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Anti-Feminist Quote of the Day: On "Woman"

By Fannie

Celebrating Phyllis Schlafly and Suzanne Venker's new anti-feminist tome The Flipside of Feminism, Rebecca Hagelin opines in The Washington Times:

"The American woman wants to be married; to care for her own children, instead of sending them to day care; and prefers to work part time rather than the long hours of C-suite executives.

So... there's only one American woman then?

But seriously, what on earth could this possibly mean? Does Hagelin sincerely believe that she can accurately inform us as to what half of the population of America wants by rhetorically reducing "her" to one woman?

Is the consciousness of American women located in a floating hub and subsequently downloaded and then shared by all of us?

By claiming to know what "the American woman wants," Hagelin sets up a standard for the correct performance of American womanhood. Women who deviate from this performance and express individuality, nuance, or disagreement with these alleged wants of "the American woman" are implicitly framed as unauthentic women.

Defining some women out of womanhood because we might want those C-suites is misogyny. That's the flipside feature of anti-feminism.

Full post as published by Fannie's Room on March 25, 2011 (boomark / email).