The Kinds of Feminism

Forbes:

The critique has to be made, but the aim of feminism must be recollected and used to refocus all energies.

Christina Hoff Sommers, Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and author of Freedom Feminism—Its Surprising History and Why it Matters Today, explains why as my guest on this week’s RealClear Radio Hour.

In her book, Sommers meticulously describes the two rival camps of feminism, which are often in conflict, but drive progress when pulling in the same direction. The first, “Egalitarian Feminism,” traces its roots back to a controversial 18th century writer, philosopher, and scandalizer of high society named Mary Wollstoncraft, who believed that, “Men and women were essentially the same in their spirits and souls, deserving of the same rights.”…

Sommers contrasts Wollstonecraft with Hannah More, whom she calls the founder of “Maternal Feminism.” More evangelized for a different-but-equal concept of empowered femininity. “Hannah met women where they were. She believed there was a feminine nature and that women were caring and nurturing, different from men but deserving of equality.” Unlike Wollstonecraft, More was tremendously popular in her time. Her books outsold those of Jane Austen and Thomas Paine, and she was widely admired as an advocate of education and work opportunities for women. Today, however, she is not only forgotten, but denigrated as an apologist for the patriarchy….

“Well, along came Phyllis Schlafly who ‘read the fine print.’,” says Sommers. “She pointed out that not only would women be subject to the draft but everything from single-sex schools to separate bathrooms would become illegal. Schlafly began a one-woman, state-by-state campaign to derail ratification, raising worries that if it passed, ‘We would all be in court forever and ever.’”

And this is where NOW and its radical brand of Egalitarian Feminism lost the fight. Yes, they insisted, the ERA would mandate the elimination of all gender distinctions in law. Nothing less the the total reengineering of society lay ahead. Americans recoiled. And the more alarmed people became, the more strident NOW behaved, chaining themselves to statehouse doors and splashing pigs’ blood on opponents.

After the ERA failed, hardline feminists, rather than reexamine their tactics, retreated to the campus, erecting sinecures where they could safely nurse their grievances. They remain there to this day, training the next generation of women to become embittered enemies of the patriarchy.

Sommers laments this waste of female talent and energy. If women are going to be set free in the developing world, all the different strands of feminism need to pull together.