The Speech I Couldn’t Give at Berkeley Free Speech Week

Today I was scheduled to speak at “Feminism Awareness Day” during Free Speech Week at UC-Berkeley. I am extremely thankful to Milo Yiannopoulos for inviting me to debut my new book, The Social Justice Warrior Handbook. I’m also thankful to Milo for taking the fight for free speech to ground zero — college campuses. In a recent radio interview, an NPR host asked him why he doesn’t just rent a theater rather than deal with college campus rules. Milo responded by asking why conservatives should relinquish participation in an arena that should be open to all views.

Unfortunately, events were canceled because of coordinated efforts by the school administration, leftist media, and leftist groups from across the country. Within hours of being included on a leaked list of invited (not scheduled) speakers, I heard from reporters with information they wanted confirmed or denied in order to catch the organizers in some sort of deceit. They went down the line speaker by speaker in order to discredit and disrupt the event. While I’m disappointed students at Berkeley won’t be able to hear from many of the invited speakers, I’m not surprised.

I managed a speakers bureau focused on campus events for six years and was the director of CPAC, the conservative movement’s largest event, for five years. I’m very familiar with event planning and how college administrators operate. They intimidate students with needless deadlines, venue switches at the last minute, threats of withholding degrees, exorbitant security fees/deposits, or insurance requests unlikely to be given to a student group. It is important to note that security costs are necessary not because of the speakers, but because of the protestors and vandals. Making speakers feel guilty for security charges is the equivalent of asking why a victim’s skirt is so short.

In my upcoming book, I write about all the tactics that SJWs use to have speakers banned or events canceled. I’m not psychic; they’re just predictable.

When I managed campus events with speakers like Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Bay Buchanan, and Christina Hoff Sommers, I often counseled students on dealing with administrators, leftist campus groups, and professors who tried to stop the events. Dozens of events never took place for the reasons above and that was before the outside influences and coordination of the national media and national political groups. While the violence and threats from those against conservative speakers has increased dramatically, the efforts to stop them from speaking is not a new phenomenon. Speakers including Milo, Gavin McInnes, Charles Murray, Christina Hoff Sommers, Mike Adams, Ben Shapiro, Ann Coulter, and even board member of the Regents of the University of California Ward Connerly have been deemed too “controversial” to speak over the years simply because they aren’t leftists. None of them are alt-right, racist, sexist, bigoted, homophobic or whatever trendy label the left tries to put on them. If they were, I wouldn’t stand along side them.

Since Berkeley students weren’t able to hear my speech on Sunday, here it is.

Feminism Is A Thief

“Are you uncomfortable when men view you as a sex object?

Are you offended when men don’t find you sexually attractive because of your hair, lack of femininity, odor, clothing or demeanor?

Do you assert your independence by demanding the government pay for your life choices?

Does a stranger suggesting you smile send you into a fit of rage?

Don’t just act. Ovary-act.

Unlike our grandmothers, mothers and professors, being a feminist doesn’t mean burning your bra. It means demanding that everyone look at you in your bra. Being a feminist activist is the most freeing thing you can do because YOU make the rules and YOU are now the majority. Studies show that American women receive more college degrees than men, so you already have a built-in community that’s eager to capitulate to your demands.

There is no such thing as a stereotypical feminist. This is because women across the country are oppressed in new and unique ways despite social norms that have virtually eliminated sex discrimination.”

That was a passage from my new political humor book, The Social Justice Warrior Handbook.

Feminism, whether you call it third-wave or radical or modern, is a thief. It takes from you until you’re empty. Trust me, I’m a single, childless 40 year-old.

Feminism steals your identity.

Remember the infamous hot mic moment between Billy Bush and then-candidate Donald Trump? Democrats, pundits, and journalists pretended to be outraged by his language. Then a few months later, many of them donned p*ssy hats with glee and delighted in dressing as female body parts. They were back to their old selves. Feminism doesn’t want women to believe they are anything more than body parts. They tell them so-called “women’s issues” are limited to abortion, birth control and body image. When they limit the issues involving our body parts, they rob women from the opportunity to learn about other issues and be able to speak about them with confidence. Feminists want women to react based on emotions, not facts. Current feminists are using the same arguments people made against the suffragette movement.

Feminism steals your heart.

Feminists say that traditional dating, like allowing a man to plan a date, pay for the date, or hold the door open are tools of the patriarchy.

Women-targeted media — books, magazines, websites, movies, and TV shows — delight in the overused cliché of women having no-strings-attached relationships and as Sex and the City put it, “having sex like a man.” Then the perfect feminist show came along — Girls on HBO. But instead of glamorizing the millennial feminist mindset something amazing happened — it showed that the characters’ awful behavior doesn’t lead to happy, fulfilling relationships. They were all miserable.

Now back to Sex and the City.

Let’s review where the series left the four characters. Carrie converted the ultimate bachelor to a man who would fly half-way around the world for a difficult, non-traditional beauty. Feminist lawyer Miranda realizes she and her out-of-wedlock baby belong with the father and that it’s worth making career sacrifices for the family. Serial slut Samantha allows herself to fall in love and experiences the first mature, secure and fulfilling relationship she’s ever had. Charlotte, the Rules-obsessed WASP, marries a Jew after pouring her heart out to him while asking for nothing in return, and they adopt an unwanted Chinese baby girl.

It’s a conservative fairy tale and a feminist nightmare.

Viewers wanted family to come first, motherhood, and husbands for the characters because many of them also want it for themselves. Sex and the City transitioned from a love letter to a Dear John letter to the feminists’ ideals.

Feminism steals your power.

No one can define another’s person’s happiness, but it’s the feminist movement that promotes one version over another. For example, a 2015 Washington Post headline told readers, “It turns out parenthood is worse than divorce, unemployment — even the death of a partner.”

Despite feminists’ whining about women being under siege in the Trump era, the truth is we have more choices today than ever before. But the only choices that matter to feminists are the ones that reaffirm their agenda, specifically their anti-family agenda.

Women my generation and younger have been told that we’re selling out the sisterhood if we choose to be stay-at-home mothers instead of working outside the home. We’re told to put off having children until we’ve achieved our career goals. We’re routinely lectured about what we’re giving up — money, career opportunities, “me” time — if we don’t work after having children. Now women in their 30s and 40s are looking back with regret as they go through physically and mentally painful infertility treatments or come to the realization that their time to have children has passed. We may have it all by feminists’ standards, but many of us know some of our dreams will never be realized.

Feminists won’t tell you about what children and parents in two-income families are missing out on. That’s because to acknowledge the power of motherhood is to deny the feminist agenda.

According to a London School of Economics study released in 2011, 59 percent of women feel pressure from society to work outside the home. The study also found that 69 percent of women would stay home to raise their children if money were not an issue. A similar study done by SurveyUSA found that 87 percent of women would stay home with their children if money were not an issue. Additionally, 73 percent of working moms said that their jobs prevented them from spending an adequate amount of time with their children.

Like many Gen Xers, I was a first generation latchkey kid from grade school to high school. In my case, it was because my parents were divorced. It made me realize that when it came time for me to start a family, I wanted to be in a financial position to be a stay-at-home mother.

Those with younger children who choose to work outside the home shouldn’t be criticized for the choices they make for their families. Likewise, those who choose to stay home shouldn’t be belittled.

Having children and raising a family is one of the most powerful things a woman can do. Feminism shows its true colors when it tells women to ignore it in favor of their selfish political agenda.

Finally, feminism steals your independence.

In my book, The Social Justice Warrior Handbook — did I mention I have a book coming out on Tuesday? — I write about feminists’ demands to march in lockstep with the social justice warrior movement. There is no room for nuance or independent thought. This is demonstrated by feminists’ attacks on smart, accomplished women like Pamela Geller and Ann Coulter who speak on issues that really affect women across the country and around the world. They are derided by feminists even though they speak out against radical Islam and illegal immigrants’ crimes and abuses against women.

Feminists call many of the women who were invited to speak during Free Speech Week traitors. But it’s the feminists who are traitors to women because they are erasing the decades of progress women have achieved. Feminists now focus on insultingly immature and shallow issues like safe spaces, redefining what it means to be a woman, tearing down men, and limiting women’s choices.

Feminists want to steal your identity, heart, power, and independence. Stop normalizing their values and stand up for yours.