New Times Op-Ed Inadvertantly Supports Steinem Op-Ed

Yesterday's New York Times featured an op-ed by novelist Lorrie Moore titled "Last Year's Role Model," the basic thesis of which is: "The political moment for feminine role models, arguably, has passed us by."

Um, yeah...first of all, Lorrie, "feminine" is different than "female," so I'm not really sure what you think you're saying there. From the context it seems you mean "female," in which case...false. Or rather, what the fuck is that supposed to even mean? It would be one thing if Moore were trying to say that political interest in female role models has waned--which anyway would be contradicted by the recent increase in female political role models such as Rice and Polosi, whatever you might think of them. But based on her subsequent argument, she seems to be saying that female political role models are actually unnecessary-- that they are, in fact, totes lame.

The first big piece of evidence for this is that boys of color are suffering more academically. This is clearly true, but...shit, let me just bullet-point all the problems with this argument:

•Um, I think women still maybe have any other problems in society, like, at all. Yknow, one or two.
•Moore argues that the American educational system was "designed by and for white girls." Wanna back that up with any evidence, or maybe explain it in some way? Some sub-points:

• Boys may outperform girls but these statistics only reflect the past 20 years and Moore herself is framing this as a recent trend, thus negating the idea that this is a flaw in the "design" of the system.
• Using these statistics in this manner in no way takes into account other societal influences that discourage scholastic achievement for boys--especially boys of color. It's not a flaw in the design of the system that boys are expected to apply themselves. It's a flaw in society that boys are expected to care more about sports. (Or gangs. Or boobs. Or whatever else it is that is way more important than English class.)
• Indeed, it is well-documented that the average classroom environment is biased strongly towards boys.
• What about black girls? Oh right, they don't exist.

•Actually, that merits its own bullet. BLACK GIRLS EXIST.
•It is kind of a leap to assume that having a black President will encourage all boys of color to study harder--and asserting that this is true undermines the notion that it is the design of the educational system that puts boys at a disadvantage. So all they need to do is apply themselves, and then the system's cool?

Then there's a bunch of general "blacks have it worse than chicks" stuff: "The sexes have always lived together, but the races have not." Which is true--so then why have we not had a female President? Why is the Senate still a mere 16% female? (An improvement from my childhood--and Lisa Simpson's--when it was 2%, but come on, we're half the fucking population.) Also, she likens Clinton's failed health plan to Guiliani's moronic placement of the Crisis Command Center in the WTC, against all sane council he received. Which totally makes sense, cuz Hillary's health care plan totally killed a bunch of people.

This piece is a perfect complement to Steinem's, for two reasons. One, it supports her main point that to a lot of people, sexism is sooooo not a big deal. Two, it's the exact same stupid thing Steinem was doing--falsely and detrimentally casting this election in terms of Race vs. Gender, and making up nonsense for the sake of touting the candidate of one's choice. Steinem likes Clinton. Moore likes Obama. All's fair in love and politics!

Oh, and also: black girls exist.