Margaret Thatcher - Feminist Icon?

[OnlyANinja]

The Guardian asks a number of influential women (apparently) but I'd rather ask MNers.

[OTheHugeManatee]

There's a sexist stereotype that says women should be more 'caring' than men. By that measure, Thatcher wasn't just a ruthless, determined conviction politician, she was 'unnatural'. I think that lies behind a lot of the Thatcher hatred: the fact that she didn't bother playing 'nicey nicey' in an appealing feminine way.

Whether or not you like her policies, the fact that she steamrollered right over sexist stereotypes like that makes her admirable from a feminist perspective in my view.

[duckdodgers]

ahtyed? hated even

[ppeatfruit]

Cogito She deregulated the banks!!!!! since when is our country in such a good way? Great for bloated rich companies who avoid tax and the bankers yes!!

I don't think the highly nationalised companies were much cop but I certainly don't think the privatisation and semi- privatisation esp. of the N.H.S. that has gone on is any better.

[ppeatfruit]

Another important point that is being ignored is her terrible snobbishness she looked down on people who travel by bus thus giving carte blanche to the lovers of congestion and car owners who reckon they rule the roost.

[OTheHugeManatee]

Yes, but what does car use or snobbery have to do with feminism? Or do women have to be sainted, unimpeachable human beings in every possible way before we will deign to call them icons?

[OhdearNigel]

Margaret Thatcher was an individualist and interested in advancing the aims and ambitions of Margaret Thatcher, not women

Why is this anti-feminist ? How many high profile men go around working for the good of "men in general" ? Men are allowed to be individualists without it being perceived as a character flaw.

I think she is one of the great feminist icons. She was not defined by her "femininity" and is judged in exactly the same way a male Prime Minister was. Whatever you think of her policies and how it affected you, she brought no female agenda to that table. Saying that she was no feminist because she did not concentrate on "wimmin's issues" is surely one of the most antifemininist ideas possible

[perceptionreality]

My dislike of her is not because she's a woman but rather because she had not s humanitarian bone in her body, she had a disgusting, bigoted attitude and was basically, a fascist.

[YNK]

ppeatfruit - YES! that is a FACT, conveniently overlooked at the moment! Pfff, feminist icon, my fat arse!!! She was all for the boys, so busy brown nosing Ronald Reagan and the banks and between them they have created the situation we are in now by allowing the deregulation of the banking industry!!!

[CogitoErgoSometimes]

"Cogito She deregulated the banks!!!!! since when is our country in such a good way?"

The Blair/Brown government were quite happy to use the money generated by the deregulated financial sector to finance their lavish spending plans of the last 15 years. We all benefited, now we all pay. If anything is to blame, it's not deregulation per se it's the collective mismanagement and misunderstanding of what unfettered deregulation meant in practice. I have a feeling that even those allegedly running the banks - rather as Barings Bank and Societe Generale discovered separately - didn't understand how dicey their practices were until it was too late.

[IslaDoit]

I think there is confusion about femininity, being a woman and being a feminist. The first is a social construct. The sex a biological classification and the third a term used to describe those who subscribe to a particular ideology about the advancement of women and equality for women.

You can be either or both of the first two and not be the third just as one can be a man and male and a feminist. MT did not agree with or support the ideology. Ergo she was not a feminist.

Does that help explain further how I believe she was not a feminist OhdearNigel?

[GeorgeT]

Feminist Icon, you have to be joking. she adopted a masculine style, didn't do women's issues. Yes she was a grocer's daughter but she benefitted from her husband's wealth and while some good was done, her legacy was atrocious. no society.... Even David Cameron has reneged on that. if someone compared me to Thatcher I would be appalled but that may say more about me than her.

[YNK]

Cogito, the banks had carte blanche after deregulation to look the other way and insure themselves against the losses created by offering all these loans so that they didn't suffer. On the contrary so long as the loans were taken up their big obcene bonuses rolled in....leaving the mess we are all paying for now!!!
This is the legacy left by Maggie and Ron! Disgusting behaviour.

[sportsfanatic]

grumblin I'm sorry if you think I am patronising, belittling and simplistic by suggesting people on this thread hate her because she was a woman, though actually what I indicated was that it was the level of visceral hatred, not hatred per se.

This country has been damaged just as much by the Brown/Blair duo with their warmongering, economic ineptitude, and collusion with the bankers - but I repeat - they do not seem to attract the same level of vitriol as Thatcher.

I stand by my view that she attracted extra opprobrium because she did not turn out to fit the stereotype of woman as caring, sharing and compassionate but was someone who saw what had to be done and got on and did it.

But then I admit I may be biased as someone whose own business was nearly bankrupted in the 70s by knock on effects of irresponsible union action and a pathetic Government who hadn't got the backbone to deal with the situation.

[mammanetta]

power-crazy control freak - yes.
feminist?
no.
not the same thing at all :)

[mammanetta]

well put GeorgeT btw

[LineRunner]

I remember the benefit gig for the miners' strike in Newcastle - Department S, the Poison Girls and a colliery brass band.

Thatcher's destruction of the mining communities was ... spiteful.

I don't use that word about her because she is female. Cameron is spiteful, too.

[JustHecate]

There is a feminist issue here, I think.

We have had some godAWFUL prime ministers. Some have really done shitty things. We have all been screwed by many of them, in one way or another.

Yet none are remembered with such hatred as her. If she had been a man, would this have been true? Loathed on a personal level? Name me another prime minister who is hated as a person by so many. Yet they have all done their share of truly shitty things. Do we even remember them as we do hers?

I lived through the strike. My dad stuck it out till the end. We really suffered under that government. I have never and will never vote Tory. I think her government did some terrible things and we're still suffering now because of them. But I do believe that she would not be as hated on a personal level as she is if she was a man.

I have no evidence to support this theory none at all. My gut just says it's so.

[talkingtomyselfhere]

I was a teen and young adult in the 80's and grew up vehemently opposed to Maggie's policies. I marched against many of the things the conservatives did at this time and still feel that they did irreparable damage to our society and we will be dealing with the fallout for many years to come.

She did nothing for women in politics ( in fact she never promoted any female to her cabinet in the entire time she was prime minister, although I am sure there were several suitable candidates) Having said all that she worked her way to the top of a male world, starting out with everyone against her and despite every obstacle imaginable worked her way to the top.Speaking as some one who works in this kind of environment - that takes balls (even when you don't have a pair of your own) I wish she had done more to advance women in the workplace but she was always adamant that she didn't see this as her role.

However, you don't have to like someone or even respect them to appreciate the hard work they put into acheiving their success and I do acknowledge she was personally successful.

[YNK]

I certainly don't single her out because she is a woman - I lump her in with her croney Reagan as the architects of social destruction!

[LineRunner]

Hecate, I think Cameron's getting there, in the hatred stakes. But he won't serve as long as Thatcher, so maybe he won't be quite so painfully remembered.

[Cupawoman]

As I remember she criticised working for mothers for not prioritising their children and spoke with horror of the 'creche' generation, yet she had children, employed a nanny and went back to work. Pity for the rest of us.

[manfrom]

Which all begs the question: Can a feminist be Thatcherite - espousing free market economics, against organised labour/trade unions, libertarian?

I would think probably not, but it's an interesting idea.

[miacis]

She was no feminist and would have been horrified to have been called one.

There's more to being a feminist than being a successful woman.

Is she hated more because she is a woman - possibly - simply because so many of us who have fought for women's rights over the years feel her reign saw so many backward steps for those rights, their advocates and our communities.

[BlueIvy]

Yes, I suppose she is, although she did nothing for women while she was in power (positively the opposite, actually).

But just by becoming the Prime Minister and wielding such power for so many years, I suppose she must be admired

I always admired the fact that she needed only a few hours sleep a night. I would love that sort of physical stamina.

[maizieD]

There are similarities between Maggie T and Queen Elizabeth 1st. They both were women in a very male dominated world and they both used their sex to manipulate the men around them. I think Maggie T had no women in her cabinet because a woman would have told her to get knotted whereas the men all loved her dominatrix style. They were all panting for her. I heard an interview very recently where a former (male) colleague breathlessly described how she had once patted him flirtatiously. Still drooling after all these years[shocked]

I hugely admired QE1, who would make no windows into mens' souls but despised Maggie T who believed in looking after No 1. I was brought up in a very christian household and everything she said and did violated all I had been taught to believe in. Conservatives still make me feel ill for that reason.