Some people don’t think that conservative feminists exist, but that’s just not true. We’re strong, proud, and as loud as our husbands allow. I believe in equal opportunity for women, as long as women keep their noses to the grindstone to earn it. That’s why I believe that all women should work hard, pull themselves up by their bootstraps, and open every tight, pesky jar by themselves.

I don’t believe in handouts, which means I absolutely do not believe in asking for help in opening a jar when the lid is screwed on way too tightly. For example, I’m struggling to open a jar right at this moment. It is my responsibility — not the government’s or anyone else’s — to tap it against my counter as many times as I can until the lid loosens enough for me to yank it off so hard that a little bit of pasta sauce ricochets off the wall in defeat.

I believe that a woman should never let a man open a jar for her. Asking a man to open a jar for you is like looting him of his strength, which he earned, not you. And he needs to conserve that energy in order to do what boys like to do: make out with their cars. Personally, I would never ask my husband to open a jar for me. He’s not home yet, but even if he were home, I would not ask him to open the jar, no matter how many times he’d insist on it. If he happens to open it for me after I happen to scream, "This jar wants me DEAD!!!” before I happen to go to the bathroom to take a pristine anger piss, then that’s just part of God’s plan.

Working moms are not a monolith. I am pro-life, pro-gun, pro-wall; I am also pro-equal-pay. Feminists contain multitudes, and perhaps some of those multitudes can maybe help out and get this jar open? Who at RAGÚ thought it was a good idea for the lid to be screwed on this tightly? Who are they protecting this pasta sauce from? Barack Hussein Obama?

Of course, I have been in situations where I couldn’t open a jar. But when I can’t open a jar, I hand it over to my hired help to do it for me. That’s hired help I earned, mind you, paid for by the generational wealth that He and he bestowed upon me. “He,” of course, meaning Jesus, and “he” meaning my great-great-grandfather who really hit it big on that insurance payment from owning the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. But due to the coronavirus hoax pandemic, I can’t get any hired help to my home, which means I’m stuck figuring out how to do domestic work while also having a demanding job and also taking care of my children, all of which I’m detailing in a Wall Street Journal op-ed called, “How Mainstream Media Is Turning Innocent Jars Against the Silent Majority.” After I finish writing, it’s back to drying out my sweaty palms with a blow dryer and then taking a crowbar to this jar.

Some would say that offering your skills to someone in need, like opening a jar for someone because it is physically easier for you to do so, is a virtue. I disagree; the concept of sharing is obviously Cold War propaganda from the communists. An honest woman like myself does not balk under the pressure of opening a jar independently, and for sure does not believe that T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land” was secretly about her using all the strength in her decrepit little fingers in an unsuccessful attempt at wrenching open this fucking jar.

Some would also say that, quite literally, many women’s shoes do not even have bootstraps. That is not my problem. If you’re a real feminist, you will figure out a way to attach your own bootstraps to your Uggs or your sensible Cole Haan sandals in order to make this metaphor work for you. I do not have the time to do the heavy-lifting for you here as you continue to leech off of society. I am too busy in my backyard, shooting at this jar of pasta sauce with a handgun, giving up, going back inside, picking up a jar of lupini beans, putting a dish towel to it, and twisting it because who needs pasta for dinner anyway, and — no? Oh, you little beans don’t want to come out of the jar? Are you kidding me? Is that how we’re going to play? Do any of my kids want to maybe learn a practical skill instead of whatever bullshit they’re doing on the iPad? Susan? Dogbert? Minervack? Caloob? Caloob 2? Priscintilltit? MARGE?! Any one of you useless shits? No? Well, I guess it’s just you and me, beans! You think you’re better than me? You’re just beans! It is your manifest destiny to die, beans. You don’t know what I’ve done, beans, and you don’t know how culpable I was in the 2008 financial crisis, beans, and you’re about to be real freakin’ sorry when I—

Where was I? Oh, right. As a mother of seven with a full-time job — a strong, conservative feminist — I believe there’s no shame in ordering a pizza tonight.