{"id":5323,"date":"2012-07-17T22:41:53","date_gmt":"2012-07-18T03:41:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/girlwpen.com\/?p=5323"},"modified":"2012-07-17T22:41:53","modified_gmt":"2012-07-18T03:41:53","slug":"second-look-reflections-on-an-anti-woman-spring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/2012\/07\/17\/second-look-reflections-on-an-anti-woman-spring\/","title":{"rendered":"SECOND LOOK: Reflections on an Anti-Woman Spring"},"content":{"rendered":"

Introducing our newest blogger:\u00a0Susan McGee Bailey, Ph.D.\u00a0Susan served as Executive Director of the Wellesley Centers for Women<\/a> (WCW) and as a Professor of Women’s & Gender Studies and Education<\/a> at Wellesley College for 25 years. Welcome, Susan! <\/em>-Girl w\/Penners<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cHouse Passes Gutted Version of\u00a0 Violence Against Women Act\u201d: the headline hits me like one more punch in an already bloody nose. But I am a 40 year veteran of the gender wars. For 25 of those years I directed the Wellesley Centers for Women (WCW), one of the nation\u2019s largest and most influential gender focused research and action organizations. Despite the disheartening direction of current policy debates and the frequency of misogynist remarks, I have learned not to succumb to the paralysis of discouragement.<\/p>\n

In the 1960s \u201ccareers\u201d for young college women were in the \u201c\u2018type, teach or \u2018care for\u2019\u201d range.\u00a0 Without a degree the options were even more restricted. Every summer I earned money for college by working as a waitress. I learned about things we had no name for then:<\/p>\n

Dottie arriving in dark glasses that she kept on all day, \u201cThey cover the bruises, honey. It\u2019s hard for Jack to be home with the kids. He gets upset with me.\u201d\u00a0 Linda, a single mom, calling in sick; we all knew it met she had no one to stay with baby Sammy. Both women were supporting their families.<\/p>\n

In those days women\u2019s employment options were limited, not by the economy, but by society.\u00a0 Some of us insisted on a different path. We forced major changes. Female construction workers, TV newscasters, and corporate managers were a rarity five decades ago. Today\u2019s graduates confront a dismal economy, but can take for granted a wide range of career choices.<\/p>\n

In fact, choice is assumed not simply in employment and the ability to seek legal protection from gender violence, but in our right to control our own sexuality and reproductive health. At a time when birth control pills were newly invented, domestic violence invisible and abortion a crime, women lacked\u00a0 control over our bodies in ways sometimes hard for today\u2019s young women and men to grasp.<\/p>\n

Suddenly this spring ignorant anti-woman statements, strident voices and proposals on contraception and reproductive health that would turn the clock back a half century again surround us. Some protest that talk of an anti-woman agenda is being promoted simply as a distraction from \u2018truly important\u2019 policy issues. Nothing reminds me more of the 1960s than this classic dismissal of women and our concerns.<\/p>\n

But there is also widespread outrage, and nuanced rebuttal. The reality that women are individuals who make a range of different choices for themselves is widely proclaimed by tweeters and\u00a0 bloggers from both left and right.<\/p>\n

Ten years ago such analyses came almost exclusively from feminists struggling to be heard.<\/p>\n

Not that the \u2018war\u2019 over. Each day brings new and outrageous policy proposes that threaten the well being of women and children.\u00a0 Still, awareness has grown. There is a good chance that key issues related to women\u2019s health, sexuality and employment will remain on the public agenda throughout the election cycle. This is positive. Keeping these concerns in the forefront of public debate where the absurdities can be exposed and countered, is the upside of the demeaning negativity. There is no time for anything but hope and the energy it provides.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Introducing our newest blogger:\u00a0Susan McGee Bailey, Ph.D.\u00a0Susan served as Executive Director of the Wellesley Centers for Women (WCW) and as a Professor of Women’s & Gender Studies and Education at Wellesley College for 25 years. Welcome, Susan! -Girl w\/Penners \u201cHouse Passes Gutted Version of\u00a0 Violence Against Women Act\u201d: the headline hits me like one more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1924,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21114,1],"tags":[21912],"class_list":["post-5323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-second-look","category-uncategorized","tag-war-on-women"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1924"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5323\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}