Changing Hawaii
WHEN I saw the Associated Press story last Wednesday, I couldn't help but lapse into my best impression of Macaulay Culkin in the "Home Alone" movie. Insulting Super Moms
The little boy -- after shaving his babyish face and slapping on some his father's aftershave with much machismo -- stops short and looks in the bathroom mirror. Then, with his palms pressed hard against his cheeks, he lets out a yowl from the lotion's painful sting. ARHHHHHHHHH!
Yep, that was pretty much my reaction on seeing the article by Sandra Sobieraj headlined, "Dole says women cannot have it all: The choice is family or career, says GOP presidential hopeful." ARHHHHHHHHH!
It was the one time in my life that I hoped someone had been misquoted. Badly.
Personally, I've liked Elizabeth Dole since she gave the keynote address at a Hawaii Chamber of Commerce luncheon in April 1998. The 62-year-old was incredibly vivacious and charming.
Murmurs of "Liddy for President" reverberated throughout the Sheraton Waikiki ballroom even back then.
Sure enough, Mrs. Dole is attempting to become the first woman to win a major party's nomination for president.
She ranks second in Republican polls behind Texas Gov. George W. Bush, with her female supporters outnumbering males, 3-2. Like me, they want to see a woman in the Oval Office sometime in our lifetimes -- and we don't mean as first lady, personal secretary or White House intern, either.
LID-DY! LID-DY! LID-DY! UH, OH! According to the story, she said feminism was wrong in promising women they could have it all. "I think most of the women who are involved today in trying to be the Super Mom or the Super Executive and all the rest would acknowledge that, 'Yeah, I have had to make some sacrifices. I don't have the time I need for all these areas,' " Dole said. "That's just realism."
Mrs. Dole, please tell me you didn't say that. Holler that you've been misconstrued. Demand a retraction!
Because if you did say something along those lines, you have insulted millions of mothers who work outside the home because they have to or want to. You've decreed that they cannot be outstanding parents as well as outstanding employees or bosses, because it is absolutely NOT possible to excel at BOTH simultaneously.
Do you likewise feel that men also can't be good fathers while at the same time being effective workers or CEOS, because that's "realism," too?
OF course not. Society continues to maintain unspoken yet different expectations for the genders.
The women are supposed to get pregnant, carry the baby for nine months, give birth and then do most if not all of the child-rearing dirty work, plus the vast majority of housework -- even if they are working full time outside the home.
Meanwhile, if the husbands/ fathers help out in any significant way, people think they are fit to be king. Hey, Prince Charming, how about throwing out the garbage once in a while without being asked?
Yep, if I don't see another story soon saying that Elizabeth Dole didn't mean what she said about Super Moms, that's it. She's lost my vote.
I'm not supporting anybody who says humans are only capable of playing one role at a time fantastically (especially when the distribution of responsibilities on the home front are so unbalanced), even if she IS our gender's only hope of seeing a woman become president in the first decade of the new millennium. ARHHHHHHHHHH!
Diane Yukihiro Chang's column runs Monday and Friday.
She can be reached by phone at 525-8607, via e-mail at
DianeChang@aol.com, or by fax at 523-7863.