Bloody Betty Friedan dies
Betty Friedan, one of the icons of modern feminism, died Saturday.
Her 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique is credited with helping to revive feminism.
She was one of the founders of NOW (the National Organization for Women), and NARAL (the National Abortion Rights Action League – now called NARAL-ProChoice American).
As with most movements, there was some good in modern feminism.
It opened the doors for women to rise up in business and government, to earn more equal pay, to be treated more fairly under the law.
Our county executive is a woman, Maggie Brooks. Sandra Day O’Connor became a Supreme Court Justice. Condi Rice is now our Secretary of State. Hillary Clinton is a Senator for my state. Louise Slaughter represents part of my region in Congress. Anne Mulcahy is chairman and CEO of Xerox Corporation, which began in my city.
Whether or not you agree with them and their positions on issues, the fact remains that without modern feminism, these women – and many more like them – would likely not have had a chance to reach their current positions.
I applaud that part of the feminist legacy.
It’s some of the rest of that legacy that I have trouble with.
Feminism has helped to spur the breakdown of social structures, including the family. It has led to a denigration of such values as sexual purity, motherhood and marriage.
Friedan herself saw problems. She split with the leadership of NOW over such issues as lesbianism and the hatred of men. She later said that feminism went too far in condemning traditional roles for women as housewives and mothers.
Good.
But as far as I know, Friedan never repented of her role in legalizing abortion through Roe v. Wade and related court cases.
She was part of a movement that used lies, pressure and protests to make the murder of the unborn socially acceptable.
So in my mind she was Bloody Betty, implicated in the greatest genocide in human history.
She and her pro-abortion compatriots have killed more people than Hitler and Stalin – combined.
Perhaps she repented before she died.
I hope she did.
I certainly would hate to face God with the blood of more than 46 million dead babies on my hands.
Her 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique is credited with helping to revive feminism.
She was one of the founders of NOW (the National Organization for Women), and NARAL (the National Abortion Rights Action League – now called NARAL-ProChoice American).
As with most movements, there was some good in modern feminism.
It opened the doors for women to rise up in business and government, to earn more equal pay, to be treated more fairly under the law.
Our county executive is a woman, Maggie Brooks. Sandra Day O’Connor became a Supreme Court Justice. Condi Rice is now our Secretary of State. Hillary Clinton is a Senator for my state. Louise Slaughter represents part of my region in Congress. Anne Mulcahy is chairman and CEO of Xerox Corporation, which began in my city.
Whether or not you agree with them and their positions on issues, the fact remains that without modern feminism, these women – and many more like them – would likely not have had a chance to reach their current positions.
I applaud that part of the feminist legacy.
It’s some of the rest of that legacy that I have trouble with.
Feminism has helped to spur the breakdown of social structures, including the family. It has led to a denigration of such values as sexual purity, motherhood and marriage.
Friedan herself saw problems. She split with the leadership of NOW over such issues as lesbianism and the hatred of men. She later said that feminism went too far in condemning traditional roles for women as housewives and mothers.
Good.
But as far as I know, Friedan never repented of her role in legalizing abortion through Roe v. Wade and related court cases.
She was part of a movement that used lies, pressure and protests to make the murder of the unborn socially acceptable.
So in my mind she was Bloody Betty, implicated in the greatest genocide in human history.
She and her pro-abortion compatriots have killed more people than Hitler and Stalin – combined.
Perhaps she repented before she died.
I hope she did.
I certainly would hate to face God with the blood of more than 46 million dead babies on my hands.
posted by A Secular Franciscan | 9:08 PM
7 Comments:
since we know not one's heart at the moment of death, I too hope she repented..however, chances are two...slim and the other one.
Hell is available who choose it, it seems...I hope I can just get in the side door of the other spot, when St. Pete ain't lookin'.
Well if you're lucky, maybe someday you can face God with the stain of all of the women who have died from illegal abortions on your soul.
Abortion is the symptom, try curing the problems. I find that stance is usually rejected by most "pro-lifers." Hypocrites.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous - your comment implies that I have done nothing to help these women, hence I am guilty of their deaths.
First, the numbers of deaths of women from illegal abortions in this country was greatly exaggerated - by NARAL (and Friedan) among others.
Second, I have voluteered with and financially support a number of organzations that try to treat and cure the "problems" that help to lead to abortion. They provide financial and material assistance, emotional support, safe havens for women threatened by violence, shelter, adoption, health care, job training, etc.
There are a number of pro-lifers who also support such help - so they are not hypocrites.
Third, abortion is not a symptom: It is a crime (even if it is "legal").
The problems that lead some women to chose abortion are mitigating circumstances, certainly, but they do not change the essential nature of abortion.
It's like saying a murderer should be let go because he grew up in poverty, had a poor education, and his parents beat him.
These circumstances lessen his culpability - but the fact remains that he committed murder.
In the end, when I face God, I won't have these women's blood on my hands.
I'll have other things to worry about!
Wait... Women choose to engage in an act that causes them to get pregnant, murder their babies illegally, and die in the process, and somehow it's OUR FAULT???
Anonymous, try taking a course in logic. Or tune down the sheer emotion you seem to thrive on long enough to actually think.
And we have a cure for the problems. But I find that stance (and cure) is usually rejected by most "pro-choicers." REAL Hypocrites!!!
I read that Friedan was on the fence on abortion for years, and that it remained a troubling issue for her--at least in her early life. Abortion, by the way, was promoted by some members of the Republican party as something worth (literally, no doubt) decriminalization. It's amazing how an economic boon was morphed into a "rights" issue and coopted by some Democrats. Interestingly enough, The Republican Party and many conservatives remain ambivalent about abortion. One might say they seem pleased with the status quo that affords them to play the right-to-life card whenever convenient.
Todd - dead on. Being pro-choice is not limited to one party. Nor is being pro-life. And the history of support for abortion is a mixed one.
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