Hyerdahl wrote:
> The Scarlet Letter's feminist leanings is not couched in whether or
not
> she wanted to live "as a man", or even if she wanted to work outside
> the home.  Their society was agrarian back that.  And, Hester's goal
> was to take her child and move away from an abusive asshole.  Now
that
> is probably more than enough to make the book appeal to feminists,
but
> the real issue in the story is that she wore the scarlet letter and
he
> did not.


   But Hyerdahl, you yourself have done so much to convince the readers
of this ng that only a lunatic would even bother to ask a woman about
the identity of her childs father, much less believe her. And in the
time of the Hawthorne story, DNA-level truth was centuries away. So
what would you do, make every guy in the whole town wear an Scarlet "A"
everytime an unmarried pregnancy occurred?
   It does not work wanting to have this both ways. Women cannot lie
constantly about paternity (and defend their right to mislead) and then
expect a community to bother taking anything they say about it the
least bit seriously.
   In the real old days, a pregnancy without a regular means of support
was likely to end up badly. In those days, women/communities were
understandably adamant that child bearing women be given the safety
that existed within some kind of home/family that they and a child
would need to have much chance of surviving.
    So now you hate men because your fore-mothers were generally so
ill-suited to making it as a single parent before the invention of the
welfare state. Hint: The story here makes sense only if one considers
that Ms. Prines success was out-of-the-ordinary for a woman in her
situation.





  That you think the story shouldn't appeal to feminists is
> really your problem.
>
> Women are everywhere, whether or not men find that it matters.  ;-)



--- UseNet To RIME Gateway {at} 2/15/05 5:19:22 AM ---