The Goddesses Must Be Crazy
Yesterday, Erica Jong argues the current feminist equivalent of the Jews control the media. "Unfortunately the Hillary-Haters are in charge," she writes in Huffington Post. "They monopolize the networks, the newspapers, the talk shows—both radio and TV. They are crossing their legs for fear of castration."
Crossing their legs for fear of castration? I mean, come on. Who talks like that anymore? Jong's earlier piece in the Washington Post was a relatively sane defense of women of her generation, who had to fight twice as hard to get half as much. In this new post, she's gone off the deep end. God, I don't even know where to start.
First, it's the usual—they make fun of Hillary's thick ankles and wrinkles. They say she pimps her daughter. They say she slept with Vince Foster and then something about bees and royal jelly, which was over my head. Then there's some subtle racism about Michelle Obama (a blind spot which seems to afflict women of a certain feminist generation). Then: "They believe HRC boils eye of newt with unborn baby's hair and little Jewish children not yet circumcised."
And that's not even the best one. The best one is: Hillary Haters Can't Spell.
Well, which one is it, they're in charge or they can't spell?
Unfortunately, Jong is not alone. Ever since Hillary lost Iowa, the icons of pop-feminism have been going crazy—Robin Morgan, Gloria Steinem, Erica Jong. Either they can't stand to watch Hillary lose, or their publishers are urging them into a crazy war, a la East Coast and West Coast rappers.
Its not that the zipless fuck was War and Peace or anything. I guess I just want my feminist icons frozen and preserved in their era. It is such an absolute pleasure to watch Germaine Greer and the rest of the feminist street poets take on Norman Mailer in that 1971 town hall, which I recently watched on video. Nothing they are saying is at all relevant to my current existence. Greer is going on about the oppression of housework (which I rarely ever do), and the rest are slamming about their vaginas and the pleasures of lesbian sex, and they are sexy and kick-ass and not faintly ridiculous because that's what it was all about back in the day, and you can watch the good NYU girls in the audience practically ripping their bras off as they stare at Greer in awe.
But that same rant fast-forwarded to the Hillary age DOES seem ridiculous and out of place. A woman is a viable candidate for president, for God's sake!! I cringe to think of what a Germaine Greer tirade about Hillary's oppression would sound like now. In fact, maybe as an exercise I'll watch the video again tonight and rewrite it substituting "Barack" for "Norman," just to see how crazy it sounds.