Thoroughly enjoying her notoriety but professing not to understand why “everybody hates Linda,” Linda Hirshman reveals herself in yesterday’s Outlook section as somebody you’d likely hate, even if she hadn’t authored a controversial “mommy wars” article. Would you really like to have a cuppa with somebody capable or writing this?
“I said that the tasks of housekeeping and child rearing were not worthy of the full time and talents of intelligent and educated human beings. They do not require a great intellect, they are not honored and they do not involve risks and the rewards that risk brings.”
Or this:
“Okay, I’m judgmental. That’s what CBS’s Lesley Stahl called me on “60 Minutes.” But I’m a philosopher, and it’s a philosopher’s job to tell people how they should lead their lives. We’ve been doing so since Socrates.”
Even NOW has been smart enough to distance itself from Linda. Washington Post blogger Leslie Morgan Steiner also seems to hate Linda-normal-but finds that there’s “often a (teeny) grain of truth in what she says.” If I could get past Linda’s New Class snobbery, I might be able to debate her. But, in a way, New Class snobbery is the essence of what we call feminism.