Not had opportunity to post for awhile, but a couple of things I'd like to comment on...
Excellent post, very interesting, thanks for the info.
+1. It actually made me care a little.
Thank you. Much appreciated.
Interesting that the Catholic priest on that panel comes across as more socially progressive than Abbott!
A.A. Alfie said:
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/misogynist
Definition of misogynist
noun
a person who hates women:
adjective
having or showing a hatred of women:
I have seen this narrow definition used elsewhere (eg. last night on Q&A) but the meaning of words changes:
Senator Hillary Clinton used a word recently that has been changing its meaning. In charging that she has been treated more harshly in the media because of her gender than Senator Barack Obama has been treated because of his race, she said, “It does seem as though the press at least is not as bothered by the incredible vitriol that has been engendered by comments and reactions of people who are nothing but misogynists.”
The word misogyny has since its earliest recording in 1656 meant “hate or contempt for women.” The etymology of misogyny is straightforward: In Greek, miso means “hatred,” and gune means “woman.” A misogynist is a woman-hater. I thought Clinton’s choice of the word was in error, and that the word she meant was sexist, meaning “one who discriminates based on sex” — that she had been treated unfairly because she was a woman. When I looked up the word she chose in the Oxford English Dictionary online, however, I noted that the meaning of misogynist had changed slightly but significantly. In 1989, the definition was “hatred of women”; in the 2002 revision, the definition was broadened to “hatred or dislike of, or prejudice against women.”
Link
I don't think Abbott hates women in a rabid Taliban-like way. I do think he has some prejudices about women who are outside the bounds of his socially conservative worldview. He seems to have a problem with women on the left which goes back to his time with the
SRC at
Sydney Uni. Now, he is operating within a wider milieu of misogyny directed against the PM which Anne Summers has
documented. Either he doesn't recognise the significance of this or he is happy to go along with it as long as he thinks it works to his advantage. He did himself no favours by standing in front of those "Ditch the witch" and "Bob Brown's Bitch"
placards. I think he would have earned some respect if he had disassociated himself from the obvious sexism, whilst still criticising the government's policy.
Abbott seems to have some patronising and stereotypical views on gender roles which make for great foot-in-mouth moments. (Ironing! I mean
really.) I don't think he is "a" misogynist, however he does hold views that are prejudicial to women. Despite Margie Abbott
claiming that her husband is a feminist because they have three daughters, denying women choice over fertility is
prejudicial to women's independence. And it's not just a private opinion he holds, but something that he was prepared to act on when he had the power to do so as we saw over the
RU486 issue. Personally, I'm fed up with him lecturing us about abortion: "Easy way out!" "Too many abortions!". The
proven way to reduce the number of abortions is *not* by making abortion more unpleasant, difficult and expensive to obtain. I haven't heard Abbott advocate for the Dutch approach. Instead he advocates abstinence, which I understand has worked so well in the US. That desire to control and restrict women is part of the misogyny at the core of religion.
