by Pia de Solenni
I don't know if Kim Gandy thought it was April Fool's Day or if the National Organization for Women has completely changed its platform, but during a five-hour symposium on maternal feminism, she never referred to the one thing NOW clings to. She never mentioned abortion.
Last week, the Mother's Council, along with the Institute for American Values and the Barnard College Center for Research on Women, sponsored a conference in New York to discuss the development of a maternal feminism. Despite (or perhaps because of) the various forms of feminism, motherhood receives little attention, even less protection, and no promotion. Yet, recent studies, books, and articles continue to unearth something that means everything to most women: motherhood.
Gandy, president of NOW, was one of six panelists who addressed a crowd representing various perspectives of feminism and women's issues. The invitation to the conference made clear to myself and every other participant with whom I spoke that the event would be a true roundtable event. We wouldn't agree on all the issues. But, from our various perspectives, we were asked to put down the battle-axes and discuss motherhood.
While I don't agree with Gandy on issues like abortion and lesbian rights, I wanted to learn her views on motherhood. From my perspective, abortion and motherhood are irreconcilable. But I wanted to know how Gandy understands them and how she thinks they relate to women. I wanted to know if we really share common ground.
Gandy began her participation by attacking co-panelist Sylvia Ann Hewlett, author of Creating a Life. So much for a constructive discussion. Then, Gandy proceeded to inform us that she'd been tricked into participating in the conference, that she had no idea that we were there to discuss these issues (namely motherhood) and that it wasn't really a roundtable since the other panelists had made speeches. No matter her grave disadvantage, “poor” Kim would rise to the challenge and speak to us.
And speak she did. She spoke of many things NOW has advocated: the pregnancy-nondiscrimination act, child-support laws, the homemaker's bill of rights, Social Security changes, education, pension reform, health insurance, and so on. Her point in all of this: “We don't need to blame each other; nor do we need to blame the women's movement.”
Granted, this conference was not intended as a finger-pointing session. But despite Gandy's rhetoric, NOW's brand of feminism has definitely been problematic for motherhood and for women. Professor Jean Bethke Elshtain of the University of Chicago reminded us that Betty Friedan referred to the middle-class family as a “comfortable concentration camp.”
Unfortunately, it went unsaid that Friedan was the first president of NOW when it was founded in 1966. According to its website, the nascent NOW became the first national organization to call for the legalization of abortion and the repeal of all anti-abortion laws in 1967. Evidently, they saw a direct link between “abortion rights” and women's interests. But Gandy was silent on this.
In fact, she seemed anxious to cast NOW in the mold of Concerned Women for America, the National Institute for Womanhood, and other institutes that represent a grassroots coalition of the needs and voices of women across the country.
One issue divides the women's groups and Gandy knows this as well as any of us. It's the white elephant no one spoke of at the conference: abortion.
Exactly one week after the conference, voters demonstrated how much importance they give to this issue. Their votes brought about a 71-percent increase in the number of pro-life women in the United States Congress. They elected the first pro-life woman senator. Voters in five states chose not to elect their pro-choice women democrat gubernatorial candidates.
According to FOX News, exit polls showed that about 80 percent of the people who voted for Missouri senate candidate Jim Talent were pro-life. Abortion was the second most important issue for Missouri voters.
Gandy tacitly acknowledged, last week, the wedge that abortion drives between women and motherhood. Her reticence to speak on abortion to a group of women indicates that NOW knows it doesn't speak for all or even most women and this election showed us that most voters don't relate to NOW.
If NOW is uncomfortable speaking of its activities and policies to a room full of Manhattanites at Columbia University in New York City, one can only conclude that Gandy and company are desperate to find a new agenda, one that addresses the needs, experiences, and desires of all women in America, including those of their president.
I, for one, would welcome.
(Pia de Solenni is a fellow in life studies at the Family Research Council, Washington, D.C. This article courtesy of the Pro-Life Infonet email newsletter. For more information go to www.prolifeinfo.org or email infonet@prolifeinfo.org.)
