The Time magazine headline tells me Gloria Steinem apologized for dissing millenial women. But when I went to look at what passes for an apology, I wasn’t surprised to find what, these days, many accept as an apology when, in fact, it isn’t.
In a case of talk-show Interruptus, I misspoke on the Bill Maher show recently, and apologize for what's been…
Posted by Gloria Steinem on Sunday, February 7, 2016
Apologizing must always include words to the effect that the speaker was in error and should, optimally, includes words expressing regret. This isn’t what Steinem expressed today. Her (non) apology is the equivalent of “I’m sorry if I offended.” It is unacceptable, especially coming from someone as smart and experienced as Steinem.
Millenials get feminism in a healthier, more holistic way than Steinem and Clinton’s generation, and in ways that Sanders, perhaps, has innately understood. There was a time when Steinem threw her support behind Sanders. When she endorsed him instead of Susan Sweetser in Vermont’s 1996 race for Congress, she called Sanders “an honorary woman.”
I stand by every critical word I wrote about Steinem here. Her neoliberal feminism is indeed insufferable. The desperation on the part of a particular quarter in the 2016 primary is having the same effect it had in 2008, by bringing out the worst in people who were either pressured or feel social and political pressure to defend through ad hominem attacks. The result? A lot of bitter ugliness is coming from the Clinton camp and none of it is lost either older or young voters.
2016 is no more Hillary’s time than 2008 was. There is no right time for an entitled approach to politics.
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Gloria Steinem Apologizes For Saying Young Women Support Bernie Sanders to Meet Boys
“The boys are with Bernie”
Feminist icon Gloria Steinem apologized Sunday for suggesting that young women are flocking to support Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders to meet boys.
The activist and founder of Ms.Magazine, who supports Hillary Clinton, said Friday that women become more politically active as they get older, but “when you’re young, you’re thinking, ‘Where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie,’” she said.
Steinem said she “misspoke” when she made the comment on Real Time with Bill Maher after being asked why she thought Clinton wasn’t doing better with young women.
Read the rest on Time.com
Right on! There’s an old term called apologia, wherein basically someone uses the space made to accept their demanded apology, and instead merely goes the long route of explaining why they did what they did again, or doubles down on the ideology while cleverly softening the tone in which their screeching over reached. For myself, what I have to say about what Gloria Steinem assumed some kind of mantle to dismiss what our young women have to say about Hillary Clinton is this. Everyone is done with figureheads. Tried it with untried Obama. Bought the t-shirt. So sorry for yellow dog Democrats ashamed of the word liberal, when today’s youth female and male aren’t really ashamed of the word socialist, much less democratic socialist. Nor are they seduced by the joys of boys and shock power. Frankly, the opposite might be the problem, but being pent up and inexperienced just isn’t the dating issue it used to be, so never mind the straight outta the nunnery. When they were shutting down all those planned parenthoods and states were changing all those laws in a bona fide war on women Hillary and Gloria both could have flown all over the nation a hundred times over reinvesting the word progressive with the fresh blood Bernie Sanders has to give liberalism it’s opportunity to exhale.
She could be doing so much, late in her career to try and achieve things none of the feminist movements achieved. Instead, she’s quarterbacking this generation of women and continuing the tradition of white feminists to cater to neoliberal interests… It infuriates!