The experience of Michelle McCusker is a perfect illustration of the misogynistic position of the so-called Pro Life crowd. Fired because she is pregnant and unmarried, she would also be condemned if she chose to terminate the pregnancy.
Whether women are fired or stigmatized for choosing to give birth without the 'blessing' of a man at their side, the message is the same. As Marilyn Frye observed in her classic piece, "Oppression", women are damned if they do and damned if they don't. That's why they call it, oppression.
Too bad if Ms. McCusker gives birth to a child who will suffer from economic deprivation; that is not the concern of Pro Lifers. What's important is that women, and their "illegitimate" children, be punished for straying from the confines of patriarchal tradition, or male control. A woman cannot give birth to a "legitimate" child without the blessing of the man.
Newsday:
McCusker, who is 18 weeks pregnant, was teaching pre-K at the St. Rose of Lima School in Rockaway Beach. A month after school began, she informed the principal that she was pregnant and hoped to carry the baby to term. The principal fired McCusker two days later, according to the complaint.
McCusker, whose residence was not divulged, contacted the New York Civil Liberties Union, which filed a complaint on her behalf with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The complaint charges that the school's policy is sex discrimination since only women can become pregnant and thus be charged with violating a doctrine against premarital sex.
The Feminist Chronicles:
In the closing hours of the 95th Congress, passage of the Pregnancy Discrimination Bill overturned the U.S. Supreme Court decisions in Gilbert vs. G.E. (1976) and Satty vs. Nashville Gas Co. (1977). Both decisions had approved discrimination against "pregnant people," the former in the payment of disability benefits for women recovering from childbirth and the latter in denying women the use of their earned sick leave for hospitalization and recovery from childbirth. The hard-won victory was the result of a two-year massive campaign by NOW and a coalition of labor, feminist, and pro-choice groups. (10/15/78)
See:
Facts About Pregnancy Discrimination
How to File a Charge of Employment Discrimination
Feminism Gender Discrimination Sex Discrimination
Patriarchy Misogyny In News Regulating Women Pregnancy Discrimination
