Palin on feminism, social issues, global warming and evolution

marjorie says...

I was most interested in the section of Katie Couric's interview with Palin that dealt with feminism, abortion, global warming, evolution and homosexuality.

Here is the interview in its entirety, with the main points I drew from it below.



Here are the main points on these topics, from this interview:

Feminism--Palin says she's a feminist, and that women today have every opportunity that a man has. This implies that she thinks equality between women and men has been achieved.

World view/News sources--Palin couldn't, or wouldn't, give a specific source for where she primarily gets her news.

Global warming--She acknowledged that some of it may be man-made, but wouldn't blame it all on man's activities. She says it doesn't matter what caused it, "the point is that it's real, we need to do something about it." There wasn't a follow-up question about how one can know how to fix something if they don't know what caused it.

Abortion--Palin repeatedly used the word "choose" in this segment of the Couric interview. She affirmed that she is anti-abortion, that she wants people to "choose life." She wouldn't say she thought it should be illegal, saying she would counsel women to "choose life." Then she went on to say this: "If you're asking though, kind of foundationally here, should anybody end up in jail, for having had an abortion, absolutely not, that's nothing that I would ever support." She went on to say that she believes that life starts at conception, and that she'd "like to see fewer and fewer abortions in this world" in response to a question about the morning after pill. When pressed on whether she would condemn the morning after pill, she would only say she wouldn't choose it personally.

Unfortunately, this interview was brief so it did not get into the complexities of the abortion debate--the fact that women will have them, legal or not, or available in an actual clinic or not, so how would Palin address the medical problems inherent in that? Additionally, the interview didn't press Palin on what kind of support should be offered to pregnant women by society. For instance, would she support government sponsored child care?

Evolution--Palin said she sees the hand of God in the creation of earth, but that this isn't something that should be taught in science class. Evolution is science that should be taught in science class, she said.

Homosexuality--Palin repeatedly referred to homosexuality as a choice, saying she would not judge people for their choices. As an example, she referenced her best friend who is gay, saying she would not make the choice her friend had made but didn't judge her.