YOU GO GRETA! I'M DONE GOING STUPID! By Reverend Barbara Sexton February 11, 2010

     'YOU GO GRETA!  I'M DONE GOING STUPID!"
     I was one of the original 'women's libbers' back in the 1960's-1970's...only I didn't KNOW it then.  I was just 'being me'.  I broke the rules in high school by wearing pants to school under my skirt and removing said pants at my locker after my long, cold walk to school.  Then one day, I kept the pants AND the skirt on...Till finally, I just wore the pants.  Of course, I got called down to the Assistant Principal's office.
     ME!  The (mostly) A student, the President of the Biology Club and Vice President of the Chemistry Club!  Me, the female 'Nerd', standing in front of the Vice Principal Sanford's desk, being told I 'must account for myself'!
     At first, I wondered WHO it was who sent me down to the office.  Was it a boy or a girl stoolie, I wondered?  It had to be a girl; I just knew it was one of the girls.  I didn't fit in, you see.  I was 'different'.  I didn't fit in with the cheerleaders or the greaser chicks or the normal girls and I could pretty much guarantee that it was a girl who had reported me. 
       Then there was also the fact that not many of the guys even knew who I was...except for my fellow 'nerds', that is, and none of them would ever turn me in, would they?
     Anyway, I stood there looking the Vice Principal squarely in the eyes and told him the God's-honest-truth.  I told him, "I was born with a congenital heart condition known as an interventricular septal defect and I had to be very careful with catching cold because I could die from it, for I have been carefully watched and treated by doctors since the day I was born." 
     Then to drive home the point, I rolled up my left sleeve and pointed to an inch-long scar in the crook of my arm and proceeded to explain the cardiac catheterization I had had to have at age eight at Flower Fifth Hospital in New York City.  As I was explaining how the catheter was routed up my arm and how it 'tickled' as it entered my heart, the poor Vice Principal cut me off, saying, "Alright, alright, I get it.  I get it!"
     "You can call my parents and check it with them", I cheerfully volunteered.  "And I can get notes from my doctors if you want", I said.  But, no, my explanation, apparently, was quite enough for Mr. Sanford and he let me go to first period after I checked in with my homeroom teacher.  The poor guy had a conundrum because of me.  For a minute I almost felt bad for him, because he really was a decent chap at heart.  But decent or no, I had a point to make!
     And so it was that I started wearing pants to school and in school.  Not much was made of it by students or staff, alike, and all I remember of that spring was that 'the skort' started popping up in school as the weather warmed.  Ever wearing a uniform of some kind, I was pretty much invisible under my lab apron and safey googles or one of my sports team uniforms, blending in with the lab or gym I happened to be in.  I even studied karate and scuba dove and did just about every strenuous thing a girl wasn't supposed to do 'in those days'. 
     I guess I'd neglected to tell Mr. Sanford that despite all the doctors' recommendations for open-heart surgery (in 1958 dangerously experimental), my parents and I decided that I'd go for broke activity-wise.  We decided to let nature take it's course and either kill me or cure me. Except for having to constantly be tested and take antibiotics for the smallest scratch, I grew up to be a fine 'feminist'.  So much for the dire predictions of my physicians and surgeons!
     Being a 'feminist' was like breathing for me.  It was just the way I was, as called for in given situations.  Naturally I attracted the attention of the few daring lesbians in those days, but they soon realized I was but a straight source of support and we kept it at that. 
     Being strong-headed and strong-willed, my first acknowledged 'break' with the sisters occurred very early on.  A few years after the pants episode, 'bra-burning' came into vogue and I personally was having none of it.
     Ever the pragmatist, I told gals who were endowed as I am that "burning your bra and going bra-less in public is the STUPIDEST THING I'VE EVER HEARD!  So, 'go ahead, you flatties with whatever you're trying to prove!"
     Which brings us to todays article by Greta Van Susteren. http://gretawire.blogs.foxnews.com/going-stupid-yes-the-womens-movement-going-stupid/   I, too, have experienced the breaking away of today's feminists from true feminist causes.  It is my opinion that today's feminists, also known as 'progressives', follow and nurture and revel in a pitiful descriptor I thought I made up--a 'culture of sameness'.
     And this 'culture of sameness' pervades politics and religion such as in the United Church of Christ (remember Jeremiah Wright?  Yes, that denomination) I have dissociated myself from.  I've find what I call 'a culture of sameness' in so many former-bastions of change in society that I have given up trying to be 'on board'.  Instead, I find that I am a detractor of the feminist thinkology I once embraced.
     For many years, my only political interests were related to women's rights regarding salaries and abortion.  Sadly, I once believed that abortion was unilaterally 'okay'.  Then I married and had my child and changed my mind, even volunteering at a Crisis Pregancy Center which encourages and facilitates adoption over abortion.  But even then, I was still not much of a political animal.    
     Ironically, the true political beast in me was first awakened in my church, of all places, starting in 2006.  I was being told to sign a UCC anti-gun resolution, a pro-abortion resolution, a reparations for African Americans resolution, and numerous other what I consider to be unacceptable resolutions.  This wasn't 'church'.  This was politics and lobbying and legislation and special interest groups.  What kind of church had I become involved in, I wondered?
     The coup de grace came in 2007, though, in Hartford Connecticut, where as a voting Delegate from my local church I attended the UCC Synod 2007 wherein one Mr. Obama declared his candidacy for the presidential election.  If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it.  What on earth was my church doing letting a political candidate declare a candidacy at what was supposed to be about church business?  Who were all of those people signing up church members to vote?  Who were those scary looking big, black guys standing all around?  What was up with all the Secret Service and other security guys, I wondered over and over?
     Soon enough I knew.  Of course clergy and fellow church officers and members were on board with it all and claimed to 'not see any electioneering at all'.  Even worse,  for the first time I saw that although they claimed to embrace affirmative action, diversity and inclusiveness, all of that was hollow rhetoric.  What proved true is that I was only accepted as a token conservative who donated generously to my church.  Once I started to reveal my conservative leanings these last two years, I've been 'shown the door' as I dared to question the obvious "progressivism" taking over my former church. 
     Far from being 'a bad thing', I feel that I am finally free of the being a slave to progressive agendas at my former church.  I feel like a weight has been lifted off of me as I see and can now declare the truth.  My leg-irons and hand-irons have been smashed to bits, Praise God! I am no longer oppressed and beaten into silence by my slavemasters at the UCC, whom I 'willingly let own me' all these years.
     Am I being a bit melodramatic?  Perhaps.  But the truth is the truth and it isn't pretty from where I stand.
    Free in Christ, Freedom in Christ I've had on this blog since it's inception.  Now, dear readers, you know the story behind it.
     So... you GO Greta.  Whatever prompted you to take such a bold step with your blog piece, it is grandly appreciated by women such as myself.  You and myself and women like us and Sarah Palin, too!..."For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them", Jesus says in  Mt 18:20 (NIV). 
     Yep, he'll be right there with us as long as what we promote is the Truth!
UPDATE: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/12/samuel-l-jackson-obama-vote-black_n_1271797.html
With Love In Christ,
Reverend Barb Sexton
http://www.dearoneshealingministry.blogspot.com/
February 11, 2010

10:50 AM ET
Going stupid? (yes, the women's movement going stupid)Blast from the past? Remember Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem? What has happened to them? They are now irrelevant because they have wandered from their core purpose to see that women have equal rights and are not demeaned for simply being women. Now - it is only about agreement with them and thus they have completely marginalized themselves. An emailing from them (posted below) has prompted me to discuss this.
Beginning in the 1960's, for Fonda and Steinem, it was about equal rights for all (not just some) women....opening the doors to all women in the workplace and ensuring that all women be treated fairly and equally. This was and is very important to women...all women. In the beginning it was about all women being able to have and voice opinions - not censored by men or even by other women. This was and remains very important to all women.
Unfortunately it has become something different for many of these women's movement old timers. Yes, I am grateful for the path they blazed for me but now they disappoint me because their movement has evolved and now it is about having one opinion - theirs. That is bad - and, frankly, tactically stupid for women. What happened to these women who were trail blazers? Where did the big tent go? Why have they turned on women who have other opinions? They now look small - not smart. And worse? they now try to hurt other women who simply have ideas or opinions different from theirs.
Women should celebrate and defend successes of all women -- not just snipe from the sidelines at those with whom they disagree. That does not mean women should all agree but you know the difference. Women should defend women who are getting trashed for being women and not just express outrage when it is done to a women with whom they agree. You know exactly why many of these women were silent when David Letterman trashed Gov Palin and her kid -- or when Newsweek put Palin in shorts on its cover. They don't like Palin's opinions. Forget the woman thing -- forget that Palin managed to become Governor of the biggest state in the union while these women sit back and attend women's pot luck dinners and trash her to each other. Frankly, I don't agree with Palin on many issues but I do believe she has a right to be treated fairly. And of course many women in the women's movement were mad at me when I said it was bad how Palin was being treated since I walked off their reservation and dared to defend a woman for being demeaned. I stayed the course. If they noticed, I did the same for Secretary Clinton.
I am proud of women's accomplishments -- whether it be Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or Governor Sarah Palin....or yes, even competitors in cable news, Campbell Brown or Rachel Maddow (yes, I confess I love it when Rachel beats the guy who has the show before her!) I don't like it when any one of these women is demeaned. It is wrong.
Below is what prompted this posting...it is what Fonda / Steinem and the Women's Media Center are emailing to women. They encourage women with "diverse backgrounds" to apply -- but not with "diverse opinions." This posting alone would not provoke this blogging - but rather I see it as an opportunity to open the discussion about the women's movement and where it is going (or not going.) I know some women will be unhappy with this posting - but I have stayed the course. I think all women have equal rights - not just those with whom I agree. Every night - for almost 20 years and 8 of them until 11pm - I have been an example for women's rights. I will defend all women being treated unfairly ...why won't they? Why has the goal of these old time leaders slipped from being one directed at making certain women are treated fairly and get equal opportunity to 'does she agree with me or not?"
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Dear Supporter,
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Peace,
Jehmu, Rebekah, Stephanie
& the WMC Team
Greta Van Susteren
Anchor
http://gretawire.blogs.foxnews.com/going-stupid-yes-the-womens-movement-going-stupid/