{"id":27,"date":"2003-01-21T11:06:45","date_gmt":"2003-01-21T19:06:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2003\/01\/21\/feminists-care-more-about-augusta-than-the-taliban\/"},"modified":"2003-01-21T11:06:45","modified_gmt":"2003-01-21T19:06:45","slug":"feminists-care-more-about-augusta-than-the-taliban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=27","title":{"rendered":"Feminists care more about Augusta than the Taliban?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Kitchen Cabinet’s Lily Malcolm<\/a> links approvingly to an anti-feminist screed by Kay Hymowitz, “Why Feminism Is AWOL on Islam<\/a>.” The article gives a broad overview of the horrifying conditions women live under in “Islamic fundamentalist” countries, and has a good sidebar on Islamic feminism.<\/p>\n

I’m glad conservatives are finally paying attention to how women are abused under Sharia law – but the article’s critique of feminism is nonsense. Ms. Hymowitz’s critique consists mostly of the usual recycled antifeminist cliches (a dab of Who Stole Feminism<\/em>, a riff on pomo academic feminists, etc). That fluff aside, Hymowitz does float a (relatively) new antifeminist claim: According to her, feminists haven’t said a word about how women in countries like Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia suffer under Sharia law; feminists never mentioned the women sentenced to death in Nigeria, feminists have never objected to honor killings. Instead, we’ve all been worrying about if women can golf at Augusta.<\/p>\n

Ms. Hymowitz’s thesis is ridiculous. Not only have feminists (including the academic feminists Ms. Hymowitz disdains) been speaking on these issues for decades, until recently feminists have been almost the only<\/em> Westerners speaking. There have been literally thousands of feminist speaking (in books, websites, articles, fundraisers, letter-writing campaigns, conferences, etc) about women under Islam and Sharia law.<\/p>\n

Let’s address one of Ms. Hymowitz’s specific claims:<\/p>\n

\n

[Feminists] have averted their eyes from the harsh, blatant oppression of millions of women, even while they have continued to stare into the Western patriarchal abyss, indignant over female executives who cannot join an exclusive golf club and college women who do not have their own lacrosse teams.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Have feminists paid more attention to Augusta and lacrosse than to the oppression of women under Sharia law? I decided to search the websites of the two largest feminist organizations in the US; how many hits would I get for Sharia versus Augusta?:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
Google search results:
Where are feminism’s priorities?<\/b><\/caption>\n
<\/th>\nSharia,
Afghanistan,
or Islam<\/th>\n		 Augusta or
lacrosse<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n
NOW<\/a><\/th>\n133<\/a><\/td>\n10<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
FMF<\/a><\/th>\n1340<\/a><\/td>\n674<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
FMF
(w\/o newswire)<\/th>\n		191<\/a><\/td>\n11<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

<\/center><\/p>\n

Contrary to Ms. Hymowitz’s accusation, feminists overwhelmingly pay more attention to women under Sharia than to women golfing. Her entire argument is based on a factual mistake – and one that she could have easily have corrected herself, if she had bothered to do fifteen seconds of research. (That feminists pay more attention to the plight of women in Saudi Arabia than the plight of women excluded from Augusta is no surprise; conservatives have been far more obsessed with Augusta than feminists. Body & Soul<\/a> has an excellent post about the “feminists-only-pay-attention-to-Augusta” silliness.) <\/p>\n

(Of course, none of the<\/a> many<\/a> right-wing<\/a> bloggers<\/a> who<\/a> blogged this article checked to see if Ms. Hymowitz’s thesis was true, either.)<\/p>\n

Statistics aside, there’s a deeper issue here: Is it ridiculous for American feminists to be concerned about American problems when women elsewhere have it worse?. Ms. Hymowitz wants us to answer “yes,” but the same criticism could be applied to Ms. Hymowitz’s work. In the mid-1990s, when the Feminist Majority Foundation was gearing up their campaign against the Taliban, Ms. Hymowitz was trying to show that Sesame Street<\/em> doesn’t help kids learn to read. By her own standards, shouldn’t she have been ignoring that issue, concentrating instead on more urgent educational problems faced by Afghani children (especially girls)?<\/p>\n

Well, yes – but Ms. Hymowitz wouldn’t dream of living up to the standards she measures feminism by, because those standards are ridiculous. It’s human nature to pay more attention to what’s going on in our own culture; and if anything, feminists have been less insular than most Americans. (Even Ms. Hymowitz has to admit that the Feminist Majority Foundation was focusing on the Taliban years before 9\/11).<\/p>\n

Perhaps it would be better if Americans paid less attention to American issues, and more attention to people who have things objectively worse abroad. But is it fair for Ms. Hymowitz to hold feminists to a standard she doesn’t hold anyone else – including herself – to?<\/p>\n

Let me make a prediction: Five years from now, Ms. Hymowitz will have moved on to some other issue-of-the-moment; but feminists will still<\/em> be working to help women under Sharia law (alongside the thousand other issues feminists worry about). Feminists were almost the only Westerners who gave a shit about women under Sharia law before 9\/11 (Dworkin<\/a> was writing about it in the 1970s), and we’ll still give a shit when it’s no longer fashionable.<\/p>\n

The truth is, feminists haven’t been silent; Kay Hymowitz just hasn’t been listening.<\/p>\n

Update<\/strong>: Boy, am I late! Off the Kuff<\/a> and The Sideshow<\/a> were covering this question back in September.<\/p>\n

Second Update:<\/strong> There’s a little discussion<\/a> of this going on over on Eschaton<\/a> (whose post on this subject<\/a> sums up what’s happening well). The funniest comment<\/a> comes from Carpeicthus<\/a>: “Ah yes, how well I remember my pre-9\/11 college days, when the Young Republicans were constantly holding rallies and passing out flyers decrying the Taliban.” Hee hee.<\/p>\n

Update the third:<\/strong> Body and Soul<\/a> picks up the ball (is it a golf ball?) and runs much further with it; if you liked this post, you’ll love Jeanne’s.<\/p>\n

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

The Kitchen Cabinet’s Lily Malcolm links approvingly to an anti-feminist screed by Kay Hymowitz, “Why Feminism Is AWOL on Islam.” The article gives a broad overview of the horrifying conditions women live under in “Islamic fundamentalist” countries, and has a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[101,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-afghanistan","category-anti-feminists-and-their-pals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}