The Nation. - Department of Government at Cornell University

~800 The Nation. June 5. 1995LIBIDOrhe Journal of Sex and SensibiliryQuarterly/$30*It’s smart, bold, challenging. It’sall-embracing and unafraid tobridge the barriers of genderorientation and age to turn on themind and the body. See how.LIBIDO, Dept. NBox 146721, Chicago, IL 60614VISAMC OrdersCall 1-800-495-1988*(Oulslde USA: Canada &Mexico, $40;Europe, SSO; elsewhere. $60; U.S. Funds)mMOVING?Send both your old mailinglabel and your newaddress to:THE NATIONP.O. Box 10763Des Moines IA 50340-0763Please allow 4-6 weeks forprocessing.rnPROBLEMS?If you have any problemsor questions regardingyour subscription, pleasewrite to us at the addressabove, or call:1 (800) 333-8536Monday to Frlday7 00 am to 11.00 pm CSTSaturday & Sunday8.00 am to 6:OO pm CST-.-fight for the appointment of womenschool inspectors. “Such acts would createand encourage class a of office seekerswlthin the organization,” Morganprotested. Morgan would not have agreedwith Sklar that Kelley spoke “for the welfareof the whole society.”Ifchildren to steal coal or refused to learnEnglish. Underneath pyrotechnic eventssuch as the 1886 Haymarket riot and the1892 Homestead steel strike lay a deep resentmentof industrial capitalists and arising vision of a different America withno elite at all, expressed through songs,folk tales, gossip and sometimes evensabotage. Interlaced through that alternativeculture were the daily skirmishesthrough which working-class womenstruggled to achieve equality with theirmenfolk. Sklar ignores this part of thecontext in which Kelley worked. Whethermale or female, working people had theirown ideas about state power and howto use it.The question, ultimately, is one of de-we’re going to develop fully a genderedhistory of late-nineteenthcenturypolitics, we need to pull back to an evenbroader definition of politics, beyond theworld of voluntary associations that Sklarand others append to the political canon.Two generations of social and labor historiansas well as feminist theorists havedefined politics to include not only massmovements such as the Knights of Laborand Populists and all the strikes, boycotts mocracy and the definition of feminism.and street protests of the 1880s but also Does it “empower women” if a handfulmyriad acts of informal resistance that of rich white women fight their way closercontested power dynamics of many sorts. to equality with their male equivalentsThousands of individuals, for example, and enact what they think best for otherintentionally violated newly imposed Jim women? Or are we talking about some-Crow strictures; others lied to government thing else, some messy, conflictual, deminvestigators(such as Kelley); still others ocratic politics from below that empowdumpedabusive husbands, taught their ers all women? 0Talk Is CheapJILL NELSON0n a plane headed to New York,my seatmate 1s a young womanwho confides that she is on herway to be a guest on Rofonda,one of dozens of syndicated talk showscurrently on television. “What’s thetoplc?” I ask.“Secret crushes.”“Do you have one?” I wonder. By thetime we land in New York, I find out shedoesn’t, though she’s told the producersshe does and given them the name of aman she vaguely knows. It turns outthat she and her girlfriends were sittingaround watching Rolonda, and when thecall for guests with secret crushes cameup during a break, complete with an 800number, she picked up the phone as agoof. Except Rofonda’s producers didn’tknow it was a joke, or didn’t care. Shesays they called her more than ten times,and in exchange for airfare, a hotel roomand a limo, she’s agreed to risk public humiliation.The producers even suggestedshe bring a pair of panties as a gift for hercrush, but she drew the line. She did agreeto lug a suitcase full of local gourmet specialtiesfor them.Jill Nelson IS the author of VolunteerSlavery (Pengurn).Over the past few months I’ve spentseveral hours a day, five days a week,watching talk shows. From Rolonda toGerald0 to Jenny Jones to Richard Beyto Donahue to Ricki Lake to Gordon El-liott to Jerry Springer to Sally JessyRaphael to Maury Povich to Monte1Williams to Oprah. I’ve watched showson mate swapping, men who beatwomen, fat women who are porno stars,the superiority in size of black men’s penises,transvestites, men who don’t supporttheir children, bisexuality, peoplewho love to have unprotected sex, womenwho love murderers, children who are outof control, white women who love blackmen, strippers, black women who lovewhite men. You name it, I’ve probablyseen it: I’ve seen it all.n 1986, when The Opmh Winfw ShowI went national, media attention focusedon what impact Winfrey’s personal, emotionalstyle would have on the ratings ofthe longtime king of serious daytime talk,Phil Donahue. Telwision critics grumbledthat her confessional approach-andsoaring ratings-would force the newsorientedDonahue to abandon his format.Almost a decade later, it’s clear thatWinfrey’s success influenced a lot morethan Phil Donahue. Imitators have takenthe cornerstones of Winfrey’s success-