If you're in NYC and want to do some movie-walking and panel-talking, come to the 92YTribeca at 7pm and see Rachel Simmons, Emily Abt, Melissa Silverstein, and me.
We love it when our community posters grow their lil' wings and fly off into the blogosphere on their very own. Check out Maya's awesome new (l)inklings.
Ruthie Ackerman sounds off about the amazing benefits of hyperlocal, citizen journalism. Namely, that folks get more than a mostly white, mostly male perspective.
Remember that awful thing the former NBA power forward wrote about Haiti? My friend Dave, who was a blogger on the site with him, weighs in.
Is Michelle Obama's anti-obesity campaign going to encourage diet talk? Ugh, I hope not.
Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards just announced that they are going to be hosting a Feminist Summer Camp that runs from June 6-12th. Find more deets at their site.
Serious WTF material: An anti-abortion group targeting African-American women has begun putting up dozens of billboards around metro Atlanta, declaring black children to be "an endangered species."
We know you all are the shit, so why not enter Dissent's Paul Goodman Essay Contest for Young Writers?
The Chronicle of Higher Ed asks, are women getting screwed in Obama's FY 2011 budget request to Congress?
0 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: What We Missed.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.feministing.com/cgi-bin/movabletype/mt-tb.fcgi/18162
"The girls then had to adhere to new ground rules - less burgers, low-fat milk, and fruits and water instead of sugary drinks; the change was significant, she said."
Perhaps this is a "diet" for some; in my house it was called "dinner".
Writers at Salon were complaining about this too ("In Fighting Obesity Michelle Eats Foot", http://www.salon.com/life/broadsheet/feature/2010/02/03/michelle_obama_war_on_weight/index.html ). They said it was wrong of Michelle to criticize her children's weight & eating habits. This is nuts. Are we so PC now that we can't tell kids to eat healthier??? Hell I'm grown & my mother still tells me I don't eat enough green vegetables! Is that a crime?
The real crime here is that kids, like my nephew, are 60+ lbs overweight and no one tells him to put down the Super Size quintuple Big Mac. Its one thing to stigmatize your kids about their body image, its another thing altogether to insist on healthy behavior. Adults are afraid of being adults.
Agreed. It would be one thing if Michelle were tightly controlling every bite of food to go into her daughters' mouths 24/7 or doing anything else to reinforce the association of eating with anxiety and "being bad." But just making sure her kids eat healthy? What's wrong with that? It's not obsessively focusing on the girls' bodies, it's just encouraging the formation of healthy eating habits which healthy bodies naturally follow from. My mom placed similar restrictions about junk food on my sister and I and I'll never stop being grateful. It means that as an adult, eating healthy comes naturally to me and doesn't feel like a sacrifice.
On the other hand, when I worked at an ice cream shop years ago and saw parents getting their 8-year-olds enormous sundaes that I wouldn't even be able to finish I wanted to grab them and shake them. No child needs that much freaking ice cream and you're not doing your kids any favors by getting their brains accustomed to constant fixes of sugar and fat. As a parent, it's totally possible to promote a positive attitude about eating and food (which I think is the important thing when it comes to things like body image) without just saying "anything goes."
The problem is, "diet" in this culture is a loaded word. It'd be one thing if she said her kids weren't living a very healthy lifestyle and she decided to insist on proper nutrition and balanced meals. It's a bit different to say she noticed her daughters (neither of whom looks obese to me) packing on the pounds and put them on a diet.
I don't think anybody objects to proper nutrition and overall good health. She could have found a much better way to phrase it, though.
Exactly. Some parents are afraid of parenting their kids, as they are too busy trying to be a friend instead. And really, a diet is in all technicality what you eat and drink. Michelle Obama has only replaced an unhealthy diet with a healthy one. I think anything less is outright negligence.
Fat shaming is bad at any age especially if it comes from a child's mother!
BTW I've seen pics of the first daughters - they are not fat!!!!
And even if they were, humiliating them would not accomplish anything other than crushing their self esteem.
How is she fat-shaming and humiliating her daughters by not letting them eat as many cheeseburgers as they want. Last time I checked, that's not fat-shaming, that's parenting.
And, no, her daughters are not obese at all. I think the idea is to not let them get that way. Also a parent's responsibility.
Are we so PC now that we can't tell kids to eat healthier??? Hell I'm grown & my mother still tells me I don't eat enough green vegetables!
My mom does the same thing, but our moms aren't telling is in front of the entire world to eat our veggies.
I have mixed feelings about this. I think her intentions are awesome and that healthy eating is important for everyone. I can also understand the concern that her efforts may be interpreted as putting her kids on a diet, which to most people is something that you do to lose weight. I do think that criticizing your kids in such a public way, when they're that age, and about what can be an extremely sensitive subject, is iffy ground to me.
"This is nuts" is abelist language and really offensive. Do we have a moderator? Or was all that just empty promises?
Likewise, arguing that "the real crime" is a fat person eating is an appalling thing to see on a feminist site. A crime? Really???
Again and again, when fat hatred comes up on this site, it's like feminist theory and analysis flies right out the window. Suddenly, looking skeptically at the moral panic about fat becomes "being too PC" and self-identified feminist on this site seem perfectly content to spew fatphobic nonsense.
Perhaps it might be best if Feministing posters simply don't bring up or link to articles like the one about Michelle Obama is they're not willing or able to put in the time of framing a discussion and moderating it.
Community moderator here.
I apologize for my slow response to this, I was meaning to write on it this weekend, but our backend has been down.
This comment borders on a real lack of empathy. Not to mention, labeling an overweight person eating "a crime" is extremely offensive.
The original post questioned whether Michelle's anti-obesity campaign would encourage "diet talk." The headline alone of the article is problematic enough. Like Jen said, "The problem is, 'diet' in this culture is a loaded word." The bombardment of "lose weight now! try this new diet!" in our media has a very significant focus on women, further perpetuating the idea that women must all be a certain size. We must recognize that while also recognizing the health issues we do have in our society as a result of eating habits and industrialized food. I would hope this comment thread could veer more in that direction than furthering fat-shaming.
- Anna
If a diet consists of less burgers and soda and more vegetables and low-fat milk, I'm all for it. As long as it is a healthy diet, I don't see what is so bad.
I do think the focus should be more on actual health than weight, though. As opposed to "my kids lost weight!" it should be "my kids will actually be healthier now," whether the child loses weight or not.
I mean, if adults want to eat unhealthy food, I'm all for it. If it contributes to weight gain, I'm still for it. Being alright with kids eating mostly unhealthy foods? Not so much.
Its no mystery that Margaret Sanger would have loved it if the vast majority of black and latin@ fetuses were aborted. That's just fact.
But there is a slippery slope here, I'm all for choice but some women are coerced or pressured into abortions. They are guided to getting an abortion because it would be best for everyone if they got one. The other hard truth is that for many women of color (ie the undesireables that eugenicists love to hate) facing an unplanned pregnancy (or even planned pregnancy in very few cases) money is an issue. They are already poor and without post high school education and limited job opportunities, adding another person to be responsible for means that she'd most likely need help taking care of that child. Who is going to give her the financial assistance that she needs? Should she be made to feel like some sort of race traitor because she wants/feels she should get an abortion or is it better to defiantly have a child she really isn't sure she wants to raise/really isn't sure she could afford to raise?
Not every abortion is built on money issues but there are many women of color who know of Margaret Sanger and her desire to see people of color either sterilized or getting abortions.
I do not know the history of Sanger's policy on this, but I do know it is a point anti-choicers like to make. (I am certainly NOT calling you anti-choice- I know you are a regular commenter on this site- I am just saying I hear it most from them w/o context so I'd like to hear more about it.) It could be because she felt they are disproportionately burdened in society as a whole. That's just conjecture on my part.
To me, coersion is against the whole premise of choice! People forget that pro choice women also support a woman's right to continue a pregnancy w/o harassment. In these situations for women of color or poor women, it's like they are damned if they do, damned if they don't. They are "welfare queens" if they have a(nother) baby, and then baby-killers if they have an abortion.
There were many black women's groups that decried Sanger as a eugenicist but were pro-choice.
Her past as a eugenecist- which is something she never denied- is something many pro-choicers would hide in shame of her racism and ableism. There is no doubt that Sanger did wonderful things with the best of intentions for healthy white women, the view is cloudy and muddy when it comes to those with disabilities and women of color. Anywhere you look you will find a conflicting story. This isn't the sort of "hysterical racism" cries that many pro-life and right wing people like to cry in order to make the opposing side look bad. This is just fact. I think the sooner people realize that YES, abortion was something often denied to white women while reproduction outside of slavery was shunned upon when the woman was black to the point where many women of color were being forcibly sterilized.
There is and always have been a group of militant men and women who are anti-choice/pro-life who will try to make it seem as though Sanger's only goal was genecide via abortion- I don't believe that. Her main goal was rights for white women.
But there is a huge part of this puzzle that wasn't her doing - the past that created a future where people of color WILL be in poverty and uneducated. Men who impregnant women and talk them into abortions for economic and his own selfish reasons of not wanting to be a father.
Well said and I agree with you. And it is disturbing that black and hispanic women make up about 25 % of the populace and nearly 50 % of abortions.
As for Michelle Obama, with the epidemic of diabetes and obesity flooding minority communities it's her duty to talk diet.
Sorry, blacks and Latino/as are also disproportionately poor and receive considerably fewer educational opportunities. I have no doubt abortion rates would change if every woman knew she could afford and support her baby. As it is, I'm pretty sure economic concerns are an obvious major factor in many women's deciding whether or not to keep a pregnancy.
So until these anti-choice wingnuts are willing to address how systemic racism leads to poverty and unequal opportunity, their race talk is shallow and empty.
And it is disturbing that black and hispanic women make up about 25 % of the populace and nearly 50 % of abortions.
But is this because these women are being pressured to abort because of their race, or because many of them feel like they aren't in financial or social positions to care for (more) children? There is definitely a problem here, but I think the issue is more that these women don't feel like they have agency to care for children.
This is just something in general that bugs me...
Yes, Margaret Sanger was racist, and ableist, and she supported eugenics. But in the time period we're talking about (early twentieth century) those beliefs were incredibly widespread and accepted by mainstream people and politicians. That is not to say that every person in American was okay with eugenics, but it was an accepted practice that was widely supported by politicians and other privileged people who didn't think it would ever effect them. The eugenics movement in Nazi Germany was heavily inspired by the movement in America. They just took it further. In America the eugenics movement caused forced sterilization and locking up of "feeble-minded" children and adults. It was really only after the liberation of the concentration camps after World War II when the rest of the world learned of the extent of the holocaust, that people realized what eugenics could lead to. There were a lot of people outside of Germany who were fine and dandy with Hitler until his habit of invading his neighbors got out of control.
More information:
http://searchwarp.com/swa548184-Americas-Unknown-And-Forgotten-Eugenics-Program.htm
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/29/60minutes/main614728.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Buck
http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/
Saying "I support eugenics" was the socially acceptable way of telling people you supported the government deciding who was fit to reproduce, rather like today saying "I'm pro-life" is the socially acceptable way of telling people you support forcing people to give birth to unwanted children. As for the principals behind eugenics, those were racism, classism, ableism, and sexism. Also incredibly widespread. I would bet good money that the majority of the middle-class white pro-lifers who throw out the "Margaret Sanger was racist and supported eugenics" argument had grandparents or great-grandparents who would have agreed with her on the racism and forced sterilization, even if they disagreed with everything else she believed in.
I really hate how people today like to judge the people of the past by modern standards. That's not to say we can't condemn things that were clearly immoral, like eugenics, but I just think we shouldn't always condemn people who supported it. What we've created is a cultural history that highlights the offensive beliefs of people we don't like, and whitewashes the offensive beliefs of people we do like. This is particularly notable with people like Margaret Sanger who died after the civil rights movement, but lived most of their lives before it. In some ways I think that undermines the accomplishments of people who fought prejudice. We've distanced ourselves enough from the eighteenth century to acknowledge that the Founding Fathers supported slavery and that that doesn't necessarily mean they were all bad people, but we haven't distanced ourselves enough from twentieth century injustice. We still like to blame things like eugenics on a few bad apples, rather than acknowledge the widespread prejudice that causes things like eugenics and slavery.
History has shown that people with privilege will often consider themselves superior to people without it. This includes people who may have fought injustice against one group, while encouraging it against another. History isn't black and white. If we want to look at all the political figures of the early-to-mid twentieth century, we'll find most of them held some pretty reprehensible beliefs. And this includes a lot of early feminists. So we can either condemn all of them, or acknowledge that that people are complicated and that you can respect someone's accomplishments and still acknowledge that they were subject to the beliefs and prejudices of their era.
"Yes, Margaret Sanger was racist, and ableist, and she supported eugenics. But in the time period we're talking about (early twentieth century) those beliefs were incredibly widespread and accepted by mainstream people and politicians.
Just because those views were "incredibly widespread and accepted" doesn't mean they were right"
Lynching - the public brutal murder of African American men by police and Ku Klux Klan terrorists as a way of "protecting White women from being raped by Black men" was also "incredibly widespread and accepted" - that does not mean that we have to be apologists for the folks who thought that way.
Huh?
Thats like saying any homophobic person twenty years ago is ok because homophobia was oh so widely accepted!
Why is shitty treatment so easily forgiveable when the victim is a person of color and the perpetrator is white female? If you're going to call people on their sht, CALL IT. Ignoring the historical significance of all of this for the sake of politics is appalling.
There were so many white men and women who were not racist and it was their efforts in support of blacks and other people of color that really help and stand out. Start with John Brown and then continue on.
As a woman of color I say to hell with any racist past or present and I dont give a damn how acceptable it was to want to sterilize, mutilate or murder people because of race I will NOT be ok with that mind set.
Personally I disagree with the "it was widespread back then so it was ok" stance. The issue is more that they tend to exaggerate how much she supported eugenics. Anti-choicers often make the claim that the fact that Sanger had some eugenicist views meant she supported Hitler and the Nazis, when in fact she was active in supporting the American war effort and in anti-Nazi organizations.
The bigger issue, of course, is that we shouldn't throw out the baby with the bathwater. Yes, she had some bad views, but every human is a mix of good and bad. A lot of these same people will say it's ridiculous to discredit Columbus because he jumpstarted the American Indian genocide, but they want to do the same with Margaret Sanger. Why can't we accept that our historical figures aren't perfect? Richard Wagner had some horrible views on race, but that doesn't mean he doesn't deserve his place as one of the most important figures in the history of opera, and it doesn't mean I'm going to stop listening to his music.
On the glass-ceiling article, I must say it sounds very classist to me and not at all feminist. (Indeed, Jones states, "I am no feminist, and I do not think that I should receive preferential treatment because of my gender, but the fact that a woman's income would be taxed at a higher rate because she is married to a successful spouse, or vice versa, is one of the worst public policy proposals I have heard in years...")
The fact is that many, many more families are struggling with much less than $250K, and many of them in the excruciatingly expensive cities she mentions. Also, for working-class families, the women often are at the moment the sole breadwinners, because men have lost their jobs. It does no good to argue that the rich get to keep their money when so many are suffering, and the social safety net our parents depended on grows more fragile every day.
I think that Jones's voice is exactly the kind of elitist feminist voice that alienated working-class and non-white women for decades.
A tax on families earning more than $250K is also a tax that will hurt mostly whites. She ignores this fact.
Jones is motivated out of self interest.
The tax money is needed to help the states to provide the services that working people need and to assist social programs. Jones does not mention what the tax money can do for the vast majority of families.
My husband and I both have great jobs, and I think it is stingy and wrong for us not to pay our fair share.
Well-put Liz. But don't forget she's "no feminist" elitist or otherwise. Heaven forbid!
Right on, Lydia, because the term "elitist feminist" is an oxymoron.
I agree completely. So now it's not okay to tax you either? Not all hardworking successful people make that much money and not all people who make that much money are all that sucessful. I would say however that if she is right and senators and representatives are not going to see a tax increase then that is wrong. The budget needs to be paid for somehow, and that somehow deserves to be the wealthiest among your people, not the poorest, or even the middle class.
Apparently, Professor Jones is so privileged she does not realize that a quarter million dollars a year is a hell of a lot of money and the vast majority of Americans (even in high cost cities like New York) make far less than that.
This doesn't so much seem like the Obama girls are "on a diet" so much as they've changed their diet.
Semantics are so huge here. Ugh. One way of talking about it seems far less insidious than the other, to me at least.