Phyllis Schlafly cracks me up. I think she is maybe also a performance artist? She should seriously open for Ashley Dupre. They can do a duet of Ke$ha’s “Blah Blah Blah.” Here are some of the things she said recently at a college in South Carolina.
Feminists are “bitter, unhappy and not successful women.”… Schlafly challenged the legitimacy of a variety of social programs and legislation put in place by feminist agenda, including abortion, shelters for battered women and sexual harassment counseling … Other controversial comments included Schlafly’s denial of the existence of spousal rape, as well as her statement that individuals shouldn’t be able to “check out” of marriage.
It provides a nice flashback to un-subtle sexism and totally unstealthy anti-feminism. She’s a very tangible Hater of Young Women With Their Freedoms. I mean, look at her hair.
I really like your suggestion that we consider naming Benjamin Kunkel or some other mild-mannered, handsome writer dude the face of 00s Sexism. I don’t know that he is sexist, or that any of those guys really are, but I do think 90s Men are different than 90s Women in interesting ways.
He said on NPR: “I think for a number of people of my generation, there’s been an explosion of freedom without any sort of similar capacity to handle the opportunities that spread themselves before us.” I think that gets at the difference you’ve talked about between Gen X men and women. The men really were all about indecision. The women were super decisive.
So maybe the “it’s all good” John Mayer type is the Phyllis Schlafly of today?