nauseating
We're even more housebound than usual today, because my Sophie-girl woke up this morning with a tummyache and has thrown up twice, a rare occurrence for her, and so we are treating her with lots of rest and coddling.
It also means that I've been sitting around with time to read, namely, about Manliness, the newest patriarchal product to come out of Harvard since Lawrence Summers. I've also had time to read a fascinating article/profile of Caitlin Flanagan, the newest feminine provocateur who's more like Ann Coulter and Phyllis Schlafly than she would probably like to believe.
The articles are nauseating and I'm sure the books being promoted both are too, especially to a radical patriarchy-blamer like myself, but that's not what makes me the angriest. I don't want to focus my anger on just these two authors-- they can write whatever they want, and have whatever psychological hang-ups they want, and live in denial all they want-- and if you think I'm overstating, read all the way through the Flanagan piece again. The lady's got issues.
But my real anger is at the seemingly liberal institutions that have allowed these two to become so prominent. My anger's at Harvard, who gave that guy tenure, at the Times for giving them much more space than they do feminist books and authors, at The Atlantic Monthly (to which I subscribe, but may not much longer) and The New Yorker who published Flanagan and rarely publish female authors, feminist or otherwise, or articles on feminism or other social movements. There's been a lot of talk recently about prevalence of men talking about abortion in the op-ed pages, and to me, this is just another example of the profound lack of a true liberal presence in mainstream media and educational institutions.
In other words, it may be time for us liberals to stop attending to South Dakota exclusively, and to look in our own midst as well for patriarchal wingnuts. They're not all in the red states, you know-- many of them are cloaked in blue, and they deserve our strict attention too.
It also means that I've been sitting around with time to read, namely, about Manliness, the newest patriarchal product to come out of Harvard since Lawrence Summers. I've also had time to read a fascinating article/profile of Caitlin Flanagan, the newest feminine provocateur who's more like Ann Coulter and Phyllis Schlafly than she would probably like to believe.
The articles are nauseating and I'm sure the books being promoted both are too, especially to a radical patriarchy-blamer like myself, but that's not what makes me the angriest. I don't want to focus my anger on just these two authors-- they can write whatever they want, and have whatever psychological hang-ups they want, and live in denial all they want-- and if you think I'm overstating, read all the way through the Flanagan piece again. The lady's got issues.
But my real anger is at the seemingly liberal institutions that have allowed these two to become so prominent. My anger's at Harvard, who gave that guy tenure, at the Times for giving them much more space than they do feminist books and authors, at The Atlantic Monthly (to which I subscribe, but may not much longer) and The New Yorker who published Flanagan and rarely publish female authors, feminist or otherwise, or articles on feminism or other social movements. There's been a lot of talk recently about prevalence of men talking about abortion in the op-ed pages, and to me, this is just another example of the profound lack of a true liberal presence in mainstream media and educational institutions.
In other words, it may be time for us liberals to stop attending to South Dakota exclusively, and to look in our own midst as well for patriarchal wingnuts. They're not all in the red states, you know-- many of them are cloaked in blue, and they deserve our strict attention too.