Young takes aim at Kathryn Joyce's Double X article about men's rights groups, which we wrote about a couple of weeks ago. Young argues that these groups are not misogynistic, but that they are merely challenging "the conventional feminist view of domestic violence-as almost invariably involving female victims and male batterers." She argues in favor of sociologist Murray Straus's research into female-initiated violence — though she does acknowledge that women are twice as likely as men to get hurt in a domestic dispute, and three times as likely to fear their partners — and argues that feminists exaggerate the impact of abuse. Young writes,

Whatever minor successes men's groups may have achieved, the reality is that public policy on domestic violence in the U.S. is heavily dominated by feminist advocacy groups. For the most part, these groups embrace a rigid orthodoxy that treats domestic violence as male terrorism against women, rooted in patriarchal power and intended to enforce it. They also have a record of making grotesquely exaggerated, thoroughly debunked claims about an epidemic of violence against women-for instance, that battering causes more hospital visits by women every year than car accidents, muggings, and cancer combined.

According to Young, men's groups exist in response to real bias against men — she says, "federal assistance is denied to programs that offer joint counseling to couples in which there is domestic violence, and court-mandated treatment for violent men downplays drug and alcohol abuse (since it's all about the patriarchy)." And she winds up her piece by quoting philosopher Janet Radcliffe Richards: "No feminist whose concern for women stems from a concern for justice in general can ever legitimately allow her only interest to be the advantage of women." Leaving aside domestic violence for a moment, this statement is actually a complicated one. On the one hand, no real feminist wants to be like the straw feminists Young and others set up — hateful harridans who use lies to further their own selfish ends. But on the other, shouldn't feminism be at least mostly about women's rights? Don't men have their own movement — that is, all of Western history?

It's easy to answer yes to these questions, and some of the time, I believe that answer. But I also think that feminism should set out to change all damaging gender stereotypes, including stereotypes about men. The patriarchy — obviously the only thing my simplistic feminist ass cares about — affects everybody, and though it often benefits men, it also fucks them up. And what's more, it fucks them up in ways that are bad for women. It tells them they need to be sexual aggressors, contributing to rape culture. It tells them they suck at child-rearing and emotional connection in general, which damages their relationships and sticks women with disproportionate familial burdens. And it tells them they need to be big and strong and ready to fight, which makes them both more likely to commit domestic violence and less likely to report it if it happens to them.

All these problems are worth fixing, and feminists — who are experienced at fighting gender stereotyping, and who care about many of the ills created by a rigid social view of masculinity — are well-equipped to help fix them. But we're not going to feel like it if people cast us as the enemy. I'm unlikely to reconsider my view of men's rights groups if writers like Young use them as a peg to insult the supposedly sorry "state of feminism" or to posit some powerful anti-male gynocracy that's promulgating lies about abuse. In fact, Young does such a crappy job of negotiating disputes between the sexes that I'd like to go around her and speak to dudes directly: Hi guys. I am a feminist. I am not an evil bitch who wants to beat you up and take your money. I am your sister, your daughter, your neighbor, your co-worker, and your friend. I support your right to have emotions, to be an involved dad, to feel physically and emotionally safe in your relationships, to hold any job you want regardless of whether it's "masculine," and, if you want, to marry another man. I get that life is hard for you too sometimes, and I want to help you. But only if you meet me halfway.

Note: The image above is a group of male college students marching in high heels to protest violence against women — a "men's group" we can get behind.

Men's Rights [Reason]

Related: "Men's Rights" Groups Have Become Frighteningly Effective [Double X]

Earlier: The Misguided Message Of Men's Rights Groups

Within 24 hours, I snapped and replied to some unwitting e-mailer that I found the comments disgusting and that what we really needed to think about was who we were trying to convince — and what we were trying to convince those people of. Well, if the polls that show women flocking to the McCain ticket and the response she's engendering from conservatives is any sign, we've convinced some people of one thing — that many feminists are feminist only to other feminists.

Now, naturally, few of these conservatives are exactly noted feminists themselves, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist (or a Wasilla mayor) to smell an opportunity to marginalize feminists or point out hypocrisies obvious enough to drive a wedge between liberal feminists and the very women that many of us have been trying to convince to vote for Barack Obama. Take Michelle Malkin, for example — hardly the kind of opinionated conservabloggier that I tend to agree with. Last week, she pointed out the opprobrium that rained down upon Sarah Palin's head for working late into her pregnancy, returning to work early and staying in a demanding job while parenting a special-needs child. She also pointed out that plenty of it came from female journalists who themselves have children and extremely demanding careers. Of course, she called them hacks and water-carriers for Obama, but that's Malkin for you — and it doesn't make her point less valid or accessible to the women that Obama needs on his side.

Then there's noted feminist scholar Jonah Goldberg, who manages to decry sexism and feminist hypocrisy even as he compares feminists to "stuck pigs" and says that one might resemble "a childless feminist who looks like a Bulgarian weightlifter in drag." But, he also hits up Gloria Steinem's OpEd, Cintra Wilson's screed and professor/columnist Wendy Doniger's truly offensive statement that Palin's "greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a woman." Because, really, there's no better way to win over independent women voters than to question their gender because of their political or religious beliefs. Women on the left should not be denying one another's womanhood because of disagreements about abortion and religion anymore than we should be allowing men like Rush Limbaugh to decide who is or is not a feminist. The problem with Goldberg's piece is not his glaringly offensive stereotypes and generalizations about feminists, it's that he can say all kinds of offensive things about mannish, childless women and it's still only barely as shocking as a feminist saying a person cannot be a Republican and a woman at the same time. And the latter bit is the only thing that's going to get a lot of traction in Central Pennsylvania, Ohio, Colorado and Michigan among the women that have swung every election for the last two decades.

Libertarian Cathy Young (who really could never annoy me as much as Goldberg or Malkin) writes a far more reasoned and compelling piece today in the Wall Street Journal asking why feminists hate Sarah Palin seemingly beyond reason. She hits some of the same shock quotes as Goldberg before her (and me before him, actually) and says that, from her perspective, Palin's "pro-life feminism [and] small-government, individualist feminism" is more attractive than a kind of feminism that requires government intervention to achieve equality. That's the kind of argument that will play well with independent women voter. It also makes its point about the feminist "hatred" of Palin without reverting to stereotypes about looks and doesn't dismiss the notion that choice is a concern for American women. This is far, far more convincing to the people that need to be convinced — you know, those 30-40 percent of voters in the middle — than arguing that Sarah Palin isn't "really" a woman.

Finally, even Elle's political blogger, Lucy Morrow Caldwell, gets in on the action, chastising South Carolina Democratic Party chairwoman Carol Fowler for saying that Palin's "primary qualification seems to be that she hasn’t had an abortion" (even as she mucks up Fowler's position in the party). Caldwell also says that no one ever suggested about Obama that "his race was the only reason he'd become a candidate in the first place," a statement that is not entirely true, as Geraldine Ferraro no doubt remembers. But few people are going to take the time to point out these inaccuracies in the politics blog of a fashion magazine, and the issue of feminists "bashing" Palin for gendered reasons allows Caldwell to gloss over the part where she herself would be "more cautious [than Palin] on certain foreign policy fronts" in favor of hitting up the mean, mean feminists.

It's not like I don't understand where the anger is coming from. I have heard often enough from liberal women that they don't understand how women can even be Republican...without, of course, ever actually asking one and listening to the answer. I also understand that, in the absence of comprehensive public record of Palin's stances on issues like pay equity or government-funded childcare, it's easy enough to attribute McCain's (bad) stances on those issues to her, especially since, as his running mate, they in effect are her new stances on those issues — and it's easy to conflate hating her positions with hating her as a person. For many women, she seems to be trying to have it both ways, to trumpet her family values and her careerism in a way that Republicans have often bashed other women for doing.

But, most of all, I think the attacks are coming from a place of insecurity that Palin (and all that comes with her) might soften the McCain campaign enough for him to triumph in November. And so if we rail against her, if we play the game of politics by their supposed rules and castigate her for the things conservatives have castigated liberal women for for decades (see: Hillary Clinton) then maybe they won't vote for her and him. The problem is that each party stands by its own hypocrites (see: Congressmen John Mutha and Jim Moran on the left and Senators David Vitter and Larry Craig on the right), so all we're doing by bashing her is inspiring a defense by her ideological compatriots and re-branding feminism as something that defends only liberal women against bias (and that denies a woman's womanliness if she dares to disagree politically, which is straight out of the Republican play book). That's not my feminism and that's not my idea of equality — and, for a lot of moderate women, it's not theirs either.

Polls Show Big Shift To McCain Among White Women [Reuters]
Is Sarah Palin a Feminist? Friday Feminist Fuck NO. [Feministing]
Sisterhood of the Protected Female Liberal Journalists [Michelle Malkin]
Feminist Army Aims Its Canons at Palin [National Review]
All Beliefs Welcome, Unless They are Forced on Others [Newsweek]
Why Feminists Hate Sarah Palin [Wall Street Journal]
Right Angles [Elle]
S.C. Dem Chair: Palin Primary Qualification Is She Hasn't Had An Abortion [Politico]
Ferraro’s Obama Remarks Become Talk of Campaign [NY Times]