The Ms. Obama cover is the controversy that won’t end: Yesterday, writer/activist/feminist Naomi Wolf appeared on CNN to weigh in on the issue, which was followed by an angry response from blogger Ann Bartow.
Ms. Bartow, of the blog Feminist Law Professors, accuses Ms. of thinking "we are just a bunch of dumb girls anyway," derides Ms. Wolf’s assertion that Obama’s inauguration should be a cause for celebration among feminists interested in progress on women’s issues, and states that "controversy and dissent… really isn’t what the feminism needs right now."
The video features snippets of an interview with PUMA Amy Siskind, who — you’ll recall — wants to start a 4th wave of feminism that ignores reproductive choice and includes some men, just not in any prominent positions (other than, as Naomi Wolf slyly hints, as donors to both that movement and the Republican Party), and is focused on electing a woman — any woman — to public office regardless of her stance on issues. But, more to the point, Siskind thinks there are two people who should have been on Ms.‘s inauguration cover — Hillary Clinton, who isn’t being inaugurated, or Sarah fucking Palin. (She also seems to think that, other than Hillary Clinton, Janet Napolitano, Hilda Solis, Lisa Jackson and Susan Rice, Obama hasn’t appointed nearly enough women to his Cabinet.)
Look, if I’m nominating people to shut the fuck up about feminism, I’m starting with Amy Siskind, not Eleanor Smeal or Naomi Wolf. Dissent is fine, and I enjoy a good conversation about what it means to incorporate visible and outspoken men into the feminist movement and what that symbolizes, both good and bad. But I think we can also all agree that Sarah Palin is no symbol of the feminist movement, and continuing to, um, caterwaul about how Hillary Clinton lost the Democratic nomination 6 months ago probably does more harm to the movement’s standing in this country than having a (rational) discussion about whether Obama is a feminist and whether a man should be one of many symbols.
Did ANYONE Who Criticized The Ms. Magazine Cover Say That Men Couldn’t Be Feminists? [Feminist Law Professors]