cnn: Santorum's stone-age view of women

[babylonsister]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/14/opinion/coontz-santorum/index.html

Santorum's stone-age view of women
By Stephanie Coontz, Special to CNN
updated 9:41 AM EST, Wed February 15, 2012

Editor's note: Stephanie Coontz teaches family studies at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, and co-chairs the Council on Contemporary Families. Her most recent book is "A Strange Stirring: The Feminine Mystique and American Women at the Dawn of the 1960s."


(CNN) -- Presidential candidate Rick Santorum is unhappy with last week's compromise over whether Catholic institutions should be required to cover contraception for their employees, arguing that birth control "shouldn't be covered by insurance at all." The issue, Santorum claims, is "economic liberty." But in the past, he has made his real objection clear, categorizing contraception as "a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be."

Taken with statements Santorum made in his 2005 book, "It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good," his opposition to contraception (as well as to abortion, even in the case of rape) seems part and parcel of a deep hostility toward efforts to empower women and enhance their status. He has shown nothing but contempt for what his book called the "radical" feminist "pitch" that "men and women be given an equal opportunity to make it to the top in the workplace." So perhaps it's not surprising that at the time of publication he did not list his wife as a co-author or contributor, although when asked last week about this and other comments on working mothers, he now says his wife wrote that part of the book.

Whichever member of the couple wrote the section on women, it is worth revisiting a couple of its points. Take the book's dismissal of programs to help impoverished single mothers improve their job prospects by returning to school: "The notion that college education is a cost-effective way to help poor, low-skill, unmarried mothers with high school diplomas or GEDs move up the economic ladder is just wrong." Or its claim that unnamed "surveys" have shown that educated professional women find it "easier, more 'professionally' gratifying, and certainly more socially affirming, to work outside the home than to give up their careers to take care of their children."


snip//

Every family must make its own, sometimes difficult, decisions about what best fits their particular needs and preferences. We don't need politicians like Rick Santorum -- or, as he now somewhat unchivalrously claims, his wife -- making those decisions more painful by suggesting that women who choose to pursue careers are worse mothers than those who do not.

[get the red out]

1. Parents

My guess is that to be Rick Santorum's daughter would not lead to a sense of self worth as an adult.

What's wrong with men who hate women this much?

[roguevalley]

6. mama washed his penis too much as a child, probably as punishment. he hates and fears women

so he attacks them.

[no_hypocrisy]

2. By removing independent means for "poor, low-skill, unmarried mothers with high school diplomas or

GEDs", women would be forced to marry, transforming marriage into legalized prostitution in order for them to survive.

I'm waiting for the next Santorum shoe to drop with Child Protection being called in for child neglect if the mother works outside the home.

[AmateurPolymath]

3. This man is solid proof that God does not exist

A Santorum presidency would be like Bush on steroids. If this man actually wins the election, I will burn my house down and move to Scandanavia.

[Angry Dragon]

4. Rick is afraid of any position except missionary

[cantbeserious]

9. Tis A Shame Since There Are So Many To Try

eom

[HockeyMom]

5. Remember what Bush said?

The solution for unmarried welfare mothers is to get MARRIED. Santorum sounds like Bush on steriods, so to speak. JOB SKILLS, whether from a college education or learning a skilled TRADE, is the way out of poverty for BOTH men and women. So if these women marry a man who flips burgers for a living they will now escape poverty? No birth control either remember. Keep making babies since Daddy is here and makes $8/hour!!!!!!!

Santorum needs professional help if he really believes this

[Craigtee3030]

7. Should we really be surprised at Rick's Stone Age approach?

After all...his wife spent 8 years living with Cro-Magnon Man.

An Elephant NEVER Forgets! Sorry, Mitt.
Thoughts at 3 A.M.
http://thoughtsatthreeam.blogspot.com/?spref=tw

[tfrey1225]

8. Rick is a

sick sick man. He has some sort of insecurity about himself and takes it out with a bitter hatred towards women.

[Liora24]

10. He should change his name to "Rashid" and move to Saudi Arabia.

He'd fit right in with the politicians there - a rich, corrupt misogynistic bitter man with nothing better to do than force there beliefs on others. However I actually hope that he does win the nomination because saying these things in a debate would finally wake people up to the idiocy of the social conservatives & their stone-age morality. Not to mention that if he said these things Obama will win in a landslide (not that it won't already happen).

[Digit]

11. I wonder what his views on divorce are

I find myself having to turn the channel whenever I begin hearing any of his woman hating ideas.