The “New” Seven Dirty Words
During a time when the majority of George Carlin’s Seven Dirty Words can be heard in everyday language as well as on basic cable, with the exception of the dreaded c-word, it is incumbent upon us to come up with a new standard of decency. Leave it to those ever clever Republicans to do just that.
Below are the seven words that seem the most offensive to the GOP:
7. Liberal: has become such a dirty word that even liberals are backing away from it. For example, the president has labeled himself a “pragmatic progressive” and not a liberal.
6. Global Warming: “Drill, baby, drill!” Of course, they don’t believe in global warming because if they did then they’d have to do something about their oil and gas campaign donors. Besides that, regulation, whether it is for the environment, banking, or food and drugs, is probably dirty word #8 to the GOP.
5. Planned Parenthood: Okay, confession: Planned Parenthood makes me uncomfortable. As a Catholic, I’m not thrilled that at certain locations the organization offers abortion services; however, no matter how against abortion and contraception you are, you have to admit that Planned Parenthood does a lot of good by providing reproductive health services (pap smears, cancer screening, STD screening and treatment, etc.) to men and women who may not have the financial means to seek treatment elsewhere. Defunding Planned Parenthood will put the health of millions of the poor at risk. Yes, the worker that was entrapped by Live Action was in the wrong and she was fired for her actions; however, we should also look at the motives of Live Action and who their backers are.
4. Abortion: Certain members of the GOP, specifically Bobby Franklin, a Republican State Representative from the 43rd District in Georgia, wants to make abortion a capital offense, meaning any woman who has an abortion and anyone who performs the abortion could get the death penalty. Franklin even went so far as to introduce a bill to the Georgia House which would force a woman who suffers a miscarriage to prove that no human had a hand in the death of her fetus. (For more on this issue, see my blog post from March 5, 2011.) Abortion advocates and foes will forever be diametrically opposed until they get some compassion for the victims, and I don’t just mean the fetuses, but the women who have to make the gut wrenching decision to have an abortion. Abortion isn’t birth control for the majority of these women; there are a combination of complicated social issues that play into a woman’s decision–everything from economics and pressure from her partner to a lack of familial and social support. Do these women really deserve to be put to death, especially when many studies have shown that this decision affects them for the rest of their lives?
3. Collective Bargaining Sure, the GOP is against unions; unions have been the enemy of big business since the early 20th century when they organized workers to strike for safe working conditions. Yes, unions are to blame in some industries for “bloating” workers salaries and benefits; however, the good that unions do far out weighs the bad. If you look at industry where workers have poor working conditions, where illegal immigrants do most of the work, and where workers have poor wages and little to no benefits, you won’t find unions.
2. Education: Republicans in Washington and republican governors across the country want to balance their budgets by cutting education funding. However, how are we, the United States, supposed to have a competitive workforce if education budgets are slashed? When education funding is cut, it isn’t the football and basketball programs or administrators’ salaries that get whacked; it’s the teachers, their salaries and benefits, and arts programs. When districts cut teachers, classroom size goes up, meaning less individual attention for students and overwhelmed and overworked teachers. When districts cut teachers salaries and benefits, teachers, both bad and good, leave education for the private sector, again raising class size. And when arts programs are cut, not ever student is equally served and educated. Higher education, specifically community colleges, which President Obama has been very vocal in supporting, is feeling the cuts as well. Cuts to community colleges means that higher education becomes less accessible to the poor and non-traditional students and it means that there will be fewer full-time positions available for educators, which will lead to more Americans without a steady income and health benefits. I know because I’m one of these educators.
1. Uterus: That’s right, uterus! I think women, specifically Republican and Tea Party women, need to ask themselves what it says about the GOP’s attitude toward women and women’s rights when one of them implies that the correct anatomical term for a woman’s womb, the body part the GOP seems the most immediately concerned with, is so offensive that the word can’t be uttered in public, let alone the floor of the Florida House. It is not as if the offender, Rep. Scott Randolph, used Carlin’s dreaded c-word.
Perhaps the #1 “dirty word,” uterus, gives us a clue into the GOP’s mindset regarding women. If we look back on the list I’ve just compiled, words 1-5 are related to women either directly or indirectly. The majority of the educators in this country are women, and the collective bargaining controversy began with the bargaining rights of teachers in Wisconsin.
The reason the Republican’s attack on women is particularly disturbing to me is because it seems to be a foreshadowing of one possible future for this country, a future that Margaret Atwood predicted in my favorite book, The Handmaid’s Tale. In this dystopian novel, a neo-conservative group, Gilead, has taken over an environmentally ruined United States. Gilead’s first move after taking over the government: take away ALL the rights of women. During a book club discussion that I was moderating in 2001 of this excellent novel, one woman commented that she was thankful something like the plot of this novel could never happen. She was shocked when I told her it already was happening–in Afghanistan–what the Taliban did in that country was exactly what the fictional Gilead did in The Handmaid’s Tale.
Is the GOP’s assault against women just a precursor to our own Taliban? You might say, never, not here. You might even think I’m a whack job for even suggesting such a radical idea. But consider how Americans obviously have a history of voting against their own interests. Case in point, Richard Nixon, George W. Bush, Rod Blagojevich, the Republican upset in November 2010. . .
Nixon lied to the people, yet he was reelected; George W. Bush scared the people and unilaterally got us into a war that he had no plan of ever getting us out of, yet he was reelected; Rod Blagojevich was just crazy and sold or attempted to sell Illinois favors throughout his Governorship, yet he was reelected; the American people were so frustrated with the GOP that they voted for change in 2008 only to be frustrated that that change didn’t happen overnight, so they reelected and elected members of the GOP in November 2010 wherever they could.
Therefore, why wouldn’t the American people continue to vote against their own interests by limiting the rights of women–women still don’t have equal rights under the law as men because there is no Equal Rights Amendment.
Come to think of it, perhaps my choice of uterus as the number one dirty word to Republicans was a bit hasty; perhaps I should have chosen women instead.
Tags: 7 dirty words, Republicans, Women, Women's Rights
April 3, 2011 8:25 am 3 Comments
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By JoVE, April 5, 2011 @ 4:37 pm
Great post. BTW, Atwood herself has said that everything in Handmaid’s Tale has either happened to women somewhere in the past or is happening to women somewhere now. It is the combination that is fictional. All the elements are absolutely true.
One of the things I find most compelling about her dystopian fiction (and have you read Oryx & Crake and The Year of the Flood?) is that very disturbing sense that this is just about possible. Very powerful.
By glenna, April 5, 2011 @ 6:30 pm
So true. Yes, I’ve read Oryx & crake and Year of the Flood. I believe there is supposed to be a third, but haven’t heard anything about her writing it or a publication date.
By Amy Theriac, May 3, 2011 @ 6:45 pm
Glenna, I am so glad that as an woman and an educator who is also a Republican that I had my uterus taken out!