The ever-living never-ending blame game

As the US election season goes on, the underlying threat from Donald Trump against Hillary Clinton is that he's going to bring up the subject of Bill Clinton's infidelities. The clear implication is that if your husband cheats on you, it's your fault and you are automatically disqualified from being President.

Of course, when this came up recently, I assumed I had written something about the subject in the past. I went to my archives and found this column which I wrote in January of 1989.

(I should note that Chatelaine is a magazine that has gone through many incarnations in its long life, some of them better, some of them worse. When this was written, it was one of their bad times.)

The current issue of Chatelaine – boy, I hate to admit it when I occasionally pick one up – has an article about the difference between "The Other Woman" and "The Other Man". I'm not going to get into it because it's as ludicrous as most of their articles lately but it did get me to thinking about the Eternal Blaming Syndrome: the notion that everything that happens anywhere can somehow be blamed on some woman. Starting with Eve, of course.

So for example, if the married Mr. X runs off with Ms Y, there are two things you'll definitely hear: 1) "What a hussy that Ms Y is, to get her claws into another woman's husband." And, 2) "It serves Mrs. X right. If she can't hold onto her own husband, I've got no sympathy for her."

Notice who gets off scott-free in this romantic triangle – not too many people pass judgment on that treacherous snake-in-the-grass, Mr. X.

The blaming syndrome is found on a larger scale as well. Thus, even after all this time, we're still inundated in our magazines and newspapers with the propaganda that all of the ills of our present-day society can be directly attributed to the women's movement.

"Feminists," I was informed just recently, "are the ones who want all women to rush out and have a career and they make women who stay home and care for their families feel ashamed of what they do."

The propaganda works very well, doesn't it?

But the way I see it, it's feminist women who recognize that our society is founded, not on the "sanctity" of the family, as we've always been told, but on the unpaid and low-paid labour of half the work force – the half that takes care of the children and the elderly, that volunteers for work in the schools, hospitals, churches and around the communities, that provides housekeeping services for the paid labour force.

It's also feminists who demand that society place a higher value on the work that women traditionally do, whether it's in the home, the office, the restaurants or the factories. And because our society expresses value almost exclusively in monetary terms, feminists lead the fight for homemakers' pensions, fair divorce settlements, dependable child care for the benefit of all mothers and children, and pay equity for women who work outside their homes.

So how can anyone say that feminists don't respect women who fulfil traditional roles? On the absolute contrary, society had devalued all women's work long before the current women's movement came along.

Perhaps the misunderstanding has come about because feminists do see the need for economic independence. Too many women are forced to remain in dead and dying marriages or in violent homes because they have no money and no certain means of getting any. Many more women are deserted by their husbands (remember old Mr. X) and left to fend for themselves and their children and are forced onto social assistance and probably into a deadening cycle of poverty, struggle, job retraining, no child care, and hopelessness.

And in spite of all this, I still hear young women embarking on their marriage careers with stars in their eyes, thinking how wonderful it's going to be to share everything in life – including the husband's pay cheque. Most of them, on their wedding day, would never believe that the day will come when they'll ask for money and he'll demand "what do you want it for?" Or that they'll be trapped in a violent situation with nowhere to go and no money to get there.

So feminists believe this battle has to be fought on two levels. When they suggest marriage contracts, or job training and experience before marriage, and part-time work outside the home during the marriage it isn't because of lack of respect for homemaking and child-rearing. And when feminists fight for fair divorce settlements, for pensions for women, for more vigilance from the courts to see that child support payments are made, it isn't because of any cynicism about all women's right to choose the kind of work they do.

Instead, it's based on the observation that so many women do so much work for so little money and that can only be changed around when women's traditional work is valued and honoured – monetarily as well as all other ways.

It's also done with one eye firmly on the divorce and desertion statistics.

The myth of the 'weaker sex' lives on

I wrote this column in The Daily News in Halifax in 1990. I spent a lot of time, both before and since I wrote this, thinking of women's lives and how they have been misinterpreted and undervalued. The feminist writer, Dale Spender, wrote a book called There's Always Been A Women's Movement This Century.

This brought home to me that with a different slant and a different analysis, the lives of our mothers and grandmothers could be seen in a whole new light.

I would write some of this differently today but this is how I saw it in 1990.

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How many times have you told friends, acquaintances, strangers at bus stops that, in your family, girls were encouraged to be strong and independent? How many times have you said, “my mother always told me I could be anything I wanted to be; I've never felt that I didn't have equal access to a good career and a decent life...”?

How many times have you expressed the novel idea that your mother and her sisters and their mother were the strong members of your family, the ones who held things together through thick and thin, who survived adversities without complaint, who displayed the kind of stamina and fortitude that you're now handing down to your daughters?

How many times did you think to yourself that your family was the exception?

I'm of the opinion that families with strong women are the rule rather than the exception and that the myth of “the weaker sex” is another part of the conspiracy that keeps women from fighting back against a system that keeps them down.

I think of so many ways that women's strengths are slighted – either by being taken for granted or scorned through derogatory attitudes towards “women's work.”

A few years ago, involved in my editing work, I came across this intriguing sentence in the minutes of a Women's Institute meeting: “It was decided to use the proceeds from the bake sale to buy our African family a goat.”

Well, no editor worth her paycheque is going to let that pass without finding out a little more. I found that this particular group had been supporting their family for some time in a program not unlike the foster child program except it included whole families. The women worked closely with international relief organizations and they had been told the goat would be easy to care for, wouldn't eat much and would provide milk and cheese for the family which could also be bartered for other special needs.

I checked with a few other groups and found that most women's organizations had, for years, been manoeuvring around governments and bureaucracies just as if they weren't there to provide people in other countries with life-supporting products but also with school supplies, hygienic provisions and things like eyeglasses, even children's toys.

I began to remember things from my own childhood: I remembered going door-to-door with my mother collecting woollen fragments and bits of fabric, packing it all in boxes, sending it away somewhere and seeing it come back, miraculously, as blankets. The blankets were sent “overseas,” along with more boxes of knitted wear, tonnes of it, it seemed, knit by my own auntie.

The women in my past – and in my present – don't expect any thanks for this kind of world's work. It's just as well as it usually goes unacknowledged.

There was another event that brought back some of the same memories. That was the time that a musician by the name of Bob Geldof organized a trans-Atlantic rock and roll concert called Live Aid. It ran on television over many hours and raised a huge amount of money for victims of famine in Africa.

In the months following the concert, Geldof was touted as a possible nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize; he was invited to Washington to give some advice to then American president, Ronald Reagan (that must have been some show); and he made an outspoken tour around the survival camps in Ethiopia, spouting opinions on the crisis at every stop among a multitude of cameras and microphones.

Now I have nothing against Bob Geldof – in fact, I kind of like him. I just think it's necessary to remind ourselves every five years or so that the concept of aid to the Third World was not invented recently and that for years, it's been alive and well in the church halls, parish centres, and rural living rooms of our nation.

Not only that, but why wasn't my auntie ever invited to Washington to give advice to a president, or why wasn't she ever offered a Nobel prize?

Oh well, she and my mother are no longer with us but many women continue their works for others – with or without the world's gratitude. Presidents, prime ministers and rock and roll singers come and go with their grandiose plans but I like to think that somewhere, a Women's Institute branch is saving the money from bake sales, bazaars and church suppers to buy an African family a goat.

Let me tell you how angry I am

Women have to be so careful what we say. No matter the circumstances, no matter how upset, women must think quickly and choose our words carefully. In court, in a bar, on the street, in the House of Commons, women know that there are consequences for saying the wrong thing and a price to be paid.

Last week, I'm sure you know, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was annoyed when the opposition parties — using a time-honoured strategy — had deliberately delayed a vote by 42 seconds. The Conservative whip, Gord Brown, was behind a group of NDP MPs. Trudeau, in an unprecedented move, stormed across the aisle of the House of Commons, said "Get the f**k out of my way," grabbed MP Brown by the arm and dragged him out of the group.

Enough with the blather about "he placed his hand on the whip's arm and led him to his seat." The Speaker himself used the word "manhandled" in describing the incident — as in, "It is not appropriate to manhandle other members." Brown reported later that he'd said to Trudeau, "Let go of my arm — now!"

During the scuffle that ensued, Trudeau inadvertently elbowed NDP MP Ruth Ellen Brosseau in the breast.

And here is where women must refrain from speaking our experience.

Ruth Ellen Brosseau was upset by the incident. "It was very overwhelming and so I left the chamber to go and sit in the lobby. I missed the vote because of this."

Her fellow MP, Niki Ashton, spoke quickly, in the heat of the moment about the nature of the altercation. She referred to it as "gendered violence" and suggested that this kind of sexual harassment made young women feel their workplace isn't safe.

Within hours, after a few apologies, the perpetrator had gone free. Crossing the floor of the House, using vulgar language and grabbing a fellow MP — which had never been done before, mind you — was forgotten. At the top of the news now was Ruth Ellen Brosseau, that big crybaby. From across the country — accompanied by the crudest words anyone has yet thought up to call women — came sneering accusations and vicious threats.

The anonymous army of trolls on Twitter were egged on and backed up by the legitimate commentators and pundits, standing in line to save us beleaguered Canadians from a woman who doesn't seem to know the difference between an elbow that hits her by accident and a man who wallops her on purpose. A prominent headline in The Globe and Mail proclaims Associating elbowgate with violence against women is an insult to victims.

Of course she knows it was an accident! What are you, kidding? You'd have to be an idiot to believe he did that on purpose.

But here's a question: so what? She was hit in the breast by an elbow. It hurt. Is she supposed to act as if nothing happened? Is she wrong to have been upset by what happened? There are many women — some of whom have experienced violence in their homes and elsewhere — who are unsettled and frightened by a man showing such blatant anger. Should she apologize to the Prime Minister for having been in his way when he broke the most fundamental parliamentary rule by crossing the floor and "manhandling" another MP?

Imagine this:

A group of friends are hanging out on the lawn. Suddenly, with no warning, a car careens off the street onto the lawn and hits one of them. Fortunately, she's not injured but she found it unsettling and she wanted to get off the lawn. She goes into the house.

The others are nervous and upset about what happened and one of them speaks sharply to the driver. But the driver is very much admired and before you know it, a crowd has gathered with many people saying, "He didn't mean it. It was an accident. She's making a big deal out of it. It's not as if he did it on purpose. How can he be held responsible for this inadvertent act?"

He drove his car on to the lawn! She was perfectly within her rights to be on the lawn. If he hadn't driven his car on to the lawn — which, by the way, is against the law — none of this would have happened. It may have been an accident but it was an accident that was his fault.

Is it possible she'll feel a little nervous the next time she's on the lawn with her friends? Is she expected to shrug it off and say, "Well, hey, it could happen to anyone. You're hanging out on the lawn and a guy drives his car on to the lawn and hits you — it was an accident. Get over it. Let's move on to something much more important than the fact that a guy drove his car on to the lawn and hit me with it!"

This makes me so angry, I can't even tell you. Male columnists — here and everywhere — can't get enough of it. When is Ruth Ellen going to grow up?

Meanwhile, that guy who drove his car on to the lawn and hit her is accepting flowers and boxes of chocolates from all those people who believe that Ruth Ellen done him wrong.

Remember, he didn't mean to do it and as for her, she should deal with that bruise behind closed doors and when she comes out, she should smile and be nice.