From the fever swamps of MSNBC comes the latest burlesque performance of death-cult “feminism,” as Melissa Harris-Perry rapturously imagines pop singer Beyonce could have performed in front of a giant illuminated sign reading “HANDS UP, DON’T SHOOT” (the mantra of the Ferguson, Missouri riots) or “BIRTH CONTROL,” or “ABORTION.” You cannot possibly imagine how creepy this is by reading about it; you have to watch and listen to her say it:
I realize that putting any degree of rational thought into analyzing this is, by definition, over-analyzing it, but Harris-Perry begins by claiming feminism is all about speaking hidden truths that have been forgotten in the national discussion… and then fantasizes about a scantily-clad pop singer shaking her feminist moneymaker in front of signs proclaiming two ideas that have been discussed to death, with decades of unending debate in the case of abortion, years of wrangling over mandatory birth control benefits, and weeks of saturation media coverage in the case of the Michael Brown shooting.
In other words, she’s living in a fantasy land where she gets to posture as a courageous archaeologist of hidden truth, a bold rebel against a fundamentalist patriarchy, when in truth she and her fellow travelers have nearly absolute control over the media, set the terms of every national discussion, hold the bulk of political power at the moment, and spend a great deal of their time telling the people they disagree with to shut up. Death-cult feminism isn’t about speaking hidden truths, it’s about silencing truths the feminists don’t want to hear. Until theirs are the only voices anyone can hear, they’re “oppressed.”
It may have escaped Harris-Perry’s notice, since the “news” network she works for is a very silly place, but at the moment the titanic power of the federal government is hell-bent on forcing people to pay for other peoples’ birth control. Resistance is a matter of fighting a desperate court battle and hoping for the best. If Beyonce decided to dance in front of a sign reading “BIRTH CONTROL,” she’d be dancing for the Empire, not the Rebellion. (Of course, rather than having their political consciences tuned, most viewers would wonder what the birth-control sign was supposed to mean. They’d be even more confused than they were about the sight of a woman wearing one square centimeter of clothing dancing on stripper poles and then parading in front of a sign that said “FEMINISM.”)
It’s also noteworthy that Harris-Perry’s feminist fantasies are drenched in violence and blood. When ideology is prized above both human nature and spirituality, death inevitably becomes its totem. Normal people, even those who broadly support abortion, are uncomfortably aware that a human life is ended in the process, and view it as anywhere from unspeakable to regrettable. Death-cult feminism celebrates abortion as the triumph of ideology over biology – the “will to power” expressed as the banishment of consequences from sex, and the leveling of a playing field that always left women disproportionately burdened with those consequences, since they bear the children. You can’t walk away from a child that is growing inside you.
It’s also telling that one of her dream slogans for the Beyonce dance is false propaganda. Whatever else we’ve learned about the Michael Brown shooting, there is now a fair degree of confidence that it did not involve the Gentle Giant holding up his hands and saying “Don’t shoot!” while an evil racist cop gunned him down for no reason. But the totemic power of that slogan has grown far beyond the mundane truth of whatever happened on that street in Ferguson. Again, ideology triumphs over reality.
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