Sarah Palin: Embracing Feminism, or Co-Opting it for Conservatives?

Everyone is so upset the Palin doesn't believe in abortion. Shouldn't everyone be entitled to their own beliefs. So I take it from the tone of the article and the comments of so many of the individuals that if you don't believe in taking the life of another individual you cannot possibly be a feminist? I believe that Susan B Anthony's work was to enable woman to have a voice in the running of our great nation if we wished to. I don't believe in abortion except in the case where the woman's life is at risk or she was not afforded the opportunity to make a birth control choice (rape). In any other instance woman have the right and responsibility to take the necessary precautions so that they do not have to kill another person who cannot possibly fight back. I believe this makes me a feminist just one that takes responsibility for my actions as we all should.

I always thought that the feminist movement was about women having the opportunity to define themselves rather than be pushed into stereotypical roles. I think that the controversy over abortion eventually devolves into a religious issue and therefore is not a proper topic for government in a secular state. The only hint about this issue in the US Constitution is that citizenship is conferred upon a baby born alive on American soil. Citizenship is not conferred upon conception or upon a traveling fetus.

As for the Tea Party movement. I think it harkens back to the reason why there was an American Revolution. The main issue then was one of economics, the British Parliament felt it had the right to take property from American Colonists to do with as it pleased. This is an attitude currently shared by both Republican and Democrat politicians.

The Tea Party movement has to do with FISCAL conservatism. It embraces the idea that people can better determine how to spend their own money than can politicians. As social conservatives like Palin try to surround themselves with the Tea Party, they will kill it.

There is no political party today for people who are social liberals and fiscal conservatives, the Tea Party is filling that void. Palin is not one of us.

Palin, despite her gender, essentially upholds views we associate with good ol' boys. Haley, too, though a first generation American child of immigrants, supports Arizona's illegal immigrant law. The observation that "conservative women have given up on the shrinking tent that is mainstream conservatism and embraced the Tea Party" as a path to electoral success is interesting. One doesn't readily associate "feminism" with the conservative Tea Party. Yet if women are embracing the Tea Party in order to win office like California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, then they are co-opting the "do whatever it takes to win" cynicism of the good ol' boys, too. Whenever the attempt is made to define a construct like "feminism" it becomes a shrinking tent term excluding "anti-" feminist women like Palin, Haley, Lincoln, Schafly et al. Feminists like politicians come in all flavors.

I thought the primary focus of feminism was not only a woman's freedom to choose a reproductive strategy, but also the freedom to use her own mind to lead her to political and economic policies independent of the pressures of others, including Frances Tobin's expectations for feminist philosophical rigidity.

So does left wing feminism and murder go hand in hand. Whether you want to accept it or not, a fetus is a living INNOCENT human, and to abort it is murder. So when protecting your right for abortion, keep in mind, it shouldnt be performed willy nilly.

oken112:29 AM Jun 11, 2010
You are right. NOW and liberals have not backed GOP women. However it is because of their politics, not because of their sex. 25% of Democrats elected to the house are women while only 10% of the Republicans in the house are women.
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Thank you for proving my point. It exposes the hypocrisy of N.O.W. and liberals. They celebrate "intelligent and assertive" womnen. EXCEPT conservative women...

It appears the "feminist" movement is all about abortion. As I recall from the beginning, it's main purpose was to give a woman equality in a male dominated society. As is the case with all liberal's, they have scewed it to politics instead of helping women. If they were sincere about the movement, they would have supported her during the last election. Shame on them!

such feminine force should have come from the left. after all, the left perceives feminism as their bailiwick.
the left hangs its feminist accomplishments on abortion and hillary, and palin needs neither to survive the powerful role she created all by herself. palin makes liberal feminism oh so '70's. enough to drive a hard lefty girl to hysterical tears.

Feminism has always been about choice - having more rights to them not fewer...

And the truth is that abortion has been an issue for women for hundreds of years. It's just that the former modern day version used to be performed in back alleys ' by butchers with dirty coat hangers' and the like. Almost needless to say, plenty of women without legal access to birth control or healthcare died as a result of predictable infection, or simply rendered infertile for the rest of their lives.

Sarah Palin and Carly Fiorina are not Feminists.

I went to high school with Carleton and I probably would have characterized her as a Feminist in the early 70's. I cheered her on when she took on HP and kicked breast cancer. I'm also a survivor.

I also bit my tongue when she championed Sarah Palin, aligned heself with the Tea Partyers, and launched the 'demon sheep' ad.

Not anymore. She has indeed changed and not in a good way, in my opinion.

And that's HER choice!

She will adopt anything that keeps her in the limelight and promotes her personal agenda of acquiring fame, money, power, and celebrity. In the end, her legacy will be one of a selfish , self centered opportunist who is a quitter.