New York, NY–I doubt many in the men’s and fathers’ movement feel this way, but there are occasions when our feminist opponents do something so embarrassing that I end up feeling a little sorry for them. Such is the case with New York State NOW’s reaction to Ted Kennedy’s recent endorsement of Obama over Hillary.
According to the Albany Times-Union, NY NOW president Marcia Pappas (pictured), in an angry, vindictive screed which sounds like it was written by a 13-year-old, recently announced:
“Women have just experienced the ultimate betrayal. Senator Kennedy”s endorsement of Hillary Clinton”s opponent in the Democratic presidential primary campaign has really hit women hard. Women have forgiven Kennedy, stuck up for him, stood by him, hushed the fact that he was late in his support of Title IX, the ERA, the Family Leave and Medical Act to name a few. Women have buried their anger that his support for the compromises in No Child Left Behind and the Medicare bogus drug benefit brought us the passage of these flawed bills. We have thanked him for his ardent support of many civil rights bills, BUT women are always waiting in the wings.
“And now the greatest betrayal! We are repaid with his abandonment! He”s picked the new guy over us. He”s joined the list of progressive white men who can”t or won”t handle the prospect of a woman president who is Hillary Clinton (they will of course say they support a woman president, just not ‘this’ one).
“This latest move by Kennedy, is so telling about the status of and respect for women”s rights, women”s voices, women”s equality, women”s authority and our ability – indeed, our obligation – to promote and earn and deserve and elect, unabashedly, a President that is the first woman after centuries of men who ‘know what”s best for us.'”
Amazing. Ted Kennedy has been a huge advocate of women’s and feminist issues for decades, but like a carping wife with a memory that never forgets, Pappas feels compelled to remind him of every time he apparently didn’t snap to fast enough for New York NOW. Pappas says that, graciously, “women have forgiven Kennedy.” But now that Kennedy has chosen one liberal candidate (Obama) over another (Hillary), it is “the greatest betrayal,” the “ultimate betrayal,” and “abandonment.”
Note that Pappas does not mention any political differences between Hillary and Obama–it’s all about voting for a woman. This is particularly ridiculous because here the contest is between a white woman and a black man. Despite women’s struggles, white women have always had and continue to have it vastly better than black men.
But you know what really amazes me about this? These people–Pappas and NY NOW–beat us. In 2006, we launched a our Campaign in Support of New York Shared Parenting Bill A330. Pappas was the opposition’s main point person.
After we launched the campaign, NOW and other feminist groups counterattacked, launching Action Alerts and campaigns against the bill. The number of calls and letters we generated greatly dwarfed those of our opposition–by a ratio well over 10 to 1–but the Shared Parenting Bill was defeated anyway. It was a stunning commentary on the stranglehold feminist groups have over gender issues in political circles in New York and many other states.
To learn more about that battle, and to read our dueling op-eds in the Albany Times Union, click here. Pappas also criticized the fatherhood movement and my co-authored New York Daily News column NOW at 40: Group’s Opposition to Shared Parenting Contradicts Its Goal of Gender Equality (7/27/06) in her column Fathers’ Responsibilities Before Fathers’ Rights.