The Patriarchy Is Alive and Well
By Laura Bray
The patriarchy is alive and well, folks, and coming to put your womenfolk back into the kitchen.
Newly released by the Heritage Foundation—you remember them, the same backward-thinking folks that brought us Project 2025—is a report that asserts that the promotion of competitive sports for girls and women “formed a core element of a broader project to remake female character itself — producing a new woman who would be more aggressive, assertive, dominant, and less deferential, less graceful, and less oriented toward motherhood and traditional feminine graces.” (See below link for an article on some of the Project 2025 proposals already implemented by the Trump Administration.)
Wait, what?? “Traditional feminine graces”??
A July 31 editorial (non-paywall link) in the San Antonio Express-News (SAEN) condemns this position; the editorial’s author said the report “argues most girls and women aren’t naturally inclined toward competitive sports.” Many of us strongly disagree. Anybody heard of Caitlin Clark? Simone Biles? Serena Williams? Megan Rapinoe?
The SAEN editorial also said that “At the same time, the Heritage Foundation asserts something [else that’s] much bigger: That there’s something innate about the genders that makes women more or less interested in certain activities, and more or less suited for them. The implication is that biology is destiny. That expanding opportunity against the grain is ‘social engineering.’ It’s an argument to put girls and women back in a certain place.”
And it’s not just women in sports that the Heritage Foundation objects to. The SAEN editorial said, “A November 2024 Heritage Foundation paper called for ending federal Graduate PLUS student loans because ‘massive and unnecessary education subsidies’ were keeping people in school longer and ‘artificially steering people into delaying or even foregoing marriage and children.’” (Lines in italics are direct quotes from the Heritage Foundation’s report.)
“A through line here is the clipping of individual opportunity for women in pursuit of a national agenda. It’s a shame you wanted to get your master’s degree or play elite sports. America needs you making babies,” said the SAEN editorial.
Part of the report also goes on to make a point about how strenuous sports creates “elevated rates of menstrual disruption.” That’s right: the men at Heritage (the author was male, of course) are making female bodily functions “their business” again, despite the fact that none of us asked them to. A woman’s body belongs to that woman alone; men have zero say in how we manage those functions.
Indeed there are many benefits to participating in sports. An article from the National Federation of State High School Associations asserted three major benefits from such participation: “1) a stronger sense of self-confidence in building relationships with others and having an expanded capacity for empathy; 2) developing a better understanding of self and in so doing understanding how their actions affect others; and 3) building foundations for lifelong fitness habits.”
It’s only in my lifetime that women were allowed to get a credit card in their own name (1974). The Equal Pay Act of 1963 made it illegal to pay women less than men in the same job, and the Civil Rights Act (1964) made it illegal to discriminate in employment on the basis of the sex of the worker. Women’s suffrage is just barely 100 years old (passed in 1920). So we’ve made good progress. But reports like the Heritage one show our progress in women’s rights is not set in stone. We must fight the battle every day.
Everyone deserves the same opportunities, regardless of the color of their skin or which reproductive organs they have.
So what can you do to fight back?
- Work to elect Democratic candidates this fall that support equal rights for women: The Kendall County Democratic Party is working hard on our Get Out the Vote efforts to identify every Democrat in Kendall County, and making sure every one of them votes in November, ideally for Democrats all the way down the ticket.
- Get involved with organizations in the fight: Groups working to dismantle the power structures of patriarchy include the National Organization for Women, the Center for Reproductive Rights, and the Association for Women’s Rights in Development, among others. You can find more groups engaged in the fight on the web.
- Vote economically: Patronize and support women-owned businesses, and refuse to purchase from businesses that don’t support full women’s rights.
Visit our website at www.kcdems.us or subscribe to our newsletter to learn how you can get involved in driving change and fighting back. Call our office at 830-331-1243 or stop by (216 E. Blanco, Suite 201) to say hello and learn more about our activities and activism.
Laura Bray is the immediate former Chair of the Kendall County Democratic Party.
Advances in women’s rights citation: https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org/resources/womens-rights-movement/detailed-timeline/
Project 2025 proposals already implemented by the Trump Administration: https://www.naacpldf.org/tracking-project-2025/
