Cassy Fiano fires back at the femisogynists

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Cassy Fiano refudiates the latest attack on Sarah Palin by the Feminist far left:

The femisogynists just cannot let Sarah Palin go. Ever since she came out of the closet as a feminist, their heads haven’t stopped exploding. When you add in the number of strong, successful, conservative female politicians who have emerged in the past year, it’s no wonder that the fascist feminists have been going through a major identity crisis. The Sarah Palin feminist story is actually pretty old news, but the feminist left just can’t stop bringing it up. The latest to join in on the cacophony of complaints is the executive vice president of the National Organization for Women (NOW), Bonnie Grabenhofer. The problem? All these gosh-darned conservative women, led by that dastardly Sarah Palin, just don’t realize that they’re victims and slaves to their reproductive rights. How dare a woman think she paved the road to her own success and be pro-life??

Grabenhofer starts with the trite and beaten-to-death meme that Sarah Palin is not a feminist.

NOW executive vice-president, Bonnie Grabenhofer, told The Daily Caller that to her, “feminism is a social justice movement aimed at getting social, political, and economic equality for women. We work for the advancement of women on multiple fronts.”

...According to Grabenhofer, Palin doesn’t qualify as a feminist.

“I do not consider Sarah Palin to be a feminist,” she said. “She has benefitted from the work of feminists but she has not worked to advance the rights of women. She works against the progressive ideas meant to help.”

What, exactly, disqualifies Sarah Palin from being considered a feminist? She’s a self-made women with an impressive career.

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But, of course, there’s a litmus test that you have to pass in order to join the Fascist Feminist Club, and Sarah Palin failed. It doesn’t matter how self-sufficient she is, or how equal a partnership she has with her husband, or how hard she worked to forge herself a spot in the boys’ club of politics. Because she’s pro-life, she can’t be considered a feminist.

Grabenhofer continued, saying that in order to be a feminist, a woman must support abortion rights.

“If you cannot control your reproductive rights, you cannot fully participate in society,” she explained.

Abortion is the end-all, be-all for the femisogynists. It is the sacred cow of their movement. If you don’t support abortion, then you aren’t a real woman. Not only are you not a real woman, but you are anti-woman, and an anti-feminist. There’s no room for dissent in today’s extremist feminist movement. But there’s a slight problem with their orthodoxy. Grabenhofer’s argument, that if you cannot control your “reproductive rights,” you cannot participate fully in society insinuates that a pregnant woman is not capable of participating fully in society, thus the need for abortions.

Isn’t that a little insulting to all mothers, everywhere?

Read the full Fiano refudiation of femisogynist Grabenhofer at the NewsReal Blog.

- JP

Cassy Fiano: Why Feminists Should Embrace Sarah Palin

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More on the continuing debate sparked by Sarah Palin between the old feminists and the new, from Cassy Fiano at the NewsReal Blog:

Last week, I noted the hypocrisy of Jessica Valenti and the feminist Left in their outrage at Sarah Palin labeling herself a feminist. The hand-wringing of “progressive” feminists continued and grew to a fever pitch...

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What none of these feminists seem to be able to understand is that they need Sarah Palin playing for the feminist team if they want the movement to have a prayer of becoming relevant again.

The problem is that feminism has been hijacked by women bent on a radical, extremist agenda. It’s about advancing leftist causes now, not fighting for women’s equality. They say they fight for “women’s issues,” like universal health care, abortion (on-demand and taxpayer funded, of course), gay rights, amnesty for illegals, and other radical Left causes that pretty much have nothing to do with actual women’s rights. It’s condescending to women, when you really think about it, to tell women that they can only care about certain issues which must be decided for them rather than thinking for themselves. Modern feminists are telling us that these are the only issues women need be concerned with, and if you don’t agree with them on these specific issues, you’re anti-feminist and anti-woman. Slowly, this pushed women away and sent feminism further and further into the fringe until feminism became a dirty word. It’s not a coincidence that bloggers have been saying that Sarah Palin “dropped the f-bomb” as if it’s a swear word. For a lot of women, it is. And it’s the fault of the extremist feminists themselves.

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[T]hey can’t understand why women want nothing to do with feminism anymore.

Sarah Palin represents American women much better than these modern feminists do. She has a certain set of conservative values and she is a feminist. She does not, however, say that you must agree with her in order to be a feminist. She does not demand you agree with her on every last issue in order to like her, either. She could be a huge asset to feminism if they’d get over their stubborn snobbery.

Women like Sarah Palin because they see themselves in her, even if they disagree politically. She’s a working mom with a loving husband and a great family. She got into politics by getting involved with the PTA, for crying out loud. She didn’t set out to make history or change the world. She’s got a common-sense, take-charge, no-nonsense attitude that women can relate to. She sees herself as a self-made woman, rather than constantly catarwauling about how she’s a victim. Women like her for all of these reasons. She’s an everywoman, and she is easier to relate to than extremist role models like Amanda Marcotte or Jessica Valenti.

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If these extremist feminists want to have the slightest prayer of regaining the relevance they’ve lost in mainstream America, then they need to embrace Sarah Palin and other women like her. Feminism started as equality for women, to give women the right to vote. It didn’t exist to tell women who to vote for or where to stand on the issues. Sarah Palin is not usurping feminism from the real feminists, she’s the real feminist reclaiming it for the modern American woman.

These are just a few excerpts. Read the latest complete commentary by Cassy Fiano here.

- JP

Cassy Fiano: Gov. Palin brings out hypocrisy of feminist left

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On David Horowitz's NewsReal Blog, Cassy Fiano takes on the feminist left in general, and Jessica Valenti in particular. As usual, we have excerpts:

Sarah Palin is the feminist Left’s favorite target. It seems strange to anyone not entrenched in a radical, extremist feminist agenda. Feminists once fought for equality between the sexes — the right for women to vote, giving women a fair chance to go to college and get a job without fear of discrimination, and the choice to either stay at home with her children or work full-time. Fighting for equality has long since fallen by the wayside though, and the leftist agenda has fully set in. Women like Sarah Palin and Michelle Malkin, therefore, cannot be feminists.

Daring to call Sarah Palin a feminist will make radical modern feminists’ heads explode. Currently screeching with rage is Jessica Valenti, angry that someone might think that Sarah Palin is indeed a feminist.

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Today’s feminists like Jessica Valenti are the least “pro-choice” people on the planet … and I don’t mean when it comes to abortion. They want to dictate everything about the lives of American women. If you don’t live exactly the way they want you to live, then you’re “anti-woman” and an “anti-feminist.”

Change your name to your husband’s when you get married? You’re a slave to the patriarchy and an anti-feminist. Personally and politically pro-life? Anti-woman! Believe in small government, fiscal responsibility, and the free market? ANTI-FEMINIST! Believe in closing the borders and enforcing our immigration laws? Don’t believe in universal health care? Think global warming is all a fake? These all make you an anti-feminist, too.

Sad, isn’t it? A movement that once fought for equality for women now doesn’t want women to think for themselves. Someone like Sarah Palin, who quite literally has it all, should be a perfect example of a feminist. She’s got a loving marriage and a wonderful family. She is the breadwinner in her family and is one of the most powerful women in the country. But she doesn’t wallow in patriarchal victimhood; she’s a conservative, she’s pro-life. She doesn’t toe the Jessica Valenti and Amanda Marcotte line, and therefore, she can never be considered a feminist. If you need an example of how hijacked the feminist movement has been by radicals, this is it.

You can read the full Fiano critique of the leftist feministas here.

- JP