had a triple coronary bypass operation. But you don’t hear about women that age with life-threatening heart disease. That’s because heart disease is a disease that affects older women. Although no doubt well-intentioned, your women’s health program carries a message that is demeaning to fair-minded men and women alike: men’s medical necessities command less social priority than women’s fashion statements. Maybe your flirtation with radical feminism wouldn’t be so bad, Mrs. Bush, except for the fact that you showcase these programs as examples of Enlightened Womanhood. Caring and intelligent women everywhere happen to think otherwise. The First Female President: The Fantasy and the Reality The first female president has taken office, courtesy of ABC’s latest series, Commander in Chief. In the first show, vice president Mackenzie Allen takes over the Oval Office when the president suddenly dies from an aneurysm – but not before confiding to Allen that she had been put on the ticket as a political stunt to get him elected. While TV viewers were treated to the fantasy of a female president on Tuesday night, American voters saw the reality of female politicians when they woke up the next morning. That’s when Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco appeared before a Senate panel investigating the Katrina disaster. The day before, former FEMA head Michael Brown, in his appearance before the panel, charged that Blanco had failed to order a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans, contributing to the overall breakdown of law and order. But when Blanco waltzed into town on Wednesday, she requested chivalrous lawmakers to not ask any embarrassing questions. Instead of being treated like any other accountable public official, she was feted like royalty. That’s a double standard in my book. It turns out the sharpest critics of female politicians are women themselves. Columnist Carol Platt Liebau recently hit on governor Blanco’s lachrymose response to Katrina, acknowledging “a visceral concern on the part of many voters about the way that a female President would act under pressure or in a crisis.” [www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=9308 ] Then Liebau took senator Dianne Feinstein to task for her outrageous conduct during the hearings for Supreme Court candidate John Roberts. Before casting her vote, she applauded Roberts for his “brilliant legal mind.” But Feinstein ended up voting against Roberts because when she asked him talk to her “as a son, a husband, a father,” he “gave a very detached response.” So let me get this right: here’s the preening third-term senator from California who is dinging the future Chief Justice of the Supreme Court for an answer she deemed was too logical and thoughtful. To paraphrase Brad Paisley’s current hit song, “What was she thinking?” Next is the problem of female politicians being out of step with the electorate. During last week’s final vote on Judge Roberts, only 22% of the Senators voted “nay.” But six of the 14 female senators – nearly half -- opposed his nomination: Barbara Boxer, Maria Cantwell, Dianne Feinstein, Hillary Clinton, Barbara Mikulski, and Debbie Stabenow. Appears the female senators far more liberal than the overall Senate. Then there’s the truth-in-packaging issue. Some female politicians project an altar-girl image of enlightened centrism, all the while lobbying behind the scenes for radical leftist legislation. Take Michigan’s Debbie Stabenow. Widely viewed as a political moderate, it turns out her voting record ranks her up there with leftist die-hards like Edward Kennedy, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry. Americans have other doubts about female politicians, concerns that have nothing to do with sexism. Many female politicians view issues through the rose-colored lens of personal relationships and gender. Carol Platt Liebau describes the concern as “the stereotype that women’s decision-making is more often based on personal experience than on rational analysis,” a perception that Dianne Feinstein’s recent grandstanding did little to dispel. Another example: men lag behind women on almost every indicator of health status. But this past week senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland issued a press release that proudly announced, “Mikulski Fights for Women’s Health Care with Federal Funding for Research, Treatment.” [mikulski.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=246499 ] Why isn’t Mikulski also fighting for men’s health? Are men political lepers whose health is simply unworthy of mention? The rap on female politicians actually runs much deeper than their stance on specific pieces of legislation. Hold on to your hat while you read this scorching blast from Devvy Kidd: “The feminization of Congress and our state legislatures is destroying constitutional government, running America into oceans of unpayable debt and breeding generations of helpless women, whining for mother government to take care of them and their every need.” [www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=43354 ] Now how’s that for political incorrectness? Finally there’s the Hillary question. Well, on second thought, that one will have to wait for later. There’s no inherent reason why a woman can’t serve as our chief of state. Indeed, Margaret Thatcher comes to mind as a courageous woman who turned around a failing British economy. But look at the current top tier of American female politicians. There isn’t a single one in the bunch who comes close to qualifying for the US presidency by virtue of her experience, temperament, and proven commitment to serving the needs of all Americans. That’s the sad reality. Women Still Unequal before the Law Bad news to the Lavender Ladies at N.O.W.: Women are still lesser to men in the eyes of the American legal system. What’s worse, it’s women who are bringing this upon themselves. Three recent events show this to be true. First was last week’s trial of Pfc. Lynndie England at Ft. Hood, Texas. Leash-lady, as you recall, was the woman who brought dishonor and shame upon the United States military by posing with naked Iraqi prisoners, then giving the thumbs-up in a full-frontal display of sadistic bravado. During the trial Pfc. England’s lawyer trotted out the sob story that she was an impressionable young lass who fell under the diabolical sway of her boyfriend, Charles Graner. “What mattered to her was her relationship to Cpl. Graner,” according to attorney Jonathan Crisp. And – get ready for this -- “She has had and has a great deal of difficulty functioning in life in general.” Yes, the poor dear obviously can’t be held responsible for her actions. Then there’s the debate over who will replace Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court. The argument now seems to be revolving around whether the nominee will be a woman or a member of a minority group. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein have joined forces with first lady Laura Bush -- all of whom fancy themselves to be constitutional law experts -- to lobby for the chick pick. Not all women are ready to jump on the female-at-any-cost bandwagon, however. Columnist Kathryn Jean Lopez fumes that the gender quota argument represents a tacit acceptance of the Neanderthal view that “A woman is not going to make it on her own. She won’t rise to the top. She can’t compete with the boys.” [www.nationalreview.com/lopez/lopez200509231057.asp ] These two cases are merely laughable or absurd. The first represented a futile legal ploy to keep Spc. England from spending time behind bars – on Tuesday she was sentenced to three years in jail. The second is an example of a pro-feminist cabal trying to stack the Supreme Court with yet another abortionist. But in the third case, the notion of female inferiority has been adjudicated by an appeals court and is now chiseled into law. The case involved a manager at the National Education Association who developed the nasty habit of regularly venting his spleen. The male employees didn’t take the incidents seriously, in fact they tended to laugh the whole thing off. But the women were less capable of tolerating the abuse. The women couldn’t take the incidents like a man, so they sued for sex discrimination. The problem with their discrimination claim was the manager was an equal-opportunity yeller -- he berated male and female subordinates alike. So to make their case, the women came up with a controversial legal theory called the “reasonable woman” standard. The reasonable woman standard posits that if females experience “disparate impact,” then that’s sex discrimination. Sure enough, on September 2 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the ladies. To conclude that they had suffered from sex discrimination, the black-robed justices wrote this Orwellian opinion: “There is no legal requirement that hostile acts be overtly sex- or gender-specific in content.” [www.littler.com/nwsltr/asap_MaleTantrums_9_05.htm ] That’s right. So a person who has never experienced a racial slight can now claim he is a victim of racial discrimination. And husbands can successfully sue for workplace sex discrimination, since they are less likely than their wives to take parental leave. There’s no limit to this looking-glass logic. If we continue in this direction, we will soon find ourselves with differing standards of justice for every identity group. Maybe this bizarre ruling will serve as an object lesson to those who wonder why the most prominent words inscribed on the frieze of the U.S. Supreme Court building are “Equal Justice Under Law.” Under old English law, when a wife over-spent the family budget, it was the husband who went to debtor’s prison. And during the 1800s, if an American woman committed a crime, it was her husband who did time. The rationale was, if a woman didn’t enjoy full legal rights, then she couldn’t be held accountable for her actions. After all, rights and responsibilities go hand in hand. But times have changed. Women now enjoy the same legal rights as men. That also means they should stop expecting to receive special treatment under the law. So 85 years after passage of the 19th Amendment, these three cases reveal a sad truth: some women are not yet ready to assume the duties and obligations that necessarily accompanied their hard-won legal rights. Equal rights and unequal responsibilities. That’s hardly the American way. Jim Crow Days for Men Rosa Parks, hailed as the mother of the modern Civil Rights movement, passed away last at the age of 92. In an interview, Ms. Parks explained why she had refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus: “The more we gave in, the more we complied with that kind of treatment, the more oppressive it became.” Thanks to her courage, many of the Jim Crow laws that dated back to the 1890s were eventually overturned. And as Americans reflected on how Rosa Parks’ actions 50 years ago helped to restore the rights of Blacks, another recent report revealed how the constitutional rights of another segment in our society are being systematically eroded. “Time to Defund Feminist Pork – The Hate-Men Law” is the title of the hard-hitting exposé by columnist Phyllis Schlafly. [www.eagleforum.org/psr/2005/oct05/psroct05.html ] With surgical precision, Mrs. Schlafly dissects the Violence Against Women Act and reveals how lawmakers have been duped into believing they are doing something good for women. Some persons ask, Who could possibly be against protecting women? That chivalrous attitude has allowed VAWA to escape the scrutiny of civil rights advocates since it was first signed into law by President Clinton in 1994. For starters, we should ask why VAWA-funded programs only serve women? After all, we live in a society that abhors sex discrimination. And male victims need our help. “Studies by the leading domestic violence researchers found that half of all couple violence is mutual, and when only one partner is physically abusive, it is as likely to be initiated by the woman as the man,” explains Mrs. Schlafly. Then there’s the word “violence.” Most people think of violence as someone battering and bloodying their partner. But in VAWA lala-land, violence has morphed into abuse, a much broader and ill-defined term. So under many state laws, everything from name-calling, controlling the household finances, and even making certain facial expressions now qualify as abuse. So men, think twice about furrowing a brow and telling your wife to not over-spend the credit card limit. She could take out a restraining order and send you packing. Abuse of these orders is not an isolated problem. In Massachusetts, about 30,000 domestic orders are issued every year. One analysis by the Massachusetts Trial Court found that fewer than half of these restraining orders involved even an allegation of physical abuse. [www.iwf.org/pdf/young_domviol1.pdf ] There’s more. Once Joe is out on the street, Jill files for divorce and custody of the kids. “What VAWA does is to promote divorce and provide women with weapons, such as the restraining order and free legal assistance, to get sole custody of their children,” Schlafly warns. And sole custody equals many years of tax-free child support checks. Another troubling piece of this law – clearly unconstitutional -- is its “mandatory-arrest” provisions. Let’s say you get into a marital tiff, your wife or girlfriend calls 911, and the cops come running. But in the meantime, things cool down and she asks police to leave. Fine, but don’t forget your toothbrush, because you will be going out in handcuffs. It gets worse. Let’s say your wife, who was well-lubricated that evening, later realizes she took the first swing and wants the complaint to be dropped. Sorry, VAWA bribes local law enforcement agencies to implement “no-drop” policies that require prosecution, even though reconciliation has taken place. This issue came to light a few years ago when former football star Warren Moon was arrested for allegedly assaulting his wife. Afterwards Mrs. Moon requested the charge be dropped. But because the police were required to prosecute the case, Warren was taken to trial. At that time Felicia Moon was forced to admit that she, not Warren, had started the fight by throwing a candlestick. Is this beginning to sound like a totalitarian nightmare? It’s no surprise that this $1 billion-a-year anti-father juggernaut eventually takes its toll on families. Highlighting the fact that almost 40% of our nation’s children now live in a home without their own father, Schlafly urges Congress to “conduct an investigation to find out how much of this fatherlessness is the result of bad government in the hands of a small radical group that is biased against marriage and fathers.” Currently the U.S. Congress is mulling the fate of a five-year extension to the Violence Against Women Act, a law that has caused the basic civil liberties of hundreds of thousands of fathers and men to be casually disregarded. And come to think of it, where has the ACLU been all this time? Rise of the Feminist Propaganda State Remember that famous line from George Orwell’s Animal Farm: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others”? Mr. Orwell, here are two more examples to add to your collection: 1. On April 20 last, sports pages around the country featured a picture of the Catherine Ndereba of Kenya with upraised arms, the “winner” of the Boston Marathon. She won not by virtue of being the fastest runner, but because the female runners had started the race 29 minutes before the men. That day the Boston Globe ran an article carrying the headline, “New Rule Engenders Equal Footing.” (www.boston.com/sports/specials/marathon/articles/2004/04/20/new_rule_engenders_equal_footing/ ) If giving women a half hour head-start is an “equal footing,” then would someone please explain inequality to me? 2. Fox News ran an article in late August about American military women in Iraq (www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,130106,00.html ). This was the lead sentence: “Today, equality of the sexes includes dying in combat.” The article highlighted the statistic that 24 female soldiers had died in Iraq. As of that time, one thousand American troops had perished -- 24 female and 976 male. If we do a little math, it turns out that only 2.4% of combat deaths are female. That’s equality of the sexes? In both stories, the reporter massacred the obvious meaning of “equality.” But where was the outrage? The fact that no one murmured a word of protest says something about the mental anesthesia that grips our collective awareness. In his recent book The War Against Men, Professor Richard Rise of Texas A&M University notes, “the female propaganda machine is relentless.” My last four columns have traced the outlines of this machine: First, erect an elaborate mythology that begins with the Great Myth of Patriarchy. Then embellish it with a series of urban legends that “men have all the power,” “marriage is a legalized form of slavery,” and so on. Remember that emotional impact, not historical accuracy is what counts (www.mensnewsdaily.com/archive/r/roberts/2004/roberts100604.htm ). Then introduce a gender perspective to the mass media. Portray men as unworthy and women as entitled. Never allow men to be depicted as victims. There’s nothing subtle here -- the key is the sheer mind-numbing repetition of the Ms.-Information (www.mensnewsdaily.com/archive/r/roberts/2004/roberts092204.htm ). Take the claim that women suffer from wage discrimination, for instance. On the average, women are paid 76 cents for every dollar that men earn. Groups such as the National Center for Policy Analysis have found that when differences in work hours and other factors are taken into account, the gender wage gap disappears (www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba392/ ). But during last week's presidential debate, one of the candidates couldn’t resist the urge to dust off the old canard that women receive unequal pay for equal work. Score one for the rad-fem PR campaign. Third is the tactic of inciting gender conflict. V.I. Lenin employed the concept of class consciousness