In 1873, a woman now lost amidst the faded pages of history was indicted for the alleged crime of voting in a presidential election. In her defense, Susan B. Anthony said, "And the only question left to be settled now is: are women persons? I hardly believe any of our opponents will have the hardihood to say they are not."
We at the State Press think that you've brought that question back into the light after 126 years, and you've brought it back in an effort to dim the illuminating influence of centuries of women's struggles.
On Sept. 23, you spoke to the Arizona Board of Regents, despairing about the evil of students living in coed dormitories and about the Women's Studies Program being a vehicle for lesbians to place young virgins onto a path of sin.
"We have a mission at universities to educate," you, the chairwoman of the House Public Institutions and Universities Committee, said. "We get the feeling at the Legislature there has been a mission drift."
Well, feelings are funny things, Rep. McGrath. Often, they can arise based on faulty assumptions of half-truths -- not on facts. So, it disturbs us, ASU everyday goers, that you, Rep. McGrath, sitting in your cozy armchair in your very fine office miles away, publicly claim to have an adequate "feeling" of what's going on inside our classrooms. When was the last time you actually sat in on a Women's Studies class?
To the contrary, we have the feeling that you and other people "at the Legislature" have no right to talk about ASU classes, the state of our education or about our programs. Simply put -- you are just not part of us.
Basing assumptions on individual voices and singled-out opinions is wrong. "Some people stumble into a course on Women's Studies and find it's Lesbian Studies," you said.
We only wish more of you "at the Legislature" stumbled into our Women's Studies classes -- to feel them for real, to inhale the messages and to be there with us. We can only wish you, Rep. McGrath, a 1957 ASU graduate in sociology and anthropology, would organize a "back to school" day for yourself and those of your kind. Because no matter how objective one tries to be, 42 years out of school is just too damn long to get the real "feeling" of the state of education today.
At the very least, we wish you had read the mission statement of ASU's Women's Studies Program. A statement that reads in part, "(the program) examines cultural assumptions about women, the validity of research on women and the effects on political, economic and social systems on women."
Rep. McGrath, there is no reason to be ashamed of strong womanhood. It's a beautiful thing to be a woman (as it is a beautiful thing to be a man) and to enjoy the fact that we can explore our heritage, together with men, and separate from them. That is what the program does, in a way that acknowledges the contributions of all kinds of women.
Maya Angelou, a writer filled with determination, once wrote,
"You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, we'll rise."
We will rise, Rep. McGrath, stronger and more determined because of classes like those offered by the Women's Studies Program, because of the continuous effort of women and men building a world of equality. We will rise, heterosexuals, homosexuals, Christians and atheists, Democrats and Republicans -- all ASU students with real feelings of our state of education.
Sincerely,
State Press editorial staff
