Women should be strong, smart, hardworking, courageous, stick to their convictions, and effective – this is what feminism tells women they should be and exactly what Phyllis Schlafly was for decades. In fact, with her devoted husband and children, and incredible career, she was a happy and truly liberated modern woman.
But Liberals and the leftwing media and popular culture don’t celebrate Mrs. Schalfly.
In the just released nine-part Hulu Mrs. America TV show attack on Mrs. Schlafly, they viciously malign Mrs. Schlafly because she was not the leftwing ideologue feminists demand from the women they support.
Mrs. Schlafly’s record of promoting conservative ideas – including America First, anti-communism, defense of traditional families, and the sanctity of human life at both the beginning and end of life is abhorrent to the Left. Mrs. Schlafly’s effective decade long campaign activated millions of women, especially fulltime homemakers, and thwarted the power grab proposed by Equal Rights Amendment.
Her success still stings the feminist movement and leftwing militants. And now, four years after Mrs. Schlafly died, their malevolent anger over her successes has this TV movie to invent a smear of her extraordinary life and achievements.
Instead of using the facts of history that are readily available – via abundant writings, books, and videos of Mrs. Schlafly speaking and debating – Mrs. America creates fictionalized conversations as liberal assassins would have liked her to say.
And Hulu and our culture step right up to support the Left with their reviews that belittle and distort Mrs. Schlafly’s life and principles. Time magazine notes that “her top-down leadership tends toward fascism.” The Washington Post calls the show an “admirable effort” and commends that she has been made “wickedly unforgettable” and that her allies include “white supremacists.” The New York Times tells of the “righteously mad women” in the movement she created and ludicrously mentions that she was once introduced to Paul Manafort and Roger Stone.
If you enjoy revisionist history of conservative successes by embittered feminist leftists, watch the show. If you want to know who Phyllis Schlafly really was, watch one of the dozens of videos of her on YouTube, read one of her 26 books, including her last published just after she died titled The Conservative Case for Trump, or just read some of the hundreds of articles she wrote over her lifetime.
I am an attorney and run a conservative group as Mrs. Schlafly did. I knew her and loved when she spoke at our events and on college campuses for us. The Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women was the first group to give her a Lifetime Achievement Award and her talk at the award ceremony to a room filled with young women was tremendously inspiring. While the Hulu show brings out some of her attributes, it is not likely watchers will remember them with the distortion and reinvention of this feminist version of her life.
The feminist movement’s policy positions have never enjoyed the support of most American women and today even less support their leftwing positions. If this TV show is an attempt to draw more women support for the now seldom heard from radical feminist leaders and their policy positions, it fails miserably. Mrs. Schlafly’s achievement like defeating the ERA against all the odds, caused her to be celebrated by most American women – but don’t expect to see anything about that in Mrs. America.
This letter was penned by Michelle Easton, the president of the Center for Conservative Women.