Boxer v. Rice
Or Why I still have a problem with what Barbara Boxer said to Condi Rice.
I've read a lot of commentary on what Barbara Boxer was saying to Condi Rice. Some of it ludicrously hysterical about how Boxer told Rice that Rice was unqualified for her job because she was single and childless. And, yes, I agree, that's ridiculous. Boxer never intimated any such thing.
On the other side, it's more of the Boxer was just saying that there are sacrifices that will have to be made to carry on the war and the surge, and we should be cognizant of the prices people will have to pay. I agree that's what Boxer intended. However, her framing of the issue unconsciously plays right into patriarchal assumptions about women. As a single, childless woman myself, I got that very quickly.
In her example, Boxer used herself and Rice as two people who don't have a personal price to pay. Both women. The price they could pay was cast in terms of their children or lack thereof. Not in terms of themselves. Women are in the military. Women die in wars, even if they aren't in combat. It's not just that Boxer's children are too old. It's that she's too old. It's not just that Rice doesn't have an immediate family to sacrifice. It's that she's too old herself.
If the only price women are seen as being able to pay for their country in wartime is their children (and husbands), what does that mean for single, childless women? Given the culture we live in, it's really not hard to read that as "you're selfish." It's not as if single and/or childless women don't get fed that message constantly anyway. "Selfish." "Unwomanly." "Failure." That's the environment in which Boxer made her remarks. The environment in which she excluded the possibility of herself or Rice sacrificing themselves (if she hadn't, there wouldn't have been a framing/subtext issue). While I don't believe she consciously meant that Rice was selfish, none of us escape our socialization. There's an unintended subtext to her remarks; one that I believe feminists and progressives should be aware of.