Topic: Media Research Center
As much as right-wingers complain about the state of American education for allegedly abandoning teaching the classics, they apparently know nothing about classic Greek literature.
Lauren Enk uses a July 1 Media Research Center Culture & Media Institute item to have a freakout over a proposal that women in Texas withhold sex from their male partnersuntil they give up on trying to pass more restrictive anti-abortion legislation:
Misanthropic feminists are at it again. HuffPo’s Vivian Norris just suggested a sex strike in Texas to pressure male voters into giving in to the feminist agenda (aka abortion on demand – er, “women’s healthcare.”)
Deeply disgruntled that Texas might pass a bill banning abortions after 20 weeks, Norris urged Texas women to force men to vote for pro-choice agendas in the future by refusing to have intercourse with them this summer. “Don't give in if your man, boyfriend, husband, toyboy is not voting for your best interests, your reproductive health -- do not sleep with that man!” ranted Norris. “I don't care how cute or charming he is! I don't care if he is your husband of many years. Resist! Go swimming! Meditate!”[...]
What about Texas pro-life women? Apparently they’re just oppressed by the patriarchy and that’s the only reason they fight for the lives of children in the womb or encourage chastity: “These women, like women who hurt other women everywhere by criticizing and judging them, need to wake up as well. Women hurting other women is suicidal. Women who play into the hand of patriarchy need to be shown the way out of that prison,” insisted Norris.
So apparently, she thinks the screaming mob that blocked the abortion bill last time around wasn’t quite radical enough. But feminists are all about power, so it’s not really a shocker that feminists would want to use sex as a power weapon. Because using your sexuality to manipulate people doesn’t objectify or degrade women at all. Right?
Over at WorldNetDaily, Chelsea Schilling has a similar freakout:
An outspoken feminist is recruiting women to stop having sex with all Texas men – even their husbands – until the men start voting for the “right” to end an unborn baby’s life with a late-term abortion.
“Don’t give in if your man, boyfriend, husband, toyboy is not voting for your best interests, your reproductive health – do not sleep with that man!” warns Huffington Post contributor Vivian Norris. “I don’t care how cute or charming he is! I don’t care if he is your husband of many years. Resist! Go swimming! Meditate!”
Neither Enk nor Schilling mentioned the obvious inspiration for Norris' "sex strike" call, let alone that it dates back thousands of years. Sum it up, Wikipedia:
Lysistrata ... is one of the few surviving plays written by Aristophanes. Originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC, it is a comic account of one woman's extraordinary mission to end The Peloponnesian War. Lysistrata persuades the women of Greece to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace — a strategy, however, that inflames the battle between the sexes. The play is notable for being an early exposé of sexual relations in a male-dominated society.
One doesn't even have to go back to 411 BC for an example. In 2011, the women of a small, remote town in Colombia launched a "crossed legs movement" in order to force the state to build a paved road to the town.
How come we, with our lowly public-school education, apparently know more about classical literature than Schilling or Enk?
