Before the baby boomers came along, there were the Betty Frieden feminist of the of the early to mid-60's. Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem are not baby-boomers. They were both born before the baby-boomers. The older group was basically the age of my Mother and the more radical group were baby boomers of roughly my age.

A more radical view of feminism come into being in the late 60's to early 70's, many, but of course not all, of those in that movement were actual baby boomers. I remember a great many clashes between feminists of those two different orientations.

Those in the older group were into NOW and MS Magazine, both of which left us completely unimpressed.

Speaking very specifically, I remember one demonstration where we younger women took off our shirts and the older women were horrified. They scolded us, we were making feminism look bad. We got real tired of them real fast. You could always spot the more radical feminist in their blue jean jackets with tampax proudly displayed, lined up in the pockets. Sisterhood Is Powerful was our bible.

Also, we were mostly all Socialist Feminist, or Lesbian Feminist, or Separatist Feminist. Some writers try to claim that Socialist Feminist were opposed to the other groups, but in fact there was much over-lap. I'm speaking here of women I actually knew, and not just written theory.

What I'm seeing now as I go out into the community with my Bernie gear on is that younger women are fired up over Bernie. They're tearing it up on twitter. They approach me and start conversations when they see my Bernie gear. It's really something like I've never experienced before. Even more surprising since this is the San Antonio area of Texas. So far, it's been young Hispanic women approaching me. One of them is 18 and still in high school, and she tells me that her friends are totally feeling the Bern.

I think these older feminist scolding the younger generation will get exactly as far today as they got 45 years ago which is to say, they'll get exactly no-where.

Women like Hillary want equality within an evil system that harms working class and poor women, not to mention the harm done to women in other countries.

Many of the working class and poor women of the younger generation look at Hillary's hypocrisy in claiming that she stands with all women, and think: "Fuck that bullshit."

an old one. I read Betty Friedan, Simone De Beauvoire and Gloria Steinem in my early youth. I never particulary liked Gloria as she was to me a celebrity NYC high society dame. I enjoyed the quips to the press like 'This is what forty looks like' but she was really not at all a icon I took seriously. I loved the wild raucous Germaine Greer in the 70's. I read her book while living in a small fishing/logging Oregon coastal town it was highly entertaining. While living in Bandon OR as a hippie 'back to the country' type I started going to women's meetings which were attended by the hippies and the local town women. They were much more enlightening as far as everyday struggles women all face.

Like the term progressive, feminism has been co-opted by the corporate elites. Women, in between, and old are not that easily fooled by those who define feminism as breaking corporate glass ceilings or by corporate male produced female celebrities prancing around in high heels shaking their booties. I'm fine and support the freedom for women to be sexual in what ever form they chose. This is not the be all of women being liberated. When someone like Madeline Albright or Hillary start defining feminism as being as bad ass the male war criminals along with wining the race to the top of the corporate defined measure of success it's offensive. They have turned real feminism on it's head insanely and it's insanely upside down.

Denigrating young women who are comfortable with their sexuality and yet see the real damage being done to women globally in both endless bloody war and naked viscous economic power used against women makes this old feminist sick. Bravo to these young women. My granddaughter is one of them. She is not a little cute girl /woman who is a slave to her hormones. She isn't looking for boy's by voicing her political views and supporting Bernie. How bizarre and insulting is this. I'm proud that my granddaughter does not equate her strength as a woman with being as big an asshole as the 'boys' who rule the world. She deals daily with the cultural and professional harassment and discrimination directed at women but thinks women like Hillary are nothing she emulates or wants to have power. It is unbelievable and that is why young women reject this false version of feminism.

I googled it, and I would be one of the early baby boomers, ie I would be your foreign baby boomer. In Germany in the late sixties I read Betty Fridan, Simone de Beauvier and listened to Alice Schwarzer. Actually none of those really influenced or impressed me greatly (aside from Simone de Beauvier for a while). I always thought they were not representing the working every day kind of women and didn't cover women as mothers. I thought they were either in denial or are blind towards a lot of special aspects of women's lives. Alice Schwarzer I found even a little ridiculous.

Neither get me discussions about sexism up in arms. I didn't find anything in Steinem that convinced me much. Today even less than back then. But then the US has had different gender relationship tensions in many respects. Women's rights are less protected here in the US than in Europe and the kind of abuse of women I hear about always shock me deeply. So, I believe that strong feminist activism is very necessary in the US, but I don't feel I could be part of it.

I think I am a little weird. The first time I heard a man asking if I have penis envy, I broke out chuckling and laughing. Why the heck would I have something like THAT? (I never heard about that term before) Only a German/Austrian psychoanalyst could have come up with such an idea or theory. I had always some healthy doubts and kind of lack of respect for Mr. Freud. So, forgive me for that. May be one day I make the effort and take him seriously and actually read what he has written. But it's pretty at the end of my "to read" list.

The divide you see is very easy for me to understand. Younger women know the social burden of working, raising kids and going to school to have a chance to get a better paid job, especially those who are doing everything alone without a supportive partner. Those burdens are addressed by Sanders in very simple and clear terms and he is pretty good at those. I think it's an "in my guts I trust Sanders support for women more than HRC's" kind of feeling. May be that is just due to the fact that HRC is using feminism and sexism as a tool in her campaigns. Many have a bit of a disgust seeing that. Several women on the democratic primary debate parties shouted against Hillary especially in response to attempt by her to use her "female" status as an arguement. It seemed lots of women don't like that. So, women come up and dare to say they are not a HRC fan by default just because she is a female candidate and a feminist one at that as well.

Ok, I am a lousy feminist, but it's not really true. I just don't like to make a fuss about it in public.