American Electra Feminism’S Ritual Matricide by Susan Faludi

ESS A Y American electrA Feminism’s ritual matricide By Susan Faludi o one who has been engaged in feminist last presidential election that young women were politicsN and thought for any length of time can recoiling from Hillary Clinton because she “re- be oblivious to an abiding aspect of the modern minds me of my mother”? Why does so much of women’s movement “new” feminist activ- in America—that so ism and scholarship often, and despite its spurn the work and many victories, it ideas of the genera- seems to falter along tion that came before? a “mother-daughter” As ungracious as these divide. A generation- attitudes may seem, al breakdown under- they are grounded in lies so many of the a sad reality: while pathologies that have American feminism long disturbed Amer- has long, and produc- ican feminism—its tively, concentrated fleeting mobilizations on getting men to give followed by long hi- women some of the bernations; its bitter power they used to divisions over sex; give only to their sons, and its reflexive re- it hasn’t figured out nunciation of its prior incarnations, its progeni- how to pass power down from woman to woman, tors, even its very name. The contemporary to bequeath authority to its progeny. Its inability women’s movement seems fated to fight a war on to conceive of a succession has crippled women’s two fronts: alongside the battle of the sexes rages progress not just within the women’s movement the battle of the ages. but in every venue of American public life. The How many times have we heard women say, women’s movement cycled through a long first “No older woman helped me in my career—my “wave,” and, in increasingly shorter oscillations, a mentors have all been men”? How many surveys second and third wave, and some say we are now report that young women don’t want, and distrust, witnessing a fourth. With each go-round, women female bosses? How often did we hear during the make gains, but the movement never seems able Susan Faludi is the author of Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women and Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man. Her most recent book is The Terror Dream: Myth and Misogyny in an Insecure America. Illustrations by Jennifer Renninger ESSAY 29 to establish an enduring birthright, a secure line her “extreme bikini wax” or read a feminist of descent—to reproduce itself as a strong and blog in which a young woman avers that “wear- sturdy force. At the core of America’s most ing a Wonderbra is a statement of empower- fruitful political movement resides a perpetu- ment” and expounds on the pleasures of al barrenness. “choosing between ‘apricot sundae’ and ‘mocha That barrenness underlies a more general dis- melt’ eye shadow.” Well, fine, I think. Who may about feminism I hear all the time from cares? When I first began writing about wom- women: “Why does it feel like we’re sliding back- en’s rights nearly two decades ago, I liked to say ward?” “How did ‘feminist’ become a dirty word?” that feminism was the simply worded sign So often these comments are conflated with gen- hoisted by a little girl in the 1970 Women’s erational appraisals: “Our mothers’ feminism isn’t Strike for Equality: i am not a barbie doll. relevant anymore.” “Young women are narcissists Now I’m not so sure. who don’t care about politics.” Despite all the Feminism takes many forms and plays out displays of cross-generational boosterism—all in efforts in which younger and older women those Take Our Daughters to Work Day events do collaborate over serious issues, usually out and “You go, girl!” exhortations—the rancor is of the spotlight. It would be inaccurate to say palpable. As a women’s studies professor burst out that the generational schism is the problem to me one day over with feminism. The primary hurdles femi- lunch, after we had nism faces are the enduring ones. Basic social How can womEN EVER VanquiSH talked for an hour policies for working mothers are still lacking about her students’ and sex segregation in the workplace and the thEir EXTErnal ENEmiES whEN boredom with wom- attendant feminization of poverty have hardly en’s history and the changed (the top ten full-time jobs for wom- thEY arE intEnt on blowing galling necessity to en in the United States—secretary, waitress, up thEir own houSE? woo them by plant- sales clerk, etc.—are the same as thirty years ing the words “girl” ago, and over the course of their prime earn- and “sex” in every ing years women make 38 percent of what course title, “We’re really furious with these young men make); male dominance of public lead- women, aren’t we?” And they with us. ership is still the rule (men occupy 80 to 95- I’ve been to a feminist “mother-daughter din- plus percent of the top decision-making posi- ner party” where the feel-good bonding degener- tions in American politics, business, the ated into a cross fire of complaint and recrimina- military, religion, media, culture, and enter- tion, with younger women declaring themselves tainment); sexual and domestic violence re- sick to death of hearing about the glory days of main at epidemic levels (nearly 20 percent of Seventies feminism and older women declaring American women report having been sexual- themselves sick to death of being swept into the ly assaulted or raped, and 25 percent of wom- dustbin of history. I’ve been to a feminist con- en are physically or sexually attacked by their clave convened to discuss the intergenerational current or former husbands and lovers); and question where no young women were invited. fundamental reproductive freedom is perpet- After the group spent hours bemoaning the ually imperiled (mounting, onerous legal re- younger generation’s putative preference for a strictions; violent attacks on family-planning sexed-up “girly girl” liberation, one participant clinics; and no abortion services in more suggested asking an actual young woman to the than 85 percent of U.S. counties). next meeting—and was promptly shot down. I’ve But these external obstacles also mask inter- delivered speeches on the state of women’s rights nal dynamics that, while less conspicuous, op- to college audiences whose follow-up comments erate as detonators, assuring feminism’s episodic concerned mostly the liberating potential of self-destruction. How can women ever van- miniskirts and stripping, their elders’ cluelessness quish their external enemies when they are in- about sex and fashion, and the need to distance tent on blowing up their own house? As femi- themselves from an older, “stodgy” feminism. nist scholar Rebecca Dakin Quinn wrote more At the age of fifty-one, and by birth cohort a than a decade ago in “An Open Letter to Insti- member of neither the second nor the third tutional Mothers,” an essay chronicling her wave, I am not exempt. Sometimes I find myself own bruising intergenerational experience at a in rooms where, by default and despite my women’s studies conference, “Mothers and years, I’m expected to represent the youthful daughters stand divided; how long feminist viewpoint because there’s no one until we are conquered?” younger around. More often, a middle-aged grumpiness tends to place me on the “old” side, he June 2009 annual meeting of the Na- as when I open a leading feminist work and tionalt Organization for Women filled the plaza find a prominent third-wave feminist defending of the Sheraton Indianapolis Hotel & Suites 30 HARPER’S MAGAZINE / OCTOBER 2010 with all the accustomed trappings. Vendors black president since Aileen Hernandez, who hawked “This Is What a Feminist Looks Like” held the position for a year in the early Seven- infant bodysuits and placards advertised ses- ties. Lyles seemed a shoo-in. When she declared sions on everything from discrimination in the her candidacy that spring, she was unopposed. insurance industry (“Classist, Racist, Sexist The only other prospect, sixty-two-year-old Auto Insurance: An End Is in Sight”) to better Olga Vives, had dropped out of consideration sex for the handicapped (“Accessible Orgasm: after suffering a heart attack. Women with Disabilities and Sexual Empower- On Saturday morning, Lyles broached the ment”). A band named Mother Jane, the eve- thorny subject of age from the hotel ballroom’s ning’s entertainment, tuned up, while an exer- dais, surrounded by a youthful group of officers cise instructor handed out invitations to “Yoga and campaign aides. “Why have I been the for the Larger Body.” youngest woman in the room?” Lyles asked of In the less public precincts, organizers mounted an organization that, she said, must represent a quieter but far more serious effort, preparing their more than one generational wave. “There is slates and counting up their support for the event great strength and power in our image not as that would be the convention’s culmina- tion, a moment many of NOW’s followers believed could be the most critical in the organization’s political history: the election of the first NOW president who might honestly declare (to borrow from JFK’s 1961 inaugural address) that “the torch has been passed to a new generation.” Fifty-five-year-old Kim Gandy’s presi- dency had lasted eight years. With her re- tirement came an opportunity that many NOW members, and in particular many younger members, found hopeful. The candidate who seemed to be in the lead was thirty-three-year-old Latifa Lyles, a charismatic speaker attuned to a youthful sensibility, a black woman who insisted on a more diverse constituency, a technologi- cally savvy strategist who had doubled the organization’s Internet fund-raising and engaged the enthusiasm of a host of feminist bloggers.

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