Quit Trashing NOW
Here's a bit of a conversation from an Anglican listserve. A bit of a rant, I guess. But you shouldn't be trashing NOW!
>Excuse me, Katherine, but I did not call women strident, I called NOW strident. Their rhetoric >leaves no room for the option other than abortion. I never said i am opposed to women's right >to choose, I said the Democratic party needs to be more nuanced in its platform, and Christians >need to articulate the truth that abortion is a tragedy. I was not being dismissive, but trying to >use an example about how the liberal/conservative labels are not very helpful.
>Perhaps you would rather just subscribe to a list of official positions and not think for yourself?
>Getting cranky in Texas,
(Name removed – ‘cause it’s the right thing to do)
Excuse me, N___, but I heard you the first time. You called NOW strident. IOW, you called women who are standing up for themselves, and for all of us, strident. I objected. I still do.
Rather than engage their arguments you dismiss them by calling them "strident" and calling their well thought-out positions "rhetoric." Actually, it seems to me you're the one engaging in inflamatory and shallow rhetoric. You've made them straw "men" and dismissed them without citing a single argument you disagree with.
You say they leave no room for options other than abortion. That's nonsense. They support wage equity and family leave and day care and educational opportunities and contraceptive awareness and availablility -- all the things that make abortion less necessary -- things that enable women not to get pregnant or to raise children if they choose. And they deserve more respect than to be misrepresented and then cavalierly dismissed while being used as a prop to make someone's point.
You're getting cranky? You don't want to get me started on cranky. All this talk about shooting bishops, murders in churches ... yet no acknowledgement of all the murders, bombings, arsons, stalkings ... against women's health care providers. Upset about listing the names of bishops someone wants killed on the web? Me, too. It's awful. But let's show some of the same furor about the old Nuremberg Files site. Loooong lists of people they recommended killing. Names of those who had been killed featured with a black line through them. Names of those who had "only" been injured had a grey line through them. True, they never listed any clergy, but they did have a link to a very good picture of me with my name and state identified. I'm sure they didn't mean anything by it, though. After the Olympic bombing there was a bombing of a women's clinic and a gay bar, right? Wrong. It was a lesbian bar. Think this isn't about women? Think I'm not cranky?
Finally, I've preached at too many doctors' memorial services, sat in the kitchen where Dr. Slepian was shot listening while his widow and children re-lived that night, spent too much time surrounded by body guards and refusing security staff's advice to buy a kevlar vest --- way too much time, to be sanguine about the kind of language that dismisses us (and by us I include NOW). Dismissing is the first step to demonizing and dehumanizing and that's the first step to making us fair game for violence. I know that you weren't going anywhere near that far down the road, N____. I know you'd decry the violence. But I also know that demonizing NOW really is the first step. It may be so far away from the bad consequences that most folks who do it don't recognize it as such a step. But those of us who've been shoved further down that road -- who've had to see and deal with the consequences -- know where it leads. Cranky? Oh, yeah.
And, by the way, those folks you dismiss as being strident, engaging in rhetoric, whom you misrepresent as not allowing for (much less fighting for) other options? Many of them (maybe most of them) share many of the same values you do. For the record -- I first met Kim Gandy (the current pres. of NOW) at a church service, I first met Patricia Ireland (past pres. of NOW) at a religious conference, and the night Dr. Slepian was killed he and his family had just returned from temple.
Those are my friends and colleagues (in some cases people whom I pastor, though not members of my congregation) you're insulting.
I didn't want to get into this. As you may recall, I simply asked in what way NOW was strident (still haven't received an answer except to be told, incorrectly, that the only option they allow is abortion. Nonsense), and thanked others for continuing the conversation so I didn't have to. But if you're going to persist in going after my friends ...
Utterly out of patience in MA
KHR+
>Excuse me, Katherine, but I did not call women strident, I called NOW strident. Their rhetoric >leaves no room for the option other than abortion. I never said i am opposed to women's right >to choose, I said the Democratic party needs to be more nuanced in its platform, and Christians >need to articulate the truth that abortion is a tragedy. I was not being dismissive, but trying to >use an example about how the liberal/conservative labels are not very helpful.
>Perhaps you would rather just subscribe to a list of official positions and not think for yourself?
>Getting cranky in Texas,
(Name removed – ‘cause it’s the right thing to do)
Excuse me, N___, but I heard you the first time. You called NOW strident. IOW, you called women who are standing up for themselves, and for all of us, strident. I objected. I still do.
Rather than engage their arguments you dismiss them by calling them "strident" and calling their well thought-out positions "rhetoric." Actually, it seems to me you're the one engaging in inflamatory and shallow rhetoric. You've made them straw "men" and dismissed them without citing a single argument you disagree with.
You say they leave no room for options other than abortion. That's nonsense. They support wage equity and family leave and day care and educational opportunities and contraceptive awareness and availablility -- all the things that make abortion less necessary -- things that enable women not to get pregnant or to raise children if they choose. And they deserve more respect than to be misrepresented and then cavalierly dismissed while being used as a prop to make someone's point.
You're getting cranky? You don't want to get me started on cranky. All this talk about shooting bishops, murders in churches ... yet no acknowledgement of all the murders, bombings, arsons, stalkings ... against women's health care providers. Upset about listing the names of bishops someone wants killed on the web? Me, too. It's awful. But let's show some of the same furor about the old Nuremberg Files site. Loooong lists of people they recommended killing. Names of those who had been killed featured with a black line through them. Names of those who had "only" been injured had a grey line through them. True, they never listed any clergy, but they did have a link to a very good picture of me with my name and state identified. I'm sure they didn't mean anything by it, though. After the Olympic bombing there was a bombing of a women's clinic and a gay bar, right? Wrong. It was a lesbian bar. Think this isn't about women? Think I'm not cranky?
Finally, I've preached at too many doctors' memorial services, sat in the kitchen where Dr. Slepian was shot listening while his widow and children re-lived that night, spent too much time surrounded by body guards and refusing security staff's advice to buy a kevlar vest --- way too much time, to be sanguine about the kind of language that dismisses us (and by us I include NOW). Dismissing is the first step to demonizing and dehumanizing and that's the first step to making us fair game for violence. I know that you weren't going anywhere near that far down the road, N____. I know you'd decry the violence. But I also know that demonizing NOW really is the first step. It may be so far away from the bad consequences that most folks who do it don't recognize it as such a step. But those of us who've been shoved further down that road -- who've had to see and deal with the consequences -- know where it leads. Cranky? Oh, yeah.
And, by the way, those folks you dismiss as being strident, engaging in rhetoric, whom you misrepresent as not allowing for (much less fighting for) other options? Many of them (maybe most of them) share many of the same values you do. For the record -- I first met Kim Gandy (the current pres. of NOW) at a church service, I first met Patricia Ireland (past pres. of NOW) at a religious conference, and the night Dr. Slepian was killed he and his family had just returned from temple.
Those are my friends and colleagues (in some cases people whom I pastor, though not members of my congregation) you're insulting.
I didn't want to get into this. As you may recall, I simply asked in what way NOW was strident (still haven't received an answer except to be told, incorrectly, that the only option they allow is abortion. Nonsense), and thanked others for continuing the conversation so I didn't have to. But if you're going to persist in going after my friends ...
Utterly out of patience in MA
KHR+
posted by KHR+ at 9:55 AM
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