THE ROLE OF WOMEN IN THE BATTLE FOR ALITOIs the left targeting its opposition to Alito at women?
MoveOn.org asserts that "Alito is a notoriously right-wing judge on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. He has consistently ruled to strip basic protections from workers, women, minorities and the disabled in favor of unchecked power for corporations and special interests." See
http://www.crosswalk.com/news/1360357.htmlUnremarkably, similar talking points are generated by NOW, NARAL, PFAW and other leftist activist groups. At one level of abstraction, all of this rhetorical excess could be distilled down to "
Alito: He’s always 'down' for ‘THE MAN.’" (Anyone who remembers the turbulent '60s knows exactly who "
THE MAN" is)
Or in other words, Alito sides with "the powerful" over "the weak." Such abstractions -- like the hasty generalizations of the anti-Aleto activist groups – grossly oversimplify and distort complex reality. But they provide an insight into the intended targets of the messages.
The "weak v. STRONG" dichotomy mirrors historical assumptions about the differences between the sexes. These concepts are deeply ingrained in our culture. For example, the Bible generalizes that wives are the "weaker vessel." See 1 Peter 3:7. The venerable stereotypes are familiar: Women nurture. Men conquer. Women are protective. Men are risk-takers. Women nest. Men explore. Women are familial and relational. Men are individualistic, even within task-oriented teams. Women are emotionally soft. Men are hardened. Women are gracious. Men are legalistic.
All of us know these traditional stereotypes are the loosest of maps to the territory of sex differences. We know of exceptionally commanding female bosses. And of female iron workers or roughnecks. And of no-nonsense female judges. And also of soft, gentle men in the "caring" professions. And of wise, avuncular men who nurture. And of kind grandfathers. And even of "stay home" dads! Yet the lenses through which the vast majority of people process abstractions are powerfully informed by these traditional, general maps. These maps endure because they are both functional and regularly confirmed.
Advertisers know this, too. And they play with these "maps" as they target their appeals to their most vulnerable customers. They often avoid hard, "masculine," fact-intensive pitches for "family" products.
For example, when Japanese companies such as Toyota and Honda advertise family-oriented minivans and economy cars, they use voice-overs by such non- threatening men as Richard Dreyfuss and Jeff Goldblum. They wouldn’t think of using an aggressive, testosterone-laced pitchman! Mercury’s newest campaign goes a step farther, pitching to college-educated females with apparently one of their own. Luxury brands usually employ quiet, elite, cultured and often foreign-sounding pitchmen, deftly manipulating the inevitable class-based associations with "the Man" (after all, luxury goods are often just badges of material success) with serene, velvety tones (Cadillac's Led Zepplin-themed campaign might be a notable exception).
A seemingly unrelated news article in the Toronto Globe and Mail adds yet another dimension to this conceptual framework: A nondenominational church in Winnipeg – New Beginnings – rents a billboard advertising "Sex: Live Chat Room." Pastor Ivor Grant explains the "blunt and explicit" church class he conducts as aiming at connecting with "with people who would not darken the doors of a church" in a "sex-obsessed society." The newspaper reports "[e]ight newcomers, all women, have joined his congregation since the sex-talk began."
While the Winnepeg church’s intentions may prove honorable, not all such targeted manipulations are. For example, American newsstands are bloated with magazines-- such as Cosmopolitan and Glamour–geared to inspire women to "explore" and "share" their sexuality in untraditional ways. All sorts of increasingly coarse mass media elevates sexualized female dress and action as normative and desireable (notwithstanding that most "real world" women still don’t dress like curvaceous dancers in a rap video or FHM/Maxim cover girls). All of this calls to mind the biblical caution that in the "last days" manipulators will "worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women . . . ." See 2 Timothy 3:1, 6.
A cynical but unifying conclusion to these diverse anecdotes is that women are often targeted by advertisers and liberals because they are a "softer sell."
As a sales professional once told me, "if you sell the woman on it, you’ll probably get the sale." Sexist, but empirically proven over thousands of encounters. While such doggerel wisdom would not be universal in societies which subjugate women by force and coercion, it seems reasonably reliable in more sexually egalitarian contexts. Its pragmatism flows both from the increasing influence of women in consumerism and in the profound difference between stereotypical "feminine" and "masculine" sales pitches.
Undoubtedly, some preachers would harken back to the earliest biblical narrative: the wily serpent (e.g. Satan) DID make his sales pitch for eating the forbidden fruit to Eve, not Adam.
Why?
Although we are not given a peek into the serpent’s devious marketing plan, human history is replete with confirmation that the soft "feminine" approach of exploiting suspicions in the weak/STRONG dichotomy often generates such results.
It also suggests a small part of the underlying truth in the shop-worn quotation "the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world." To win a values war, one must win over the hearts and minds of those who inculcate most of the values to our future generations. The left knows this reality well.
Thus, in the modern world, the left concentrates its rhetorical fire on painting Alito and other opponents as "THE MAN."
The left equates "THE MAN" with virtually all external restraints on individual behavior (excluding, of course, governmentally-imposed, overt accommodations or subsidies of another’s non-traditional or irresponsible behaviors).
Perhaps inconsistently, the left also depicts "THE MAN" as favoring virtually unrestrained corporate or organizational conduct.
Opposing -- indeed rebelling against -- "THE MAN" now means attacking any "non-progressive" aggregations of power and championing weakness. More than simplistic "rage against the machine," it means focusing on those who seemingly "need" nurturing (e.g. "workers, women, minorities and the disabled") and forcing the "power structure" to do the nurturing without moral context. It means, in short, appealing to the dominant, nurturing nature of women without getting into the messy technicalities of efficient resource allocation or moral theory.
Furthermore, the left can only be successful in this strategy if it can associate Alito with "THE MAN’S" historic "subjugation" of the weak. It must keep alive fading memories of "social injustice" and translate those into fear of the future.
Because women make up the largest previously subjugated class and the "softer sell" has proven so effective, the left’s principal attack will follow the well-worn channels of pitting weak vs. strong . . . women vs. men . . . powerless vs. powerful.
Predictable, isn’t it?
Some would argue that the present moral and political climate in which the Alito nomination will ferment reflects one described in the Bible. Paul wrote:
1But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. 2People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, 4treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God—— 5having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them. 6They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, 7always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth.8Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so also these men oppose the truth——men of depraved minds, who, as far as the faith is concerned, are rejected. 9But they will not get very far because, as in the case of those men, their folly will be clear to everyone. 2 Timothy 3:1-9.
The folly of the radical left (and the secularized right) is clear to those who can see it.
Whether these are the "last days" is, of course, uncertain and unknowable. We do live in a radically individualistic, sybaritic, hedonistic era. We do have many leaders that have "a form of godliness but which deny its power."
But what is inescapable is that the Alito nomination is a skirmish in an ideological war that predates all of us and endures across cultures and eras. And the intellectual battleground will be focused on persuading the feminine elements of American society to reject or accept Alito. Conservatives must not lose sight of this aspect of the fight.
