Socialism & Feminism Archive Carey Roberts probes and lampoons political correctness. His work has been published frequently in the Washington Times, Townhall.com, LewRockwell.com, ifeminists.net, Intellectual Conservative, and elsewhere. He is a staff reporter for the New Media Network. You can contact him at E-Mail. Scaring the Wits out of Women Halloween decorations made an early appearance this year. In September my local grocery store put up its wicked witch holding a rubber pitchfork. Cobwebs soon began to sprout like silvery hobgoblins, and scary Jack-O’-Lanterns now adorn front porches. Last week a reader sent me this ghoulish warning, which I now quote: "Robbing Females Using the Bathrooms at Shopping Malls" The way the scam works is, a man slips into the women’s rest-room and sneaks into a stall. He waits until there is only one woman in the restroom in a neighboring stall. The criminal then stands on the toilet and points a hand gun into the next stall, demanding the woman’s valuables. After getting her cash and jewelry, he demands that she remove all of her clothing and kick them out of the stall. The thief tosses the clothing into a shopping bag, hangs an out of order sign on the restroom door, and slips back into the mall. The out of order sign ensures no one will soon come to the woman’s rescue. It usually takes an hour or two for the woman to work up the nerve to leave the restroom in the nude, giving the criminal ample time to make his get away. The woman is left naked and humiliated in a mall full of strangers. The best defense, says police, is to never go into a shopping mall restroom alone, as only women who are by themselves are targeted. But something didn’t add up. Shopping mall restrooms are busy places, and I can certainly think of easier ways to steal a handbag. And why no details about names, dates, places, and so forth? A quick internet search revealed the Halloween pranksters were already hard at work. In fact this particular hoax has been making the rounds since 2002. That’s when a bogus Associated Press story claimed this shopping mall caper was occurring with “amazing regularity.” [urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl-mall-restroom.htm ] Why do I share this amusing tale? Because a quick check of the e-mail thread revealed the gloomy warning already had been sent to 50 women, each of whom had been instructed to “PLEASE FORWARD THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW!!!!” Which means over half the female population in the United States no doubt has received this message by now. Now we know why women always go in pairs to powder their noses. This raises two interesting questions: Why do persons start these urban legends? And why do so many women believe them to be true? I’ll come back to that first question in a minute. Let’s now broaden our focus. What if women began to believe that danger lurked behind every scarecrow, moon-lit cornstalk, and knurled tree? What if people began to believe that the slightest grimace or gesture could be perceived as hostile, and concluded that harassment had reached epidemic proportions? And what if employers began to ban Christmas parties because such events were seen as breeding grounds for sexual harassment? This has already begun to happen. What if a certain law dedicated to curbing domestic violence kept claiming that men commit 85% of partner aggression? All this in spite of the research that shows women are the sex more likely to abuse? [pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/ID41E2.pdf ] In England, lawmakers are debating whether to pass a law that would require a woman who drinks alcohol to give her written consent before engaging in sexual relations. Why? Because a recent rape trial collapsed when the woman admitted she was too inebriated to remember whether she had consented to sex. [www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=410535&in_page_id=1770&in_a_source= ] Let’s say we all agree that if a woman drinks a glass of sherry, her verbal consent is null and void. (We won’t dwell on the obvious double-standard here.) So where does the slippery slope end? Many cold medicines make persons feel drowsy and confused. Ditto for anti-depressants. Consent forms would be needed for those situations, as well. Of course pre-menstrual syndrome is known to affect one’s emotions, so the list would have to be expanded. And why should written consent apply only to sexual relations? Why not a full-blown competency test for every woman who wishes to apply for a credit card, ink a business deal, or vote in the local elections? Do you see where this is headed? Yesireee, we’re staring the Nanny State in the face. So ladies, here’s your Halloween treat: There’s no need to fret over illusive bathroom purse-snatchers. And don’t worry about a stealthy stalker casting a hex on your broomstick. But we do have an epidemic of abuse hysteria on our hands -- and it’s caused by wicked women who are only interested in pushing their divisive and destructive gender agenda. Beware the ladies knocking at your door who are more Trick than Treat. That’s something to really get spooked about. Gender Newspeak at Newsweek Now for tonight’s “Behind the News” story: Reneging on its duty to report the news fairly and accurately, the mainstream media now resorts to fake scandals and faux-tography to keep the audience entertained and its numbers juiced up. Nowhere is that more true than at Newsweek magazine. Remember last year when Newsweek made the claim that military interrogators at Guantanamo had flushed a Koran down the toilet? But when 25,000 pages of documents failed to support the incendiary claim, Newsweek was forced to retract the account. But not before 16 persons died during ugly anti-American riots. Then the Valerie Plame brouhaha came along. Vice president Dick Cheney and other administration officials were accused of outing Plame, a CIA operative, to punish Bush’s political enemies. Newsweek, CBS, and the rest of the mainstream media pounced on the story like horseflies drawn to barnyard manure. But last month State Department bureaucrat Richard Armitage admitted that he was the source of the leak. Maybe the sham accusation wasn’t a shining moment for investigative journalism, but it sure made for a lot of good copy. Having elbowed their way into the competitive ranks of Glamour and the National Enquirer, the editors at Newsweek could not afford to rest on their laurels. So last week they ran the article, “Fighting over the Kids” by reporter Sarah Childress. [www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14870310/site/newsweek ] Everyone knows fathers gain child custody only 15% of the time. Yet Childress makes the claim that family courts are actually biased against moms. How did Childress reach that conclusion? Here’s the logic: When battered wives ask for a divorce, their husbands try to wrangle joint custody of the kids. Then to win the sympathy of the divorce judge, they accuse the wife of parental alienation. In support of this controversial claim, Childress trots out two surveys. First she cites a study by Jay Silverman. But Silverman’s conclusions are based on interviews with a grand total of 39 self-selected Massachusetts women. And he doesn’t provide an iota of hard evidence to back up the ladies’ claims. Beginning to sound like advocacy research? Then Cal State psychology professor Geraldine Stahly weighs in with her study. But what’s the name of the article? Was it ever printed in a respectable journal? Were the respondents cherry-picked to provide a pre-set answer? Let’s just call it junk science. George Orwell’s classic, Nineteen Eight-Four, describes Newspeak as a lingo that does away with dodgy words like “thought” and reduces everything to polar opposites like good and ungood. This spells the eventual demise of the English language, which soon becomes known as Oldspeak. Orwell predicts, “By 2050 – earlier, probably – all real knowledge of Oldspeak will have disappeared … Even the slogans will change. How could you have a slogan like ‘freedom is slavery’ when the concept of freedom has been abolished?” Here’s a good example of Newspeak a la Sarah Childress: “Although men are sometimes battered by their wives, women are the victims in the majority of abuse cases.” Childress uses the words battering and abuse to mean the same thing, when in fact true “battering” occurs in only a tiny fraction of “abuse” cases. But the problem is not just semantic sloppiness, because Childress’ claim is downright false. University of New Hampshire researcher Murray Straus recently released his latest findings about dating violence in American couples. When severe violence occurs, in 28% of cases it’s a female perpetrator and 15% of the time, the man is the aggressor. For the remaining 57% of cases, both the man and the woman are mixing it up. [www.unh.edu/news/cj_nr/2006/may/em_060519male.cfm?type=n ] Ironically, even though women are more likely to be the abuser, it’s wives who are more likely to level allegations of abuse that turn out to be false. According to a report from the Independent Women’s Forum, 85% of requests for protection orders are made by women. [www.iwf.org/pdf/young_domviol1.pdf ] And to what end? “Everyone knows that restraining orders and orders to vacate are granted to virtually all who apply,” notes Elaine Epstein, former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association. “In many cases, allegations of abuse are now used for tactical advantage.” Now, 47 states have laws on the books that require family judges to consider such allegations or findings when they make child custody decisions. [www.mediaradar.org/docs/Perverse-Incentives.pdf ] When life-altering decisions are based on false or trivial allegations, it’s the children who lose out. But at Newsweek, nobody seems to be speaking out against Newspeak. And that’s tonight’s report. Now back to you, Katie. Uppity Men Let’s face it, we’ve been snookered. They promised gender liberation, now we’re becoming dependents of the Nanny State. They averred no fancy for special treatment, now we have affirmative action. They said they only wanted to give women a voice, now we’ve got speech codes. They claimed to be for gender equality, now boys are struggling just to keep up in school. Why has it taken so long for us to catch on? One of the tacit rules of the New Gender Order is that the opinions of men don’t count. “If white men were not complaining, it would be an indication we weren’t succeeding and making the inroads that we are” was the remarkable admission once made by the most influential media mogul in the country, Arthur Sulzberger, Jr, owner and publisher of the New York Times. Author Warren Farrell calls it the “lace curtain,” the invisible hand of editorial censorship that throttles the First Amendment rights of half our nation’s population. It’s like we claimed to be engaged in free and open debate, all the while holding one of the parties gagged, blind-folded, and hog-tied. Or if men were allowed to speak, it was made perfectly clear that they not say anything that might force the delicate gals to resort to smelling salts – remember l’affaire of Larry Summers? But three weeks ago something snapped. Michael Noer at Forbes.com wrote a column called “Don’t Marry Career Women.” It was an advice column for eligible businessmen thinking about making the plunge. Predictably, the ladies reacted with well-rehearsed outrage, forcing Forbes to run a counterpoint by Elizabeth Corcoran, “Don’t Marry a Lazy Man.” [www.forbes.com/2006/08/23/Marriage-Careers-Divorce_cx_mn_land.html ] True, some of Noer’s facts could be disputed. Maybe he didn’t qualify his statements enough. But Noer’s article struck a deep chord with hard-working men whose liberated wives had come to look askance at anything that might remotely be called housework. And it resonated with the average Joes who put in long hours on the factory line, only to come home and learn that he was a member of the male oppressor class. This time there would be no “Button up that lip, little man!” Within hours the Internet was buzzing over Noer’s apostasy as thousands of men spoke out at Forbes.com, FreeRepublic.com, and other sites. All of a sudden, full-throated debate became fashionable. Remember this line? “I’m as mad as hell and I won’t take it anymore!” That rant won Peter Finch an Oscar for his role in the movie Network. That pretty well sums up the attitude of many men and women who have become disgusted with feminist-driven, government-enforced intervention into the personal matters of private citizens. For years, women like Christina Hoff Sommers, Wendy McElroy, Cathy Young, and Phyllis Schlafly have been speaking out against government intrusion disguised as female emancipation. Now their protest is ringing through the lan Take Doug Richardson of Detroit. He was forced to pay more than $80,000 in child support, even after paternity tests proved the child was not his. Now he’s waging a one-man campaign to expose the swindle and bring the malefactors to justice. In North Dakota, Mitch Sanderson got fed up with the raw deal that fathers were getting in divorce court. So he started up the North Dakota Shared Parenting Initiative. Then he quit his day job and combed every hamlet and town in the state to get the required 13,000 signatures to land his shared custody bill on the November ballot. Some guys are willing to put everything on the line. Like John Murtari of Onondaga County, NY. Murtari owes more than $60,000 in child support, an amount he couldn’t pay because the figure was calculated based on an income far higher than what he now earns. On July 31 he was sentenced to jail, triggering a hunger strike that caused him to lose 29 pounds in just nine days. As of this writing his situation remains precarious. April 19, 1775, a rag-tag group of Minutemen waited in muffled silence at the Old North Bridge in Concord, Mass. Within minutes they were engulfed in a desperate fire-fight with the British regulars. Soon the smoke cleared. That shot heard ‘round the world marked the first battle of the American Revolutionary War. It was the first hard-fought step to freedom from government oppression. Over 230 years later, state-sponsored tyranny has re-appeared in our midst. And once again, a group of uppity men are willing to risk their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor in the defense of justice and family. The Femocrats Like a tarantula that lurks in the shadows, radical feminism has insinuated itself into every American institution, waiting to pounce and extract its life blood, rendering the carcass lifeless and abandoned. In 1964 the Democratic National Committee was riding high. Lyndon Johnson had just crushed Barry Goldwater by winning 61% of the popular vote, and the Dems held a 2 to 1 edge in the Congress. Back then, the Democrats didn’t need a feminist plank in their platform to woo the female vote. But in 1972 the party began its process of ritual self-immolation. That year the DNC recommended the make-up of the National Convention delegations be “in reasonable relationship” to the proportion of minorities and women in each state. That guideline quickly became a 50-50 gender quota. Suddenly ethnic Catholics, conservative southerners, and male union workers, long the backbone of the party, were out in the cold. And the Dems found themselves sucked into the vortex of feminist-socialist agenda. The Reign of the Femocrats had begun. If there is one person who can take credit for the Democrats’ rapid descent into hysterical irrelevance, she would be Eleanor Smeal, former president of the N.O.W. It was Smeal who first ballyhooed the notion of the gender voting gap, and used it to bludgeon reluctant Dems to embrace the rad-fem manifesto. While it was a matter of record that the men’s and women’s vote sometimes aligned differently, it was less clear which political party would become the beneficiaries of that gap. In early 1984 Smeal guaranteed the Democrats would enjoy a 10% boost if they selected a female presidential running mate. So that July the Democrats announced Walter Mondale’s right-hand gal would be Geraldine Ferraro. But four months later, only 44% of female voters voted for the Mondale-Ferraro ticket, handing Ronald Reagan a historic landslide victory. No comment from Ms. Smeal about that sure-fire 10% margin of victory. In 1985, EMILY’s List arrived on the scene, funneling millions of dollars to Democratic candidates who advocated abortion. EMILY’s List would eventually help elect 61 members of Congress, 11 senators, and eight governors, all of them proponents of a death-dealing ideology. Three years later Michael Dukakis tapped lady-in-lavender Susan Estrich to head up his presidential campaign. Then Dukakis waffled on what he would do if his wife was raped and murdered. Overnight his polling numbers plummeted, and Bush Senior waltzed into the Oval Office. In 1992 the “two-for-the-price-of one” Clintons came to power. Practically overnight, Hillary became the darling of the Democratic left and feminist ideology became the operating principle for the executive branch of the federal government. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2006/0531roberts.html ] Eight years later, still determined to capitalize on the elusive gender voting gap, Al Gore had one of his Alan Alda moments and selected Donna Brazile to manage his campaign. No one seemed to mind that Brazile’s columns in Ms. Magazine consistently played the gender-victim card. And in the 2004 go-around, the Dems chose hen-pecked John Kerry, the man who admitted during one debate, “And my daughters and my wife are people who just are filled with that sense of what’s right, what’s wrong. They also kick me around.” What of Smeal’s now-famous gender voting gap? From 1976 to 2004, the DNC managed to increase its share of the female vote by exactly one percentage point. That’s right – in 1976, 50% of the ladies opted for Mr. Carter. Twenty-eight years later, John Kerry garnered 51% of the soccer-mom vote. And what of the NASCAR dads? They abandoned the Democratic party in droves. While 50% of men voted for Carter in 1976, only 44% of the guys selected Mr. Kerry in 2004, translating into a 3.5 million vote gap favoring Mr. Bush. In the seven elections from 1980 to 2004, the once-noble Democratic party has managed to prevail in only two contests. The conclusion is clear: The gender voting gap usually operates to the benefit of the Republicans, thanks to consistently strong support from men. [www.washingtontimes.com/functions/print.php?StoryID=20041218-100132-6503r ] The Democratic party now appears to be caught in a mental paralysis, incapable of coming up with constructive solutions to the Iraqi war, acknowledging the existence of the Social Security crisis, or reversing the break-down of the American family. The Femocrats can’t even engage in honest debate that goes beyond boo-hoo stories, stale clichés, and Nazi comparisons. The Democratic party has become intellectually vacuous, psychologically emasculated, and morally bankrupt. Call it the death knell of the DNC. Don't Marry a Career Woman: The Debate Heats Up Wondering about that muffled howl you’ve been hearing the last couple weeks? It’s the sound and fury of feminists reacting to Michael Noer’s latest exegesis, Don’t Marry a Career Woman. Noer’s column, which ran at Forbes.com, surveyed marriages in which the wives doggedly pursue a high-powered career, all the while neglecting family and home. The research shows these women are more likely to be unhappy if she earns more than the guy, or if she quits her job and stays home. Either way, she’s going to be a grump. Her husband is more prone to be discontented if she is the primary breadwinner. The house is going to be dirtier. In the end, she is more apt to cheat on him and the marriage will fall apart. [www.forbes.com/2006/08/23/Marriage-Careers-Divorce_cx_mn_land.html ] Of course, these findings don’t apply to every ambitious woman who has risen to the top of her field – but the connection is true in many cases. In practically every woman’s magazine, you’ll find advice columns to help the reader find Mr. Right and then entice her football-addled boyfriend to commit for the long-haul. But when a male columnist dispenses relationship advice for men, that appears to be strictly verboten -- at least according to the Shrieking Sisters of Silliness who cut loose on Mr. Noer. On Good Morning America, one Rutgers U. prof claimed to be absolutely shocked: “I’m surprised that the man thinks it. I’m astonished that he wrote it. And I’m astonished that anyone published it, particularly Forbes.” (No word whether MIT professor Nancy Hopkins swooned at the news.) Forbes hastily arranged for reporter Elizabeth Corcoran to pen a response sporting the acid title, “Don’t Marry a Lazy Man.” Describing Noer’s factual article as “frightening,” she dispensed this condescending advice about men: “If he can pick up new ideas faster than your puppy, you’ve got a winner.” Needless to say, Ms. Corcoran’s screed only reinforced the worst stereotypes of the “I-know-what-I-want-and-I-know-how-to-get-it” career woman portrayed in Noer’s column. Thereupon the readers jumped into the fray, all recounting their grudges about members of the opposite sex. A pretty picture it was not, but the debate is long-overdue: forums.forbes.com/forbes/board?board.id=respond_marry_career_woman and www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1688730/posts . Part of the ladies’ discomfiture with Mr. Noer’s article springs from the fact that for the last 30 years, discussions about women in the workforce have been guided by the unspoken rule, “Men’s Opinions Don’t Count.” But then women’s one-sided conversations lapsed into over-wrought declamations about men who didn’t pitch in around the house, forgetting that that men often put in longer hours on the job, commute longer distances, and do physical labor that leaves them exhausted. Doesn’t mowing the grass, killing creepy-crawlers that traipse through the kitchen, clearing leaves out of the gutter, and coaching Little League count for anything? And let’s not forget the old axiom that rights and responsibilities go hand-in-hand. If women are demanding more rights, then what additional duties – like compulsory registration for the draft -- are they going to shoulder? Ironically, the same day that Michael Noer published his op-ed, columnist Nancy Levant came out with a fem-ripper called The Cultural Devastation of Women. [www.newswithviews.com/Levant/nancy55.htm] Levant deplored the fact that thanks to the libbers, American women “now hire maid services, landscapers, pool cleaners, painters, interior decorators. . . .while losing every intuitive aspect of our female natures.” In the process, women “use men like ATMs” and “bankrupt multiple men with mandatory child support payments.” One can only imagine the hullabaloo if Mrs. Levant had uttered such heresy at Forbes. So what’s a career woman to do? For a moment, let’s can the feminist ideology and take stock of that rare commodity, common sense. Have you ever seen a woman (or man, for that matter) exclaim at death’s door, “I only wish that I could have spent more time in the office”? Neither have I. It’s no secret that the most rewarding parts of a person’s life revolve around relationships with spouses, children, and other family. So why are career women driven to dismember those connections that give the most meaning to their lives? It’s true that women find satisfaction and fulfillment from paid work. And some have no choice but to get a full-time job. But the reality is, wives’ happiness is not tied to living out of a suitcase or having an equal paycheck with their husbands. Indeed, the opposite is true. When husbands are the primary wage earners, wives have more freedom to pursue their own interests. So Mr. Noer, lick off those wounds, straighten up that tie, and sharpen your pencil. Get ready for Round Two Harassment Hysteria Threatens Military Morale Last year Naval Academy instructor Lt. Bryan Black made a sexually-tinged remark to a female midshipman. It was not a case of rape or sexual assault. It was not even “I’ll trade you a better grade for certain sexual favors.” Rather, the comment was a vulgar remark – much like something you might hear during a Sex in the City re-run. But Cupcake got offended and filed a complaint. The complaint eventually made its way to the Naval Academy’s superintendent, Vice Adm. Rodney Rempt. All of sudden, Black found himself the target of a criminal investigation. A criminal charge for salty language? What’s going on here? Tailhook, that’s what. In 1991 a group of Navy aviators touched down in Las Vegas for their Tailhook Convention, an annual round of carousing, imbibing, and other bacchanalian indulgences. Gloss over the fact that most female personnel in attendance were repeat attendees who knew exactly what was coming. Ignore the libidinous ladies who lined up to engage in activities like “pleasuring the rhino.” Pretend that the gals didn’t engage in their own high-flying debauchery, including “package checks” of male genitalia and topless bartending. And forget that Ensign Beth Warnick accused three male aviators of gang-raping her, only to later admit that she had lied so her boyfriend wouldn’t learn the truth of her extra-curricular activities. The fact was, after they sorted through all the tawdry tales, only three of the reported incidents of “sexual assault” could be considered criminal in nature. No matter, the media began to compare Tailhook to the rape of Nanking. And feminists seized on the episode as proof of a warrior culture that needed to be brought to heel. A full-throated -- and well-orchestrated -- hysteria over sexual harassment in the Armed Forces was about to begin. And elected officials who desired to curry favor with the feminist lobby began to call for a non-stop series of hearings, investigations, and task forces. In 1994 the General Accounting Office did a survey on sexual harassment in the military. The GAO found that “unwanted sexual advances” ranked dead last on the list. One of the most common types of harassment, though, consisted of comments that the presence of women had lowered military standards. That’s right, men, stop griping because women can’t drag a firehose across the flight deck or give the heave-ho to a 100-pound anchor. Don’t you realize that such remarks are creating a hostile environment? What has become clear from all the surveys, though, is that a crisis of false allegations now overshadows the problem of actual physical abuse. Earlier this year the Sexual Assault and Prevention Response Office (SAPRO) reported on an analysis of 848 investigations. Among those alleged sexual offenses, 641 were found to be unsubstantiated, unfounded, or involved insufficient evidence. So three-quarters of the complaints were deemed unworthy of disciplinary action. In May the Naval Academy Board of Trustees was informed that among 40 cases of alleged sexual harassment, 72% were found to be unsubstantiated or invalid. Last year Joseph Schmitz, Inspector General of the Department of Defense, released a report on sexual harassment at the service academies. This survey featured a new twist -- it also asked about false allegations. Among men, 72% reported that fraudulent allegations are a problem. Likewise 73% of women said false claims were cause for concern. The gals realized that frivolous allegations do nothing to enhance their standing and respect among their male peers. So why did it take over a decade of taxpayer-funded investigations to come to that common-sense conclusion? Recently Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness concluded, “these polls embarrass the academies, demoralize the cadets, and make the case for more lucrative contracts for ‘victim advocates’ . . . Feminist pork needs to be trimmed from the DoD budget, not expanded even more.” [cmrlink.org/CMRNotes/ED%20Testimony%20062706.pdf ] Meanwhile back in Annapolis, last January superintendent Rempt invited the Navy cadets to attend a performance of Sex Signals. Given that the play contained far more sexual innuendo and X-rated language than Lt. Black could have indulged in with Cupcake a few months before, maybe the play should have been called “Mixed Signals.” And exactly why did Vice Adm. Rempt decide to lower the boom on Bryan Black? Because Rempt had just launched a “zero-tolerance” policy on sexual harassment. Of course, we live in a flawed world with imperfect people. So in practice, “zero-tolerance” becomes the basis for ramping up the penalties for an offense that no one can define, and abolishing due process protections for an allegation that no person can ever hope to refute. Double-Standards Cripple the Fight against Terrorists It is a sign of cultural confusion when the most-heralded account of individual bravery in the Iraqi war centers around a teenage girl who did nothing that could be considered heroic. When her convoy made a wrong turn behind enemy lines, 19-year-old Jessica Lynch passed out during the ensuing ambush. For that she was rewarded with fawning media coverage, an official biography, and a made-for-TV movie. PFC Lynch didn’t thwart the enemy attack, save anyone’s life, or even fire a single shot. So what amazing feat of valor qualified Lynch for the Bronze Star? Get ready for this: she fell to her knees and started to pray. And then she smiled for the camera. The chivalrous adulation that greeted Lynch’s return covered over a dirty truth: Feminist double-think permeates the military more than any other institution in our society. It’s what Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, calls DSIW: double standards involving women. That dual standard now threatens the readiness and morale of our military services which must now cope with the surging threat of Islamofascism. Women have long played an important and indispensable role in the military. And 20 years ago, different requirements weren’t a concern when women were assigned mostly to nursing and stateside desk jobs. But shortfalls in military recruitment goals and demands by Rep. Patricia Schroeder of Colorado to assign the “real plum jobs” to the gals changed all that. Soon women were being tapped to work as pilots, ordnance handlers, and grease monkeys -- just like their daddies used to do. Everything seemed to be on track for the imminent arrival of the gender utopia. Then the 1990 Gulf War came around and 40,000 females were ordered to report for duty. That’s when the ladies began to rediscover their inner-mom. Long-barren women became rapturously pregnant, and military mothers were suddenly the reincarnation of Madonna-with-child. Newspapers wailed because “thousands of American mothers are saying good-bye to their families to face the unknown dangers in the Gulf.” Some G.I. Janes claimed their recruiters had promised they would never be sent to war. Gender-integrated basic training, which came along three years later, proved to be an even bigger jolt. The Sergeant Furies wondered how the female trainees would be able to survive, much less pass, the hand-grenade exercise, given the fact that most women couldn’t heave the thing beyond its 35-meter burst radius. Soon the requirement was changed so just dumping the grenade over a cement wall gave you the green light. After all, grenade-throwing is simply a confidence-building exercise, and the key is to try your hardest, right? Battle-hardened drill sergeants were ordered to remake themselves in the manner of Mister Rogers, and obstacle courses were modified to resemble a Romper Room set. Navy trainees were urged to wave a “stress card” to settle frayed nerves. And mothers were consoled with infant nursing breaks and assorted child-bonding activities. Despite all the gender-norming and hand-holding, Stephanie Gutmann documents in The Kinder, Gentler Military that women in training suffer 2-3 times more stress fractures, back sprains, and broken ankles. And at the Marine Corps Officer Candidate School in Quantico, Va., last year’s female candidates washed out three times more often than the guys. [www.cmrlink.org/CMRNotes/ED%20Testimony%20062706.pdf ] George Orwell once wrote, “if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.” That aphorism rings true in many of the official statements on women in the military. “All soldiers, regardless of gender, train to a single standard, the Army standard,” proclaims one regulation. “Differences in performance requirements between the sexes, such as Army physical fitness testing scoring, are based on physiological differences and apply to the entire force.” How’s that for twice-around-the-block double-talk? Then we have those politicians who gush about “the men and women in uniform who are fighting for our country.” Apparently these well-intentioned souls don’t realize that a woman who slings an M-16 over her shoulder for a couple hours of guard duty does not qualify as “fighting.” And remember Lt. Kara Hultgreen? Her jet crashed and burned on the USS Abraham Lincoln because she approached the flight deck at too sharp an angle – an error she had committed twice before. Then Navy officials tried to pin Hultgreen’s death on “engine failure.” Put that one in the “cover-up” category. Six years ago Stephanie Gutmann asked, “Can America’s gender-neutral fighting force still win wars?” Some found her question to be provocative; to others it was merely amusing. As we approach the fifth anniversary of 9/11, it’s time that we seriously ponder that question. No Need to Keep Rape Accuer's Name a Secret Crystal Gail Mangum’s life has been marked by a Kudzu-like thicket of ups and downs. After graduating from Hillside High School in Durham, she spent two years in the Navy as a radio operator. She married twice, taught her first husband how to read, worked for a while in a nursing facility, and is now the single mother of two. In 1996 she filed a complaint that she had been raped – but she didn’t get around to filing the police report until three years later. And once the allegation had been made, she didn’t bother to complete the paperwork. Sorry fellas, nothing personal. In 2002 Mangum stole a car and and took deputies on a high-speed chase, which eventually landed her in jail with a criminal record. Other details of her life have been extensively documented. [johnsville.blogspot.com/2006/04/duke-rape-accuser-crystal-gail-mangum.html ] Later Mangum enrolled at North Carolina Central University, a predominantly black college. To supplement her income, she worked as an exotic dancer and for an escort service locally known as Bunny Hole Entertainment. Thanks to time-stamped photographs, eyewitness accounts, police reports, forensic examinations, and dogged media interest, the timeline and events surrounding the case are now well-documented. [en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Duke_University_lacrosse_team_scandal#_note-28 ] Over the weekend of March 10-12, 2006 Crystal Gail Mangum indulged in sexual hijinks with four different men. On Monday March 13, she went to a hotel room and participated in an X-rated escapade with a couple. Any of these events could have produced the minor bruises, cuts, and vaginal injuries that Ms. Mangum later claimed were caused by the Duke lacrosse players. Later that evening, Mangum and fellow-stripper Kim Pittman (aka “Nikki”) arrived at a run-down house near the Duke University campus in Durham, each knowing they would be paid $400 for a one-hour set. The two were together for the entire time, except for a five-minute period when Mangum went to the bathroom. When later asked about Mangum’s rape allegation, Pittman called it a “crock.” The police officer who first saw Mangum described her as “passed-out drunk.” She first claimed she had been raped. Then the officer reported she said “no one forced her to have sex.” A few minutes later she came back to her original claim – not totally surprising for someone who is well-juiced and wants to avoid a charge of public drunkedness. At first she said she had been raped by 20 men, then she decided the number was actually five, and finally settled on three. But the photographs revealed her bruises were there before the alleged rape occurred. And the hospital sexual assault nurse did not find any evidence of sexual assault. The DNA tests failed to produce any link to the lacrosse players. A second DNA analysis did implicate Mangum’s boyfriend, however. [www.abcnews.go.com/US/LegalCenter/story?id=1958031&page=1 ] When asked about the exculpatory DNA tests, District Attorney Michael Nifong nonsensically replied, “It doesn’t mean nothing happened, it just means nothing was left behind.” Nifong’s case has more holes than the frayed netting of a goalie’s lacrosse stick. Maybe that’s why Nifong speculated the alleged rape may have been a hate crime, falsely hinted at the use of a “date-rape” drug, withheld key documents from defense lawyers, and unconscionably delayed the trial until next Spring. Legal commentators have excoriated Nifong for his unprofessional and reckless handling of the case. But by skillfully playing the race card, Nifong did manage to come out on top during the May Democratic primary. On April 21, Tom Leykis repeatedly stated Crystal Gail Mangum’s name on his nationally-broadcast radio talk show. Two days later Matt Druge again disclosed her identity. The very next day the players’ defense lawyers filed a motion listing Crystal Gail Mangum by name. That document is publicly-available: www.kirkosborn.com/Motions/RITCHIEMotion.pdf . During the next month the defense team filed three more motions, all mentioning Mangum on the first page. MSNBC Host Tucker Carlson mentioned Mangum’s name during his May 15 show. Internet columnists Michael Gaynor and Nicholas Stix also reported her name, as well. A Google search under “Crystal Gail Mangum,” “duke,” and “rape” turns up 648 hits. Some persons have misspelled her last name as “magnum,” which turns up even more documents. Crystal Gail Mangum’s notoriety has reached the point that she even has her own Wikipedia site: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_Gail_Mangum The cat is out of the bag. The identity of the Duke rape accuser has been widely disseminated on the radio, via the internet, in public legal documents, and in an encyclopedia. The name is Crystal Gail Mangum. So why would anyone pretend her name is still a secret? With Feminized Men, Who will Fight the War on Terror? As a jubilant Ned Lamont announced his improbable win over incumbent Joe Lieberman, N.O.W. president Kim Gandy stood cheering at his side. The National Organization for Women press release proclaimed, “Peace is a feminist issue and the Iraq war has been a key issue in this campaign. . . . NOW PAC will continue to support Ned Lamont through the general election in November.” Little did Gandy realize that world events would soon overtake Lamont’s “just-give-peace-a-chance” mantra. Because just two days later on August 10, the world was rocked by news of a foiled Muslim plot to blow up more than 10 jetliners. Funny, Mr. Lamont couldn’t seem to find the right sound-bite to spin this latest episode in the international war on terror. Forty years ago the National Organization for Women was founded. That marked the beginning of an unholy jihad to deconstruct masculinity. Now, a low-level hostility to all things macho pervades our culture. A toddler is warned that pointing his finger in the shape of a gun will earn him 10 minutes of time-out. No dump trucks or military figures sully the serenity of his play area. “Go play with your Ken-and-Barbie set,” his gender-enlightened parents console him. Want to come out and play Cops and Robbers? Forget it, little boy! On TV he’ll be treated to the likes of Homer Simpson, that all-around dufus who can spoil even a family vacation. The little tyke will never learn that Leave it to Beaver lost out to Beavis and Butthead years ago. During the Saturday morning cartoons, he’ll marvel at Wonder Woman and Firestar who easily vanquish their male assailants. And over at the Justice League, Aquaman was retired from combat in order to bring in super-heroine Hawkgirl. At school, junior is informed that tag was banned because it promotes competition and aggressiveness, and recess may be coming next. In history class he learns memorable facts such as the West was won by brave teenage girls, Sacagawea led the Lewis and Clark expedition, and Mary Todd Lincoln endured great hardships during the Civil War. If our aspiring man wants to play high school sports, he may be enlightened, “Sorry, but not enough girls signed up for field hockey this year.” If he mentions the sex bias of Take Your Daughter to Work Day, the female principal is likely to take him aside and warn him those remarks are creating a hostile environment for the girls. He will see girls who slap, punch, and kick their boyfriends. Later he’ll attend a domestic violence class which explains men assault their partners because they crave power and control. When Bubba goes to college, he may be required to attend a presentation on date rape where he learns that if a woman says “No” -- even weeks after the act took place -- he can be accused of sexual assault. And merely watching an exotic dancer perform her routine could get him arrested on a rape charge. And even though men of that age group have a three-times higher risk of death than women, he’ll learn that male-dominated medicine has been insensitive to the needs of women. Samson was the Biblical figure of Herculean strength who was known to wrestle lions and slay his foes. But then he fell in love with Delilah, who came under the sway of the Philistines. Delilah persuaded Samson to divulge the secret of his strength. One night as he slept, a servant cut off Samson’s seven locks, thus depriving him of his legendary power. The emasculated Samson was soon captured by the Philistines, who thereupon gouged his eyes out. Like modern-day Delilahs, feminists have taken a generation of our men, stripped away their warrior persona, and robbed them of their vision. Call to mind those hollow-cheeked metrosexuals that dolefully adorn the after-shave advertisements. Reflect on those apologetic girl-guys who meekly refer to themselves as “male feminists.” Consider the foot-dragging politicians that governor Arnold Schwarzenegger once dubbed, “girlie-men.” Ponder Joseph Biden, III, son of senator Biden of Delaware, who recently admitted, “We Biden men know it’s the Biden women who really run the show.” Think of presidential candidate Al Gore who actually paid feminist Naomi Wolf good money to advise him how to become an “alpha male.” And of course we all know who wore the pants during the Clinton co-presidency. So where are the brave men we are counting on to protect us from the terrorist threat? A Woman can do Anything a Man can do (Well, almost) Fact and feminism keep tripping over each other. For decades, radical feminists have prostrated themselves upon the altar of androgeny, flatly declaring that all differences between the sexes are socially constructed. So when men earn more money than women, they say that’s proof of sex discrimination. But men have the Y chromosome, while women don’t. And it turns out that one chromosome contains 78 very important genes. Those genes contain programming instructions that control a man’s brain structure, sex hormones, and a host of other functions. These critical genetic differences play out in thousands of ways that influence risk-taking, sex relationships, and social roles. Steven Rhoads’ book, Taking Sex Differences Seriously, is an information-packed, must-read on this topic. Women conceive babies, men can’t. Women are better at decoding facial expressions, hearing a baby’s whimper in the night, and simultaneously talking and listening. Fine. But what happens when we insist that men and women are social equivalents, twisting like neutered cogs in a giant gender nirvana? Last year I was talking with a woman who insisted female athletes are just as skilled as the men. A few months later, the US female Olympic hockey team played a boys’ high school team from Warroad, Minnesota. The small town boys prevailed 2-1 over the elite Olympians – and that was a non-checking game. Then there are the women-in-combat zealots. They parade girls like PFC Jessica Lynch as living proof that women can handle the fierce demands of front line combat. You may recall that war heroine Lynch later admitted about her Iraqi mishap, “I did not shoot, not a round, nothing. I went down praying to my knees. And that’s the last I remember.” What about women in the media? Remember, they were going to bring us a more balanced and empathic perspective on the world. Well, that was before Oprah Winfrey predicted one in five heterosexual Americans would die from AIDS by 1990 and Meryl Streep duped the EPA to ban alar. Let’s not forget Connie Chung’s scientific discovery that breast implants make women sick. Even though researchers could never prove the link between implants and connective tissue disease, the ensuing hysteria-driven lawsuits eventually forced Dow Corning into bankruptcy. Of course there’s the ever-apoplectic Maureen Dowd, left to wonder why the New York Times circulation numbers tumble ever-downward. And rumor has it that once Katie Couric debuts at CBS News, she’s planning to sign up Cindy Sheehan as a political analyst for the upcoming November elections. And women, it is said, will make the political arena more ethical and fair: “Research shows the presence of women raises the standards of ethical behavior and lowers corruption.” That quote comes to us by way of senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, which practically makes the claim self-refuting. We were promised that women in academia would bring important new insights. But soon the ladies came to the sobering realization that Beethoven composed Ode to Joy to induce men into a sexual frenzy, and Newton’s Principia Mathematica is actually a rape manual. We should all feel especially sorry for MIT professor Nancy Hopkins. As a biologist, she no doubt learned how primates engage in sex-specific courtship rituals and hunting patterns. But then ex-Harvard president Larry Summers suggested that innate differences in the human species also might exist, causing the ever-delicate Dr. Hopkins to lapse into a swoon. Smelling salts, anyone? Those examples are mostly amusing. But there’s one variation on the woman-can-do-anything-a-man-can-do theme that’s downright dangerous. It’s the “mothers and fathers are interchangeable” mantra. The reason is simple: little boys don’t identify with their moms the same way they bond with their dads. And girls learn different lessons from dads than from moms. Want proof? Look at inner city ghettos ravaged by Great Society programs that required dad to vacate the home before mom was entitled to collect her welfare check. Bereft of their loving fathers, boys looked to the media and gangs for their male role models. Is anyone surprised when all manner of social pathologies take root and flourish? It’s one of the conundrums of our time that while demanding fealty to the dogma of androgeny, feminists condemn the expression of masculine qualities by men and then turn around and demand that “liberated” women exemplify exactly those same attributes. As my mother used to say, Who said women had to be logical? Blame it on the Patriarchy The feminism is a secular religion with its own high priestesses, dogmas, and initiation rituals. Its creation myth holds that on the first day Goddess created Eve, and all was right with the world. But that idyllic state was shattered when first patriarch Adam stumbled into the Garden, pounded on the table, and demanded his apple. Simply put, the word “patriarchy” denotes male leadership. By that definition, the United States is a patriarchal society. It was our Founding Fathers who brought forth a nation based on the principles of democracy, equal opportunity, and limited government. Men provided the raw muscle power and ingenuity that became the engine for a booming economy. Patriarchs, also known as primary breadwinners, provided sustenance and stability to their families. And male leadership enabled our country to prevail through two World Wars and the Great Depression. Those events left an indelible mark on the men who pulled us through those terrible times. These brave souls can be forgiven if they sometimes burp without covering their mouth or find it hard to talk about their feelings. Then Gloria Steinem and her ilk came along. They co-opted the word patriarchy, did an ideological shake-and-bake, and stamped it “Hazardous to Women.” Those same men who years before had returned to our shores as war heroes were now branded as bellicose ogres. The feminist jihad then indicted the entire male species for Crimes against Womankind. The never-ending litany of grievances is like one of those Whack-a-Mole games at the county fair -- as soon as one myth is squelched, another pops up. Here are just a few: Count No. 1: Husbands are considered the head of their family. Sometimes these men are known to actually encourage their wives to stay within the credit card limit and to stay out of cat fights. Yes, silly, that’s what leadership is all about. Count No. 2: The callous brutes in the U.S. Congress are insensitive to the needs of women. That’s right. And those monthly checks that keep rolling in to Grandma for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid – programs enacted by and largely paid for by men – are designed to hoodwink unsuspecting women about the vast, untamed patriarchal conspiracy. Count No. 3: Men don’t listen to their wives. And considering all the women who rant and rave about patriarchal oppression, maybe they’re not worth listening to. Sensing people still were not convinced of their plight, the Matrons of Mischief trot out examples of sad-sack women who suffered tremendously at the hands of patriarchy. Take feminist icon Betty Friedan whose husband set her up in cushy digs in New York suburbia, provided her with a maid, and encouraged Betty to pursue her writing interests. Betty expressed her gratitude by calling this a “comfortable concentration camp.” One of the tenets of the cult of feminism is that women, being the appointed guardians of gentleness and light, are capable only of doing good. (For now we will ignore inconvenient facts like the women who abort 1.3 million unborn children each year, unwed mothers who finger some unsuspecting dude to get a bigger child support check, and exotic dancers who fabricate claims of being raped by a bunch of lacrosse players.) So when bad things happen, women have a convenient scapegoat: male-dominated society. When a demonic mother drowns her five kids in a bathtub, the chief suspect becomes her husband who failed to protect the woman from herself. When a woman castrates her husband, her lawyer trots out the always-reliable Battered Woman defense. When a wife breaks her vows and cheats on her husband, she evokes sympathy (and wins custody of the kids, just for good measure) by claiming to feel “stifled” in the relationship. The notion that women should not be held accountable for their misdeeds is laughable. You mean to say that women should enjoy equal rights with men, but not equal responsibilities? There’s another reason why the patriarchal bogeyman persists – it’s what liberal dragon-slayer Ann Coulter calls “girly guilt-mongering.” Take men who hold immense pride in knowing their families are well-provided for. Now lecture them they got it all wrong -- that providing and protecting are actually oppressive to women. Once this fantastic guilt trip has been imposed on male breadwinners, then tell them it’s pay-back time. The shibboleth of oppressive patriarchy lies at the very foundation of feminist ideology. So imagine what would happen if people arose from their slumber one day, looked around in amazement at the false idols that now surround us, and came to realize that Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, and their fellow myth-makers are the modern-day incarnations of the Jezebels and Delilahs of yore? The Kiss-and-Accuse Capers Former New England Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson was one of the lucky ones. On July 16 the three-time Super Bowl player was arrested in Weston, Mass. for assaulting his wife. But last Monday Jackie Johnson came clean: “My husband, I adore him, and, it was my fault. . . . It breaks my heart to think I would be responsible with one emotional, irresponsible call in destroying this beautiful man’s reputation.” Judge Rucker Smith of Sumter County, Georgia can also thank his lucky stars. When he announced his decision to break off a romantic relationship, his girlfriend bit him fiercely on the leg. Then the woman called the police to allege that he had attacked her. On May 5, the jury acquitted the judge of all charges against him. And let’s not forget TV talk show host David Letterman. Last December Colleen Nestler of Santa Fe, NM claimed that Mr. Letterman was using mental telepathy, facial gestures, and televised code words to induce her to move to New York. Judge Daniel Sanchez granted an order directing Mr. Letterman to cease the harassment. The laughable injunction was eventually dropped. But few men have the financial where-with-all of a former NFL player, sitting judge, or media personality. So when they are accused of domestic violence, men often find themselves dragged into a legal machinery that eventually leaves them penniless, disillusioned, and broken. Often the false claims are made during an acrimonious divorce or child custody case. This past January Wendy Flanders of Lancaster County, PA alleged her ex-husband acted in a threatening manner towards her, and requested a restraining order. Unfortunately for her, the whole incident was caught on surveillance cameras that proved her allegations were a complete fabrication. Flanders is now charged with making false reports and criminal conspiracy. Restraining orders now come a dime a dozen. Each year 2-3 million restraining orders for domestic violence are issued in the United States. [www.mediaradar.org/docs/VAWA-Restraining-Orders.pdf ] And get this – in half the cases, violence is not even alleged. All the guy has to do is think strange thoughts, make facial gestures, or use code words – just ask David Letterman. Many men find the allegations so stigmatizing and humiliating that years later, they are still afraid to tell their story. “William” was a Department of Defense sub-contractor with a high level TS/SCI security clearance who supervised an information security project. When he broke up with his girlfriend, she retaliated by claiming abuse. DoD Directive 5220.6 requires that a clearance be revoked, even on the basis of a mere allegation. As a result William and the 30 project personnel had to be laid off. “John,” a successful consultant with a six-figure income, filed charges against his ex-wife after she assaulted him. In turn she requested a civil restraining order, which served to pre-empt the criminal charges against her. The civil order was then leaked to Dunn and Bradstreet, thus destroying the man’s reputation and business. A year later the woman recanted her allegations, saying John had never been physically abusive. False allegations of rape are also commonplace, with one-quarter of rape claims believed to be a hoax. [www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,194032,00.html ] Last February Tamara Moonier of Orange County, CA accused six men of brutally raping her at gunpoint. But a home video showed a laughing Moonier cheering the men on: “I just like sex, I can’t help it!” If convicted on all counts, the men could have spent the rest of their lives in prison. But Ms. Moonier faces a maximum sentence of 44 months for her little white lie. Which of course brings us to the three Duke U. lacrosse players accused of raping an exotic dancer. The DNA tests don’t match, the pieces of the story don’t add up, and legal experts say the chances of a conviction are slim to none. But no matter, prosecutor Mike Nifong, who is facing a tough re-election bid, says he has no plans to drop the case. Kathy Seligman, mother of one of the accused players, recently told CBS News, “You just can’t imagine what it’s like to see someone do this to your child.” Over 200 years ago, brave American colonists rose up against the shackles of English tyranny. Their aim was to found a republic based on laws that enshrine the presumption of innocence, a respect for due process, and the preservation of civil liberties. Sometimes the hard lessons of history only can be learned from first-hand experience. Women Good, Men Bad? It’s about time that we probe an assumption that has insidiously worked its way into our culture -- the notion that women are the guardians of goodness and grace, while all those male neanderthals are emissaries from the dark side. I will freely admit that men indulge in a number of vices, those including gluttony, greed, and of course forgetting to put the toilet seat down. Growing up in the halcyon days of the Patriarchy, I was treated to my fair share of ribald humor. But nothing quite prepared me for what I saw a couple weeks ago. Strolling at the local mall I spotted a young lass, maybe 13 years old. She was sporting a white T-shirt with an unusual picture. The shirt depicted a girl cold-cocking a boy. Above the how-to diagram were etched these words: “How to Drop a Boyfriend.” For the last decade, we’ve been hearing the mantra, “There’s no excuse for domestic violence.” So how could anyone even think of wearing a shirt like that? Of course the Lavender Ladies have long scorned traditional notions of feminine virtue. In her book Feminist Morality, Virginia Held haughtily dismisses the ideal of the unselfish, nurturing, and non-aggressive woman as “the whole female stereotype.” So now we must ask, What happens to common morality when selfishness, aggressiveness, and all-around oafishness are held up as the cultural ideal for newly-liberated women? I’m not going to dwell on the abortion issue. That’s because no one, not even the most rabid feminist, will claim that baby-killing is a virtuous action. Their excuse is that we must allow abortion so as to not put a crimp on a woman’s lifestyle options. Let’s agree to put that one in the “selfish” category. And what about our epidemic of hyper-aggressive females? Our society is reeling from stories of sexually-assertive school teachers who prey on their male students. We find it incomprehensible that teenage girls would form into gangs and lurk in the alleyways. And research now shows that female-initiated partner violence is more common than the male variety. [www.unh.edu/news/cj_nr/2006/may/em_060519male.cfm?type=n ] Think of Xena the Warrior Princess with premenstrual syndrome. Which brings me to another one of my favorite T-shirts: “Girls Lie.” Our society has become inundated with so many feminist prevarications that it has difficulty separating truth from falsehood. Here goes: the oppressiveness of marriage, the stifling effects of childrearing, the gender wage gap, the epidemic of domestic violence against women, the exclusion of women from medical research, the shortchanging of schoolgirls, the catch-all insensitivity to women’s needs, and much, much more. Which makes you wonder, How did the Nervous Nellies ever get through college without a Take Back the Night rally to steady themselves? This is my personal favorite: “Women have always been the primary victims of war. Women lose their husbands, their fathers, their sons in combat.” That insight comes to us by way of HRC. Now visit any of the radical feminist websites – they seethe with anti-male diatribes and epithets. I’ve seen outright bigotry in my life, but nothing that quite compares with the rants of Andrea Dworkin, Catherine McKinnon, or Kate Millett. Then there’s the fairness gene – or lack thereof. Feminists squawk and fuss about “gender equality,” but once men become an endangered species on college campuses, all of a sudden the message shifts to “female empowerment.” When men die five years sooner than women, why does the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services fund Centers for Excellence for the ladies, but not the lads? And if the women’s libbers want true equality, why aren’t they burning their bras so they can win the “right” to trek over to the post office on their 18th birthday to register for government service? And now for the dirty little secret – feminists are the most intolerant people on the earth! Last week the flap was over the Screen Goddess calendar that was adorned with 16 IT vixens. [www.itgoddess.info] Naturally the Champions of Choice became apoplectic. “Girls are often excluded from the possibility of the profession by its cultural maleness,” one woman shrieked. And remember Larry Summers? He said there was a slight possibility that discrimination was not the reason for the small numbers of female physicists and rocket scientists. Even though he became a serial apologizer, the red-fems tarred and feathered the poor man and sent him packing from his Harvard U. presidency! There’s a lesson to be learned here: You can never appease a feminist. Napoleon Bonaparte once observed, “Female virtue has been held in suspicion from the beginning of the world, and ever will be.” That’s why as feminism gains, virtue wanes. Feminist Scheme for U.N. Reform You know things are getting desperate at the United Nations when its leaders begin to listen to feminist proposals to revitalize this talk-much, do-little, scandal-ridden bureaucracy. Following months of deliberation, in April the UN jettisoned its Human Rights Commission in favor of its new Human Rights Council. That’s a good cost-cutting move, since the new signs will only have to cover up the last 8 letters of the old name and replace them with “uncil.” And perfectly fine to use up the old HRC stationery, as well. And thank goodness the new membership of the new Human Rights Council includes such upholders of individual freedoms and civil liberties as Cuba, China, and Russia. Of course we’re all supposed to stand up, applaud, and send in our check. Just for the record, U.S. taxpayers pony up $420 million a year to the United Nations for “assessed” dues, plus billions more in “voluntary” contributions to the overall U.N. system. In a recent article in the Financial Times, Kofi Annan espoused the Alice-in-Wonderland view that everything would be just fine if only the United States would stop bruising the sensitivities of all the developing countries by wielding its “power of the purse.” Maybe we should all chip in and buy Mr. Annan a little sign to put on his desk to remind him, “The Buck Stops Here.” Are you ready for the next round of this Funny Farm routine? In April a coalition of U.S. women’s groups sent a letter to Mr. Annan complaining the world body did not “more powerfully represent women’s empowerment and gender issues,” and demanding a new agency be established to advance the feminist cause. And like a white knight in shining armor, Stephen Lewis has come to the rescue of the beleaguered belles. “For 20 years I’ve felt that the rights and needs of women in the UN system are largely unattended,” Mr. Lewis emotes. “They make up more than half of the world’s population but efforts to address their problems have been a travesty.” Travesty? That’s right, all those agencies, programs, and campfire circles devoted to women’s issues simply aren’t doing enough. After all, nobody pays attention to the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), the Division for the Advancement of Women, the UN Population Fund, the Office of the Special Advisor on Gender Issues, or the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW). What does it matter that the World Health Organization has more women’s health programs than it can keep track of? UNICEF has a high-profile Go Girls! Program, but everyone knows its budget is a mere pittance. And then those treaties designed to lift the ladies out of their bondage, like the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), and the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children – they’re as worthless as the paper they are printed on! To make his case, Lewis peddles grievances that are so far-fetched as to be farcical. Here’s one: “Women are more insecure in the working world, unemployed longer and more frequently than men. Yes, being forced to take care of the kids and having to accept money from a male breadwinner must be a tremendous burden. Other claims are rendered meaningless with telltale qualifiers like “up to” and “as many as.” Here’s an example: “Up to 3 million women a year lose their lives to gender-based violence or neglect.” Of course the U.N.’s World Report on Violence and Health found that men are twice as likely to die from violence-related causes as women. But the excess number of male deaths does not appear to trouble Mr. Lewis much. Last week was not a good one for Mr. Lewis’ crusade for a feminist Camelot. First the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute denounced the idea as “another UN absurdity. . . .the UN is almost totally about radical feminism and such an agency would be a remarkable redundancy.” Then the Concerned Women for America, one of the largest women’s groups in the country, gave the proposal an even stronger tongue-lashing. “Lewis’ proposal would dramatically strengthen the already-incredibly-strong radical feminist influence at the U.N.,” the CWA noted. “There’s no need to create another wasteful U.N. agency just to give feminist activists a secure paycheck and platform.” The feminist infiltration of the United Nations is one of the biggest reasons why this once-respected organization has lost its social relevance and moral compass. Ambassador Bolton, let’s put this proposal out of its misery before it inflicts any more damage Half-Truths about Human Trafficking Raman was forced to work as a brick-maker to pay off a debt incurred years before by his grandfather. For years, he was paid three rupees (two cents) for a bag of bricks. If he didn’t work hard enough and long enough, he was beaten with a stick. Michael, 15, was kidnapped to serve as a combatant in the Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army. During that that time, he was forced to kill another boy, and on another occasion was forced to watch as a boy was hacked to death. Over the last 10 years, globalization has triggered an unprecedented demand for unskilled and low-skilled laborers. Employers from countries with booming economies in Europe, Asia, and the Near East scour the globe in search of willing bodies to work in construction, manufacturing, agriculture, and domestic work. Because working conditions are often grim, employers often tap the most vulnerable segments of the population. In some cases, women and girls are caught up in prostitution rings. In its worst form, a desperate parent sells a child into modern-day slavery. Like young Nayla of Azerbeijan, ransomed by her mother to traffickers, who was then shipped to Dubai to work as a club prostitute. No one knows the extent to which human trafficking exists around the world, but many believe able-bodied males represent the most vulnerable group. A recent United Nations report, Trafficking in Persons: Global Patterns, noted, “it is men especially who might be expected to be trafficked for forced labor purposes.” A report issued last month by the U.S. State Department notes that in several parts of the world, boys are forced into pick-pocketing gangs. In West African countries, men posing as Moslem scholars lure young boys away from their parents with the promise of teaching them the Koran. Once removed from the custody of their parents, the boys are turned into common street beggers. [www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2006/65983.htm ] In the Middle East, 2,000 young boys from Bangladesh have been taken away from their families to become camel jockeys in the Persian Gulf states. These boys are highly sought-after because they are the lightest possible riders for races. And when civil conflicts flare up in Africa and Latin America, boys as young as 12 years old find themselves pressed into military combat. There are those who would have us believe that the misfortunes of women are somehow more compelling, and therefore they are more deserving of human rights protections. That became apparent in 2000 when the United Nations passed its Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children. What about men? That bias is also found in the legislation of many countries. According to the Trafficking in Persons report, “In many countries, the laws relevant to human trafficking are restricted in their application solely to women. . . In addition, many service providers limit their support and protection only to female and child victims. Thus, exploitation through forced labor is often quite unlikely to come to the attention of those dealing with victims.” Once human trafficking is defined as a crime that only affects women, statistics become meaningless. U.S. authorities have stated that up to two million women and children are trafficked each year across international borders. But a 2002 report from the Washington, DC-based Migration Policy Institute exposed the flaw behind that claim: These “numbers are widely regarded as very conservative because they do not including trafficking within countries, nor do they take into account the trafficking of men.” Gender bias persists to this day. Recently Janice Shaw Crouse wrote an article for National Review titled “No Tolerance for Human Trafficking.” Despite its high-minded invocation of the human rights issue, Crouse’s article does not devote a single word to the male victims of human trafficking. [article.nationalreview.com/?q=NWEyODBjZDkxYWQ4OWU0YjZjMDUzNTk3ZjY0MGFhZjQ= ] Crouse’s crusade is to curb prostitution, a human vice that is demeaning to women and men alike. But in the process, she tries to smear the entire military establishment: “It’s a given that prostitution coexists with military bases and installations. Where there are military forces, you’ll find brothels.” Mrs. Crouse makes no mention of the laborers with calloused hands and broken hearts whose passports are removed by their employers and told to work ever harder. No comment about the men who are ordered to never report the abuses being perpetrated against them. Nothing of the millions of Ramans and Michaels around the world who are forced into lives of destitution and involuntary servitude. It is high irony that some segments of a movement that purports to advance human rights would deem half the world’s population as less worthy of attention and concern. That stance, morally repugnant and intellectually indefensible, undermines the very notion of human rights for all. Twelve-Step Feminist Cure It’s a condition that’s known to be chronic, progressive, and highly contagious. With my own eyes I’ve seen bright, caring women fall under the sway of its deceptive allure. They soon begin to speak and act like someone possessed. Its initiates are taught that women are “strong and invincible,” but at the same time are the victims of an implacable patriarchal conspiracy. These self-contradictory beliefs induce a stress-producing condition known as cognitive dissonance. To relieve the discomfort, the girls are instructed to immerse themselves in the radical ideology. The next stage of the disease is marked by a loss of sense of humor, self-centeredness, and a decreasing ability to perceive reality accurately. Some adherents refuse to use lip-stick or brush their hair, believing such actions contribute to their “objectification.” As the condition progresses, serious psychiatric symptoms begin to appear, including paranoia, hysteria, and intense anger. Some of these persons become diagnosed with conditions such as borderline personality disorder. [www.orangecounty.net/html/living_article5.html ] In its most extreme form, the disorder becomes life-threatening. Just look at the picture of high-priestess Andrea Dworkin that was taken shortly before her untimely death last year: www.theage.com.au/ffximage/2005/04/15/andrea_dworkin_narrowweb__200x266.jpg Somehow Ms. Dworkin doesn’t appear particularly liberated or enlightened. In fact she looks downright miserable. It’s hard to dispute the fact that millions of women have been duped by the chimera of radical feminism. How will we help these poor ladies? One program, Rachel’s Vineyard, offers weekend retreats to help women (and men) grieve the loss of their aborted children. That’s a good start. But many feminists have become skeptical of the value of therapy. Traditional cognitive approaches don’t work, of course, because these women have been taught that reason and logical thinking are the cause of their distress. Other women got involved in a rogue form of counseling called “feminist psychotherapy,” which teaches patients that patriarchy is the cause of all their woes. [www.womensfreedom.org/artic552.htm ] Imagine going to a counselor to get help for your abusive tendencies, and being told join the N.O.W. for the cure! Wonder how much they charge for that advice? Obviously psychotherapy will make only a dent in the epidemic. What we need is a massive de-programming effort to help the millions of Gender Studies grads who now endure lives of resentment and barren solitude. They urgently need a helping hand – what will we do? The solution is a 12-step self-help program -- you guessed it: Feminists Anonymous. With no apologies to the Friends of Bill, here are the 12 Steps to gender recovery: 1. We admitted we were powerless over feminism -- that our lives had become bitter, lonely, and meaningless. 2. We came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. 3. We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him. (That’s right, Him. Now’s the time to get rid of that Wiccan broomstick stashed in your closet.) 4. We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. (Hint: Humility is the first step in the path to self-awareness.) 5. We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. 6. We were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character -- despite the self-professed good intentions of Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem. 7. We humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. 8. We made a list of all men and women we had harmed, living and unborn, and became willing to make amends to them. (Practice saying, “I’m sorry” in front of the mirror each morning.) 9. We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would be impossible, or would injure them or others. 10. We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it. (If you haven’t already taken your name off the Feminist Majority alert list, do it now.) 11. We sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. 12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to feminists, and to practice these principles in all our affairs. Over the years I’ve seen far too many families destroyed, too many men broken, too many children harmed, and too many women forced into “choices” that they later came to regret. These women deserve our compassion and understanding. Let’s put an end to the insanity. VDay: Until the Hysteria Stops If you happened to take in a Yankees game last week, you probably saw the message flashing on the stadium’s giant screen: “Until the Violence Stops: NYC.” Next Tuesday you can trot over to Prospect Park and “Run Until the Violence Stops.” And the colorful posters dotting the subways constantly remind us to “make New York City the safest place on the earth for girls and women.” What’s going on? An invasion of the New Jersey purse-snatchers? Well, if you haven’t heard, Eve Ensler, that nice lady who brought us The Vagina Monologues, decided it wasn’t enough to get college girls to ritualistically chant that three-syllable word that starts with a ‘V.’ “When I started this 10 years ago, no one said the word ‘vagina,’” Ensler notes with satisfaction. “Something has shifted in people.” Now there’s an accomplishment to put on your resumé. And a two-week “arts festival” (that’s what the New York Times calls it) is just the beginning. [www.untiltheviolencestops.org/go.php ] The NYC event soon will be serialized with encore performances in Chicago and elsewhere. And for V-Day’s 10th anniversary, we’ll all be snapping up tickets for the big do in the New Orleans Superdome. Before long the Girl Scouts will be selling cookies stamped with the letters “VDAY” and school textbooks will hail Ensler as the reincarnation of Florence Nightingale. Any way you cut it, VDAY is beyond absurd. Men are four times more likely to be homicide victims than women. And the latest research shows women, not men, are more likely to engage in domestic violence. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2006/0607roberts.html ] Of course if a couple gets into a mix-up, the lady is more likely to get hurt. But can we expect men to tolerate the abuse forever, especially when the domestic violence hotlines treat men who call for help like perps trying to game the system? And police officers treat male victims like they are the aggressors, no questions asked. Remember former NFL quarterback Warren Moon? His wife started the fight by hurling a candlestick. But when Moon tried to act in self-defense, the police took him away in hand-cuffs. [www.mediaradar.org/docs/Justice-Denied-DV-Arrest-Policies.pdf ] Maybe we’re being too harsh on Miss Ensler. After all in the feminist worldview, violence is not just being punched, kicked, or shoved. To the luna-chicks, careless facial gestures and inconsiderate name-calling are all proof of the epidemic of violence that those strong, invincible women must endure. And then there’s the rampant garden-variety caterwauling – shameful! We know that caring, emotive women are far more likely to make facial gestures than those unfeeling, stoic men. So when the Goofball Girls talk about violence against women, they’re really referring to those villainous ladies who cast grimacing looks. This is not the first time in recorded history of an outbreak of mass hysteria. The Salem witch-hunts. The recreational lynchings of Black men. McCarthyism. The Vietnam War demonstrations. But there is something especially frightening about the contemporary outpouring of feminist angst. Because as the recipient of billions of dollars in government largesse, the domestic violence crusade carries the imprimatur of political legitimacy. Even the titans of industry have begun to smile on VDAY. The Rockefeller Foundation kicked in $500,000 for the New York City program. I wonder what John D. would have to say about dissipating his oil fortune on a high-estrogen rant? Verizon was another VDAY Sugar Daddy. And the Avon Foundation coughed up profits from sales of beauty products. Mascara to cover up the bruises – get it? Our nation’s frenetic crusade to “stop the violence” is steadily taking us away from our fundamental notions of freedom and protection from government intrusion. It is making a mockery of equal justice under law. And it has destroyed countless families thanks to false charges of domestic abuse. Every person who cares about saving our country from government tyranny dressed up as gender liberation should read last month’s bell-ringer by Phyllis Schlafly: “Violence Against Women Act money is used by anti-male feminists to train judges, prosecutors and police in the feminist myths that domestic violence is a contagious epidemic, and that men are naturally batterers and women are naturally victims.” The result is a constitutional nightmare: “This criminalizing of ordinary private behavior and incarceration without due process follows classic police-state practices. Evidence is irrelevant, hearsay is admissible, defendants have no right to confront their accusers, and forced confessions are a common feature.” [www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=14822 ] It’s time for outraged citizens to voice their opinions to corporate America: Rockefeller Foundation: Telephone 800-645-1133; E-mail Verizon media contact John Bonomo: Telephone 518-396-1095; E-mail Avon Foundation: Telephone 866-505-AVON; E-mail Until the hysteria stops. Playing Politics with the Federal Fatherhood Initiative Last week the Pope issued a wake-up call to persons of all religious persuasions. “Never before in history,” the pontiff warned, has the family “been so threatened as in today’s culture.” As the traditional defender and protector of the family, it’s no surprise that fathers and fatherhood have taken the brunt of the Leftist-feminist onslaught. Fatherhood has come under attack on six fronts: 1. Smearing dads with the “patriarchal” epithet 2. Claiming that fathers and mothers are socially interchangeable 3. Removing fathers’ legal say in abortion decisions 4. Encouraging moms to summarily evict their husbands under the pretext of domestic “abuse” 5. Allowing inequities in child custody awards 6. Enacting child support laws that send men to jail for not paying money that they don’t have in the first place No wonder American families are falling apart. And no surprise that so many eligible bachelors avow no interest in marriage. Back in 1995 president Bill Clinton directed all federal agencies to review their programs with an eye to strengthening fatherhood. With the high-profile backing of vice president Al Gore, the federal Fatherhood Initiative sprang to life. Conferences were held, research agendas were developed, and fathers were on a roll. But the Lavender Ladies began to fret over the “infiltration” of fathers’ rights groups and plotted to throw a monkey-wrench into the operation. Finally someone had a stroke of genius: we’ll insert the adjectival “responsible” before the word “fatherhood.” Who could ever oppose that? So in his June 17, 2000 Father’s Day radio address, Bill Clinton gave his blessing to the catechism of Responsible Fatherhood, making it clear that responsible dads always make their child support payments on time. [www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=58649 ] Problem is, that high-sounding phrase is a demeaning affront to fathers. It’s like saying mothers need to be taught how to be nurturing, and of course we need a government program to take care of that. What mom in her right mind would ever go to a class called, “Caring Motherhood”? With the Fatherhood Initiative now under the ideological thumb of the child support zealots, the whole effort quickly lost its momentum. A few months later George W. Bush was elected on a platform that included shoring up the traditional family. Bush tapped Wade Horn to head up the Administration for Children and Families, a gargantuan $49 billion welfare bureaucracy that covers everything from Head Start, child abuse, homeless youth, and child support enforcement. A psychologist by training, Dr. Horn had served as president of the National Fatherhood Initiative for eight years. Horn seemed destined to be the go-to guy to re-focus and re-energize the Fatherhood Initiative. In the religious tradition, confession must precede atonement. Unfortunately, the Administration for Children and Families has never admitted the heinous sin of Great Society welfare programs that made fathers redundant, thus decimating the traditional family in low-income communities. Wade Horn did not wish to do battle with his own Office for Child Support Enforcement. In fact, he became its vocal proponent. In 2003 Horn wrote in Crisis magazine, “In such cases, are we to simply turn our backs on negligent non-custodial parents who refuse to support their children financially?” [www.crisismagazine.com/letters.htm] That stinks like a pile of fresh barnyard manure. Everyone knows that the problem of non-payment of child support is concentrated among low-income fathers. It’s not Lexus-driving dads who have “negligently” abandoned their kids. The problem is a scandalous government program that saddles poor men with a debt they can never hope to pay off. The disinformation continues when we are told that responsible fatherhood also means reducing the “violence committed by men.” [fatherhood.hhs.gov/factsheets/fact20020426.htm ] Shame on the ACF for ignoring the well-known fact that women are just as likely – or even more prone – to engage in domestic violence. Eventually even well-meaning bureaucrats began to lose interest. Check out the Fatherhood Initiative’s “What’s New” page, and you’ll see its “new” information was last updated one year ago on June 20, 2005. [fatherhood.hhs.gov/whatsnew.shtml ] Guess not much is happening with fatherhood these days. The Fatherhood Initiative has become an orphan program that the Sisterhood would happily kill off, but the higher-ups know that would be politically embarrassing. So the Initiative now floats in bureaucratic cyberspace with no defined mandate, leadership, operating structure, or budget. So as we celebrate Father’s Day this year, we might reflect on Bill Clinton’s disingenuous radio address six years ago, and how the red-fems schemed to leave millions of American boys and girls without their daddies. One only hopes that God will be merciful. Is Feminism a Mental Disorder? Peer into the dark heart of radical feminism, and you’ll get a glimpse of a seething caldron of delusion, phobia, and paranoia. Visit the N.O.W. website and you’ll see dark warnings that “women are still not receiving equal pay for equal work.” Things are even worse at the National Abortion Rights League, which alerts us that President Bush “has waged a tireless war on women’s reproductive rights and personal privacy.” But the greatest feminist boogeyman is domestic violence. No other issue so propels the luna-chicks into a wailing convulsion of breast-beating and hair-pulling. As a service to my readers, I must state the following warning: DV HYSTERIA IS HIGHLY CONTAGIOUS. The only known way to prevent the spread of this condition is to inoculate yourself with the facts. So let’s see what the research has to say. Recently the Journal of Family Psychology reported on a national survey of married and co-habiting partners. In 4.6% of the couples, the woman had engaged in “severe” partner violence, compared to only 2.1% of couples with male violence. [www.smu.edu/experts/study-documents/family-violence-study-may2006.pdf ] Just two weeks ago University of New Hampshire researcher Murray Straus spoke at a New York City conference to share his latest research on dating violence. His conclusions told the same story: female-only violence is twice as common as male-only violence – not just in the United States, but in 32 nations around the world. [pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/ ] Got that? More often than not it’s the woman who’s violent, and the man is on the receiving end of the abuse. Now prepare yourself for the ideological onslaught. Here’s feminist icon Gloria Steinem: “Patriarchy requires violence or the subliminal threat of violence in order to maintain itself. . . The most dangerous situation for a woman is not an unknown man in the street, or even the enemy in wartime, but a husband or lover in the isolation of their own home.” But it’s not just a few miscreant wife-beaters -- “It’s every man and in every class of society,” according to Gudrun Schyman, founder of the Swedish Feminist Initiative. That settles it, hubbies. All these years you thought you were a dutiful protector for your family. But it turns out you’re really a perpetrator. Sometimes DV hysteria erupts into an incoherent rant. Here’s Lis Wiehl writing for Fox News just last week: “This is one plague that doesn’t discriminate. It affects all women equally, whether rich, poor, religious, non-religious, black, or white.” Not to interrupt a good catharsis, Ms. Wiehl, but you might want to re-read the fifth and sixth paragraphs of this column. As I’m sure your Harvard Law profs told you, always read the evidence before you render an opinion. Feminist dementia even impairs persons’ ability to perform simple arithmetic. This month’s issue of Mother Jones features domestic violence statistics. Blithely ignorant of the research, the issue claims that 73% of abuse victims are female and 15% are men. [www.motherjones.com/news/featurex/2005/07/dv_stats.html ] Let’s see, 73 plus 15 equals 88. Whatever happened to the other 12%? Oh there I go again, being so linear. Ann Coulter’s latest book, Godless: The Church of Liberalism devotes an entire chapter to our national epidemic of “Sobbing, Hysterical Women.” This coming week thousands of these sad-sack fems will congregate in New York City to attend a VDAY celebration organized by Eve Ensler. Anyone who has heard of Ensler’s raunchy Vagina Monologues knows this will be no ladies’ sewing circle. On Monday, June 12 the faithful are being summoned to attend Ensler’s “once-in-a-lifetime” reading of her play Necessary Targets. The story highlights the plight of female refugees in the Bosnian civil conflict. The moral of the play: if only peace-lovin’ women were put in charge, war would come to an end and the gender utopia could commence. This time around, a two-week purification ritual is being called for. So VDAY will continue with late-night monologues, rants, and ritualistic chanting about female genitalia. The festival will conclude on June 27 with a 5K run through Prospect Park to exorcise any remaining demons. [www.untiltheviolencestops.org/go.php ] Feminism has morphed from an enlightened social movement into high-octane mass hysteria, shunning reason and fact in its compulsive quest to flog the long-dead horse of patriarchy. This movement has become the beneficiary of billions of dollars in government largesse, much of which is channeled in programs designed to recruit ever-more women into its seductive fold. Abuse hysteria is on the move and poses a threat to the well-being of millions of normal, happy women. That makes it worthy of a full-fledged psychiatric diagnosis. Here it is: FIPH – feminist-induced phobic hysteria. The Day the Matriarchy Came to Power It was a bloodless coup. It happened under the penumbra of the law. In fact chief justice William Rehnquist presided at the event. The date was January 20, 1993. The recent November elections had announced the Year of the Woman, with Dianne Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Carol Moseley Braun, and Patty Murray all sweeping into the U.S. Senate. Everyone knew the federal bureaucracy was a stronghold for those domineering patriarchs. Obviously that needed to change. First, equal justice had to be turned into feminist justice. So the Rodham-Clinton co-presidency brought in Janet Reno to direct the Department of Justice. The NOW Legal Defense Fund hailed the dowdy Reno as “a stellar attorney with an extraordinary track record.” Not to be outdone, the Department of Education brought in radical chicana Norma Cantu to head up its civil rights office. Cantu made “proportionality” the only test for Title IX compliance. Ten years later, 80,000 slots for male athletes had been eliminated from more than 350 men’s sports teams. Next, the gender wage gap had to be fixed, so Karen Nussbaum was named director of the Women’s Bureau at the Labor Department. With Hillary perched approvingly at her side, Nussbaum issued the “Working Women Count!” report. The study revealed that many working women believe “I do not get paid what I think my job is worth.” Welcome to the real world, ladies. Over at the Department of Defense, SecDef Les Aspin was given marching orders to clean up the lingering fallout from the Navy aviators’ Tailhook fiasco. So just three months after he took office, Aspin issued a historic order: “The services shall permit women to compete for assignments in aircraft, including aircraft engaged in combat missions.” Then the blue-ribbon Department Advisory Committee on Women in the Services got into the act. The group opted to extend Aspin’s order, pushing for female involvement in submarine crews, Multiple Launch Rocket Systems jobs, and Special Operations Forces. Before long the group – officially designated as DACOWITS – came to be known as “Lack-o-Wits.” With all the liberated single women clamoring for taxpayer-funded husband substitutes, the next order of business was to expand the Nanny State. So Hillary looked to her gal-pal Donna Shalala to head up the sprawling Department of Health and Human Services. Shalala had earlier turned the Hunter College women’s studies program into a radical feminist outpost. Within months of her appointment, Shalala would lend credence to the porker about medical research being conducted from the “white male point of view.” [www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/sommers-camelot ] But Hillary’s greatest obsession was the promotion of international feminism. So she leaned on Bill to nominate Madeleine Albright to the United Nations ambassador post. During her stint at the U.N. and later as Secretary of State, Albright was a tireless advocate for abortion on demand. Hitting all the right notes, she once claimed, “our voluntary family planning programs serve our broader interests by elevating the status of women, reducing the flow of refugees, protecting the environment, and promoting economic growth.” The U.N. had slated its Conference on Women to be held in China in September 1995. Albright was named to chair the U.S. Delegation, and Hillary Clinton was tabbed to deliver the keynote speech Afterwards, president Clinton created the President's Interagency Council on Women. The Council’s mission was to “follow up on U.S. commitments made at the UN Fourth World Conference on Women” – meaning that whatever promises Albright had made during her Beijing junket should now be imposed by fiat on the rest of us. The high-flying Council was headed by the triumvirate of Hillary Rodham Clinton, Madeleine Albright, and Donna Shalala. Meeting monthly, reps from all the top-level federal agencies were instructed to implement the Beijing Platform for Action. [www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/beijing/platform ] One of the Council’s Work Groups was tasked to “develop procedures that ensure the integration of a gender perspective into the policies and operations of government so that different impacts on men and women may be determined and inequities addressed.” That’s fem-speak for “pressure the male geezers to retire, so women can come in and run the show.” Sure enough, from 1994 to 2002 the number of male professional workers in the federal government fell by 17%, while the number of female employees actually rose. [www.opm.gov/feddata/demograp/demograp.asp ] Laws such as the Violence Against Women Act and the Gender Equity in Education Act were enacted. The federal government was soon beholden to a far-reaching array of programs designed to promote the socialist agenda of the U.N. Conference on Women. And that’s how a feminist cabal overthrew the entrenched federal Patriarchy in eight short years. Legal Services Corporation Turns its Back on Men Chances are you don’t pay much attention to the Legal Services Corporation, a hold-over from the glory days of the Great Society. This bureaucracy ekes by on $335 million in federal money – chump change by Washington standards. The LSC was created for a good purpose: to provide legal services so poor Americans could have their day in court. But while taxpayers and lawmakers looked the other way, the Legal Services Corporation has fallen under the sway of a radical gender ideology. The Journal of Family Psychology recently published a study that revealed wives and girlfriends are more likely to engage in domestic violence than their male partners. According to researcher Renee McDonald, 18.2% of the couples had experienced female-on-male violence, while male-on-female aggression was found in only 13.7% of partners. This is not news. For the last 30 years, researchers have proven time and time again that women were at least as likely as men to commit acts of family violence. [www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm ] But to radical feminists, ideology always trumps the facts. This has real-world consequences. When the Legal Services Corporation was created in 1974, the idea was to help poor people deal with absentee landlords and faceless welfare bureaucracies. But along came welfare reform in 1996, and the LSC suddenly found many of its clients were no longer in need of its services. Time for Plan B. Plan B was to implement the radical feminist agenda. That agenda says domestic violence is the tool that brutish patriarchs wield to keep women in their place. So at the LSC, the most common type of cases became family issues, “many of which involve securing protective order to keep spouses and children safe from domestic violence,” according to the LSC’s latest Annual Report. [www.lsc.gov/about/annualreport.php ] Drill down and the full truth emerges. Legal Service attorneys have “Represented battered women seeking orders of protection, child support enforcement, and divorces from abusive spouses,” according to the LSC’s Press Kit. What about battered men seeking orders of protection? The LSC website reveals many examples of taxpayer money being used to represent women claiming to be victims of abuse – but not a single example of its funds going to help abused men. For example, Legal Services funds were used to establish a policy with the Texas Public Utility Commission so “when women meet with legal aid attorneys for protective orders, those same attorneys can also provide practical help in securing affordable shelter.” That news appeared in the Winter 2005 issue of Equal Justice Magazine. Apparently its editors were oblivious to the irony of male victims of domestic violence being denied equal justice. [ejm.lsc.gov/EJMIssue10/brief_T38_R5.php ] The Legal Services Corporation website highlights the story of “Debra” in Minnesota, who claimed to be falsely accused of child abuse by her ex-husband. LSC attorneys succeeded in dismissing the protection order and returning the children to her custody. [www.lsc.gov/about/clientstories.php#mn ] Apparently poor men are never subjected to false allegations of abuse, or at least are unworthy of receiving free legal services. One of the LSC’s grant recipients is MidPenn Legal Services in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The firm’s latest annual report tells of Deborah Lucas who secured a protective order and won custody of her child. The report makes no mention of abused men being helped by MidPenn. [www.midpenn.org/DL/MidPenn_04_AnnualRpt.pdf ] Earlier this month, several Pennsylvania judges revealed that MidPenn and other local law firms are scripting the statements that women make to the courts to request restraining orders. This revelation was made to associates of the North Carolina-based True Equality Network. The judges expressed concern over the reluctance of local D.A.s to prosecute false claims of abuse, according to True Equality president Terri Lynn Tersak. Pennsylvania’s sweeping domestic violence law includes, “Knowingly engaging in a course of conduct or repeatedly committing acts toward another person, including following the person, without proper authority, under circumstances which place the person in reasonable fear of bodily injury.” So a father who makes any effort to see his children could be accused of placing the mother in “fear,” thus putting the man at risk of being thrown in jail. As a result, caring, decent fathers have simply been cut off from seeing their own children. Back in Washington DC, the future of the Legal Services Corporation looks bright, its financial health now secure. Because the Violence Against Women Act, recently re-enacted by president Bush, now allows the LSC to provide services to all women who claim to be domestic violence victims, regardless of their immigration status. [www.lsc.gov/pdfs/progltr06-2.pdf ] All aboard the domestic violence gravy train. Has Matriarchy made the Sexes Equal? A number of years ago someone came up with the idea that Patriarchy was the cause of untold misery and hardship of women. So why not let the ladies run the show for awhile and see if they can clean up the mess? That idea began to take root, and on January 20, 1993, the Matriarchy came into power. That’s the day the Rodham-Clinton co-presidency checked into the White House. After thirteen years of social engineering designed to advance the feminist agenda, we can ask, Are we now closer to the long-awaited gender utopia? To answer that question, we might first note that despite its widely-publicized shortcomings, the Patriarchy had at least a few redeeming features. Women have long enjoyed special consideration by chivalrous lawmakers. For example, women were exempted from the military draft and spared from the most hazardous occupations. Because of their longer life spans, females were favored by government programs such as Social Security and Medicare. The eligibility criteria for welfare programs such as Medicaid gave preference to custodial parents, another nod to mothers. Such multi-billion dollar programs, we might note, were largely conceived, enacted, and paid for by those linear-thinking patriarchs. Like socialism, Matriarchy avers to be an enlightened and egalitarian form of social order. Let’s probe that claim. We’ll start with abortion. When feminists pushed to legalize the procedure, did they envision that fathers and pregnant women would be equal in their decision-making? Hardly. The feminists’ harsh refrain was “our bodies, ourselves.” When Carol Gilligan and her comrades pushed for the 1994 Gender Equity in Education Act – a law that cast the spotlight on the needs of schoolgirls -- did they mention that boys had always lagged on tests of reading achievement? Not to my recollection. When president Bill Clinton named hard-Left feminist Norma Cantu as director of the Department of Education civil rights office, she became obsessed about the under-representation of girls in college sports programs. But did she ever worry about the under-representation of boys on dean’s lists and honor societies? Not on your life! When Hillary Clinton lobbied behind the scenes for the Violence against Women Act, did she ever muse about the well-known fact that men, too, are often victims of domestic violence? Nope. And when the former First Lady advocated for women’s health, did she ever comment on the odd fact that men were dying 6 years earlier than women? Well, I guess I missed that speech. Not to pile on HRC too much, but when she stumps for her Paycheck Fairness Act, does she ever mention the glass ceiling that keeps men from working fewer hours, accepting less stressful jobs, and retiring at an earlier age, as their wives often do? Ditto on that one. When the Lavender Ladies lobbied to stiffen penalties for non-payment of child support, did they ever address the problem of custodial moms who blocked their ex’s from seeing their own kids? Answer in the negative. When feminists speak about child custody, do they espouse the rhetoric of equality and fairness? Not in New York, at least, where last month feminists lobbied ferociously against a bill that would have allowed an equal presumption of joint custody. So despite all the feminist hoopla about gender equality, it is difficult to find even a single example where reality measures up to rhetoric. Alexis de Tocqueville was a political thinker who charted the early stirrings of socialism in the years following the French Revolution. Tocqueville sagely noted, “Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.” In 1831 Tocqueville journeyed to the United States to study our nascent democracy. Noting similar socialistic yearnings in America, he made this prescient observation: “There are people in Europe who, confounding together the different characteristics of the sexes, would make man and woman into beings not only equal but alike. They would give to both the same functions, impose on both the same duties, and grant to both the same rights; they would mix them in all things-their occupations, their pleasures, their business. It may readily be conceived that by thus attempting to make one sex equal to the other, both are degraded, and from so preposterous a medley of the works of nature nothing could ever result but weak men and disorderly women.” Weak men and disorderly women – an apt description of how things stand in America, circa 2006. Comic Relief from the World Health Organization Feeling a little bored, maybe suffering from after-the-holiday blues? The World Health Organization never fails to provide a moment of levity in our otherwise hum-drum lives. Take the AIDS epidemic. After all these years of seeing the epidemic spread unchecked, I’m beginning to wonder if the world health body views AIDS as its stealth population control strategy. If that statement seems a bit harsh, consider the WHO’s “safe sex” campaign which pushes this Russian-roulette message: “Go ahead and enjoy no-fault sex with multiple partners, just so long as you use a condom.” As we know, condoms fail 15% of the time. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/1207roberts.html ] And if you want a real belly laugh, check out the WHO Sex Work Toolkit, designed to make prostitutes feel good about themselves as they service their AIDS-infected clientele. Just in case you were worried, the Toolkit comes with this disclaimer: “In no event shall the World Health Organization be liable for damages arising from its use.” [who.arvkit.net/sw/en/index.jsp ] Then there’s the malaria epidemic that claims the lives of millions each year. Spraying tiny amounts of DDT on the walls of houses is highly effective in killing malaria-infected mosquitoes. But the WHO won’t allow household spraying because – you guessed it -- that might offend the environmentalists. And last July the WHO added two abortion-inducing drugs – RU-486 and Mifrepex – to its list of “essential medicines.” At least WHO won’t have to worry about providing so many vaccines and vitamin pills to little kids. Here’s the most recent laugh-getter from the World Health Organization. Can you imagine the world body doing a study that cherry-picks its participants and relies on flawed methods in order to reach a pre-determined conclusion? That’s exactly what the WHO did with its recent “Multi-Country Study on Women’s Health and Domestic Violence Against Women.” [www.who.int/gender/violence/who_multicountry_study/en/index.html ] Every study I’ve seen shows that domestic violence is an equal opportunity problem. Professor Murray Straus of the University of New Hampshire interviewed over 8,000 men and women in 16 countries around the world. He found high rates of assault “perpetrated by both male and female students.” [pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/ID16.pdf ] And recent reports from Canada [http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/85-224-XIE/85-224-XIE2005000.pdf ] and Australia [www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,17051698%255E1702,00.html ] likewise reveal that women are equally likely to assault their male partners. But that rendition of gender equality didn’t sit too well with the lavender ladies at WHO’s department of Gender, Women, and Health. They solved that problem by designing a study that – you guessed right again – only interviewed females. Then the WHO asked radical feminist organizations around the world to conduct the surveys. That’s like doing a study on persons’ opinions about wearing animal fur, and letting PETA run the show. Since the interviewers knew nothing about how to do surveys, they were put through a 3-week indoctrination – er, training – program. The training was based on a manual called “Researching Violence Against Women” [www.path.org/files/GBV_rvaw_front.pdf ], which, not surprisingly, had very little to say about domestic violence against men. Of course they ensured the survey not ask any questions whether the woman had ever injured her husband or boyfriend – that might get a little embarrassing. To top it off, they did a little definitional hocus-pocus, absurdly claiming that “abuse” is the same as “violence. To no one’s great surprise, the survey found that there’s plenty domestic violence around the world, and of course it’s those brutish men who are at fault. Predictably the WHO apparatchiks blamed it on the all-powerful patriarchy: “Violence against women is both a consequence and a cause of gender inequality,” laments the report. Then they got the boss to give a headline-grabbing endorsement. “This study shows that women are more at risk from violence at home than in the street and this has serious repercussions for women’s health,” according to WHO director Lee Jong-wook. Of course Dr. Jong-wook never mentioned that men are twice as likely as women to die from violence-related causes. That fact didn’t quite fit into the punch-line. As if that wasn’t enough, the WHO had the arrogance and chutzpah to bill the fraudulent survey as a “landmark study.” [www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2005/pr62/en ] It may be true that laughter is the best medicine, but this time the joke’s on us -- the U.S. taxpayer. In order to support this misguided comedy routine, each year the United States sends the WHO $95 million for assessed dues, and another $45 million for so-called “extra-budgetary” contributions. That money is funneled through the Office for Global Health Affairs in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Eventually your hard-earned money winds up in the Swiss bank account of a UN bureaucracy that lacks fairness, accountability, or intellectual honesty. Joe Biden's Weird Sense of Chivalry Call it senator Joseph Biden’s family secret. He grew up with a bully-sister. She didn’t just boss people around – she beat people up. Her name was Valerie. She was Joe’s younger sister. How do we know this? Because Mr. Biden, with his usual unblemished candor, told us. It happened during the Senate hearings held on December 11, 1990 to probe the problem of violence against women. This was Biden’s tell-all: “In my house, being raised with a sister and three brothers, there was an absolute – it was a nuclear sanction, if under any circumstances, for any reason, no matter how justified, even self-defense – if you ever touched your sister, not figuratively, literally. My sister, who is my best friend, my campaign manager, my confidante, grew up with absolute impunity in our household.” And this was the good senator’s bell-ringer: “And I have the bruises to prove it. I mean that sincerely. I am not exaggerating when I say that.” Most politicians who had experienced that type of childhood trauma would be pushing for a law to protect children from abusive female siblings. But Mr. Biden’s reaction was different -- champion a law designed to protect women. Call it the Patty Hearst syndrome, in which an abused person comes to identify with his tormentor. Why does this matter? Because thanks to senator Biden’s chivalry, taxpayers are now saddled with a billion-dollar-a-year boondoggle called the Violence Against Women Act, a law that looks the other way on female batterers and throws men in jail when they act in self-defense. Twenty-some years ago, progressive-thinking men began to kow-tow to the feminist shibboleth that patriarchy was at the root of all of society’s woes. This belief was voiced by the eminent physician Lewis Thomas, author of The Youngest Science: Notes of a Medicine-Watcher, who floated this wacko proposal: “Taking all in all, the history of human governments suggests to me that the men of the earth have had a long enough run at running things; their record of folly is now so detailed and documented as to make anyone fear the future in their hands. It is time for a change. Put the women in charge, I say. Let us go for a century without men voting, with women’s suffrage as the only suffrage.” Of course, we now have the record of folly when feminists sink their talons into once-proud organizations like the World Health Organization, [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2006/0104roberts.html ], Amnesty International [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/0420roberts.html ], and even the Girl Scouts. [www.intellectualconservative.com/article3139.html ] Chivalry has now been transmogrified into a convoluted line of thinking that reasons, “Yes, we must treat women as equals, so let’s enact another affirmative-action program.” Or better yet, “We’ve never had a female president, so this time it’s their turn.” This inflated sense of chivalry also runs rampant in the legal system, which operates by the unspoken code that women who come before the court always should be given a second chance. You may remember Debra Lafave who was accused of having sex with a 14-year-old student. A few weeks ago Florida prosecutors announced their plan to drop the case. Miss Lafave is now negotiating a lucrative book deal. [www.tbo.com/news/opinion/commentary/MGBMSQ4LBLE.html ] Ladies used to express appreciation to men who extended acts of courtesy and respect. And fortunately most still do. But feminists came along and did a double-cross. First they played on men’s innate sense of chivalry to enact laws and policies that grant women unfair advantage. Then they turned around and claimed chivalry only put a happy-face on gender oppression. Columnist Selwyn Duke reveals the formula: “preach equality, accept favoritism, win with stacked decks, pretend you had no advantage, then rub salt into the wound.” [www.newswithviews.com/Duke/selwyn29.htm ] Another version of the ruse is to claim that men and women are equally chivalrous. Funny, I’ve never heard of a female soldier who charged into a fusillade with the blood-curdling cry, “Death before dishonor.” And some women will pretend that chivalry doesn’t exist, but never hesitate to cash in on a free dinner from her latest heartthrob. Back in Delaware, chivalry is alive and well. Valerie Biden Owens, now employed at a high-powered political consulting firm, continues as to serve as one of senator Biden’s closest political confidantes. This past November, young Joseph “Beau” Biden, III announced his plan to run for attorney general of Delaware. And guess who he picked as his campaign manager? Missy Owens, daughter of Valerie. [www.delawaregrapevine.com/4-06politicking2.asp ] Joey junior is proud to operate at the behest of a woman’s machinations. As he recently announced, “We Biden men know it’s the Biden women who really run the show.” Like father, like son. From Bias to Bigotry: CBS News goes into Free-Fall What will Dan Rather be most remembered for – the forged memos from the ill-fated Texas Air National Guard story? Or will it be this candid admission, “Who among us have not lied about somebody? I think you can be an honest person and lie about any number of things”? No matter, now we have a new contestant in the How-much-can-you-slant-the-news-and-keep-a-straight-face sweepstakes. Her name is Katie Couric, and in a few short weeks she will sashay into the anchor seat at CBS News. You may remember, she was the first host of a morning talk show to ever broadcast her own colonoscopy. Whether the issue is abortion, the gender wage gap, or daycare, Couric has always crooned in harmony with the feminist looney-tunes. She credited Madeleine Albright as being a “rock star” and hailed Nancy Pelosi’s ascension to the House leadership with a “you go, girl!” In a June 2, 1994 interview, Couric invited Christina Hoff Sommers, author of Who Stole Feminism?. When Sommers explained that football does not provoke male viewers into a wife-beating frenzy, Katie offered this response: “Let’s say, if one accepts your thesis, that these statistics are inflated or used incorrectly. Aren’t you worried about throwing the baby out with the bath water?. . . Aren’t you afraid that you’re going to be dismissing the problem all together if you refute that, or if you constantly criticize that?” So Katie let the cat out of the bag – when feminists make their grandiose claims about brutish patriarchs and downtrodden women, they don’t believe a single word of what they’re saying. It’s just that telling the truth would be tantamount to “dismissing the problem all together.” In 1991, Clarence Thomas was nominated to the Supreme Court. When feminist Anita Hill switched her testimony, senator Arlen Specter remarked on her lack of credibility. Nine years later, Katie was still seething. So on March 6, 2000 she invited Specter to her program and then proceeded to rake him over the coals: “You know you, you angered a lot of feminists when you accused Anita Hill. In fact, you detailed how she changed her testimony during questioning, during the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings. And you accused of her publicly, quote, ‘Flat out perjury.’ Any regrets?” Always on the look-out to find sexism where none exists, Ms. Couric invited Time magazine managing editor Jim Kelly to her show on December 22, 2003. Waving the magazine’s Person of the Year issue, Kate demanded, “Tell me why you all decided to honor the American soldier? Wondering why there’s no woman on the cover, too?” When Kelly pointed out the uniformed woman on the front, Couric began to trot out her pre-scripted answer, only to realize too late that she had goofed: “Oh, there you go….oh sorry....I couldn’t tell because of her helmet.” But it was a segment she did on February 8 last year that most exposed her feminist-socialist leanings. The piece featured a taped interview with Gloria Steinem. This was Couric’s best line: “While nearly as many women are now in the workforce as men, they are still paid less. About 76 cents for every dollar a man makes.” Of course Couric was raking in $13 million that year, plus incentive provisions and syndication fees. Yes, Katie knows all about the oppression of women in the workplace. Katie is not just a perky cheerleader for the latest feminist cause-de-jour; she has a history of being an unrepentant gender bigot. In a November 1997 interview of Nicole Contos, the cast-off bride of Tasos Michael, Couric asked Contos, “Have you considered castration as an option?” Katie, I know of women who have gotten wet feet at the last minute. So will you be asking their jilted bridegrooms, “Have you considered vulvectomy as an option?” Just a month later on December 15, Couric reported that commercials directed at men are simple-minded, compared to those aimed at women. That’s because women are capable of more complex thought, according to Katie. But above all, Katie Couric is the lead pom-pom girl for team Hillary. After Mrs. Clinton released her book in 2003, Couric ran a five-part series to commemorate the event. When Hillary invented the story about daughter Chelsea barely escaping a firey death in Battery Park on 9/11, Katie sympathized, “At that moment, she was not just a senator, but a concerned parent.” Tissue, please. So as Katie Couric takes over at CBS News and HRC revs up her presidential campaign, get ready for more fawning interviews, tear-jerker stories, and good ol’ fashioned tall tales. Women's Health Hoax Twenty-some years ago the mavens of medical misfortune sounded their shrill alarm. Hillary Clinton lashed out because of the “appalling degree to which women were routinely excluded from major clinical trials of most illnesses.” Marcia Angell, then editor of the august New England Journal of Medicine, pronounced this lament: “There is little doubt that women have been systematically excluded as subjects for study.” And Dr. Vivian Pinn of the National Institutes of Health wrote, “The exclusion of some women from clinical studies may sometimes be valid, but not all women all the time.” Of course no one had ever bothered to actually compile the numbers, so they were unable to refute the claim. But everyone knew the male-dominated medical research establishment was interested only in prostates and male-pattern baldness, so the ladies’ claims rang true. Now under the political gun, the NIH hastily created its Office for Women’s Health Research. In 1991 president George Bush (the first one) appointed cardiologist Bernadine Healy as director of NIH and gave her a mandate to break the patriarchy’s stranglehold on medical research. Feminists skillfully parlayed public outrage into research agendas and budget allocations. Millions were pumped into breast cancer research, and by 1992, National Cancer Institute funding for breast cancer reached $145 million. No one mentioned that the prostate budget that year barely topped $31 million. [www.nci.nih.gov/public/factbk97/varican.htm ] But skeptics began to doubt the common wisdom. An Institute of Medicine panel looked into the matter and was forced to admit it “could not nail down the truth of the perception that women have been under represented” in medical researc In 1993 Congress passed a law that required the NIH to track sex-specific enrollments. Everyone knew the numbers would reveal an appalling under-representation of members of the fairer sex. So the following year, red-faced NIH officials had to admit things weren’t so grim after all. Participants in NIH-funded studies were 52% female, 45% male, with the remainder being unknown. But no one was going to let facts stand in the way of gender liberation, so the crusade pressed forward. At latest count, male research participation had fallen to 40%. [orwh.od.nih.gov/inclusion/FinalAnnualReport2003-2023.pdf ] Two years ago Dr. S.M. Huang and colleagues at the Food and Drug Administration published a review, “Evaluation of Drugs in Women: Regulatory Perspective.” Tallying up five separate analyses of sex-specific participation, they concluded “women have been included in drug development studies at least since the early 1980s in approximate proportion to the prevalence of disease in them.” Of course the Sisters of Insincerity knew their ruse would eventually be exposed, so they set out to consolidate their gains. Before long a federal bureaucracy devoted to the cause of women’s health had sprung into existence. Those programs would boast a $5 billion budget, four times more than the money allotted to men’s health. There’s a certain irony to all this. Every year the government publishes a compendium of health information that takes the measure of Americans’ health. [www.cdc.gov/nchs/hus.htm ] Leaf through its pages, and you’ll see that men are lagging on practically every measure: death rates, doctor visits, insurance coverage, and so forth. At latest count, the lifespan of women was 80.1 years, with men trailing at 74.8 years. And Black men – their life expectancy is only 69 years. Whatever happened to the vision of gender equality? Today, the women’s health movement has become a multi-billion dollar interest group that tap-dances smoothly among feckless bureaucrats, chivalrous congressmen looking to woo the female vote, groups like the Society for Women’s Health Research lining up to take their cut, and media types desperate for yet another story to pander to their female readership. Women’s health has become elevated to a cult-like status, a religious crusade worthy of Red Dress galas hosted by the First Lady, national events touting a “Race for the Cure,” and a recent front-cover tribute by US News and World Report. Being divinely-blessed is good, because then you can enjoy your Marie Antoinette moments. Child Support Gold-Diggers Laws that protect the fairer sex from rape, domestic violence, and sexual harassment all rest on a simple assumption: women who claim to be victims are almost always telling the truth. Maybe it’s time to revisit that belief. Three weeks ago the National Center for Men filed a lawsuit on behalf of Matt Dubay, 25, who claims his girlfriend repeatedly assured him that she was unable to get pregnant. When she later bore a child, the state of Michigan went after Mr. Dubay for child support. That’s what people used to call entrapment. But chivalrous pundits rose to defend the honor of this damsel in distress, dubbing Mr. Dubay a “sexual predator,” “deadbeat dad,” and – horrors! -- a “weasel.” And if you happen to believe that men should be shouldered with the responsibilities and women enjoy all the rights, their criticisms certainly ring true. Recently That's Life! magazine polled 5,000 women and asked tem if they would lie to get pregnant. Two-fifths of the women – 42% to be exact – said “yes,” according to NCM’s Kingsley Morse. Yikes! But that was just a hypothetical survey. Women would never stick it to a man they actually knew. Or would they? Consider the paternity scam. Here’s how it works: Find any dim-witted man to get you pregnant. Then look up the name of some unsuspecting Joe who’s got a steady job – it doesn’t matter that you never met the poor bloke. Put his name on the baby’s birth certificate. Now cross your fingers and hope the man is out of town when the sheriff delivers the papers. In California, such default judgments account for 70% of paternity decisions, according to a 2003 study by the Urban Institute. Or defraud one of your previous boyfriends, assuming he’s a good breadwinner, of course. That’s what happened to Carnell Smith of Georgia, who willingly assumed financial responsibility for a child, shelling out more than $40,000 in child support over an 11-year period. But when the mother went to court to up the payments, Smith requested genetic testing. That’s when he learned, to his great surprise, that he wasn’t the girl’s father. Stung by the injustice, Mr. Smith founded Citizens Against Paternity Fraud, [paternityfraud.com/pf_fight_back.html ] a group that works to protect men from being cheated by these modern-day Welfare Queens. Last year Michael Gilding, sociology professor at Swinburne University in Australia, reviewed studies from around the world, and concluded that 1-3% of children were fathered by someone other than the man who believes he’s the daddy. Let’s run the math. Four million children are born in the United States each year. Using the mid-range 2% figure, that means 80,000 men become victims of paternity fraud. Yikes again! Ready for the next scam? This one involves false allegations of domestic violence. Each year, one million restraining orders are issued that serve to evict a person – usually a man -- from his own home. Restraining orders have become so commonplace that family lawyers refer to them as silver bullets, slam-dunks, or simply, “divorce planning.” It has been estimated that one-third of those orders are requested as a legal ploy in the middle of a divorce proceeding. Not only are the orders easy to get, in many states a restraining order automatically bans a father from gaining joint custody of his children. [www.mediaradar.org/docs/VAWA-Threat-to-Families.pdf ] So the restraining order granted on the flimsy grounds that he caused “emotional distress” becomes the woman’s meal ticket to many years of child support payments. Prosecutors never go after persons who commit perjury, anyway. And state welfare agencies don’t get upset either, because the federal Office for Child Support Enforcement reimburses 66% of the costs of states’ child support enforcement activities. Think of it as a bounty payment for deleting daddies. So let’s see . . . 42% of women admit they would lie to get pregnant. Each year 80,000 non-biological fathers become victims of paternity fraud. And about 300,000 restraining orders are issued in the middle of a divorce. Assume a father so defrauded finds himself on the hook for $250 a month for each of his children. Over an 18-year period, that comes out to a cushy $54,000, all legally-enforceable, tax-free, and no strings attached. In the past the American legal system was guided by the rule, “No person shall benefit from their own wrong-doing.” But now, hundreds of thousands of women replace that dictum with the self-indulgent excuse: “Get while the getting is good.” Restraining Order Madness Word has gotten out that CBS talk-show host David Letterman has been involved in a secret liaison these past several years. It began back in 1993 when Colleen Nestler of New Mexico began sending Mr. Letterman “thoughts of love,” and Letterman responded with televised code words and seductive eye gestures. According to Ms. Nestler’s 6-page complaint, Letterman soon began to send her mental messages seeking her hand in marriage. But the relationship went sour. Alas, she found herself unable to sleep at night and was forced into bankruptcy. Determined to fight back, Nestler sought legal protection. So this past December 15, Santa Fe judge Daniel Sanchez issued an order instructing Mr. Letterman to not “think of me, and release me from his mental harassment and hammering.” [www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,179430,00.html ] Hammering? One might hope such bizarre events are rare. But it turns out they are commonplace. Each year, 500,000 domestic restraining orders are issued without even an allegation of violence, according to a recent report from R.A.D.A.R. – Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting. [www.mediaradar.org/docs/VAWA-Restraining-Orders.pdf ] These orders are often used as a legal tactic designed to gain an unfair advantage during a divorce proceeding. Columnist Cathy Young explains, “The advantages of a restraining order to the complainant -- exclusive possession of the home (with the alleged abuser often required to continue paying the rent or mortgage), temporary and probably permanent sole custody of the children -- can be tempting.” [http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/1999/10/25/restraining_orders/index2.html ] Case in point is actress Tawny Kitaen, who happened to be addicted to prescription drugs. In April 2002 she was arrested in Newport Beach, CA for attacking her husband, Cleveland Indians pitcher Chuck Finley, after repeatedly kicking him with her high-heeled shoes. [http://espn.go.com/mlb/news/2002/0403/1362902.html v] Following her arrest, Finley filed for divorce and was granted temporary custody of the kids. So she dropped the nuclear bomb of family destruction, accusing Finley of domestic violence, even though she was the one who had been arrested and he had no prior history of abuse. Domestic restraining orders were originally designed to protect persons from actual or imminent harm. But over the years, feminists convinced state legislators to expand the definition of domestic violence. So now if you live in Michigan, placing a family member in fear of mental harm could get you thrown out. In New Jersey, interfering with your spouse’s “well-being” might get you the boot. In Illinois, be careful not to cause any form of “emotional distress,” that could get you in trouble with the law. Now judges crank out orders like counterfeit one-dollar bills. “I think judges grant the restraining orders without asking too many questions,” admits former state Rep. Barbara Gray, a sponsor of the Massachusetts Abuse Prevention Act. Once you’re out of the house, a broad range of once-normal behavior becomes off-limits. If your wife calls and leaves a message, don’t call her back – that’s considered a violation of the order. If one of your kids has a birthday, don’t send him a birthday card – that’s prohibited, too. In most cases, the victim of restraining order abuse is a man. But in about 15% of cases, women are the victims of drive-by restraining orders. How would you react if a friend of yours was fired from his job merely because a co-worker feared – but had absolutely no proof -- he might do something violent? What would you think if a girl was expelled from school merely on the basis of an allegation that she was somehow harassing her classmates? But with domestic orders the stakes are much higher – loss of family and home. New Jersey attorney David Heleniak puts it this way: “In 10 days, the hypothetical husband has gone from having a normal life with a wife, children and home to being a social pariah, homeless, poor, and alone, trapped in a Kafkaesque nightmare.” In the next few days, March Madness will reach its climactic finale. The victorious basketball team will bask in its newly-found glory, the colored streamers will be swept off the court, and college students will go back to their books. But for the rest of us, the threat of another type of madness looms. Black Men, Soul Brothers Tantalize single moms with an array of juicy economic incentives, cripple the Black family, and blame the whole mess on those stingy Conservatives. Going back to LBJ’s Great Society, that’s been the essence of the Left’s social welfare program. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2006/0315roberts.html ] The end result was to disenfranchise the male and marginalize fatherhood. Now we’re paying the price for four decades of the Nanny State. When a girl is raised without the guiding hand of a father, she is at greater risk of engaging in sexual experimentation – with its all-too-predictable consequence of unwanted pregnancy. One analysis found that young women with divorced parents were three times more likely to have an out-of-wedlock birth. Researchers Lorraine Blackman and colleagues recently combed through 125 social science studies and concluded that when fathers are absent, the harmful effects on boys are also traumatic. [www.americanvalues.org/html/consequences.htm ] According to one study, Black teenager boys from broken homes were more likely to be suspended from school and get into trouble with the police. And they were six times more likely to run away from home. But when fathers are allowed to stick around, good things begin to happen. According to Blackman’s review, boys from father-present homes benefit from three times higher parental involvement. As a result the boys have a much higher self-concept. They are more likely to be prepared for school. And to no great surprise, they are more likely to aspire to a college education. Overall, father absence harms boys more than girls. Blackman concludes, “The marriage benefit appears to be much stronger among African American boys, who receive considerably more attention when their father is married and in the home.” Of course no parent is surprised by these commonsense findings, but now we have scientific proof. Some pessimists look at the pattern of intergenerational poverty, crime, and broken families. They wonder whether we will ever find the formula to lift Black men from the bowels of hopelessness and despair. The simple answer is “yes. Yes, we need strong educational development and job training programs to help break the cycles of social pathology. And certainly we must do away with misguided welfare policies and lock-‘em-up child support enforcement. But book-learning, jobs, and policy reform will only be a start. The real answer will be found, I believe, in the hearts of Black men. It is there that an indomitable spirit and an unquenchable thirst for dignity still resides. It was that spirit that in 1968 compelled 1,300 men in Memphis to go on strike. Weary sanitation workers picked up placards on which they had etched the phrase, “I AM A MAN.” Think about those four words for a minute. It was that march for dignity that brought Martin Luther King to Memphis, only to be felled by a sniper’s bullet. That same spirit animated a group of brothers to come together to establish an organization known as 100 Black Men. Forty-odd years later, the group has grown to over 10,000 members working to improve the social and economical opportunities for all African-Americans. That animus drove the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity a few years ago to organize its ambitious Prostate Cancer Global Awareness Campaign. That campaign inspired Anheuser-Busch to pledge $250,000 in support of the effort. Prostate cancer, of course, if far more lethal in Black men than in Whites. It’s that ineffable character that drove the survivors of a tragic syphilis study to establish the Tuskegee Human and Civil Rights Multicultural Center. Chipping in their worn-down dimes and quarters, they hoped that future research projects would never repeat the same mistake. That spirit is evinced every week in small town churches that dot the countryside, where all-male gospel groups give their distinctive rendition of soul-sound. It’s the same spirit that guides a group of Baha’i Black men to come together once a year to chant prayers and recommit themselves to a life of service. I chanced across these men a few years ago while grieving the loss of a family member. Relieved of artificial impediments, the physical body has a remarkable ability to heal itself and regenerate its functions. So too the souls of Black men. Black Families, Black Men Sounding like a born-again social conservative, president Lyndon B. Johnson stepped to the podium and made this stirring pronouncement: “When the family collapses, it is the children that are usually damaged. When it happens on a massive scale, the community itself is crippled.” And with his usual modesty, LBJ later hailed that 1965 Howard University commencement address as his “greatest civil rights speech.” A few months later the Moynihan Report came out. Despite its commonsense focus on strengthening the Black family, civil rights leaders raised a stink that Mr. Moynihan was trying to “blame the victim.” Floyd McKissick, director of the Congress of Racial Equality, insisted, “It’s the damn system that needs changing.” So the architects of the Great Society not only set out to ignore the formative role of the Black family – they plotted to make things worse. They instituted programs with men-stay-away names like “Women, Infants, and Children.” They enacted Medicaid in 1965 that imposed eligibility tests slighting non-custodial parents (read “fathers”). Then the social do-gooders delivered the knock-out blow: the Aid to Families with Dependent Children program. AFDC had its infamous “man-out-of-the-house” rule that withheld benefits if the primary breadwinner (again, read “father”) resided in the house. Sociologist Andrew Billingsley has traced the historical lifeline of the Black family. In 1890 the number of intact Black families with fathers and mothers at home was 80%. Over the next seven decades through 1960, that figure held remarkably constant. But once the Great Society programs were put in place, the African-American family went into a tailspin. When the number-crunchers tallied up the results from the 1970 decennial census, they couldn’t believe their eyes – the number of intact Black families had fallen to 64%. For the next 20 years two-parent families continued their free-fall, reaching a rock-bottom 38% in 1990. And most of the remaining intact families were concentrated in the Black middle class. In the inner city, the traditional Black family had essentially ceased to exist. So forced to compete with a government welfare program, poor Black men had suddenly found themselves persona non grata in their own homes. Like an unwelcome houseguest, Uncle Sam had moved in, unpacked his bags, and made himself a surrogate husband. What two World Wars and the Great Depression were unable to do, the Great Society accomplished in only 25 years. With the Black family now in shambles, no amount of federal money could fix the problem. In 1965, 21% of all American children under the age of 18 lived in poverty. Thirty years and billions of welfare dollars later, the number of American children living in poverty was – 21%. Of course the Leftists refuse to admit the obvious failures of the Great Society. And is their habit, they tell the exact opposite of the truth. Robert Hill of the Urban League once spun this whopper: “Research studies have revealed that many one-parent families are more intact or cohesive than many two-parent studies.” Excuse me Mr. Hill, when millions of poor teenage girls are having out-of-wedlock births, how does that fit into your concept of “intact” and “cohesive”? Likewise, feminist scholars celebrated the ascendancy of the female-headed household. Believing the nuclear family is the bastion of male privilege, feminist Toni Morrison lionized the “strong black woman” who was “superior in terms of [her] ability to function healthily in the world.” But there’s a deeper reason for the Leftist cover-up. Karl Marx argued that economic realities determine social conditions. According to that formulation, if you pump money into a community, social indicators will automatically improve. But the Great Society proved the opposite – squander money on programs that weaken social structures, and life becomes unbearably squalid. Viewing the plight of the once-proud Black family, Kay Hymowitz recently mused in the City Journal, “The literature was so evasive, so implausible, so far removed from what was really unfolding in the ghetto, that if you didn’t know better, you might conclude that people actually wanted to keep the black family separate and unequal.” [www.city-journal.org/html/15_3_black_family.html ] When I reflect on the vestiges of the American Black family, the disenfranchisement of its men, and the despair of its children, I admit to feeling an abiding sense of betrayal – actually outrage is a better word. They promised us the Great Society. Family Make-Over Ponzi Scheme Charles Ponzi certainly couldn’t be faulted for a lack of ingenuity. Way back in 1820 Mr. Ponzi began to lure people in with the promise of double your money in 90 days. Word spread, and soon Ponzi found himself ensconced in a 20-room mansion and was raking in $1 million a week. A similar Ponzi scheme is at work today. This time it’s an ideological pyramid scam, and it has to do with families and fathers. The Mother of All Confabulations goes back to 1986. That’s when feminist Phyllis Chesler alleged in her book Mothers on Trial that divorcing fathers win child custody in 70% of cases. Never mind that the actual number of fathers winning custody was only 15%. [www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/p60-217.pdf ] And don’t worry that Chesler’s conclusion was based on a sample of 60 discontented women referred by feminist lawyers -- still, it made for a great story. A decade later, the National Organization of Women was beginning to run out of real issues. So it set out to invent new outrages calculated to rally the faithful. In 1996 the N.O.W.-nincompoops passed a resolution that repeated Chesler’s bogus 70% custody figure. Then they added a new twist, claiming that patriarchal oafs who wanted to stay involved in their children’s lives after a divorce represented an “abuse of power in order to control in the same fashion as do batterers.” [www.now.org/organization/conference/1996/resoluti.html ] How’s that for high-decibel gender-baiting? That claim may have succeeded in swelling the N.O.W. membership rolls, but it still needed some scientific apple-polishing. So they brought in the Wellesley Centers for Women, a group with an impeccable reputation for research integrity. Well, almost. It was the WCW, of course, that had earlier published that fraudulent fiction of female academic underachievement, How Schools Shortchange Girls. And sure enough, the Wellesley women delivered. In 2002 the WCW published “Battered Mothers Speak Out: A Human Rights Report on Domestic Violence and Child Custody in the Massachusetts Family Courts.” People were ecstatic because the report vindicated everything that the N.O.W. had been saying. Take a look closer, and you see the WCW report is based on interviews with a small group of 40 Massachusetts women. Worse, the report lacks any objective proof of their allegations of rampant legal bias. Which once again proves you can reach almost any conclusion, just so long as you’re allowed to hand-pick your subjects and don’t ask too many hard questions. Soon, the whole M.O.M. Squad -- Joan Meier, Jay Silverman, Lundy Bancroft, and others -- was singing the Chesler catechism. Take a look at what they pass off as “research,” and you’ll see they all reference each other in an ever-expanding circle of self-serving citations. [www.fathersandfamilies.org/NEWS/BTSResearchCritiqueWithComments.pdf ] Most disturbing of all is the tale of sociologist Amy Neustein. She was one of the featured speakers at the M.O.M. conference that was recently held in upstate New York. [www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org ] Last year Neustein wrote a piece in The Jewish Press alleging her ex-husband sexually abused their daughter Sherry. Neustein won lots of sympathy points telling people she lost the custody battle due to a “malfunctioning court system that punished me for trying to protect my daughter from abuse.” [www.amyneustein.com/childless.htm ] But a few months later Sherry, now a graduate student in New York City, came along with a rather different account: “She would begin by telling me a sordid -- and false -- story about my father, such as a detailed account about how he had molested me or about how he had thrown me violently against a wall.… The truth, however, is that my father never sexually abused me.” [nhcustody.org/My_Homepage_Files/Page36.html ] And let’s not forget Sadiya Alilire, the woman who was portrayed in PBS’ Breaking the Silence as a heroic mom who was done wrong by the legal system -- but was later outed by court documents proving her to be a serial child abuser. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/1123.html ] Seven months after Charles Ponzi set up shop, his house of cards began to collapse. On August 10, 1920 the newspapers revealed Mr. Ponzi was bankrupt and pronounced his scheme an odious ruse. He was later sentenced to five years in prison. But 20 years after Phyllis Chesler made her preposterous claim, her siren call of family destruction continues to make the rounds. Worse, the Mothers Opposed to Men are on the offensive, setting up websites, attracting sympathetic media coverage, and lobbying state legislators. This time, it’s not persons’ money that’s at stake. It’s our families that need to be shored up, and our children who desperately need their fathers. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2006/0301roberts.html ] Remember how the Great Society evicted fathers from their homes and turned Black families into wards of the government? That’s what the M.O.M. Squad has in mind for the rest of us. The Feminist Anti-Kid Crusade Call it one of those simple yet profound truths: only a father can help a boy become a man. And only a daddie can teach a girl about healthy male-female relationships. Both dads and moms are unique and special. Maybe that’s why dads love to mix it up with rough-and-tumble play. Perhaps it’s why fathers teach kids a thing or two about risk-taking. And no doubt it has something to do with that tough love thing. Countless studies point to the same conclusion: kids with hands-on dads do better in school, in the community, and in life. I could almost write a book about it – and fortunately, someone already has: www.fatherhood.org/fatherfacts.asp . But there’s a somber side to this story. Kids who lose their father are two to three times more likely to get in trouble with the law and are more likely to suffer from a broad array of social pathologies. The saga can be traced back to the mid-1960s when marriage was portrayed as an oppressive institution and no-fault divorce laws arrived on the scene. Within 10 years, the U.S. divorce rate almost doubled. And what happened to the million-or-so kids whose parents divorced each year? Operating under the “tender years doctrine,” family courts almost always awarded custody of the youngsters to mothers. But the tender years apple cart was upset in 1971. That year the Supreme Court ruled in the landmark Reed v. Reed case that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prevents courts from basing opinions on sex. Before long, gender-neutral custody statutes had replaced maternal preference standards in almost every state. Despite those changes in the law, judicial bias persisted. In 1994, mothers were awarded custody in 85% of cases. Eight years later, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, that number remained unchanged. [www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/p60-217.pdf ] Keep in mind, every time a father is relegated to the status of an every-other-weekend visitor, it’s the children who lose out. It’s those same kids who end up as social misfits and statistics in your newspaper police report. So children’s rights advocates began to push for laws based on a presumption of joint physical custody. Not only is joint custody firmly rooted in the notion of gender equality, it’s also ideal for kids. As Dr. Joan Kelly, former president of the Academy of Family Mediators concluded, shared parenting “is a desirable outcome which clearly is in the best interests of children and families.” [www.fatherseqrts.org/determin%20custody ] By 1991, over 40 states had shared parenting laws in place. But the M.O.M.s – Mothers Opposed to Men – were not going to remain silent. In 1996 the National Organization for Women passed a resolution that began with this chestnut: “many judges and attorneys are still biased against women, and fathers are awarded custody 70% of the time when they seek it.” [www.now.org/organization/conference/1996/resoluti.html ] So there you have it – the fact that mothers were winning custody 85% of the time was proof of widespread anti-female bias in the legal system. The M.O.M.s then proceeded to do everything in their power to throw dirt on the joint custody idea. But nobody would listen to them. In fact powerful politicos – Republicans and Democrats alike – began to speak out on the importance of fatherhood. So three years ago the M.O.M. Squad met at tiny Siena College in upstate New York to plot their next move. This time they decided to drag the domestic violence boogeyman out of the closet. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2006/0222roberts.html ] Soon the M.O.M.s were cranking out red-meat claims like, “In custody cases where the mother alleges battery by the father, the father is awarded custody two-thirds of the time.” That shrill allegation made its way into the recent PBS fake-umentary, Breaking the Silence. But once again, the M.O.M.s were blowing smoke. [www.fathersandfamilies.org/NEWS/BTSResearchCritiqueWithComments.pdf ] Despite the fact that kids with involved dads do better, regardless of all the joint custody laws, and in spite of the laughable antics of the M.O.M. brigade, mothers continue to be favored in custody decisions by a 7 to 1 margin. All this, of course, is done in the name of the “best interests of the child.” Family researcher Judith Wallerstein once lamented, “I have been deeply struck by the distress children of every age suffer at losing their fathers.” Maybe we should all begin by listening to the voices of the little ones. The M.O.M. Squad Capers All Points Bulletin: M.O.M.s are on the loose. They’re armed and dangerous. Be forewarned, M.O.M.s – Mothers Opposed to Men – wield a formidable array of fake statistics, sob stories, and old-fashioned propaganda. I admit, sometimes I feel a bit silly trying to answer their preposterous charges. But since the M.O.M.s keep saying this stuff, maybe it’s time to put the kibosh on the whole thing. So here goes: 1. The M.O.M. Squad claims that divorcing fathers gain child custody 70% of the time, citing Phyllis Chesler’s 1986 book, Mothers on Trial. But Boston Globe columnist Cathy Young calls Chesler’s claim a contender for the Phony Statistics Hall of Fame. [www.lapresrupture.qc.ca/cpadec10_cathy_young.html ] Fact: Fathers win child custody only 15% of the time. 2. The M.O.M.s say that male violence against women is all-pervasive. Here’s feminist icon Catherine MacKinnon at her level-headed best: “Just like terrorist attacks, acts of violence against women are carefully planned, targeted at civilians, and driven by ideology.” Fact: Women are just as likely as men to assault their partners. [www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm ] If you don’t want to look up the research, just ask Indianapolis Colts cornerback Nick Harper, whose wife Daniell spent a couple days in the slammer last month after stabbing him with a kitchen knife. 3. The M.O.M.s claim fathers commonly abuse their children. Like the child custody canard, that statement is the exact opposite of the truth. Fact: Women represent the majority of child abusers. According to the federal Administration for Children and Families, “In 2003, 58.2% of child abuse and neglect perpetrators were females and 41.8% were males.” [faq.acf.hhs.gov/cgi-bin/acfrightnow.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=70 ] The ACF also reveals that in 30% of child fatalities, the perpetrator is the mother is acting alone, while in 18% of cases, it’s the father acting alone. [www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cb/pubs/cm03/figure4_2.htm ] Are you ready for the latest bombshell? 4. This one concerns fathers who find they must go to court in an often futile effort to gain joint custody of their children. This whopper made its way into the recent PBS program, Breaking the Silence: “Numerous studies have confirmed that approximately 75% [of fathers seeking custody] involve a history of violence.” Fact: This defamatory statement is akin to the claim that Jews were wrecking the German economy. Look beyond the histrionics of the PBS claim and you can’t help but notice that “The references cited by the film’s supporters in most cases are a round-robin of assertions, in which the same pool of authors repeatedly cites each other’s opinions, without supporting data,” as one critic put it. [www.fathersandfamilies.org/NEWS/BTSResearchCritiqueWithComments.pdf ] Broadcast of Breaking the Silence this past October shifted the M.O.M.’s campaign into high gear. But their agitprop suffered a setback when the program drew flack from thousands of PBS viewers and producer Dominique Lasseur was grounded by PBS ombudsman Michael Getler. [www.pbs.org/ombudsman/2005/12/introduction_and_breaking_the_silence.html ] The Mothers Opposed to Men used to hang out at a website known as the Mothers’ Research and Resource Center, but then columnist Wendy McElroy outed them. [www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,177893,00.html ] Within days they yanked the incriminating evidence – but not before a copy was made. [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/1207archived.html ] So why on earth are the M.O.M.s engaged in this anti-family campaign? Twenty years ago, divorcing mothers were the beneficiaries of a legal system that reflexively awarded them child custody. But fathers said that wasn’t fair, that gender equality is supposed to apply to men, too. Plus, research shows kids with hands-on fathers do far better in school and are less likely to get into trouble with the law – think of dads as the social equivalent of Wonder Bread. So in many states fathers pushed for laws that say child custody should be shared between dad and mom, assuming both parents are fit. That common-sense approach is called a legal presumption of joint custody. Most would say that arrangement is good for all parties: kids, mom, and dad. And it doesn’t cost the taxpayer a flat dime. But the M.O.M.s were not pleased, because they view joint custody as a capitulation to the dreaded patriarchy. So now they’re going around the country and meeting behind closed doors with judges and lawmakers, spreading their anti-father calumnies. Their aim is to stampede them into passing laws based on the premise that dads are dangerous, so we’d be better off if they were all locked up somewhere. Look out for the M.O.M. Squad, coming to a legislature near you. Women who Treat Women as Sex Objects Advisory: This week’s column contains adult language. And nothing is made-up. Picture this image: 18,000 women line up at Madison Square Garden in New York City. They pay as much as $1,000 apiece to witness the spectacle. For the audience warm-up, the women are bombarded with the word “Vagina!” Soon, the Vulva Choir is singing the praises of their inner-vagina. The play features a series of vignettes, including one about a 13-year-old girl who is plied with alcohol and raped -- by a woman. At the end, the girl revels in her new-found liberation from heterosexuality: “I’ll never need to rely on a man…if it was a rape, it was a good rape.” This actually happened on February 10, 2001. Nothing here is made-up. The play, known as the Vagina Monologues, wins the prestigious OBIE Award. The New York Times hails playwright Eve Ensler as “the Messiah heralding the second wave of feminism.” [www.zetetics.com/mac/ifeminsts/2002/0212.html ] Since then, the Vagina Monologues has been staged in front of hundreds of thousands of coeds at college campuses around the country. Listening to women talk about their genitalia is their way of celebrating Valentine’s Day. Some of them wear self-reassuring T-shirts that say, “I love my vagina.” On September 13, feminist Eve Ensler invited former Playboy bunnie Gloria Steinem and others to star in an event in New York called “Vaginas Vote, Chicks Rock.” The event was designed to encourage voter registration among Democratic-leaning women. Here are a few gems from Ensler’s address: “Are there any registered vaginas in the house?” “Step into your vaginas and get the vagina vote out!” Her speech concluded with this heart-warming appeal: “Vulva! Vulva! Vulva! Vote!” Ensler’s event was successful. Seven weeks later, women turned out in record numbers. Many of them voted for George W. Bush. Most mental health professionals would regard Miss Ensler’s obsession with her crotch as a treatable condition. But now, a whole generation of women has come to believe that all manner of lewd and indecent behavior is acceptable -- just so long as it can be justified with feminist buzz words such as “liberation,” “empowerment,” and “choice.” Here are some recent examples: In California, attorney Liana Johnsson reached this insight (note the liberation theme here): “At some point, men’s breasts became liberated and women’s didn’t.” So now Johnsson is pushing the California Legislature to pass a law allowing women and girls to “drop their tops” at California beaches and parks. Growing numbers of women enjoy viewing pornography, and now represent 30% of all online porn visitors. Holly Moss, founder of Women In Adult, explains this trend: “As women have more choices in life and purchasing power, they are choosing what they want to see and how they want their porn.” [www.xbiz.com/news_piece.php?id=1161 ] Did you spot the skillful use of both the “choice” and “power” motifs in Miss Moss’ remarks? But there’s more. Last year a teenager marched into her school cafeteria in South Hadley, Mass. wearing only a bra and sweat pants. According to principal Melodie Goodwin, “We had girls fall out of their shirts in the sixth grade.” Now the Michael E. Smith Middle School has tightened up its dress code. [www.masslive.com/chicopeeholyoke/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-8/110759319912580.xml ] Now, liberation even extends to the Soccer Mom set. USA Today recently reported on mothers who parade around the house with cleavage on full display and cook breakfast for junior wearing three-inch heels. According to reporter Olivia Barker, mom “doesn’t want to check her sexuality at the picket-fence gate anymore.” [www.usatoday.com/life/ lifestyle/2005-01-26-hotmoms_x.htm ] Finally, let’s not forget to mention those TV soft-porn hits like Sex and the City and Desperate Housewives. No surprise, these shows are watched mostly by women. During the former Reign of Patriarchy, men sometimes regarded women in terms of their female anatomy. Most persons agreed that wasn’t a very good thing. But it happened. Then feminism came along and disposed of the Patriarchy. Men were told to stop objectifying women. So what happened? Women began to objectify women. Here’s the amazing part – many intelligent women became convinced that it was good to be treated as sex objects. In fact, they were willing to part with good money to see a play that celebrated the rape of a 13-year-old girl. In the past, the sexual degradation of women was confined to the bedroom and the brothel. But now, gender objectification permeates our culture. It is flaunted at college campuses, on the Internet, on prime-time TV, and during Super Bowl half-time shows. And it is done at the behest of women. This has really happened. Maybe the Patriarchy wasn’t so bad. Breaking the Hearts of Men Women are seeing red over the latest program from the American Heart Association, dubbed the “Go Red for Women” campaign.  Why would women ever be perturbed about that? Because this one-sided campaign overlooks the fact that men have hearts, too.  Wondering if the feminist campaign for gender equality had somehow gotten side-tracked, I contacted the AHA for an explanation. Here’s what spokeswoman Toiya Honore had to say: “When many people think of heart disease or heart attack, the image that comes to mind is the middle-aged white male clutching his chest.” Ms. Honore’s comment may be true, but misses the key point. That “middle-aged white male” also happens to be married, with a wife and kids. When that husband and father suddenly dies, he leaves behind a devastated family. Mom is now saddled with the additional burdens of becoming the primary breadwinner and household repairman. She has also lost her confidante, lover, and soul-mate. That’s not all. When his widow reaches her Golden Years, she will be four times more likely to be warehoused in a nursing home (according to a study by Lois Vergrugge), compared to a married woman of the same age. In contrast to that “middle-aged white male,” women who die of heart disease are typically in their 50s and 60s. Usually they are not the primary breadwinner of a struggling family, and their children have already grown up. Ms. Honore offers a second justification for the Heart Association’s campaign that again is technically correct, but misses the bigger picture. Honore notes, “overall, more women die from cardiovascular disease than men.” It is true that of all persons who die of heart disease, 52% are female and 48% are male. But even a first-year public health student can spot the flaw in that logic. Go to the nursing home in your community, and you will see that most of the residents are female. And heart disease is a condition of older people. So of course women hold a numerical edge in the heart disease tallies. That’s a no-brainer. But crude numbers are notoriously inadequate in guiding program priorities. For example, the number of Blacks who die of heart disease is far fewer than the number of Whites. If we only relied on raw numbers, we would start shutting down programs for Blacks and other minorities. And knowing that more men die of cancer than women, is the Heart Association also calling for a halt in breast cancer research? I certainly hope not. The only accurate gauge of need is a person’s risk. The risk of dying of heart disease is 228 per 100,000 for white males, and only 134 among white females. In other words, men face a 70% higher risk of dying from this dread disease. The American Heart Association knows these facts are true - they report them on page 10 of their own 2004 Statistical Update www.americanheart.org/downloadable/heart/1075102824882HDSStats2004UpdateREV1-23-04.pdf. American men die an average of five and a half years before women. If it wasn’t for the unequal gender toll of heart disease, men would be living almost as long as women. And far fewer women would be spending their last years alone, gazing blankly at the cinderblock walls of a nursing home. Forty years ago the American Heart Association sponsored a conference on “Hearts and Husbands.” This conference, which taught women how to keep their husbands healthy and alive, was attended by 10,000 wives and wives-to-be. Those women had far greater compassion and common sense than the radical feminists who are now calling the shots at the American Heart Association. Feminine Mystique or Feminine Mistake? Noticed how Hillary’s been looking so, well, angry? During his recent State of the Union address, president Bush made a light-hearted remark about Bill Clinton. The camera turned to Hillary for a cameo shot, and all she had to do was smile politely. But no, she shot back her trademark “isn’t-this-guy-an-idiot” expression. Hillary, I’m afraid you were set up -- right in front of a national television audience. Somehow, Hillary’s ire is emblematic of everything that has gone wrong with the feminist movement since Betty Friedan released her celebrated book, The Feminine Mystique, in 1963. I’m admittedly mystified that so many persons are unaware of Friedan’s Communist past [www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2003/1125roberts.html]. And positively stupefied that even fewer understand what the “feminine mystique” really means. Here it is, in Friedan’s own words, “The feminine mystique says that the highest value and the only commitment for women is the fulfillment of their own femininity . . . this femininity is so mysterious and intuitive and close to the creation and origin of life that man-made science may never be able to understand it. But however special and different, it is in no way inferior to the nature of man; it may even in certain respects be superior.” Can you imagine some sweaty working stiff taking a smoke break, and suddenly becoming inspired to enlighten his buddies with that kind of narcissistic drivel? Someone would have thrown a tool belt at him and ordered him to get back to work. But coming from a woman ensconced in a well-appointed New York City suburb, Friedan was hailed as the latest feminist savant. Mrs. Friedan had considerable first-hand experience with the feminine mystique. Her husband Carl, a successful advertising executive, employed a full-time housekeeper, which allowed Betty to pursue her writing career. Apparently Friedan didn’t like the hired help, because she would later denigrate housework as “particularly suited to the capabilities of feeble-minded girls.” So 40-odd years later, is it time to pop open the champagne bottle and exclaim, “You’ve come a long way, baby”? To find out, let’s do a quick tour around the country. First stop, your local college campus. This month, The Vagina Monologues is being performed at 600 colleges around the country. There smart, ambitious co-eds will look on as a lesbian actress seduces a 16-year-old girl, only to be reassured, “If it was a rape, it was a good rape.” These women are then instructed to reclaim their sexuality by chanting, “My vagina is huggable.” Wouldn’t Betty be proud? Now go visit the offices of your local Heart Association. There you will learn about the AHA’s high fashion campaign, “Go Red for Women.” [www.goredforwomen.org] Of course it’s men who are at far greater risk of dying from heart disease, but the AHA only cares that women wear red dresses. Somehow that chauvinistic phrase, “may even in certain respects be superior,” is ringing through my head. Next stop: The Oxygen Network (women can’t breathe in patriarchal society, so they need oxygen – get it?). There, we see the Network is airing six animated spots based on the book, Chicks Dig Fries: A Guide for Clueless Men. [www.chicksdigfries.com/video.htm] By any standard, the spots are tasteless and misandrous. But in feminist la-la land, women are always right and men just don’t get it. No wonder men are dropping out of the dating scene. Once men stop dating, they also stop marrying. This is creating a panic of sorts. One of the more sorry movies I’ve seen, Bridget Jones’ Diary, recounts the escapades of a slightly neurotic thirty-something who, no matter how hard she tries, can’t seem to find Mister Right. The movie, based on the international best-selling book, taps into the angst of millions of single women who are chasing after a shrinking pool of willing bachelors. The last stop on today’s tour is that part of America that never took a fancy to the emancipation agenda of The Feminine Mystique. It’s that place in America where gentlemen still hold doors open for ladies, and young women look forward to balancing careers with marriage and motherhood. It turns out this segment of America has a much larger following than the mainstream media is willing to admit. According to a 1999 Gallup poll, 74% of American women do not consider themselves to be feminist. And one CBS poll reported that 22% of women said that being called a feminist would be considered an “insult.” [http://ms.cc.sunysb.edu/~lhuddy/neelyhuddy.pdf] Like Britney, Madonna, and Oprah, The Feminine Mystique has left an indelible stamp on our society. Thank goodness the majority of American women have had the common sense to reject its Trojan horse prescription for gender liberation. Who's Afraid of Carol Gilligan? Most feminists will come right out and tell you they pretty much despise men. But some feminists, like the leechers and blood-letters of yore, make the claim that yet another spoonful of feminism will actually make boys and men feel better. Such is the case of psychologist Carol Gilligan, whose nostrums were recently featured in Newsweek magazine as the cure-all for the Boy Crisis. For years, the mainstream media has been running cover for Dr. Gilligan, hoping no one would find out the truth. So exactly who is Carol Gilligan, and what is her agenda? It all goes back to 1982 when Gilligan released her book, In A Different Voice, hailed as “the little book that started a revolution.” The book examined the ways men and women make decisions about right and wrong – what psychologists call “moral reasoning. Gilligan concluded that men tended to focus on rules and principles, while women were more swayed by their personal experiences and emotional take of the situation. That common-sense description is hardly earth-shattering -- in my experience, it’s more often men who want to make the rules, and women who try to bend them. Translated into nine languages and with 600,000 copies sold, In a Different Voice was a huge success. But the acclaim was not unanimous. The Sisterhood was aghast that Gilligan would even hint that innate differences existed between the sexes. Feminist Linda Kerber ridiculed Gilligan’s book as echoing the “romantic sentimentalism of old voices in the women’s movement.” Sure enough, Gilligan soon buckled under the weight of the criticism and fell into lock-step with the rad-fem vanguard. But she knew that at some point, she would have to make amends for her revisionist past. That moment came in 1990, when Gilligan published Making Connections, which was based on her interviews with well-to-do girls attending an upstate New York boarding school. Gilligan reported that at the age of 11, these carefree, confident girls suddenly hit the “wall of Western culture” (read “patriarchy”), and suddenly found themselves voiceless and adrift. Now really, I have never in my entire life seen a group of adolescent girls who hesitated to speak out on practically anything that crossed their minds. But that’s what Gilligan’s research claimed. Needless to say, Gilligan never bothered to interview any teenage boys. Soon Gilligan was regarded with a cult-like veneration. Senator Barbara Mikulski, one of those poor women who had lost her voice, now sang the professor’s praises: “All of us are familiar with Dr. Carol Gilligan and her pioneering work...Dr. Gilligan’s research indicated that women speak in a different voice, but those voices are often made silent by the stereotypes in the dominant culture.” Thanks to the girl hysteria that Gilligan engendered, the Gender Equity in Education Act was passed in 1994. Of course by that time, girls had surpassed boys on most measures of school performance. But that didn’t stop Gilligan from receiving the Heinz award from Teresa Heinz Kerry, another one of those silenced women. In 2000, Jane Fonda, her spirit also crushed by patriarchal culture, gushed, “I know what Professor Gilligan writes about. I know it in my skin, in my gut, as well as in my voice.” So thanks to the GEEA, boys are admonished that tag and dodge ball bring out their latent aggressive tendencies, so better to stick with hop-scotch and jacks. Go to any schoolyard, and you will find that more often it is the voices of boys who have become silenced. So what is professor Gilligan’s prescription for the Boy Crisis in her recent Newsweek article? [www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10965127/site/newsweek ] Because fem-speak is often shrouded in weasel words and loopy logic, as a service to my readers I offer a plain-English translation. First, Gilligan’s solution for the Boy Crisis involves boys “recognizing their sensitivities, building honest relationships, and strengthening a healthy capacity for resistance.” Translation: More sexual harassment lectures and fewer sports programs. Then Gilligan warns against “reinstituting traditional codes of manhood, including a return to the patriarchal family.” Read, No need to worry that 40% of American children do not live with their biological fathers, because the Nanny State can do the job better. But the real message comes out in the sub-title of Gilligan’s fatuous essay: “A feminist scholar explains how the study of girls can teach us about boys.” Meaning: Don’t try to take even a penny of my precious GEEA money away from feminist indoctrination centers, ahem, women’s studies programs. With the continued feminization of the male species, we can all look forward to seeing the Boy Crisis for a good, long time. Alito Hearings Bring Fathers Back into the Abortion Debate The pictures said it all. First was the shot of the unflappable judge, serenely gazing…waiting…hoping…that senator Joe Biden would finally get around to asking his question. Then the unforgettable image of judge Alito’s wife Martha-Ann, gasping at the accusation that her husband was a closet racist. And at the end of it all, there was Teddie Kennedy, his contorted face reduced to a helpless, choleric rage. Richard Durbin buried his brow in his hands. And poor Dianne Feinstein – she looked like she had just returned from a back-alley encounter with a pack of mating wildebeests. Much of the Judiciary Committee’s scrutiny revolved around Alito’s views on abortion, including his 1991 dissent in the now-famous Planned Parenthood v. Casey case. Predictably the “engaged and enraged” feminists had worked themselves into a lather. Rep. Lynn Woolsey of California fumed that Alito’s position “takes us right back to the 1950s,” and a hyperventilating Louise Slaughter said that Alito had “argued that the state effectively has the right to give a man control over his wife.” It may come as a surprise to many that Planned Parenthood used to be against abortion. Back in 1963 they issued this warning: “An abortion kills the life of a baby after it has begun. It is dangerous to your life and health. It may make you sterile so that when you want a child you cannot have it.” But along came Roe v. Wade in 1973, and Planned Parenthood decided to milk the cash cow of abortion-on-demand. Eventually it realized that state laws that placed restrictions on access to abortion were robbing them of their market share. In Pennsylvania, the Planned Parenthood chapter began to eye a 1982 law that required a pregnant woman to “notify” her husband of her intention to abort. Contrary to Rep. Louise Slaughter’s rant, the spousal notification requirement of the Pennsylvania law did not give the husband any kind of veto power. In fact, the law didn’t even require a woman to “plan” the pregnancy with her spouse. It only required a simple notification, as in, “Hey hon’, I’m going to go out to have my nails done, pick up some groceries, and maybe get an abortion.” But Planned Parenthood would not tolerate even that minimal concession to the father’s interest to keep his unborn child alive. So it sued to overturn the law. At the time, Samuel Alito happened to be one of three judges on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Two of the judges ruled that the spousal notification requirement was not lawful, but Alito disagreed. He argued the provision was “constitutional because it is ‘rationally related’ to a ‘legitimate’ state interest.” As we know, the next year Planned Parenthood took the case to the Supreme Court. In 1992, the Supreme Court affirmed that fathers had no legitimate role in decisions to continue the lives of their own offspring. In retrospect, we have to ask how so many learned judges, most of them fathers themselves, failed to discern a legitimate state interest in respecting the bonds between biological dads and their children? The 1992 Supreme Court ruling came just months after vice-president Dan Quayle gave his famous Murphy Brown speech which deplored the fact that, “Where there are no mature, responsible men around to teach boys how to become good men, gangs serve in their place.” The opinion followed a decade of revelations by social scientist Sara McLanahan, who discovered to her horror that fatherless children do far worse on a broad range of social indicators. One of the tragic results of the decision was that fathers were banished from the abortion debate. From the Left, fathers were scorned as simply irrelevant. On the Right they were reviled for their alleged hit-and-run treatment of women, even though rape and incest accounted for less than one percent of all abortions. The sad fact was, dads were now persona non grata. Planned Parenthood v. Casey amounted to the biological disenfranchisement of dads and the radical de-legitimization of fatherhood itself. For every beating heart snuffed out by Roe v. Wade, Casey drove a stake through the heart of a proud father-to-be. Judge Samuel Alito, who confirmation is expected later this week, has almost single-handedly deflated the Leftist hegemony over the spousal notification debate. Now we can to begin to acknowledge the obvious: men are grievously wounded when they are removed from the life-and-death decisions affecting their own flesh and blood. © 2006 Carey Roberts See Books, Issues Contact Us | Disclaimer | Privacy Statement Menstuff® Directory Menstuff® is a registered trademark of Gordon Clay ©1996-2023, Gordon Clay