Amanda Marcotte

Get Opinionated: A Progressive’s Guide to Finding Your Voice (and Taking a Little Action)

admin — Wed, 05 May 2010 16:01:00 +0000

A few years ago, my uncle, the family’s token conservative, sent me a copy of Dinesh D’Souza’s Letters to a Young Conservative, probably to irk my mother. Despite my inclinations, I decided to give it a try. The first chapter of Letters is masterful, beginning with a lecture D’Souza gave at Columbia University, at which he was greeted with crowds of angry, rioting, liberal students bent on silencing his conservative point of view. D’Souza recalls fighting his way through bullhorns and posters saying things about “capitalism” and “imperialism.” D'Souza presented this situation as a testament to the sorry state of modern liberalism. Although today this sequence may remind us of a Tea Party rally, the image of the crazed young liberal beating drums and waving signs is one that’s hard to shake.

I thought of D'Souza's Letters while reading a new book on modern progressivism, Get Opinionated by Amanda Marcotte, editor of Pandagon and regular contributor to RH Reality Check and Slate's Double X blog. Both are fiery calls to action from well-respected authors. Unfortunately, both are also a little light on facts and evidence.

Marcotte clearly sees her goal as motivating liberals—ostensibly young liberals—to become more politically aware and take steps in their own lives to see their ideals realized. “Consciousness raising isn’t just for identity politics,” she tells the reader, urging him or her to leave comments on blogs to foster intellectual discourse. Marcotte says that to counter anti-government histrionics from conservatives progressives need to put forth “positive, truth-based counter-arguments to raise people’s consciousness.” If only Get Opinionated practiced what it preaches.

The problem is that Marcotte isn’t arming her readers with strong arguments. Instead, Get Opinionated teaches readers that hyperbole will suffice when it comes to shaping political beliefs. If Marcotte urges her readers to go forth and debate, then she should also explain that they should be equipped with serious arguments and evidence, which some progressives aren’t.

Marcotte acknowledges that liberals often have a PR problem. Addressing the war on drugs, for example, she reminds us that stoners don’t make the best spokespersons, stressing that, instead, sensible drug policies are best fought for by someone who looks good in a suit, doesn’t smoke pot, and will discuss the social and economic ramifications of mass incarceration. But while Marcotte notes that a reasoned liberal makes a stronger case, she doesn’t always follow her own advice.

“Deep down inside, we all wish people read and thought about subjects in a little more depth,” she writes. But when it comes to offering a framework for addressing more touchy subjects, Marcotte has a harder time presenting sober, nuanced opinions. Take, for example, her discussion of terrorism. The language used in discussions about terrorism is tricky, with liberals often confusing their emotions about Bush's misadventures in Iraq with the separate issue of terrorism. Marcotte herself falls victim to the dangers of emotional rhetoric. “The most likely explanation for the unnecessary histrionics at airport security is that they’re part of the ‘frog in boiling water’ strategy of introducing a stronger police state,” she writes. Such an argument echoes the kind of wacky conspiracy theories that keep liberal opinions from being taken seriously. Perhaps Marcotte is right, but such accusations need evidence. Presented only as speculation, they are no better than Fox News claiming Barack Obama is a socialist.

Political debate should not rely on ad hominem attacks, but that good idea is frequently overshadowed by the ways in which Marcotte fires at conservatives. A great blogger, journalist, and feminist, Marcotte is just the person to demonstrate the sexist implications of social conservatism. Instead, she intimates that socially conservative men get turned on by talk of “family” and that they spend an inordinate amount of time “monitoring the status of their teenage daughters’ hymens.” These accusations are counterproductive, sidetracking the debate from the actual reasons social conservatism harms women. Marcotte risks alienating potential supporters of women’s rights by giving a distasteful comment while setting a low bar for political debate.

Marcotte is at her best when she argues that “You Don’t Have to Be a Stinky Hippie to Care about the Environment,” the name of her first chapter. She paints an enticing picture of a life in which Americans ride bikes, grow gardens, eat less meat, and save energy in myriad ways. But most liberals already accept that America needs to reduce its carbon footprint. So even though this is a strong point, it is by far the most conventional.

What Marcotte misses in her book is that liberal thought today still lacks a coherent and well-reasoned approach to national security. It’s too bad she took a reactive stance rather than the positive goal of creating a new, liberal approach. It is precisely because Marcotte repeatedly invokes the power of conversation, debate, and good information that the lack of careful reasoning in the book is so strange. Get Opinionated is clearly Marcotte’s own vision of liberalism, one that she hopes will inspire others to think and talk. However, she should demonstrate how to formulate intelligent and persuasive opinions, not just encourage her readers to get political.

“I want badly to say that reading this book means you’re already on the right path, but humility forces me to declare that it is only marginally deeper than Jon Stewart’s book featuring naked pictures of historical figures,” Marcotte says. She could argue that Get Opinionated was all in good fun, that this review is overblown because she wasn’t that serious. But publishing a book has responsibilities, especially when it purports to represent a liberal viewpoint. Marcotte is smart and could have done better. Instead, she may have accidentally given D’Souza new fodder for a second Letters.

This article was created by Campus Progress.

Written by: Pema Levy, May 5th 2010

It’s a Jungle Out There: The Feminist Survival Guide to Politically Inhospitable Environments

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 13:33:00 +0000

By Amanda Marcotte

Seal Press

If you keep up with the purported leaders of feminist blogging, or if you heard any of the controversy about the John Edwards campaign bloggers last year, the name Amanda Marcotte may ring a bell. Perhaps in recent weeks, you’ve heard rumblings about the racist imagery within Marcotte’s first book, It's a Jungle Out There, which depicts white women conquering a jungle of dark-skinned "savages."

The controversy that erupted over Marcotte’s book is not without warrant, nor is it a foreign topic among white feminist bloggers turned book writers. Authors’ lack of control over their books and the subsequent excuses and apologies (or lack thereof) are an [interesting story](http://feministing.com/archives/005898.html#comment-54766," p="'155) all on their own, and Marcotte and her publisher, the well-known and pro-woman Seal Press, have respectively apologized. But while the issues raised do warrant the attention this book has received, the content does not.Future printings, even sans racist imagery, will contain roughly the same text, save a new introduction or two, and sadly, despite Marcotte’s good intentions to pen a tongue-in-cheek book about the perils of being a politically-minded feminist, her effort falls painfully short.

It's a Jungle Out There reads like a series of blog posts that are haphazardly placed under witty headings, and in my view, it speaks down to its audience. Being a feminist in any environment is tricky territory, and instead of drawing on the wealth of knowledge from our collective feminisms, past and present—or even Marcotte's own practical experience—a lot of the handbook’s advice centers around being snarky and annoyed with your adversaries instead of bridge-building and cooperating in the name of a larger good. I don’t make pals with the anti-abortion protestors either, but I don’t go looking for a fight and would not advise that of anyone, especially allies in a movement of change. This was not meant to be a scholarly feminist tome about our history and our future, but I also expect more from a “feminist survival guide” than chapters about shoe shopping woes and advice on how to handle a Girls Gone Wild camera crew.

Marcotte doesn’t give the subjects she’s claiming to tackle anything more than buzz-word treatment and a few (sometimes offensive) jokes. Women’s legitimate choices – not having a child, for example – are not broken down into logical arguments that support our case, which would be the normal route for “surviving a politically inhospitable environment.” Explaining yourself and making concise, thoughtful arguments to back up your choices may feel like you’re defensively explaining your entire political and personal life, but at least you’ll be dignified doing it. For Marcotte, most issues should be answered with a version of “It’s my right, damnit!” And, be that as it may, it doesn’t exactly give a young feminist an advantage in a conversation or debate with the ideological opponents she will surely encounter. In fact, it makes her look silly, privileged, and naïve instead of reasoned and informed about her legitimate life choices and political ideals.

To be fair, some of Marcotte’s assessments are in a vein that makes sense for a large contingency of young women who self-identify as feminists. There were moments in the book that made me laugh. I understand that, mostly, this is Marcotte’s intention. Young women who are new to the concepts of equal rights or the feminist label face cultural resistance at every turn with very little validation from the mainstream media of their empowered decisions. Allies in their corner can mean a great deal, and as someone who once read more lighthearted texts instead of the volumes that now line my shelves, I resonate with the intentions of reaching out to those coming a few years behind me.

But there were many comments in the book that made me cringe and wonder where the diverse community-building was, the impetus for transformation behind slamming Christian fundamentalists. Where are the messages of feminist unity and community outreach? By negating whole groups of people with flippant commentary and stereotypes, how does a movement become more inclusive? We need to teach our young sisters a message of hope and solidarity, and I didn’t find them in the midst of confusing blogosphere name-dropping, PETA bashing, generalizations about red states, and a ridiculously insular reference section. I felt a bit worried for younger feminists, and alienated from a label and movement that I support and love.

If I did not say how I truly feel about this book, I’d be doing every self-labeled feminist I know a disservice. Writers don’t have integrity when they let potential audience repercussions silence them, and women certainly shouldn’t back down from their truths. Marcotte doesn’t shy away from being controversial, and her book advances a narrow idea of feminism that, coupled with the idea that rolling your eyes is revolutionary, comes off as entitled and without a greater understanding of the wide variety of feminisms that many of us try to navigate.

Young feminists will not learn survival from this “guide.” They will learn how to make blanket judgments of their supposed adversaries instead of learning that sisterhood and cooperation can advance the well-being of us all. This kind of contempt cloaked as humor perpetuates an already unfortunate stereotype that feminists are angry and hateful, and it speaks poorly of anyone still claiming the f-word label. Maybe it’s just that I think love is more powerful than hate, but I prefer to believe that a message of unity, hope, and community revitalization is more important than choosing sides and acting like you already have it all figured out.

Written by: Brittany Shoot, May 29th 2008