Congrats to Jessica for the big time coverage in the NY Times. Anything that gets the word out about the feminist blogosphere is a net good for us.
That said: Aye, I hate the catfight narrative the mainstream media puts on any situation where two women disagree. This article contrasts Marcia A. Pappas, who wrote an overheated press release on behalf of NY NOW accusing Senator Kennedy of betraying women because he endorsed Obama, with Jessica Valenti, who owns the website that denounced Pappas for claiming to speak for all women on this. (Feministing could have gone further and pointed out that the hyper-focus on the achievements of a wealthy white woman running for President over and beyond all other issues of more immediate importance to workaday Americans, half of whom are female, only reinforces criticisms that feminism is a movement more worried about a fraction of all women, even to the detriment of others. I disagree that this is true, and when someone lives up to that stereotype like Pappas did, I get pretty angry. I think having a female President is a very important goal. But I don’t think it outstrips all other concerns.) The article could have focused on the substantive differences between the two women, but instead they chose to do a fucked-up hatchet job on both that implies that Jessica is a lightweight (untrue) and Pappas is an ax-wielding man-hater (I don’t know her, but I bet that’s not true).
Before the article gets around to even mentioning the actual views of the women involved, clothes must be discussed.
Ms. Valenti enjoyed a sparkly moment in the sun last June, when she went on “The Colbert Report” in a tasteful skirt, three-inch heels and fashionably bare legs to promote her book “Full Frontal Feminism.” In between consistent efforts to make the case that most young women are feminists even if they don’t know it, she gamely fielded compliments (only half in jest) from Stephen Colbert about her “hot little bod” and indulged in a little flirty banter about girls gone wild at Mardi Gras.
And the two org’s websites are contrasted in a way that reinforces the idea that one can be ignored as a featherweight and the other ignored for stodginess.
But that’s pretty much where the similarities in their feminist backgrounds and presentations come to a screeching halt. Ms. Valenti’s Web site has video bloggers, and postings under subject headings like “Hot Menses Mess,” and covers pop culture and international affairs. Ms. Pappas’s NOW-NY Web site prominently champions the Equal Rights Amendment, features an online version of its print newsletter and is sprinkled liberally with language like “in sisterhood and equality.”
You know, Feministing also champions sisterhood, equality, and the ERA. I’m fucking sick of the media pitting older feminists against younger ones, as if they were different beasts altogether and as if only women were witness to minor generational differences that can cause tension. True, the second half of the article gets around to actually quoting Jessica, so you can see she’s not a featherhead, and Pappas is (barely) allowed by the reporter to share the fact that she’s not actually a harridan who wants to stomp the younger feminists. The reporter also begrudgingly allows that Pappas is pretty alone in her harsh opinion of Sen. Kennedy, and that is far from some earth-shaking rift between feminists. But all the good parts of the article, including a concluding paragraph that admits that feminists of different ages have more in common than not (while still implying that there’s some generational catfight going on here) are all safely in the second half of the article, hidden from the eyes of most readers who just scan the first half to get the gist of things. Also missing is the extensive defenses that Feministing has offered of Clinton against sexist coverage of her, leaving the incorrect impression that younger “fun” feminists don’t give a shit about the importance of the candidacy.
All press is good press, of course, so it’s great that Feministing got this coverage. I expect that readers interested in online feminism will skip over the outfit descriptions and look for the quotes, anyway. But could they be any more obvious about how the catfight narrative is about discrediting both women in the story? What’s really maddening is that the catfight narrative has this ugly potential to infect our own understanding of ourselves and our movement, stoking hostilities that could be resolved.
26 Responses to “Feminist catfight my patoot”
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Thanks, Amanda! That’s exactly how I felt after I read the article — that it made both women seem like caricatures and seemed the think the only way to describe an ideological difference between two women was to make it into a petty catfight. I agree with you that it unfairly made Jessica (and, by extension, the young feminists who she is a stand-in for in the story) seem frivolous and politically unserious, while it made Ms. Pappas and NOW-NY seem like the stereotypical crazy out-of-touch “women’s libbers.”
It could have been an opportunity, like you said, to illuminate the real philosophical differences between generations of feminists and how the affect the way each group is viewing the presidential campaign. THAT would have been an interesting article… which wouldn’t have needed to mention Jessica’s bare legs.
I can’t read this blog post. Those kitties!
This is nuts, it’s nothing but a takedown piece about all feminists. Hell, you have to consider Hillary Clinton a paragon of strawfeminism for this narrative to work. I love how the only way the MSM can claim to be objective is to be like mean girls, without the wry wit of Tina Fey.
10 points for Amanda’s use of ‘patoot’.
50 if anyone ever uses, ‘as hard as a carp’, in some sentence.
We’ll make you midwesterners yet!
Yay, kitties!
This blog needs more kitten!”
Henceforth perhaps we should begin commenting on TV appearences of men by remarking on their wardrobe. For example: “Mr McCain appeared in a tasteful grey suit with a red tie, and of course the de regeur American Flag pin.
Seriously, unless that peice was written for Vogue who the hell cares what she wore??
You miss (not being a New Yorker) the additional level of class stratification going on. Jessica is described as “from Astoria by way of Williamsburg,” while Pappas’ upstate place of residence is never really given, because it doesn’t matter. Her place of business, Albany, is given, but that’s sufficient to communicate to the Times’ audience that she’s the Other.
What’s not communicated is that Jessica is not, in fact, “from Astoria by way of Williamsburg,” but “from Astoria,” having grown up there. She lived in Williamsburg for only a few years (and I did covet her apartment there, but alas, it was being sold by her landlord for ungodly sums, so she and her roommates had to leave).
Astoria is, yes, the first stop on the ladder to Manhattan of a lot of young people (at least as far as the Times is concerned) because it’s relatively cheap, but it’s also an ethnic enclave. Williamsburg, however, is the place where young hipsters live, and Jessica was being positioned as a young hipster vs. Marcia Pappas.
This topic came up at Ed Brayton’s blog, and the anti-choicers turned the discussion toward abortion as usual.
I’m now getting surrounded by concern trolls, surprisingly including Ed Brayton.
Anyone want to join the fray? Any assistance would be appreciated.
http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2008/01/when_feminists_act_like_a_mind.php#comment-733814
Oh and I’m an “arrogant feminist” now. Previously, I was decorated only with “arrogant atheist” and “arrogant liberal elite”.
This is a great honor!
It seems like about 99% of what the MSM writes are simple madlibs. Reporters go out to fill in a couple of nouns, adjectives, and verbs, but the story is already written.
The insult to injury on the article is the final paragraph:
Thanks, there, Times. Your condescension is appreciated.I think I’m reaching the threshold of my tolerance for the NYT being both out-of-touch and smug about it.
“I’m fucking sick of the media pitting older feminists against younger ones, as if they were different beasts altogether and as if only women were witness to minor generational differences that can cause tension.” On the other hand, there’s a kernel of truth there, as witnessed by the discussions about Feministing’s logo and the reactions to it from second-wave v. third-wave-and-beyond feminists.
I can’t help but laugh at the rightists’ descriptions of feminists.
When feminists agree with each other, they are accused of groupthink or blind ideology.
When feminists disagree, they are having “catfights.”
Imagine if that “logic” were applied to supporters of Romney, Huckabee, and John “Keating Five” McCain.
I really hated the way they kept referring to each of them as “Ms.”
I really hated the way they kept referring to each of them as “Ms.”
Huh? Why? That’s NYTimes “Style”, which hilariously renders the “artist” Meat Loaf as “Mr. Loaf”
Well, I agree with Roxie. Times style or no, I hate all the honorifics in their articles. It feels very pretentious to me.
It’s like a guy who wears a top hat and monocle, speaks with an old-timey British accent, and likes to quote Chaucer and Shakespeare because he thinks it makes him seem classier/smarter/cooler than you.
Don’t be that guy.
Although, articles referring to Mr. Loaf, Mr. Diddy, and Mr. Dogg are kind of awesome. I can get behind that stylistic choice.
I prefer the honorific. It’s not like American culture is overly formal, in case you haven’t noticed.
(In fact, we need MORE honorifics: in some countries, “Engineer” is a title like “Doctor”.)
Do you mean Ann Althouse and “boobiegate”?or i should say *during* boobiegate, which was about jessica’s picture. i don’t think Ann’s a second-wave feminist, though. isn’t she more like CWA?
Roxie,
What would you prefer over “Ms.” Wasn’t that advanced as a more modern alternative to Miss, Mrs., not to mention the old “(Mrs.)” Wonder how many readers ever even saw that one. [It was at one time used on letters by married women, particularly in the South.]
If not “Ms.” then what on second ref? Just the last name? Some writers of style manuals contend that last-name only refs should be used only for notorious individuals, such as criminals, in order to avoid the honorary title.
I’m all in favor of honorifics, used consistently.
I have never, ever heard of that Doug. What “writers of style manuals” of 1857?
Maybe it’s another “generational” thing, but since AT LEAST 2001 (and I know it started much earlier) they teach that it is last name only (not counting titles and degrees).
I agree with Roxie- male politicians are usually given only a last name, and it looks weird and overly formal when you see them referred to as “Mr.”
The New York Times still uses “Mrs.” frequently, as in “Mrs. Clinton.” (In fairness to the Times, however, Senator Clinton apparently chose the “Mrs.” honorific rather than “Ms.” for the purposes of the Senate Roll Call, and the Times never uses “Senator” as an honorific.)
Elayne, most of the older feminists who have the logo explained to them get it, though. I’ve not heard too much anger about it. Mostly it’s clear it’s a joke.