International Women's Day: Advancing Radical Feminism?

Yesterday was "International Women's Day." What goes on during such a commemoration?

Well, for some, the day's mostly used to advance the left's radical feminist agenda, as this news report indicates:

Eagle Forum, a leading pro-family organization founded by Phyllis Schlafly, author of Feminist Fantasies, condemns the U.S. Government's endorsement of the worldwide feminist event, International Women's Day. According to its website, IWD is a "global day connecting all women around the world and inspiring them to achieve their full potential." Back in 1911, the very first IWD was celebrated in order to campaign for such noble ideals as women's right to work, to vote, and to hold public office.

Today, IWD serves to advance radical feminism in the form of promoting pro-abortion and pro-gay rights legislation, ratification of ERA, affirmative action for women, Title IX, government babysitting services, and government wage control, commonly camouflaged as "pay equity" or "comparable worth." The supporting organizations are not women's groups, but feminist groups, including Feminist Peace Network, Aurora Women's Network, UNESCO, and the United Nations Development Fund for Women, also known as UNIFEM. Even media groups, such as CNN, the BBC, and Aljazeera TV have signed on as sponsors. Tomorrow, over 450 rallies and "events" are planned in 44 different countries across the globe.

"The United States Government has no business supporting IWD," said Eagle Forum President Phyllis Schlafly. "The radical feminists know that they can't complain about American women because we are the most fortunate class of people who ever lived, so they search the globe for oppression in other countries using taxpayer dollars."

Now Phyllis Schlafly's got some pretty strong views on women's rights, so make what you will of her comments. It's nevertheless interesting that not one of the major national news dailies comes up when plugging "International Woman's Day" in a Google search this morning, while leftist media outlets are well represented.

It turns out that my young neocon blogging buddy GSGF has a post up on this, which has engendered a litttle debate.

I'd just add a few points:

It is true, as GSGF notes, that hundreds of thousands of women are eliminated annually in Third World nations that elevate boys as more valuable. The New York Times reported the massive scale of women’s human rights violations in China this week:

For more than three decades, the restriction on births has been a centerpiece of government economic and social policy. Local officials receive performance ratings based partly on how well residents adhere to the restrictions. In the 1980s, officials routinely forced women to abort fetuses that would have resulted in above-quota births, and both men and women were often forced to undergo sterilization operations.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/29/world/asia/29china.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

The article omits the intense prevalence in female infanticide in the country, which is considered widespread in other developing countries as well:

The phenomenon of female infanticide is as old as many cultures, and has likely accounted for millions of gender-selective deaths throughout history. It remains a critical concern in a number of “Third World” countries today, notably the two most populous countries on earth, China and India. In all cases, specifically female infanticide reflects the low status accorded to women in most parts of the world; it is arguably the most brutal and destructive manifestation of the anti-female bias that pervades “patriarchal” societies. It is closely linked to the phenomena of sex-selective abortion, which targets female fetuses almost exclusively, and neglect of girl children.

Source: http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html

Also, academic research correlates the treatment of women to levels of democratization:

ARE predominantly Muslim societies distinctly disadvantaged in democratization? Some observers, noting what appears to be an especially high incidence of authoritarianism in the Islamic world, have held that Islam may be incompatible with open government … Muslim societies are not more prone to political violence; nor are they less “secular” than non-Muslim societies; and interpersonal trust is not necessarily lower in Muslim societies. But one factor does help explain the democratic deficit: the subordination of women."

Source: http://muse.jhu.edu/login?uri=/journals/world_politics/v055/55.1fish.html

I think the lack of sympathy for women’s rights is found in the attacks on “cultural relativism” by authoritarianism’s apologists.

But certainly, the West is best:

A culture that gave the world the novel; the music of Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert; and the paintings of Michelangelo, da Vinci, and Rembrandt does not need lessons from societies whose idea of heaven, peopled with female virgins, resembles a cosmic brothel. Nor does the West need lectures on the superior virtue of societies in which women are kept in subjection under sharia, endure genital mutilation, are stoned to death for alleged adultery, and are married off against their will at the age of nine; societies that deny the rights of supposedly lower castes; societies that execute homosexuals and apostates. The West has no use for sanctimonious homilies from societies that cannot provide clean drinking water or sewage systems, that make no provisions for the handicapped, and that leave 40 to 50 percent of their citizens illiterate.

Source: http://www.city-journal.org/2008/18_1_snd-west.html

Well, I don't know if we should call it "International Gendercide Day," but there's certainly some consensus to that effect, at least outside the ranks of the radical feminist contingents.