Bread & Circuses

WHEN Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott joined the chorus sneering at the military code of loyalty, self-restraint, honesty, and obedience, he committed what is nowadays called a “defining moment.” Its immediate effect was to increase the pressure on the Air Force to grant Lt. Kelly Flinn, its first female B-52 pilot, the general discharge she sought-or, at least, graciously condescended to accept. Lt. Flinn, heroine and victim, had first demanded an honorable discharge in tones of the highest moral indignation. This claim flew in the media and in Congress, and it might have flown in Middle America too if the aggrieved wife of Kelly Flinn’s soccer-coach boyfriend had not finally appeared, taking the shine off the lieutenant’s heroine status and creating an alternative and more plausible victim.

This came too late to avert the Air Force’s overall retreat in the latest gender skirmish. But it served to demonstrate that although the media have great advantages in setting the ideological terms of debate, their power is not absolute. A betrayed wife may be a traditional symbol, but it is one which feminism has not yet managed to demystify or make ridiculous.

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Kate O'Beirne

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WHEN Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott joined the chorus sneering at the military code of loyalty, self-restraint, honesty, and obedience, he committed what is nowadays called a “defining moment.” Its immediate effect was to increase the pressure on the Air Force to grant Lt. Kelly Flinn, its first female B-52 pilot, the general discharge she sought-or, at least, graciously condescended to accept. Lt. Flinn, heroine and victim, had first demanded an honorable discharge in tones of the highest moral indignation. This claim flew in the media and in Congress, and it might have flown in Middle America too if the aggrieved wife of Kelly Flinn’s soccer-coach boyfriend had not finally appeared, taking the shine off the lieutenant’s heroine status and creating an alternative and more plausible victim.

This came too late to avert the Air Force’s overall retreat in the latest gender skirmish. But it served to demonstrate that although the media have great advantages in setting the ideological terms of debate, their power is not absolute. A betrayed wife may be a traditional symbol, but it is one which feminism has not yet managed to demystify or make ridiculous.