Abu-Lughod: Difference, Choice, and Feminism

In her article, “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others,” Lila Abu-Lughod explores the post-9/11 ethics of the “War on Terror” and the justifications made for American intervention in Afghanistan in terms of liberating, or saving, Afghan women. What makes Abu-Lughod’s article so valuable is that it forces us to think about the issues that we are supporting, the issues that we aren't supporting, and more importantly, why. Often, in the face of conflict, we turn to religion and culture instead of history and politics. In turning everything into a cultural issue - we lose the context, and without the context, it is easy to make sweeping generalizations about complicated issues.

Abu-Lughod's article is loaded with important passages and questions, touching on everything from cultural relativism, cultural imperialism and colonialism, feminism, the third world, human rights, and religion - to name a few. In one of her most powerful passages, she writes, "What I am advocating is the hard work involved in recognizing and respecting differences - precisely as products of different histories, as expressions of different circumstances, and as manifestations of differently structured desires. We may want justice for women, but can we accept that there might be different ideas about justice and that different women might want, or choose, different futures from what we envision is best?" (788). What might be best for a woman in the United States might not be what is best for a woman in Afghanistan. There may be some overlap and agreement, but there maybe there won't be. The important thing to recognize is that this is okay to have different views. It is okay to have different beliefs and fight for different causes. Women around the world do not all want the same things, and shouldn't feel like they have to. Abu-Lughod continues, "My point is to remind us to be aware of differences, respectful of other paths toward social change that might give women better lives. Can there be a liberation that is Islamic? And, beyond this, is liberation even a goal for which all women or people strive? Are emancipation, equality, and rights part of a universal language we must use?" (788). These are questions that I think every person should consider.

Abu-Lughod's discussion of respecting and understanding differences connects to the larger idea of choice. I can't help but recognize how dominant this theme has been throughout the semester, and how important it is to recognize that women everywhere deserve to have choices. The same idea applies to feminism. Feminists come in all shapes and sizes. When the authors of Manifesta came to speak, they talked about how there is no one definition of feminism - it means different things to different people. Can a woman be pro-life and be a feminist? Of course. Can a woman be a Muslim and be a feminist? Why not? More importantly, who has the right to argue otherwise? Imposing certain beliefs on others, feminist or otherwise, does not seem to benefit anyone. What we could all benefit from is taking Abu-Lughod's words to heart - we all must ask ourselves how we might contribute to making the world a more just place... for everyone.

Emerging from the Veil

Building upon the readings and class discussion concerning global feminism, the notion of the "veil" seems to have emerged in the past ten years as the predominant figure that United States and other Western feminists have looked to as the example for what feminine oppression is in the third world. The rhetoric of the United States government has truly reinforced these notions of women in the Middle East as women who have lived under repressive regimes for their whole lives and has neglected the cultural and social contexts of Islamic tradition. The generalizations that have been made about the third world are even more prevalent regarding the women in the Middle East because of the events of September 11, 2001. Women have taken a large role in our look into the repressive and extremist Islamic regimes of the Middle East. As Western feminists have taken a deeper look into these extremist governments, they have used these cultures as a basis for the idea of feminism in the Middle East.

The notion of "under the veil" truly resonates with our generation. Just like Pearl Harbor, the Vietnam War, the assassination of JFK, September 11 was the event that our generation will always remember. We will always remember where we were at the moment, and the small story of the connections we all had to people in the World Trade Center. The face of 9/11 is the "terrorists wearing the turban," and the "women under the veil." These conceptions are truly unfortunate because they have come to envelop all of the Middle East. This has become a contemporary type of "colonial feminism." It is a positive notion to include the fight for the rights of women alongside the fight against the terrorists in the world. Their intentions are a direct threat against human rights and included in that, as Bunch notioned, is the idea of women's rights. I think Abu-Lughod discounts the value of looking at different parts of the world through a lens of religious tradition and cultures. I think this is especially important in regions of the third world where religion essentially shapes the lives of the people. This is something that Westerners are not accustomed to. In my psychology class, we are looking at collectivist versus individualist cultures. The US, being very individualistic, is vastly different from these different regions that live collectively. We simply cannot fully understand the customs.

Many women in the Middle East have defended the burqa. This is completely understandable and we need to begin looking at this in a different light. Just as women place high value on their own individual success and progress in the United States, many Muslim women have placed an extremely high value on being respected. However, many women claim, as well as other scholars, that these women are subjected to harassment and looked down upon without the burqa. The only argument I would have is that in this case, they simply are not given the choice here. We do need to understand the cultural context, but the freedom of choice is very important for women and I think a first step into achieving rights. When women can decide, that is progress.

Abu-Lughod questions: "What does freedom mean if we accept the fundamental premise that humans are social beings, always raised in certain social and historical contexts and belonging to particular communities that shape their desires and understandings of the world?" (786). I think we do need to understand that this notion is somewhat true. However, I agree that the notion of interrelatedness that came up in the Mohanty article, and even more so here. Cultural relativism does discount interconnectedness on a certain level and we must realize that working with each other and understanding each other is the only way we can come to progress for the overall rights of women, where I believe, just the right to have our own opinions and beliefs, lie at the basis. Working within a framework may be the only preliminary way to address the situation and once a change has been made, new strides can come about. We really cannot discount the foreign aid that we have given to oppressed peoples and countries in need, but we must realize that questions about different regions produce different answers. I think we have come a long way since 9/11 regarding "women under the veil," but we still have a long way to go.

"The Third-World Woman"

In the discussion of "Third-World Feminism," a host of new problems arise concerning Western literature and our understanding of the notion of women in these countries that we have only heard about, read little about, or seen false depictions in movies and on TV. Both the processes of colonization and decolonization have led Westerners to take on a superior role to countries that we consider "third-world." The concept of Woman versus women is a very important one. While analyzing the role of females in these different cultures, we first have to contextualize in a sociological, political, and economic way the roles of the Woman. After understanding the history of these countries and their different cultures, we can then assess the state of women in the country. I think this is a very important distinction, and a trap that we have fallen into in the discussion of feminism in the US - overgeneralization without understanding cultural and historical contexts. The concept of "the Other" is something many of us have seen, for example, in history classes when studying the US soldiers' perception of people in Vietnam. Never have I read any literature concerning the role of "the Other" in the dialogue about feminism. Ethnocentric universalism can lead us down a very dangerous path, but so can cultural relativism. I think cultural relativism is a better way to initially approach the study of the role of women in "third-world" countries. We must contextualize their roles and then link their roles back to the interrelatedness of human beings, and human and women's rights.

Mohanty talks of "women as an already constituted and coherent group with identical interests and desires, regardless of class, ethnic or racial location, implies a notion of gender or sexual difference or even patriarchy which can be applied universally and cross culturally" (64). As we have been recently discussing in class, this is a very "second wave" approach to feminism. Today, we have in fact made strides to begin to contextualize feminism in a number of ways. The article shows that it may be dated (1988). The concept of the "average third-world woman" implies all of the stereotypes we hold as Westerners as well as a type of superiority that our lifestyle and the meaning of a woman in our culture is somehow superior. All over the world, women are seen as "victims of male violence," as "universal dependents," "victims of the colonial process," and stuck within familial systems and religious ideologies. Women do not deserve to have this "subject status" (67) that lowers them to a level of being placed in a group rather than seen as a group of unique individuals from many different cultures who practice many different customs - many of which are different from the West. Mohanty correctly points out that the ORIGINS of oppression need to be put into question in order to fully understand the situation of women in different parts of the world. She is a bit rash and overly critical of Western texts that have made the effort of writing about women in the third-world, although she has some valid points, I think she discounts that magnitude of the fact that a dialogue has been opened, and from here we can expand on this, modernize this, and use it to begin understand the historical and cultural contexts of the history of women in different parts of the world.

Women of the west are in no way superior to the "third world women." We are blessed to live in such a prosperous nation, and therefore have access to many things that women in the third-world do not - the right to vote, education, etc. However, in many cultures, this does not play a relevant role. We must understand this and understand that some people do not understand the Western way of living.

Development cannot be seen as the "all-time equalizer" (71) but rather a process of educating women about their options - therefore, giving them the chance to have rights. We cannot reinforce divisions in order to make progress, rather we must understand specific cultural discrimination against women, which in turn, can begin to open up dialogue for solutions. Mohanty brings up the feminization of poverty and the impact of this in the third world. I think this rings even more true in the "third-world" than in the West because we have a generalization of these women as all impoverished and oppressed with no rights and no hope to ever gain rights. I agree with Mohanty that we must move from our binary judgments regarding females and patriarchy, always as the victim. By placing these women within different contexts of their culture, we can begin to see their roles and expose any injustices they may be facing.

Bunch's article sheds a different light on the situation of women in different parts of the world. I think she brings up a very important point that the rest of the world does not see 9/11 as a pivotal moment as people in the US do. I think her article is a bit unpatriotic and extreme when talking about different administrations, because we cannot all place ourselves in the shoes of the President of the United States, especially when a catastrophe like 9/11 occurs. She does raise some valid points. Human security versus national security is a very good distinction that we do not often make in the US. Being abroad last semester in Paris, I had the opportunity to take a human rights course. The professor focused solely on the UN and its policies and evolution since the 1950s. He placed a much greater role on human rights and UN policies like CEDAW than I have ever seen taught in a class in the US. Here, we are much more focused on the policies of the US government, which seem to center around US security. The US is seen as a role model in the world, and the national security model of defense, rather than an open model of dialogue and coexistence has subsequently taken hold in other regions of the world.

I think asking the question, Why have feminist not had a greater impact on global issues? is extremely important. Examining the answers to this question could lead down many avenues that begin to explain the new role that feminists need to take on to have an international voice concerning human rights. US feminists and women of the rest of the world need to support EACH OTHER, and by doing so, begin to understand each other, because there is power in numbers when working under a system mainly dominated by patriarchial values. However, this is more and more dissipating, and women have a role to fill on the international scene.

NEWS FLASH: The Decrease in Childbirth Options for Women

This Tuesday, the New York Times published an article entitled Maternal Deaths Decline Sharply Across the Globe (Grady 2010). These new findings, published in the medical journal The Lancet, seem to support the notion that maternal healthcare is improving. We think we are doing better, and in some ways this is true. At the same time, many women don’t have access to the kind of maternal care that they want, or that they need. I am not saying that the statistics published in this study aren’t important. What I am saying is that such studies shouldn’t overshadow the fact that more women are having less options when it comes to childbirth. I firmly believe that all women should have the choice to give birth however they want, as long as its safe, and that choice should be supported.

Four days before Grady’s article was released, The New York Times published a different article, With the Closing of a Hospital, Women’s Childbirth Options Diminish (Dominus 2010). The hospital that the article is referring to is St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan. After a long struggle to stay afloat, the board of St. Vincent’s Catholic Medical Centers voted on Tuesday, April 6^th, to officially close St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan. Sadly, with the closing of St. Vincent’s, the local community is losing some of its essential community services, and women all over the city are losing one of the most unique obstetrics departments in New York City.

The obstetrics department at St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan was well known for providing a full range of childbearing options for women. Women hoping to experience anything from a low-tech childbirth to a scheduled Caesarean could find care and support at St. Vincent’s. The department, run by Dr. George Mussalli, was exceptionally midwife-friendly and considered the hospital of choice for home midwives in the event that they needed to transfer a patient. Dr. Mussalli’s own obstetrics practice, Village Obstetrics, describes itself as committed to “minimally invasive obstetrics care” and a low caesarean section rate, in addition to working collaboratively with midwives and doulas. Even in a place like New York City, this kind of approach to childbirth is hard to find. Dominus writes, “In a city where you can live however you want, as long as it’s safe – and sometimes even if it’s not – it seems absurd that there are so few places where women can give birth however they want, as long as it’s safe” (2010). Women who want to have the option (and support from their doctor) of natural birth, or any other option that deviates from the standard/norm are not able to access facilities that can provide such services.

In fact, just this past November, another one of New York City’s natural birth clinics closed its doors. Like the obstetrics department at St. Vincent’s, the Bellevue Birth Center was a unique facility. In their article, Bellevue Natural-Birth Center, Haven for Poor Women, Closes, A.G. Sulzberger and Nick Pinto explain, “The Bellevue Birth Center was celebrated as a landmark for the natural-birth movement in New York City when it opened in 1998. The luxurious natural-birth center, designed to feel more like a home than a hospital, was the only one of its kind dedicated not to Manhattan’s trend-conscious set, but to poor, mostly immigrant women on Medicaid.” In addition, “the center gave healthy women the opportunity to give birth in a comfortable environment absent the frenetic bustle of a normal hospital delivery ward. Roughly 85 percent of the patients were Chinese- or Spanish-speaking immigrants, most of them referred through Gouverneur Healthcare Services on the Lower East Side. (All midwives were required to be fluent in either Mandarin or Spanish).” At Bellevue, expecting mothers were allowed to walk around and bathe in Jacuzzis to naturally reduce pain, and had the option to choose to forgo common but invasive medical techniques like induced labor and epidural blocks. “Unlike women who chose natural birth at home,” the authors write, “patients had immediate access to hospital facilities if there were complications.” Now, with the closing of Bellevue and St. Vincent’s, there are less than a handful of natural birth facilities available in New York City. If this is the case in of the United States’ largest cities, then it seems fair to assume that women who don’t have access to such metropolitan areas also don’t have access to very many birthing options.

The one exception that I know of (though I certainly hope that there are others) is the Tuba City Regional Heal Care Corporation in Tuba City Arizona, run by the Navajo Nation and financed partly by the Indian Health Service. In class, we read Denise Grady’s article Lessons at Indian Hospital About Births, and discussed the benefits of maternal care at a hospital like Tuba City, that “prides itself on having a higher than average rate of vaginal births among women with a prior Caesarean, and a lower Caesarean rate over all.” There are four other hospitals in New Mexico and Arizona, run by the Indian Health Service, that offer vaginal birth after Caesarean to healthy women. In general, “nurse-midwives at these hospitals deliver most of the babies born vaginally, with obstetricians available in case problems occur. Midwives staff the labor ward around the clock, a model of care thought to minimize Caesareans because midwives specialize in coaching women through labor and will often wait longer than obstetricians before recommending a Caesarean. They are also less likely to try to induce labor before a woman’s due date, something that increases the odds of a Caesarean.” Another interesting fact the article brings up, is that in the rest of the country, nurse-midwives attend about only 10 percent of vaginal births. Donna Rackley, a nurse-midwife in Tuba City said that in Tuba City, “if labor is slow but there is no sign of fetal distress and the patient wants more time, the doctors will wait.” In the rest of the United States, there are very few hospitals, and doctors, that can insure the same thing.

Elan McAllister, president of Choices in Childbirth, a non-profit organization based out of New York City, is cited in the article about St. Vincent’s as well as the article about Bellevue. According to their website, Choices in Childbirth “strives to improve maternity care by helping women make informed decisions about where, how, and with whom to birth. Through education, outreach and advocacy, we provide information to the public about women’s rights and options in birth.” McAllister said that Bellevue’s natural-birth center, “should be a model that the other city hospitals are looking to replicate… And now, if you are uninsured and want that, I wouldn’t know where to send you” (Sulzberger and Pinto 2010).

In all three models, St. Vincent’s, Bellevue, and Tuba City, natural childbirth is, or was, a choice offered that every mother had the option to make. As Dominus explains, “the range of options at St. Vincent’s, in Greenwich Village, was about as wide as any expecting mother could want. You need a scheduled Caesarean? By all means. You want to give birth at home on your futon with incense burning and monks chanting on your iPod? So be it.” Now that two of these three institutions that provided such overwhelming support for women are gone, what does this mean for women?

In his article, “How Childbirth Went Industrial,” Atul Gawande (2006) addresses this very issue. Gawande has a problem with what he calls the “standardization” of childbirth, which makes it easier for doctors to deliver babies but doesn’t necessarily consider what is best for the mother. Gawande doesn’t say that c-sections are always bad, but he emphasizes that they aren’t the only option. He believes that doctors should be taught a wider variety of practices and procedures to ensure that women have access to all options and that they understand that they have to (and can) do what is best for each individual woman and her baby. What is important about Gawande’s article is that he is pushing for women to have choices and access to information to make informed choices, throughout the entire process of pregnancy and childbirth.

Overall, what is at issue is the importance of choice, in all stages of pregnancy. In class we talked about how a wide range of options should be available for women. What if we were to combine resources, so that a woman could have a midwife or a doula and an obstetrician, all in the same hospital, in the same room? Choices in childbirth should be available to ALL women, regardless of class, ethnicity, language, or anything else. Unfortunately, with the closing of so many natural birth friendly facilities, choice is becoming less and less of an option.

Dominus, Susan. "With the Closing of a Hospital, Women's Childbirth Options Diminish." The New York Times. 9 Apr. 2010. Web. 13 Apr. 2010. .

Gawande, Atul. "How Childbirth Went Industrial." The New Yorker. 9 Oct. 2006. Web. 24 Mar. 2010. .

Grady, Denise. "Lessons at Indian Hospital About Births." The New York Times. 6 Mar. 2010. Web. 25 Mar. 2010. .

Grady, Denise. "Maternal Deaths Decline Sharply Across the Globe." The New York Times. 13 Apr. 2010. Web. 13 Apr. 2010. .

Sulzberger, A.G., and Nick Pinto. "Bellevue Natural-Birth Center, Haven for Poor Women, Closes." The New York Times. 7 Nov. 2009. Web. 13 Apr. 2010. .

News Flash: The Body Hair Taboo and the Impact of Media on Body Image

It is all too common in our society today that the female image is guided and determined by how celebrities are depicted in the media. This is longstanding trend that has impact on everything ranging from hair styles to handbags. The result of media culture and reliance on celebrity image to in turn define female image is a narrow funneling of what exactly is deemed as acceptable and the ‘right’ image of the female. Catherine Saint Louis takes an interesting examination of this characteristic of our society in her New York Times article “Unshaven Women: Free Spirits or Unkempt?” What is unique about Saint Louis’ article though is that she examines the shock and uproar that results when a female celebrity is seen with body hair and how society perceives this as an aberration and an unnatural occurrence. The media culture that is present in this nation where celebrities are looked to as the ideal images creates an atmosphere where women are forced to walk a narrow line. and this is clearly highlighted when a celebrity strays from this short list of acceptable characteristics.
The short list of characteristics used to define what is feminine is shown most clearly when a woman strays from these standards, for example by growing body hair. Perceptions play a large role is shaping body image and the title of Saint Louis’ article highlights the inherent dichotomy in the perception of the female’s decision to let body hair grow. This decision today cannot be viewed as a simple circumstance that arises for no reason at all and instead is labeled by society as either an act of a free spirited individual or someone who has no regard for their image. To the contrary, I would argue that celebrities care very much about their image and Saint Louis cites several in her article. The contemporary example Saint Louis cites is Mo’Nique who was outed as a non-leg shaver while wearing a shorter dress to this past Golden Globes Award ceremony. Other A-list celebrities are included, such as Julia Roberts and Madonna. These are three women who capitalize off of their recognition and their image, yet have been known to sport leg, underarm, and pubic hair. I also feel Saint Louis’ inclusion of the three different areas where women are not expected to have hair is an interesting and beneficial piece of this article. Referencing Madonna’s 1985 appearance in Playboy as the spread, in all senses of the word, Saint Louis shows the different degree of acceptability and reactions to hair that has developed over time. Madonna’s more intimate pictures that “drew cheers not jeers from readers” provide stark contrast to the nasty reaction Mo’Nique received for having leg hair and underscore the strict body image those women perceived as ‘normal’ are forced to adhere to today.[1]
So Saint Louis’ article shows that people today are apt to label body hair on women as “disgusting” but what do the undertones in this article really prove?[2] The biggest message that this article provides, whether Saint Louis intends to or not, is that women are held under great scrutiny and are often met with criticism when they don’t meet society’s desired standards. The standards set by the continual and unavoidable influx of rail thin models and celebrities in society today are beyond the limits of attainability for many women. So while a woman may face scrutiny for placing a few too many calendar days between shaving her legs this culture of continually striving to look like the models is also what leads to eating disorders and other impacts that females are witnessing today. Curtis Sittenfeld’s essay in Listen Up about life as a girl touches on the panic that ensues when a girl’s body begins to stray from the steady and ‘normal’ prepubescent body to the ‘awkward’ and changing body as hormones take the driver’s seat. Portions of the essay such as, “every day during the summer after your junior year in high school, you run two miles to the country club, then you climb 250 flights on the StairMaster” reflect the lengths that are taken to fulfill the desired standard body image for many women.[3] While Sittenfeld’s essay is a fictional set of circumstances measures like this do not seem unrealistic for young girls and women in the pursuit of an idealistic body image. It is the unrealistically high standards driven by our nation’s media culture that drive many females to go to great lengths in order to fulfill not just an ideal body image but one that society has even labeled as the norm for today.
As mentioned earlier, this narrow perception of what defines an acceptable woman has changed over time. Whether through analysis of the appreciation of Madonna’s naked body in 1985, even “with no sign that she had used a razor anywhere,” or adolescent female expression of sexuality today it is clear that times have changed.[4] I do not intend to argue that we have progressed from a perfect time when everyone was cheerful and women were accepted for who they were and not who they were trying to be because this would be inaccurate. The necessity for women to adhere to certain social norms has always been true but I feel that media culture and the reliance on celebrities and models as stock images of femininity has exponentially narrowed the boundaries of acceptability for female body image. Ariel Levy provides a helpful expression of the differences over the past decades that have changed with media culture as she states, “when I went to high school, you wanted to look good and you wanted to look cool, but you would have been embarrassed to look slutty.”[5] This is included in her chapter ‘Pigs in Training’ that highlights the prevalent sexuality in younger and younger females. Thongs, short skirts, tube tops, and even sex have been mainstreamed for young women in society and this is a result of the ubiquitous presence of images of women bearing these articles or engaging in these acts. Levy even points out that the tabloid fascination with Paris Hilton’s sex tape has led to a similar instance with an eighth grader where “like Paris Hilton before her, the dissemination of her amateur porn swiftly resulted in a major uptick in her level of popularity and celebrity.”[6] No, not every eighth grade girl is making and distributing sex tapes but images, people, events, and other aspects of the media are exacting more influence than ever. One of the greatest impacts from the media is the ability to present a specific personality, image, and set of characteristics that is common among a small group of women and attribute this to the entire female population, causing anyone who is different to be scrutinized. Saint Louis’ article is not a manifesto attempting to tear down the societal structure that has led to the constriction of the female image in society. I even think Saint Louis’ acknowledgement and highlighting of those celebrities with body hair as different has just that effect in alienating them from the norm as something ‘weird’ and ‘different.’ Weird and different are not the commonly accepted standards for the female in society and definitely not what has become characteristic of media in our society. Therefore, even while Saint Louis may not be trying to take a controversial stance she does provide a starting point for evaluating the role that media and celebrity culture has taken on our society. While there may be no particular person or people to blame, certainly not celebrities and models for being who they are, there is clearly issues present in our society that show clear signs of stemming from what we see in the media. I think through education and acceptance of what truly is a standard body image and personality type may lead to countless benefits for women and society as a whole. This is of course a massive undertaking but as Saint Louis highlights with the transition in turning of perceptions from 1985 to today, from acceptance to rejection, changes and evolution can and do take place. There is nothing stopping a reversal of these trends in society today and rather than the attempts at homogeneity we need to push for individuality and the acceptance of women for who they are, even if they have hairy legs.
[1] Catherine Saint Louis, “Unshaven Women: Free Spirits or Unkempt?,” The New York Times, April 15, 2010, Fashion and Style.
[2] Catherine Saint Louis, “Unshaven Women: Free Spirits or Unkempt?”
[3] Curtis Sittenfeld, “Your Life as a Girl,” in Listen Up: Voices of the New Feminist Generation, ed. Barbara Findlen (New York: Seal Press, 2001), 3-10.
[4] Catherine Saint Louis, “Unshaven Women: Free Spirits or Unkempt?”
[5] Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture (New York: Free Press, 2006).
[6] Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture.

Feminist Welfare Politics

Although I found Gwendolyn Mink’s accusatory tone and vast generalizations off-putting, Mink raised several interesting points worth considering. Within her article The Lady and the Tramp, the author identifies welfare reforms as a “war against poor women” (56). While the intention of self-proclaimed “feminists” in Congress clearly was not malicious, Mink attempts to reveal how the Personal Responsibility Act perpetuates inequality, especially within the lowest social strata of the population. Mink asserts that the (relatively) new welfare legislation “distinguishes poor single mothers as a separate caste, subject to a separate system of law” (58). Mink hopes to draw attention to the potentially unnoticed disparities within our legal system and demonstrate how such imposed laws may alienate a specific group of people. In order to overcome the perpetuation of control over a vulnerable number of women, Mink believes welfare must be accessible. To her, “welfare… is a condition of women’s equality” (58).

Mink proceeds to offer a brief context of second-wave feminism, suggesting many of the policy claims made by these women marked a transition to “independence through paid employment” as the new primary goal of white feminists. This argument is extremely controversial in its large generalization of individual motivations, however once the reader recognizes the exaggeration within the statement it is possible to find some truth behind it. Middle-class feminists, Mink reasons, understood the home to be their historical site of oppression. In attempting to challenge this tradition, women turned to paid employment as a means of liberation and independence. What Mink believes many people fail to realize, however, is that “when middle-class women moved into the labor market, they did not trade in their caregiving obligations” (60). Now working as an employee was supplemental to the existing responsibility within the home setting.

In order to compensate caregivers for their parenting efforts, Mink concludes with the challenge “to lead policymakers to give poor mothers’ caregiving work the dignity it is due by providing it an income” (62). By suggesting mothering deserves to be on payroll, Mink supports her notion that parenting within the home is work in itself and should be thus rewarded as so. The author makes sure to mention men would not be excluded from this type of income, as not to create more divisions of inequality within our society – the wage for caregiving should be available to all those qualified.

Although Mink raised several interesting arguments throughout the course of her article, I was rather irritated by her vast generalizations and eagerness to place blame on others. As she attempts to unveil why the Personal Responsibility Act was passed, Mink asserts that over time recipients of welfare have been labeled with “radically charged images of lazy, promiscuous and matriarchal women” (59). While there is undoubtedly a stigma attached to welfare and various stereotypes that accompany it, we are reminded that such misconceptions are undeserved because every situation is unique to itself. Although Mink is quick to dispel any biases surrounding women on welfare, she finds no problem in stating “Republicans won their war against poor single mothers with the complicity of millions of other feminists” (56). Even if Mink intends to shock the reader with her blameful language in hopes of drawing attention to the subject, it seems hypocritical to fault such a diverse body of people with the same offense. Instead, I think it would be more productive to approach the topic of welfare with an inclusive approach. Peggy McIntire, for example, recognizes her advantage as a white female and calls upon the reader to join her in a comprehensive effort to promote women’s rights. An individual is likely to be deterred from supporting Mink after being blamed with years of inequality among struggling mothers. Mink’s article would have been more effective had she used more progressive and encouraging rhetorical strategies.

Gender, Work, and Equality: The Mommy Tax

In her article "The Mommy Tax," Ann Critenden highlights several important and controversial issues that both women and men face when they choose to have children. Despite the article being slightly outdated and sometimes extreme, Critenden makes several points that forced me to think about issues that I realized I wasn't very familiar with. I think many people are familiar with the issue of equal pay between men and women in the workplace, but Critenden's focus on mothers (and parents) provides a new framework for consideration.

I think most government and company policies only scratch the surface of an issue that they should be facing head on. I found it troubling that both Virginia Daly and Cindy DiBiasi - women who fought back against the system - were essentially silenced by the system and the law. For DiBiasi, the process was so draining and overwhelming that she ended up not suing her employer at all. Cases like hers are discouraging, yet this seems to be the norm, not the exception. A lot of women are having to decide between having a career and having a family. For some people, this may not seem like such a big deal. Why not just pick one? Why not have both? It is strange to think that this decision may be framed as a choice. Critenden explains, "Americans have a hard time realizing that such deeply personal choices as when or whether to have a child can be powerfully circumscribed by broader social or economic factors. American women, in particular, are stunningly unaware that their "choices" between a career and a family are much more limited than those of women in many European countries, where policies are much more favorable to mothers and children" (108). The choice may seem simple to those of us who haven't had to consider it - have a career or have kids. But the reality for most parents is anything but simple. The social norms, stereotypes, and laws in the US make it very difficult for parents to actually have both without facing negative consequences - consequences that Critenden says could be prevented if more appropriate laws were in place.

At the Manifesta lecture, several students expressed concerns about the administrations handling of sexual misconduct and assault. Jennifer and Amy talked about how sometimes it can be difficult for people (in that case, the administration) to grasp the importance and/or severity of an issue. They suggested framing the issue in terms of another issue - something that Critenden does with the mommy tax and anti-discrimination laws - a possible step in reducing the mommy tax by expanding antidiscrimination laws to cover parents. She explains that Joan Williams, a law professor, argues that "the design of work around masculine norms can be reconceptualized as discrimination" (107). Perhaps in this light, more people would realize the significance of the issues faced by mothers, fathers, children, and families in our country and begin (or hopefully, by now, to continue) to work together towards positive change.