Female Bonding Isn't Feminism

Ellen Goodman wrote last week that some conservatives are calling liberal women out because they won't support Sarah Palin for Vice President. Aside from the fact that you can't do that without voting for McCain as President, the charges of hypocrisy ring all hollow.

Feminism is not, and never was, an attempt to replace the Good Old Boys with the Good Old Girls. Feminism is an analysis of how power works and how to end oppression.

From the 1960's to now, step by step, feminists have pointed out:

*Prejudice: the mental image of women as inferior.

*Discrimination: actions that keep women in an inferior position (whether the acts are based on prejudice, or on male self-interest, or inertia, or just plain obliviousness).

*Woman-hatred, as expressed in degrading images of women and degrading language about women.

*Rape and sexual violence.

*Institutionalized discrimination: where seemingly neutral standards, like long hours and no provision of child care for men or women, actually hurt women more.

Who would do more to oppose these strategies of domination? Good Old Girl Sarah Palin, who doesn't even recognize they exist? John McCain, who verbally abuses his wife in public? Or Michelle Obama's husband?

Lipstick Traces

Last week, Barack Obama said:

"John McCain says he’s about change too, and so I guess his whole angle is, ‘Watch out George Bush — except for economic policy, health care policy, tax policy, education policy, foreign policy and Karl Rove-style politics — we’re really going to shake things up in Washington,'” he said.

“That’s not change. That’s just calling something the same thing something different. You know you can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. You know you can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change, it’s still going to stink after eight years. We’ve had enough of the same old thing.”

This week's news: The McCain campaign accused Obama of slyly denigrating Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin. Former Massachusetts Gov. Jane Swift (R) says the comment is clearly about Palin. “There’s only one woman in the race.’”By that logic, Obama was calling Palin a pig.

Tomorrow's news: The Cosmetics Industry Association (CIA) denounced Obama for his association of lipstick with animals. "It's an insult to our tens of millions of customers to put the words 'lipstick' and 'pig' in the same sentence," said Bella Schweinhundt, CIA spokesperson. She called lipstick "a perfectly legal product" and threatened to stop Senator Obama at airports until informed that power belonged to the other CIA.

Weekend news: People for Ethical Verbiage about Animals (PEVA) called on Obama to stop associating animals with lipstick. "In real life, cosmetics testing harms countless cute, adorable animals every year. By talking about putting lipstick on pigs, Obama is condoning this form of exploitation, which is tantamount to torture," claimed PEVA spokesperson Lotta Katz. She then explained that "tantamount" is not a breed of horse, so no animals were harmed in the making of her statement, according to Katz.

Monday's news: Jews And Muslims Together Over Dietary Allusions, Yuck! (JAM TODAY) asked the Obama campaign to retract any statements that referred in any way to pork, shellfish, cheeseburgers, or alcohol. The Obama campaign welcomed the JAM TODAY statement. "See, I told you Obama was not a Muslim," campaign spokesperson Christian Nazarene said.

Nest week's news: it is revealed that John McCain used the expression "lipstick on a pig" long before Barack Obama did. (True!) The candidate shrugged off the comparison. "I've changed my position on immigration, on the Religious Right, and even on torture, and nobody cared. Why should they start paying attention now?"