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Last Revised December 22, 1996

GENDER WARS: Part One
WILL THE REAL ENEMY
PLEASE STAND UP?

by Beth Grimes

     To all Sonoma County males of any age and to the women who
love them:  There is an organization right here in our own county
that wants to know you and tell you how victimized you are. Our
local branch of the Men's Movement paints a bleak picture of men's
lives and prospects, using grim statistics about males' shorter
life spans, over-representation in workplace deaths and injuries,
and in numbers of homeless people. It provides horror stories about
men's unfair treatment in divorce and child custody cases.
     Much of what this group tells you is true.  Men are mistreated
and exploited in many ways and are often limited and pressured by
the traditional male role.  
     But be careful!  While accurately describing many of the
difficulties faced by men and boys, this crowd fixes blame for male
problems on innocent scapegoats, neatly diverting our attention
away from those who are really responsible for the problems. Its
organizers engage in endless comparisons between the plight of men
and the condition of women, in ways which create the impression
that women not only enjoy advantages men do not have, but enjoy
them at the expense of men. 
     The Sonoma County branch of the men's movement is only one of
many nationwide. There are at least five and they seldom
communicate with each other. 
     Of these five, Joe Manthey, Petaluma resident and leading
spokesman for mens' issues, is aligned philosophically with the
National Coalition of Free Men.  Author Warren Farrell is a leading
theorist for this branch of the men's movement.  Manthey advises
his followers and prospective allies to read Farrell's book "The
Myth of Male Power".  He also recommends "Who Stole Feminism" by
Christina Hoff Sommers. A logical assumption is that Manthey and
his group agree with the content of the two books and the ideas
expressed in them. 
     Farrell's diatribe is so full of distortions, misogyny, and
outright error (to put it charitably) that it's hard to know how to
criticize it.
     Sommers' book is offensive in a different way. Her approach is
to genuflect in the direction of accuracy by making a statement
with which anyone could agree, then going on for a full chapter to
throw out bushels of boring, sometimes irrelevant statistics, page
after page all of which negate her original factual statement and
all of which reflect badly on women. It was Sommers who first made
the distinction between "equity feminists" (good girls) and "gender
feminists" (those bad, radical, male-bashing types.) The
Madonna/Whore dichotomy may be history, but we now have the Equity
Feminist/Gender Feminist divide.   
     
     Where are women in all this?  Some are staunch allies of anti-
feminist men's groups.   One is the Independent Women's Forum. 
Another calls itself the Women's Freedom Network.  These are
composed of affluent professional women with access to wealthy,
politically powerful men and institutions.  They claim to be
feminists and to represent the majority of American women.
But membership of their governing boards tells us who they really
are. Women's Freedom Network is led by Jeanne Kirkpatrick, former
U.N. Ambassador to the United Nations; Christina Hoff Sommers,
author of "Who Stole Feminism"; Mona Charen, conservative columnist
and CNN commentator; Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, prominent academic and
writer, and others equally well-known and equally rightwing. 
     Independent Women's Forum is better known than WFN.Its founder
is Laura Ingraham, former aide to Clarence Thomas.  IWF  developed
from the group "Women for Clarence Thomas".  It was a leader in
supporting Paula Jones in her sexual harassment charge against Bill
Clinton. The executive director is Barbara Ledeen (married to
former Reagan security adviser, Michael Ledeen).  Also on board are
Wendy Lee Gramm, wife of Phil Gramm, and Lynne Cheney, wife of
former defense secretary Dick Cheney. A whopping ninety percent of
IWF's budget comes from ultra-conservative foundations.
     Do we see a pattern here?
     In the last issue of this paper, Enid Pickett reported on the
coup brought off by Concerned Women for America in getting the
National Education Association to roll back existing policies to
support African American History Month, Women's History Month, and
diversity programs of all kinds.
     This followed CWA's veritable barrage of newspaper ads in
1995, alleging that the NEA backed programs intended to "subvert
American youth into homosexuality." With these shameless ads, CWA
knew they were inciting a rise in gay-bashing, especially against
teenage schoolkids.
     CWA's president is Beverly LaHaye. Revealing statements from
the Ayatollah LaHaye include such goodies as, "Christian values
dominate our government...Politicians who do not use the bible to
guide their public and private lives do not belong in office."
     Theocracy, anyone?  
     It was during the Reagan and Bush administrations that the
draconian budget cuts were made, which slashed funds for housing,
OSHA, veterans benefits and other programs of benefit to men. It
has been conservative politicians on both sides of the aisle in
Congress who voted for ever-bigger military spending while starving
domestic programs, including those of benefit to men.  It was the
same crowd which brought us union-busting, NAFTA and GATT, gave tax
breaks to industries to relocate out of the country, taking jobs
with them and driving down the living standards of Americans,
including men. 
     So isn't it curious that our own Sonoma County self-appointed
defenders of men ally themselves with the forces which have  
done so much damage to the lives of men? Isn't it odd that they
promote divisiveness between men and women and encourage men to
distrust women.  How can this be helpful to men?
          All you hurting guys out there: If you want to fight back
against those responsible for your situation, you first have to
correctly identify the enemy.
     Hint:  it's not your sisters.

Please note:  Sources for this article include "The Myth of Male
Power" by Warren Farrell, "Who Stole Feminism" by Christina Hoff
Sommers, article in "On the Issues" magazine, Spring, 1996 edition
by Elayne Rapping entitled "The Ladies Who Lynch" and numerous web
sites.

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