Hells Bells, another gender-bender!

Yes, men can be total bastards; but that applies equally to women.

I support equality of opportunity for women – all of humanity will benefit from social perspectives generated equally from both halves of humanity’s biological divide. It’s taken a long time to get anywhere close to it in the developed world. The hard slog of dedicated women working for that gets a fair run-down in the book “The Long Road to Greenham Common”. The women of Switzerland only got the vote about a half-century back; and a great many women, even in the “more civilized” world – and Australia, still do not have adequate rights to control their own child-bearing destiny.

But to make the inference that girls like tough turkey Golda Meier, sink-the-Belgrano Maggie Thatcher of Falklands war fame, Mrs Ghandi of India, Mrs Bandaranaike of Ceylon were fronts for the male brigade – is untenable. There is no denying that, across the spectrum from Thatcher to Gro Harlem Brundtland, these lassies were no surrogates for shadowy males hiding in the wings of corridors of power. Both Condoleeza Rice and Hilary Clinton can be expected to manipulate what power comes into their hands, within its limits, according to their own agendas

"a great many women, even in the “more civilized” world – and Australia, still do not have adequate rights to control their own child-bearing destiny."

What a load of emotive crock.

Women in Australia have more than adequate rights to control their own fertility.

They can choose to be married or unmarried, whether to use birth control or not, to have a child within marriage or outside of marriage. They can choose not carry on with a pregnancy or too keep the child or adopt it out.

They can choose to be gay, straight or bi.

Unlike countries like China, the women of Australia do not have to apply to government in order to get pregnant.

A woman does not even need to include her male partner in her decision to get pregnant.

Some swallow the Matriarchial feminists messages about having it all and delayed child rearing, only to discover the older you get the more difficult it is to fall pregnant, so in reality is nature which controls a womans fertility, not the government or laws.

To quote your article:

"These countries don’t need the US imperial democracy in female drag. This is in no one’s interest, especially not the women of Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, and Israel. And it is not in the interest of women in the United States."

How dare you speak about women in the middle east, when you are so class bigotted and obviously think that white women and the western world are so superior and so much more important than the "brown mass" that exists elsewhere that you actually speak about the rights of women in the west at all. This is like sending an ambulance to the white guy who cut his toe instead of the brown guy who was blown up. Gender equality in the west is all but fixed, a few minor things are maybe yet to ironed out.

However, to not focus entirely on the rights of women in the middle east, where gender apartheid is sanctioned and official. You obvioulsy think that these brown masses are supposed to live like animals.

Did you support Hirsi Ali when she came out here recently, speaking about abuse of women in middle eastern countries? If you didn't then you have made my point for me.

White Warlock - as I commented earlier, don't think much of this piece at all. I think colinsett actually articulated views I share more succinctly than I did.

Your post White Warlock however, is specious in the extreme and I can't agree with it in the slightest.

You point out that gender issues in oppressive regimes are far more serious, and they are. But to state: "to not focus entirely on the rights of women in the middle east, where gender apartheid is sanctioned and official. You obvioulsy think that these brown masses are supposed to live like animals."

Is wrong for so many reasons. Firstly, employing the same logic, poverty exists in the third world, so we shouldn't be at all concerned with poverty in Australia. The same goes for STDs, malnutrition, in fact, almost any health issue you care to name.

This is specious in the extreme. At present, short of all out warfare, there is little we can do about the gender issues in these nations, and as evidenced by the Iraq war, combat has the potential to bring greater misery with no guarantee of remedying such human rights abuses.

Secondly, your implication that the author therefore isn't concerned about the "brown masses" is similarly flawed.
Because you focus on a problem in your back yard, it doesn't mean you don't care about broader issues. It certainly doesn't mean you support those issues overseas. Your attack there is among the most specious I've seen.

Lastly, whilst I tend to think gender discrimination in our culture is pretty mild, certainly compared to oppressive regimes, it hasn't been eliminated entirely. Men still earn consistently more than women for similar jobs and women have greater difficulty entering the workforce.
I'm not saying I necessarily agree with some of the measures introduced to change this and I'm not sure that there won't always be a lingering cultural issue regarding the status of women and motherhood. Nevertheless, to deny the issue exists is wilfully churlish.

The writer asserts that that “We need a politics where gender is not defined by one’s biological body”. What she means is one defined by her ideological nostrums, rather than what real women actually feel, advocate and do. Any female who doesn’t conform to her prescription is not a real woman but a “decoy”. What rubbish.

Haven’t we just spent 200 years trying to overcome the notion that authentic womanhood is defined in the eyes of a third party, not the capabilities, skills, lives and ideas of actual women, in all their diversity and contradictions?

If she disagrees with Hillary and Condi, (I often do too) let her say why. But to attack them as gender “decoys” or “manly women” is despicable bigotry.

The main gist of this excerpt from the author's book is:

"Thinking of either of these women as feminist or as icons of democracy makes about as much sense as the wars they authorise." the rest simply enlarges upon this basic encapsulation.

So what on earth are more recent posters getting their knickers in a twist about?

The woman's just objecting to the way the US government points to these two women whenever criticism of US democracy (notice she uses the phrase "so-called democracy"?)is abused and then goes on to cite them as proof of (non-existent) liberalism in Government.

Geez. The woman is saying the USA knows squat about democracy (as is one poster), couldn't be less interested in women's rights either at home or abroad, and will use any excuse to go to war anywhere, anytime anywhere, which she finds abhorrent. As do many posters.

She's objecting to the fact that Condi and Hillary are being used to divert attention into the old argy-bargy of gender politics (and a couple of posters skillfully illustrate how beautifully this tactic works)and she thinks it stinks. End of story.

Margaret Thatcher and Indira Ghandi or other female leaders therefore have nothing to do with this issue. And far from thinking how superior either she or her country is, she is accusing them of deceit, dishonesty, smoke-screening and manipulation.

She is most certainly not taking sides about women of one nationality versus another, but saying that the US government is.

More and more it seems that the analogy of Pavlov's dogs rules many people in our society: a little bell rings when key words like "Democracy, "Feminist" "Gender" "Islam" Middle East" "Terrorist" etc. appear and out they come, minds set and metaphorical fists swinging, for another serving, regardless of what is actually being served.