Bogus feminist victimhood

By Dennis Prager
World Net Daily

If you want to understand the negative impact of feminism on women (and men) and, by extension, the destructive effects of liberal teachers, Democratic politics and liberal news media on African-Americans, here is Katie Couric last week on the "CBS Evening News":

"A new study on teens and sexual harassment should give every parent pause.

"Most teenage girls report they've been sexually harassed. ... In a study that appeared in the journal Child Development, 90 percent of teen girls say they've been harassed at least once."

Millions of American parents and their daughters were told on one of the most widely watched evening news reports that nine out of every 10 American girls aged 12 to 18 are sexually harassed.

Suspicious that the feminist and liberal I-am-a-victim ideology was at play here far more than some real plague of sexual harassment, I decided to look into the report cited by Ms. Couric.


"A study released this month reports that 90 percent of girls between the ages of 12 and 18 reported experiencing sexual harassment. The study found that girls who had a better understanding of feminism from the media, their parents, or teachers were more likely to recognize sexual harassment.

"Campbell Leaper, professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and one of the authors of the study, said in a press release, 'Sexism remains pervasive in the lives of adolescent girls. Most girls have experienced all three types of sexism – sexual harassment, sexist comments about their academic abilities, and sexist comments about their athletic abilities.'

"Science Daily reports that the study found Latina and Asian American girls reported less sexual harassment than the other girls who participated in the study. … The most commonly reported forms of sexual harassment were unwanted romantic attention, demeaning gender-related comments, teasing based on their appearance, and unwanted physical contact."

This confirmed my suspicions.

First, "The study found that girls who had a better understanding of feminism … were more likely to recognize sexual harassment."

There is no question that this is true. Girls subjected to feminist indoctrination are undoubtedly more likely to interpret innocuous behavior as sexual harassment. Almost the entire liberal-left Weltanschauung is predicated on portraying every group in America except white, male, heterosexual Christians as oppressed. Women are oppressed by men. Blacks and Hispanics are oppressed by whites. Gays are oppressed by straights. Non-Christians are oppressed by Christians.

Of course, the fact is that American women have more opportunity and more equality than just about any women in the world today and certainly in history. Moreover, if either sex is "oppressed" today, it is far more likely to be males. If women were incarcerated, let alone murdered, as disproportionately as men are; if only 40 percent of those getting a bachelor's degree were female; if girls dropped out of high school at the rate males do, there would be a national outcry. It is men who are, in fact, suffering. But for feminists, academics and CBS News, it is women who are still oppressed. And that is what they are taught in high school and college by feminist-oriented teachers.