http://www.reclusiveleftist.com/2010/02/03/super-bowl-patriarchy/#commentsI’m not really paying attention to the Super Bowl news, seeing as how I’m still busy with my secret new women’s group thingy. Actually I wouldn’t be paying attention even if I weren’t busy, because jesus, who gives a shit? In fact, I was surprised to realize today that the stupid game hasn’t happened yet. Isn’t it always in January? Aren’t we now in February? Has there been a wobble in the region of space-time occupied by the NFL?
At any rate, the reason I’m aware of the impending Super Bowl at all is because of the hilariously offensive anti-abortion ad sponsored by Focus on the Family. (It’s hilarious to me, at least; personally I long for an ad in which a mother explains how she was advised to get an abortion and refused — and now her grown son is a serial killer. If only I’d aborted the little creep!) Some muddled souls are saying that this ad is about “choice,” but it’s not. It’s about patriarchy. The whole Super Bowl is about patriarchy: the game, the cheerleaders, the commercials, the ritual, the whole thing.
The number one rule of patriarchy — the guiding principle, the foundation of it all — is that women are the sex class. They aren’t individual people, like men; they aren’t full members of the human race. They are appendages. Their role is to give birth to men, to nurture men, to marry men, to fuck men, to serve men, and so on. The only real people in this setup are men. The world belongs to men and is their sphere: theirs to fight over, dominate, settle, destroy, remake. Women are simply adjuncts, like talking pets or livestock.
The Super Bowl is a precise reflection of this world view. In that sense, the Focus on the Family spot is a perfect fit. It’s all of a piece with the whole scheme. The only thing new here is that abortion is considered a “political” topic — unlike dressing women up as prostitutes or reducing them to sex toys, which is the usual Super Bowl approach.
Which is not to say that I think the appropriate response here is just to wave in vague disgust at the general misogynistic nastiness of the world as we recline on our sofas in the opium den. Eh, whaddya gonna do? Pass me that pipe. Patriarchy has to be disassembled brick by brick, and the Super Bowl ad is as good a place to take a stand as any. As Jaclyn Friedman writes in The Nation:
The ad becomes even more disturbing when we consider who it’s trying to reach. Assuming that Focus on the Family operates with the same mindset as most Super Bowl advertisers (and there’s really no evidence to suggest otherwise), it’s also safe to assume that men are one of the primary targets of this spot. So now what we’ve got is an ad telling men that it’s wrong for women to abort their potential children, lest those children not get the chance to grow up to be famous quarterbacks who paint Scripture references into their eyeblack. In light of new research revealing that about a third of women who report partner violence also report that their partners try to pressure them into pregnancy and motherhood (as do 15 percent of women who had never reported relationship violence), this male-targeted argument is particularly chilling.
Unfortunately, I missed all the excitement last week with NOW and Sarah Palin and NOW again and all that. (I heard Terry O’Neill did great on Larry King, though.) As usual, the self-delusional rhetoric from the pro-lifers serves to obscure the real issue. “Messages like this empower women!” says Sarah Palin in defense of the ad. Empower us to do what? Have babies? Uh, Sarah, we’ve got that covered. Having babies is Job 1 for women under patriarchy. A commercial telling us to have babies is about as empowering as a commercial telling us to take up sewing. Or cooking. Really: the baby thing? We’ve got that down.
Nor is this an improvement on the “be a sexbot” message emanating from the rest of the Super Bowl effluvium. “For too long women have been made to feel like sex objects in our ‘modern’ culture,” Palin says, and she’s absolutely right. But being made to feel like baby machines is the same fucking deal. Get it? Get it?
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