Patricia Heaton: How can she be a feminist and vote for Bush?

[TrueAmerican]

Maybe I don't understand because I'm a guy.

[benddem]

1. who is she? n/t

[calico1]

2. She is the wife on "Everybody Loves Raymond"

[The Zanti Regent]

63. She's a big right wing shill

I remember when she went after Sharon Osborne during an awards show. I was hoping Sharon would get in a catfight with her...

[TrueAmerican]

3. Ray's wife

On Everybody Loves Raymond

[Dookus]

4. Who says she's a feminist?

She's an anti-choice right-winger.

[TrueAmerican]

6. She does. She is head of Feminist for Life

http://www.feministsforlife.org/

[TeacherCreature]

9. feminists for Life is an oxymoron

She is not a feminist even if she wants to think so.

[shance]

13. Thank ya*

Took the words from me.

[Kipepeo]

19. Thank you

Anti-choice feminist = bacon-eating vegetarian

[ScreamingMeemie]

23. Love your sigline!!

:thumbsup:

[TeacherCreature]

31. Hi Mrs Grumpy!

Thank you for the compliment. :hi:

[southernleftylady]

24. Thats my first thought too... its like compassionate Conservative n/t

[TeacherCreature]

32. "Feminists against women's rights"

Now that just ain't right!

[southernleftylady]

25. dupe n/t

[SemperEadem]

53. she's not a feminist--she's a chick who has to work in order to eat

[TeacherCreature]

56. Most of us have to work to eat. She calls herself a feminist

Want to try another comment that addresses that truth?

[SemperEadem]

65. oh lighten up

[ClassWarrior]

45. More RW spin.

It's like saying "pro-life" even though most of them are for war.

[Dastard Stepchild]

5. Patricia Heaton is her name

and I was never under the impression that she was particularly progessive, but that's a personal opinion. I know that she is staunchly pro-life, so the support of Bush could be because of that - she's likely a one issue supporter.

[BayCityProgressive]

7. feminists for life?

LOL, what the fuck? That would be like me starting "Gays for AIDS" and saying I am a proud supporter of gay rights..what a moron...

[Cha]

12. She would throw our Country away on the right for

Women Not to have a choice. IMV, she's a highly deluded ignorant "feminist". And thankfully..most of the actors and actresses are pro choice.

ON EDIT~ patricia heaton is an idiot!

[benddem]

8. check out

the feminists for life webpage. That group is anti choice. It is an anti abortion site.

[BillZBubb]

10. She's no feminist.

That's typical right wing front language abuse. Sort of like National Socialism (Nazi-ism) wasn't pro-socialist, as a matter of fact they killed a good number of them.

Feminists for Life uses the same deception technique. Heaton is an airhead Bush*bot.

[bahrbearian]

11. Healthy Forest ,Clean Skies, Uniters not dividers......

[BillZBubb]

30. Yep, Iraqi freedom, patriot act, compassionate conservative...

Their use of language is consistently manipulative. Sadly it works on a lot of numbskulls.

[EndElectoral]

14. Being feminist and voting Bush,is like believing Bush is a peace president

[progressivebydesign]

15. Total non-celebrity..

.. I had no idea who she was, but remember she does some Albertsons grocery commercials... Influential as hell. ha, ha.

[depakid]

16. Does a person have to be pro-choice to be a feminist?

I'm not so sure about that. Feminism involves a whole range of concerns, including equal pay for equal work, affordable child care, access to women's healthcare and birth control, Title IX issues, etc.

While it seems antithetical that a "feminist" would impose her "life begins at conception" beliefs on others, I don't think that necessarily means she's not for women's equality. I think it just goes to show how we put way too much stock in labels in this country... and on this board.

[Kipepeo]

20. yes

If you are against a woman's right control her body, you're against a woman's autonomy. Which makes you anti-woman and therefore anti-feminist.

You can have a personal pro-life stance and a political pro-choice stance at the same time, no problem.

But once you take on a political anti-choice stance, you become an advocate for sexist anti-woman policy. Patricia Heaton is not only personally pro-life, she is politically anti-choice.

[Dastard Stepchild]

21. I've had this conversation...

with other female friends of mine. We never seem to come to a consensus :) The more inclusionary friends state that feminism must embrace all women with all beliefs. The more "hardline" feminist friends state that anyone imposing their moral beliefs on another woman is not worthy of the feminist title.
Since I have yet to personally meet a feminist who is pro-life, I'm not sure many exist.

[knitter4democracy]

36. I know I'm going to get flamed, but

I'm pro-life and a feminist. I do stop short of imposing my belief system on anyone else, and I vigorously defend Roe v Wade to anyone. Personally, however, I agree that the better solution is to have a society that supports a pregnant woman no matter what her socioeconomic or personal issues are. Since we aren't there yet, I want abortions to be safe and legal for any woman who decides to get one.

This is a much more complicated issue than most people treat it. I personally knew a girl (she was a 14 y.o. at the time) who was forced to get an abortion by her mother under extremely awful circumstances, and the doctor who did it needs to lose his license. Was it her choice? No. It was safe, and some would say it was legal (I wouldn't--it was child abuse), but it was still wrong. Okay, she didn't die in a back alley somewhere, but she will be scarred for life because of what was done to her. What do we do about the women who feel trapped or pressured into abortion? Is it truly their choice? What if we did more to support women with children so that it actually was a real choice? What about all the girl babies aborted simply because of their sex? How can we feminists stand there and trumpet choice when the reason the mother chose abortion was because she knew that birth and child would not be accepted and that she wouldn't be supported?

If we simply boil everything down to sound bites and sign slogans, much is lost--including the women in the midst of a difficult time.

[NightOwwl]

40. knitter4democracy says:

"I'm pro-life and a feminist. I do stop short of imposing my belief system on anyone else, and I vigorously defend Roe v Wade to anyone."

And that's why I respect you. You have your beliefs, but you don't expect others to live by your rules.

[knitter4democracy]

47. Thank you

Of course I don't. I really think it is a decision best left to a woman and her doctor. The other thing that scares me about the pro-life crowd is that they want to infringe on the doctor-patient relationship, which to me is practically sacred.

I had a hard time getting pregnant (while I was teaching high school, no less), and I felt my babies move very early (my son at 10 weeks, when he still could have been aborted in my state), so I just could never be okay with killing them. Abortion is the killing of a life, no matter how much we sugar-coat that with other words ("fetus" or "blob of tissue"), but sometimes it really is the only option for that particular woman. I just wish we could make it more rare.

[Dastard Stepchild]

50. Well hey...

Oh wow - then yer the fist pro-life feminist I have met. Hello :)

[TeacherCreature]

57. Oh for sanity's sake, you are pro-choice.

Why play games with words? Heaton is anti-choice, you are pro-choice.

[knitter4democracy]

61. Words are more powerful than we think

I agree that politically I am pro-choice, but I prefer to say pro-life because that's my real belief.

BTW, sanity's got nothing to do with it. ;)

[SarahB]

62. I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm anything but pro-choice, but...

I know for me personally, it would be extremely difficult to have an abortion when that child was conceived in a trusting, loving relationship. I don't know if I could and yes, I've been faced with some pretty tough life-altering choices in life regarding this. Am I a feminist? You bet I am!!!

Would I want to legislate this? Hell no. Would I impose my conscience for my individual self on someone in completely different circumstances? Hell no.
I do get where you're coming from though.

[sandnsea]

17. Watch out for the "new" feminist

They're a scary bunch and are against every single thing women need to be independent and direct their own lives.

[Kipepeo]

18. because she's a dumbass

anti-choice right winger, not a feminist

[Nikki Stone 1]

22. "Feminists" for Life was a deliberate misnomer:it is an antiabortion group

The organization was started in California by Susie Carpenter McMillian, a rather silly person who had had two abortions of her own, and then decided to deny the right to everyone else. She is quite charming on radio and was a frequent guest on Tammy Bruce's show on KFI (before the Cosby family got mad at Tammy for calling Mrs. Cosby "crazy" right after her son Ennis' murder, and got Tammy fired.)

But no, McMillan is not a feminist and neither are her group members.

As far as Heaton is concerned, she is staunchly pro-life and a devout Catholic (I believe). She walked out on an Emmy Awards show one year because that slutty Jenny McCarthy (ironically, another nice little Catholic girl) started running her trash mouth. Heaton felt that McCarthy's pornographic comments were unworthy of the Emmys--or of her--and left.

I am staunchly pro-choice, myself, and I hate the misnomer of this anti choice group. But I do hand it to Heaton for walking out on Jenny McCarthy.

[lancdem]

26. Susan Carpenter McMillan was also a "friend"

of Paula Jones.

[Nikki Stone 1]

28. That's right! I forgot the Susie/Paula Jones connection!

So Susie is just another repub. operative....like Anne Coulter.

[Cleita]

27. Doesn't she have about five kids?

Shouldn't a pro-life mommy like her be at home baking cookies instead of playing one on TV? Or, is she like a lot of mothers, the only bread-winner in the family? Let's talk about the hypocrisy here.

[Nikki Stone 1]

29. Heaton has 4 children and a working husband

http://www.patriciaheaton.com/Bio.shtml

"Heaton is married with four sons and resides in Los Angeles with her husband, actor/producer David Hunt."

Guess kids are being raised by a nanny or something.

She hasn't been pregnant recently. Wonder if she uses birth control.

[Athletic Grrl]

52. I think she's in her mid-40's now...

...probably finished popping out the pups.

To be honest, other than her staunch stance on this issue (as someone else noted, she was raised and remains a deeply religious Catholic), she seems a lot less "Hollywood" than most of Hollywood, including her co-star on the show who lives in a $50 million mansion.

I don't share her views on the topic, but I'm not going to try to silence her either. Being a member of the Party who espouses First Amendment rights, that would be a wee bit hypocritical on my part.

[DemBones DemBones]

33. This thread has a high proportion of ignorance and vitriol.

Note that I said "ignorance," not "stupidity." I'm saying many of you are ignorant because you haven't learned, not that you're incapable of learning.

Susan B. Anthony was opposed to abortion so according to some of you she was no feminist. Elizabeth Cady Stanton was opposed to abortion, too. Not a feminist, huh?

I'll bet I was a feminist before most of you knew the word and I am opposed to abortion. I think abortion is bad for women and question how anyone can think that killing your own child could possibly be good. Our species will continue to be morally retarded as long as we countenance abortion, capital punishment, and war.

Women will also continue to be second class citizens as long as some of us see fit to attack another woman for working instead of being a stay-at-home mother. Of course, the attacks on Patricia Heaton were made solely because she opposes abortion, not because she doesn't stay home with her children. That's how freepers operate and I expect better of DUers.

Politically speaking, Democrats will continue to lose votes as long as they allow the hard-core NARAL supporters to determine our party's platform and show no interest in doing anything to make abortion rare as well as safe and legal.

The way a lot of women defend abortion, you'd think we got paid for having them and it felt good, too. Given that neither is true, why aren't women motivated to accept full responsibility for preventing conception when engaging in consensual sex?

We don't have over a million abortions a year in the US because of rape or incest or therapeutic abortion of deformed fetuses. The larger number of abortions are of healthy but "unwanted" fetuses, women shelling out hundreds of dollars to have an unpleasant procedure designed to kill a normal baby. "But we have our rights!" That's truly disturbing.

Why not exercise our rights before conception? Prevent conception rather than destroy a child's life.

[Nikki Stone 1]

34. How about rape?

The one thing I will never understand about anti-abortion types is their rejection of abortion even in cases of rape.

[Mandate My Ass]

35. Ignorance????!!!!?????!!!! HELLO????

The way a lot of women defend abortion, you'd think we got paid for having them and it felt good, too. Given that neither is true, why aren't women motivated to accept full responsibility for preventing conception when engaging in consensual sex?

Who says abortion is not accepting full responsibility for engaging in consensual sex? :eyes:

Don't confuse "accepting responsibility" with your narrow view of what accepting responsbility entails. Don't confuse a difference of opinion as being ignorance and vitriol.

[Nikki Stone 1]

37. Abortion was extremely unsafe for women in the 19th century

Many 19th century supporters of women's rights saw abortion as one of the ways women could die--easily and at a high rate. There is a great book on the history of abortion called, simply, "Abortion." I can't remember the author, but I read it years ago and found it very well balanced. While some early women's rights supporters were opposed to abortion on health grounds, they were against the prosecution of women for it, especially those who were poor and desperate. Of course, pregnancy and chilbirth also had high death rates for women, but the rate of death from abortion was higher.

Current methods make abortion safer for a woman than childbirth. Death rates for women in either situation are both very low, but abortion is a little safer.

[REP]

67. Some People Just Think They Know Better Than Everyone Else

And of course, that's nothing more than hubris, and from that flows stupidity and vitriol.

Of course, abortion is taking responsibility. Every woman is fully capable of making her own decision, no matter what some people seem to think.

[Zomby Woof]

38. We won't lose votes - total putrid bullshit

The hardcore fundies who oppose abortion at any cost will never vote Dem, and since most people are pro-choice (tough shit for you, huh?), independents and rank-and-file Dems are not going to vote for the Repubs based on your NARAL boogeyman taking away our votes with the platform. Or boogeyperson, as it were. ;-) Boogeyfetus?

Abortion must be kept safe and legal, bottom line. Just because you don't like the reasons some women get them doesn't mean the safety and/or legality of abortions should be compromised one iota. Diaphragms break, the pill can fail... and that's the way the egg bounces.

I find it disturbing that you equate the abortion of a fetus to be infanticide, just like Bush, Heaton (who supports Bush, the REAL reason we wish she would be kissed by her own shit), and other fundie fetus fetishists.

The Democrats will lose MORE votes if they compromise the precepts laid down in Roe Vs. Wade, an imperfect protection of abortion rights, but the best one women have. May it be preserved.

[Kat45]

41. Zomby: "fundie fetus fetishists" -- I love it!

That bit of alliteration nails it: perfect description. :-)

[against all enemies]

39. New York Times - Barbara Ehrenreich, says it best.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/22/opinion/22ehre.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fContributors

Abortion, you can't have it both ways. It is a women's right to choose, respect that. Someday you might need that right.

[Kipepeo]

42. We do not lose votes by being pro-choice

No more than Repukes lose by being anti-choice.

And quite frankly, if someone wants to encourage the government strip me of my right to control my body, they are not on my "side" at all.

I think we should all be working to make abortion more safe AND less necessary, but an anti-choice political agenda does neither of those things.

Also, my problem with Heaton is not her personal pro-life position.

It is her political anti-choice position that threatens my rights. That's the difference.

[fujiyama]

44. What must be done

to make abortions more rare?

Well, we can start off by having better sex ed programs...Though, it's the right that's at fault. They want to push ineffective and ridiculous "abstinence only" bullshit.

Second (and this goes along with the first), promote contraception and birth control (including the morning after pill). Once again, the radical nutjobs oppose these measures as well. If safer methods of early abortions aren't made available, then later, more risky procedures will be undertaken.

I'm not sure how much NARAL and other groups have done to promote the above measures, but Clinton repeatadly stated that the goal is NOT to promote abortions, but to allow it to be safe, legal, and rare.

As for late term abortions ("partial birth"), which women would WANT one? Very few, and I'm sure any decent doctor would discuss the problems and health risks associated with these (including psychological/mental).

I would argue that it's not a very feminist notion to block access to an abortion. It's one thing to hold a personal belief that abortion in wrong (I believe that late term abortions are very wrong), but pushing these views on everyone is just not right. The party's platform is clear. It's about CHOICE, not about promoting abortions.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

49. How many unwanted babies have you personally adopted? If you...

...truly believed what you're saying, you and all of the other people opposed to abortion would line up to adopt as many unwanted babies as possible. I don't see that happening, do you?

If you and all of the other people opposed to abortion would work to affect change in the body of laws surrounding the difficulty of adoption of unwanted babies born in the U. S., perhaps far less people would be willing to go overseas to adopt. I don't see that happening, either.

One more comment about abortion...do you want to see women going back to the old ways of the back-alley clinics, and/or self-induced abortions? IMHO, that is exactly where all of this going.

You folks talk big about being anti-abortion, but when it comes to where the rubber meets the road, I personally don't see much substance.

As to your comments about preventing conception, contraception has ALWAYS been the preferred way of dealing with this subject. Unfortunately, the NeoCons in the anti-abortion movement have been allowed to phrase the argument as being "all life starts at conception". Therefore, if you don't allow life to occur, you are basically guilty of murder. Therefore, condoms are bad as well as ALL other contraceptive methods.

[Dastard Stepchild]

51. I don't really think abortion is that significant of an issue...

for the majority of voters. I do think there is a very vocal minority both opposing and supporting abortion, but all in all, I don't really believe this to be the political issue that yer average citizen puts a lot of weight on. Don't really have a source to back this up - it mostly stems from my experience with people falling all along the political spectrum. I think most people are content to develop an opinion on abortion and leave it at that, sans the overt politicalization.
I disagree that abortion is inherently wrong, but I do feel that feminism does have a place at the table for women sharing vastly different perspectives. My concern has always been that abortion remain legal for those who chose to have one, but I take little offense to women who would never have one.

[TeacherCreature]

58. How about when birth control fails?

How about ignorant single catholic women who would rather pretend they are "carried away byt the moment" than admit they are planning on having pre-marital sex? So they fail to use birth control and are not prepared to be single pregnant women much less single mothers and so they get abortions too.

We are living in a very different world than Anthony and Stanton. No matter what you think of people's motives, they have a right to make their own decission and you have no right to require that they live by your moral values.

[Cleita]

59. Get off your high horse. Many of us who are pro-choice do

not take abortion lightly, but we do stand behind those who choose to end a pregnancy that they have a right to a safe therapuetic abortion from a doctor trained in the procedure. To deny a woman this right is sexist and ignorant if you ask me.

[murielm99]

66. NARAL and Planned Parenthood DO support the

morning-after pill, and want to see it made available over the counter.

I heard one of NARAL's speakers talk about how many unwanted pregnancies and abortions this would prevent.

Do you think Planned Parenthood supports abortion only? They want contraception and safe sex first!

We defend abortion because it is part of the total package of controlling our bodies and our lives. We have to defend it as vociferously as we do because the fundies have taken it as one of their favorite issues.

I have never had an abortion. I have three planned children. But I am a white middle class woman with access to birth control and education. It is the poor women and the very young who need this option more than I.

I have every intention of defending abortion in any way I feel is necessary. And what you said about losing votes is untrue. We will lose votes if we abandon Roe v. Wade.

Hooray for the hard core NARAL types. YAAAAY!

[BonjourUSA]

43. Bush is a compelling sex-symbol

and even a feminist can't resist.

[bushwakker]

46. Is she part of the Hollywood liberal elite?

[PROGRESSIVE1]

48. Can she spell "BOYCOTT"?

[Fleshdancer]

54. I guess she's a non-practicing feminist

Bush's attack on women go beyond the abortion issue so I really don't understand why even a pro-life feminist would vote for this guy.

Then again, while I do believe most women would choose to never personally have an abortion, I don't understand how someone can say she/he's a feminist but then decide to pick and choose the rights a woman should and should not have such as abortion. I guess it all depends on how we define feminism?

[xxqqqzme]

55. if she is anti-choice - she is no

feminist. I consider my self pro-life because I am anti-war, anti-death penalty. I am 100% PRO choice.

It is the language. These people have 2 B called what they R - ANTI-CHOICE.

[Bluebear]

60. Is the right wing saying "Just shut up and act!!!!", no I thought not.

nt

[mitchum]

64. Because she is a mendacious, selfish pig of an "actress"?