Can we trust women as ethical decision-makers?

[stilltrucking]

ELLEN GOODMAN
Does Jane speak for John?
By Ellen Goodman | July 31, 2005
DIDN'T THIS ALL begin when we rediscovered that pillow talk in the White House doesn't always penetrate a president's ear?
In the frenzied days after Sandra Day O'Connor's announcement, the first lady openly expressed her desire to see another woman on the highest bench. It was widely assumed that Laura was speaking for, or at least to, her husband. The media short list was quickly filled with skirts.
Then along came John G. Roberts all dressed up in a suit and tie and carrying an inscrutable resume. Since no one can figure out what he would do on the bench, especially about Roe v. Wade, speculation has turned from the details of his paper trail to the fine print of his marriage.
It turns out that Jane Roberts, lawyer, mother of two, and one of the first female graduates of Holy Cross College, is also a bona fide board member of an antiabortion group. Does the fact that Jane belongs to Feminists for Life mean -- gotcha! -- that John is a Nominee against Roe?
Well, let's go to the videotape, excuse me, the website. FFL is a boutique antiabortion group dedicated to the proposition that you can be prowoman and prolife. Their mission statement says: ''Abortion is a reflection that our society has failed to meet the needs of women. Women deserve better than abortion." Unlike most prolife groups, the small group of FFL members are more critical of the policy failings of society than the moral failings of women.
To many, being a prolife feminist is an oxymoron, though there aren't so many women eager to identify themselves as feminists that I would kick Jane out of the sisterhood. Working to make college campuses more friendly to motherhood is better than videotaping license plates at the abortion clinic. But FFL is coy about whether it seeks to criminalize abortion, eerily quiet on contraceptives, and silent about whether it trusts women as ethical decision-makers.
We don't know if her work in FFL means Ms. Roberts wants to overturn Roe. Even if we did, does Jane speak for John? Are wives the canary in the mine of their husband's minds?
There isn't a whole lot of evidence to support the power of pillows over politics. Remember back when Abigail Adams wrote the famous line to husband John: ''Remember the ladies. . . . Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of husbands." John wrote back, ''I cannot but laugh" at the plea for women's rights. He then wrote a snippy little phrase about men being subjected ''to the despotism of the petticoat."
We generally assume that women are to the left, not the right, of their husbands on women's issues. In recent years, Barbara Bush was widely known as being prochoice. Laura Bush has openly said she's not in favor of overturning Roe. These Republican in-laws were designated to wink and nod, to reassure moderate voters that their husbands wouldn't really be dangerous to the right to choose. Stash that thought with the pillow cases.
While we are on the subject, a mother's opinion may mean nothing more than a wife's. Republican Mitt Romney once cited the prochoice views of his late mama to reassure Massachusetts voters. But that didn't stop him from switching sides in the abortion controversy as cunningly as he switched his sights from being governor to being president.
It's true -- Mary Matalin and James Carville notwithstanding -- that husbands and wives are more likely to agree with each other politically than not. The much vaunted gender gap is not really about spouses canceling each other out at the ballot box. It's actually a marriage gap, with single women far more likely to be progressive than those who are ''sleeping with the enemy." And just for the record, there isn't any gender gap at all on the subject of abortion.
So we are also entitled to suspicions about Roberts and Roe. But after reading memos from the 1980s and the details of his biography, we will remain clueless about what he would do on the bench unless he tells us. Only John Roberts can and should tell the senators his legal beliefs on the right to privacy and the foundations of the Roe decision.
In the end, the views of his wife offer little more information than his religion, Catholic, his alma mater, Harvard, or his portfolio, diversified. Jane's membership in Feminists for Life says little more about the safety of Roe v. Wade than John's prep school role as Peppermint Patty in a production of ''You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown."
John may or may not be our cup of tea. But we can't find out by reading his wife's tea leaves.
Ellen Goodman's e-mail address is ellengoodman@globe.com.

[hester_prynne]

I wonder if Goodman has ever written anything on women giving up their power to men. I mean, this seems to be the core issue.

I was half watching some tv show last night, (the other half doing the crossword), where the subject of a woman being the next president was being discussed, and the comment was made that men from the midwest and red states would never go for a woman as president because those men want their women at home, looking after them, not doing "manly" things like being a president.

Of course I laffed my ass off.

I mean think about it. Men want their women home taking care of them? And serving as president is "manly work"? Good Lord, does anyone really believe that crap?

No one on the show even flinched at his statement.

It's a pity, really....
H

[e_dog]

if tha feminists ever truly got their shit together, women could dictate. i mean woimen got tha numbers .

the prezident like all politicians is supposed to be a public servant, so exepect that slogan to be trotted out when and if hilary wins, which i hope for, i guess.

[stilltrucking]

if hilary wins, which i hope for, i guess

My feelings exactly.

I can think of so many better women for the job but they don't look pretty in pink. Like senator Barbara Mikulski from Maryland.

Not meant to sarcasm Hester, I remember how distraught some women were when she wore that pink dress to stand by her man after his blowjob. Molly Ivins a hero of mine. She wrote a column about some women who went to Austin to protest some abortion bill that the mostly male members of the legislature were about to pass; they wore body suits with the female reproductive system out lined on the body suits. The guys were clueless; mean they were ignorant of the most basic facts about a woman's body. I dread abortions, but sometimes they are necessary. But it is a hellish method of birth control. I met one woman who has had six, and she was only in her late twenties. Don't know the details but that seems like a lot.

[hester_prynne]

I really like Molly Ivins too Still, she's got spine like me.
I wish there were more spine in this world, but there isn't.

Nobody can tell me what to do when it comes to choices about my body, or my lifestyle. Period. The fact that anyone thinks they can is ridiculous. The fact that men think they can control women makes me laugh. They'd have to kill me first!
I mean what is that? What kind of fucking idiot thinks they have that kind of say over anyone?

The only way anyone can have control of me is if I let them. (fat chance...just ask any of my old flames if they could control me! ). But this is precisely what the majority of women in America seem to do, sans berkas. I don't know why. But women seem to like to be the long-suffering martyrs, doing it all and complaining about the man they suffocate and enable and essentially, they destroy, because they are too fucking full of low self esteem, too fucking afraid to be alone and experience independence from an old outdated scene. They control and create their own misery, their own loss of rights. It's a status quo I'm very glad not to be a part of anymore.....

I'm afraid men are gaining strength in their weaknesses, simply because they can. It's an entitlement our society continues to perpetrate, even though it's totally invalid and really unfair, and has been for a long time, and you know it!

And the Bush admin continues destroying America, because they can!
Everyone is looking the other way when it comes to Bush's criminality, especially the media, which of course has been bought out. Pretty soon, i'll be flogged and jailed for even expressing what I have expressed here! I'm sure some of you reading this now would like to see me gagged.
Too bad.
La la la
I think this is about the millionth time i've expressed these sentiments.
I'll do it a million more times too....
H

[stilltrucking]

The fact that men think they can control women makes me laugh.

Yeah spider woman’s husband thought he could control her with sex. I remember she smiled when she told me that.

I thought it was pretty interesting column, I liked the part about Adams and his wife and the petticoats. what time is it there are you getting cranky or is it just me?

[mnaz]

Can we trust the women? Can we trust the men? Can we trust anyone, or anything at all, in this wired ghetto of information and new dispensation of the Gospel of Mechanized, Synthetic Freedom and Multinational Rape, pushed forward by its infinite possible interchangeable and expedient permutations of good and evil? Can I trust myself?

Perhaps the "Machine" has rendered the question somewhat moot....

Can we trust the women? They would be hard-pressed to do worse than the men....

[stilltrucking]

ten four on the hard pressed

and you are right no need to point fingers

hester did you ever check out the link to the enteric brain?
japanese word for it is sinyo or sanyo, I guess american slang would be gut feeling. That post you made about forks in your stomach, seems like a uterus would add a whole new layer of thoughts over wombless males? This won't make one bit of sense to you if have not read the link.

[hester_prynne]

Heh, hey still, no I'm not cranky..just a broken record....

I havent' seen that link I don't think. I'll check it out this afternoon when I get home from wipin elder butt.

Me cranky? Nevah! Just pissed off at the world......
H

[mousey1]

Ethics have no genitalia!

Leastwise not that I have seen!

[e_dog]

there are some would disagree, think that women tend to have different ethical perspective than men. for example, the notion -- decribed by feminist psychologist -- that women are more about an "ethic of care" whereas men are more inclined toward an ethic of duty and rights. this is, at any rate, used as a critique of prevailing male-centered ethical doctrines and may have some truth to it, i dunno.

[Glorious Amok]

http://www.canada.com/news/national/sto ... 441624060c

it almost hurts to live in such a highly evolved country. well, almost.

[hester_prynne]

wow! great story Glam.
I haven't watched any news today here in the US but I would bet there will be nothing much about this, when in fact, it should be the headlines everywhere.
Too much of a threat I guess.
Bush would certainly roll his beady eyes and wonder if terrorism were afoot in Canada......

I'm sending your link to CNN and some local news stations anyway.

What would it take to move to Canada?
H

[stilltrucking]

if you need a man to be pissed off at help your self to me.
If you think I am playing a broken record, I suppose i must have too much static in my attic for you to tune me in.
"old song's don't sound so good on broken radio's"

talk about being wall punching pissed, lost second pack of cigarettes, I must be hiding them from myself. I got this plan on howl to move to the beach. With my lungs foull of cancer and my pocket full of rocks.

enteric brain, so many nerves running to the abdomen, some consider it a second brain.

another broken record is sherry turkle at MIT text based communities

emoticons are such a chick thing but got dam this is all text based I got to give some clue

[Doreen Peri]

Can we trust women as ethical decision-makers?

I can't decide what the right answer should be to this question.

Trust me.



But seriously, can we trust men as ethical question writers?