I didn’t want to write about the John McCain and the word “bitch” incident for precisely the reasons that Cara articulates here—having to deal with all the people who’d scramble make excuses for his reaction, when they know full well that if someone had gotten up and made a similar racist slur about Obama, if McCain laughed and said, “Excellent question,” he’d probably be resigning from the campaign in disgrace right now. Not that I’m trying to set up some competition between racism and sexism, by any stretch,* but in just this very narrow area, there’s a social acceptance of misogynist terms where their equivalent in racist terms are considered beyond the pale. There’s a series of complex reasons for this that don’t actually speak that much to the oppression people face on an individual basis,** but the bare minimum issue in this case is pretty simple: By accepting the word “bitch” in discourse about candidates for major elections, you’re signing tacitly onto the idea that women’s very presence in politics is unwelcome.
But I can see and have sympathy for the argument that McCain was just being a natural politician and doing what politicians do, which is to be hyper-agreeable to everything said by potential voters in an effort to get their vote. That doesn’t explain, as Cara notes, his refusal to participate in the ritual denunciation after the fact, which again I can grant wide berth for good intentions, because I personally hate the ritual denunciations and would pretty much like to see them disappear from the discourse completely, since it’s gotten to this point where not tripping over yourself denouncing this or that is being treated as acceptance of it. But that McCain has turned around and channeled what you might call the “pro-bitch” sentiment into a fund-raising letter crosses a big fat line and makes it hard to deny that he’s fully behind the use of derogatory terms intended to marginalize women from politics.
All this vile sexism aimed at Hillary Clinton is making me rethink my single-minded issues-based voting strategies. Like Katha Pollitt recently said:
The more people insist that sexism plays no part in the primary campaign or its media coverage, the more likely I am to vote for Hillary Clinton and I’ll bet I’m not the only one. Her poll numbers with women are rising, after all. I think a lot of women are just fed up to here with the sexism they see around them every day at their own workplaces and that their male colleagues just don’t notice as they ride the testosterone escalator upwards. Six male politicians salivating to score points, two super-self-satisfied male journalists asking the questions (and what questions!), one woman who has got to know the world is just waiting for her to set a foot wrong–it makes a picture. If you’ve ever been the only woman at the meeting, on the panel, with your job, at your level, you see that picture all the time, and it’s a self-portrait.
I’m probably still going to vote for Edwards in the primary, since Clinton’s unwillingness to stand up against torture alone makes her unacceptable, but if it were any other female candidate, the identity politics issue would override a great deal of policy issues with me, and that’s a big admissions, since I’m usually a stalwart on opposing the voting-for-identity or voting-for-personality crap. (Personality maybe a little; I need to believe that a candidate can stand up for their convictions.) But this base sexism in politics is so completely out of control that drastic measures need to be taken.
As is usual with identity politics, the existence of them depends pretty much entirely on the actions of the oppressors. I don’t want to have to weigh a woman’s sex heavily in her favor, but the sexist pigs of America are making it so that we have to for the good of the nation. Call it the plague of “girl cooties”—the nation seems stuck in the 3rd grade in so many ways. Accusing someone of having girl cooties is quite possibly the most favored political slur in the country, at least against Democrats. Al Gore had Naomi Wolf as a consultant (and she told him how to dress! or that’s the rumor, probably untrue), therefore Gore has girl cooties. John Edwards (and Bill Clinton and whoever else) gets their hair done in a salon, which is something girls do, therefore girl cooties. Hillary Clinton is actually a girl, thus girl cooties out the wazoo. The fact that Republicans get their hair done and have their clothes micromanaged and even have female advisers and are occasionally women themselves doesn’t matter—being a Republican is a vaccination against girl cooties. The Shrub gave everyone an injection when he non-subtly showed off the presidential package during the “Mission Accomplished” debacle.
We as a nation need to progress from the 3rd grade to at least the 6th grade or so, considering that we’re a fucking superpower. As part of Operation Grow The Fuck Up, we need to get past the girl cooties slur, and come to the burgeoning puberty realization that girls are not poison. This is critical for the world peace, because a lot of people in this country who fear girl cooties appear to think that killing a bunch of brown people overseas is an excellent vaccination against girl cooties.*** Regularly electing high-placed female leaders, especially for President, could help those who live in bone-quaking fear of girl cooties realize what your average fucking 6th grader knows, that girl cooties are a playground legend, and not real at all. And we are in critical need of that realization, since important things like getting health care for the nation, slowing global warming, and world peace appear to hinge largely on that realization.
*For those who absolutely demand that such a competition exists and I need to weigh in on it, my sense is that for average people in 21st century America, racism is the greater ill.
**Again, I think the average black person of either gender faces more routine hostility than white women do.
***Bizarrely, some of those same people seem to think that the HPV vaccination gives you a special strain of girl cooties, called slut cooties. Go figure.
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The comparison to a racial slur–that it would have been the end of McCain’s campaign if he had laughed and gone along with it–is accurate *except* for the starting point. A woman in the audience asked McCain how he/we can beat the bitch. I can’t imagine an African-American voter in the audience posing that question (with a racial epithet at the end instead of “bitch”) to a white male candidate. The episode is horrific and should disqualify McCain from the presidency, but it’s made more complicated by what a woman did.
True, I think that it’s important to realize that the two kinds of slurs have a very different place in our society, which complicates the issue. Basically, racial slurs are more about rejecting individuals, whereas with sexism there’s a sense of rejecting The Feminine (along with individuals). Women have more room to be sexist than racial minorities to be racist against their own race, because there’s a flexibility in gender identity. Kind of, “I’m a woman, but I also agree that the feminine is degrading to the will/spirit and needs to be controlled.” Thus why so many women can be in the anti-choice movement. It’s an outlet to express internalized misogyny, to say, “Just because I’m technically a woman doesn’t mean I’m one of those Bad Women.” What they fail to understand is you can never completely escape the taint of the feminine—even men can’t do it, so how could women?
Amanda, can you you add the link to Jill’s post?
You know what I hate? Having to defend Hillary Clinton. I really don’t like her policies, her running for Senate in New York cost the Democrats a true liberal voice and actually put the seat in play, and I’d think she would be a really bad President. But then instead of getting attacked on things that matter, we get her being called names or Obama courting the Washington press by attacking her on Social Security. Will these people stop it so I can go back to not having to defend her?
Slightly offtopic, but even excluding the sexism involved in the incident, McCain comes off looking bad. If someone at an Edwards event had stood up and said “How do we beat that dick Guiliani?” and Edwards failed to immediately denounce it we would be seeing Senate resolutions condemning his campaign. McCain had no problem condemning MoveOn for the “BetrayUs” ad, but now turns around to raise money on this.
Rob, I echo what you say entirely.
I’m going to have to vote for her, because my state (VA) has its primary too late to make any difference, so the only chance I’ll really have is in the general. And I’ll have to vote for her, since by now VA has bizarrely become a swing state. And I’m not looking forward to it at all, for the reasons Amanda and Rob articulated. The only thing I like about her is that she took the best the Republican slime machine had to offer and came out on top, looking classier for it. But I hate her policies, her conservatism, and the loathsome corporatists that surround her. Yet I’m so sick of these paranoid males who never got out of early puberty that it’s going to make me marginally less reluctant to pull the lever for her.
Possible sign that America’s 3rd-graders are moving ahead:
My daughters — currently 11 and 18 — report never having heard of cooties. They seem to play a variant of the “cootie game”, but they never called them “cooties” — or anything in particular, they say.
“…thus girl cooties out the wazoo.”
That is where cooties come from, isn’t it?
I think Hillary Clinton has every right to play the woman/sexist card in this election. She should continue reminding people that there are many women eager to see her elected. In the LV debate she talked about fathers bringing their daughters to her campaign appearances, and 95 year old women wanting to see a woman elected in their life time (I’m a 70 year old man that wants to see a woman president in my life time). And she also eluded to the glass ceiling she is attempting to break.
Senator Clinton’s detractors are desperate to label her as “Just another woman.” This would let them compare her to any other woman they happen to dislike and endlessly characterize her as just a whining, privileged female like, you know, — fill in the blank with your favorite ______.
Unfortunately, there are many potential voters that are not eager to vote for Hillary under any circumstances, or so they say now. But they need some rational sounding reason to oppose her candidacy. It’s tough to say she’s not smart or accomplished. So they point to some of her policies that aren’t exactly what they like, or blather on about her legendary negatives — she’s cold, calculating, ruthless, she engages in excessive political calculation, corporate backers will manipulate her, she has a talent for parsing, and she probably can’t be elected in a general election because men won’t vote for her and it seems that a fair number of women aren’t enthralled by her either. All the familiar Clinton negatives but above all, Hillary is sooooooo polarizing. So what? In my entire voting life, I’ve never been able to vote for a presidential hopeful that I agree with 100%. And I’m sure it will never happen.
One thing this election will make crystal clear is the extreme difficulty facing any woman that runs for the highest office in the U. S. So why shouldn’t she take advantage of every card in her deck. Would Obama fail to aggressively go after the black vote? Or Richardson the Hispanic vote? Of course not. And we should never forget George Bush’s blatant attempt to characterize himself as just another good old boy. One of the guys anybody would like to have a beer with.
Is it just me or is the fact that Obama is black mostly gets ignored by the media. So why all the angst over Hillary being an obvious woman? I’m to old to get it I suppose. When I was young I opened doors for women, let them have my seat on the bus and now I’m perfectly happy to let one into the oval office. Just think, she might redecorate the place and do some much needed cleaning. Who knows?
I think Hillary Clinton has every right to play the woman/sexist card in this election. She should continue reminding people that there are many women eager to see her elected. In the LV debate she talked about fathers bringing their daughters to her campaign appearances, and 95 year old women wanting to see a woman elected in their life time (I’m a 70 year old man that wants to see a woman president in my life time). And she also eluded to the glass ceiling she is attempting to break.
Senator Clinton’s detractors are desperate to label her as “Just another woman.” This would let them compare her to any other woman they happen to dislike and endlessly characterize her as just a whining, privileged female like, you know, — fill in the blank with your favorite ______.
Unfortunately, there are many potential voters that are not eager to vote for Hillary under any circumstances, or so they say now. But they need some rational sounding reason to oppose her candidacy. It’s tough to say she’s not smart or accomplished. So they point to some of her policies that aren’t exactly what they like, or blather on about her legendary negatives — she’s cold, calculating, ruthless, she engages in excessive political calculation, corporate backers will manipulate her, she has a talent for parsing, and she probably can’t be elected in a general election because men won’t vote for her and it seems that a fair number of women aren’t enthralled by her either. All the familiar Clinton negatives but above all, Hillary is sooooooo polarizing. So what? In my entire voting life, I’ve never been able to vote for a presidential hopeful that I agree with 100%. And I’m sure it will never happen.
One thing this election will make crystal clear is the extreme difficulty facing any woman that runs for the highest office in the U. S. So why shouldn’t she take advantage of every card in her deck. Would Obama fail to aggressively go after the black vote? Or Richardson the Hispanic vote? Of course not. And we should never forget George Bush’s blatant attempt to characterize himself as just another good old boy. One of the guys anybody would like to have a beer with.
Is it just me or is the fact that Obama is black mostly gets ignored by the media. So why all the angst over Hillary being an obvious woman? I’m to old to get it I suppose. When I was young I opened doors for women, let them have my seat on the bus and now I’m perfectly happy to let one into the oval office. Just think, she might redecorate the place and do some much needed cleaning. Who knows?
Reiterate what Rob said.
I had this problem in the 90’s. Repubs would make baseless attacks on Clinton-the-male and I would be in absolute shock that not only didn’t the media expose such lies, but they would refuse to criticizes Clinton on his actual failures. The 90’s never get old, it seems.
I think Hillary Clinton has every right to play the woman/sexist card in this election. She should continue reminding people that there are many women eager to see her elected. In the LV debate she talked about fathers bringing their daughters to her campaign appearances, and 95 year old women wanting to see a woman elected in their life time (I’m a 70 year old man that wants to see a woman president in my life time). And she also eluded to the glass ceiling she is attempting to break.
Senator Clinton’s detractors are desperate to label her as “Just another woman.” This would let them compare her to any other woman they happen to dislike and endlessly characterize her as just a whining, privileged female like, you know, — fill in the blank with your favorite ______.
Unfortunately, there are many potential voters that are not eager to vote for Hillary under any circumstances, or so they say now. But they need some rational sounding reason to oppose her candidacy. It’s tough to say she’s not smart or accomplished. So they point to some of her policies that aren’t exactly what they like, or blather on about her legendary negatives — she’s cold, calculating, ruthless, she engages in excessive political calculation, corporate backers will manipulate her, she has a talent for parsing, and she probably can’t be elected in a general election because men won’t vote for her and it seems that a fair number of women aren’t enthralled by her either. All the familiar Clinton negatives but above all, Hillary is sooooooo polarizing. So what? In my entire voting life, I’ve never been able to vote for a presidential hopeful that I agree with 100%. And I’m sure it will never happen.
One thing this election will make crystal clear is the extreme difficulty facing any woman that runs for the highest office in the U. S. So why shouldn’t she take advantage of every card in her deck. Would Obama fail to aggressively go after the black vote? Or Richardson the Hispanic vote? Of course not. And we should never forget George Bush’s blatant attempt to characterize himself as just another good old boy. One of the guys anybody would like to have a beer with.
Is it just me or is the fact that Obama is black mostly gets ignored by the media. So why all the angst over Hillary being an obvious woman? I’m to old to get it I suppose. When I was young I opened doors for women, let them have my seat on the bus and now I’m perfectly happy to let one into the oval office. Just think, she might redecorate the place and do some much needed cleaning. Who knows?
There are so many good reasons to oppose Hillary Clinton that its kind of pathetic people end up attacking her because of gender.
Really, I think we’re all overreacting here.
See, it turns out that the woman who called Senator Clinton a “bitch” is part of a online forum that gives the presidential candidates nicknames based on the new fellowship candidates on “House”. Clinton is Cutthroat Bitch, Edwards is Thirteen (because he’s pretty), and Mitt Romney is, of course, Big Love. Everyone agrees that CIA Chick (aka Fred Thompson) doesn’t have a chance, but no one’s sure if “Foreman” (Al Gore) is going to enter the race or not.
[/irony]
So they point to some of her policies that aren’t exactly what they like, or blather on about her legendary negatives — she’s cold, calculating, ruthless, she engages in excessive political calculation, corporate backers will manipulate her, she has a talent for parsing, and she probably can’t be elected in a general election because men won’t vote for her and it seems that a fair number of women aren’t enthralled by her either.
It’s the policies that make me less than eager to vote for her in the primary, though I’ll jump at the chance to vote for her in the general election. What’s most interesting to me is that the other things you mentioned–the cold calculation, the parsing, the corporate backing–are all things that are considered either non-issues or strong points for male candidates, especially in the Republican party. Yet another example of how something good for the guy is bad for the woman.
It’s an issue of familiarity.
I listened to one of the all-male panels refer to the male candidates with their honorifics and surnames in tact but SEN. CLINTON only by her first name or a (usually sneering) diminutive. It’s not shocking with celebs that are household names to sling around nicknames, but when every single damn one of the rivals gets the respect of their honorifics, it’s not a sign of affection.
Familiarity should be a two way street. I call my (M) spouse, girlfriends and sisters “Bitch” in jest or when I’m angry because they know me well enough to know the difference regardless of volume or tone of voice. When they call me “Bitch” I know the context immediately.
It’s like access to my house. Friends and family give me a light knock and if the door’s not locked they can walk right in, no waiting.
Neighbors I know well: light knock, hello through an open door, walk your ass on in.
Stranger neighbors: wait till I invite them in.
Landlords, repair guys, journeymen, etc.: official notice, paper and approval beforehand.
Gov’t, law enforcement: explicit invite, else warrant or equivalent. No warrant, no entrance.
FAMILIARITY is a two-way street and the consent in all cases skews to me first.
@Stanley Evans, as a woman I’m proud that Hillary has the most polished, presidential-seeming image of all the candidates. It’s not hard, for me and apparently lots of other voters, to see her in the Oval Office, and that’s a big step for women right there. I’m with Incertus Brian: of course I’d vote for her in the general election.
I just resent the assumption that I’ve got to support her now because we both have the same reproductive equipment (and, incidentally, skin tone). She’s way too conservative for me: she’s never explained herself properly on Iraq, and she’s too cozy with Wall Street for my taste. To me, freedom means being taken seriously as a supporter of whatever candidate I find most inspiring. Right now that’s Obama (at least until his bizarre recent statements on Social Security), and race and gender have nothing to do with it.
So they point to some of her policies that aren’t exactly what they like, or blather on about her legendary negatives — she’s cold, calculating, ruthless, she engages in excessive political calculation, corporate backers will manipulate her, she has a talent for parsing,
Weren’t pretty much all those things said about her husband, though?
Hey, Amanda. I think that you’re actually referring to a post that I wrote, not Jill (I’m guest-blogging). Either that, or you accidentally linked to the wrong post, because Jill did write about it early in the week.
Yes Fruitbat, but the difference is that we liberals were willing to overlook it in him. Republicans said all these things about Bill Clinton. Many Dems were aware, but still voted for him and approved of him (if approval ratings mean anything). However, many Dems are not willing to overlook it in Hillary Clinton, which suggests sexism to me. Hell, I have a female very-liberal friend, who will admit those very things about Bill and wish he could run again. In her next breath, she will castigate Hillary and claim “I won’t vote for her just because she’s a woman because that would be reverse sexism.” I explain about reverse sexism being impossible, but she won’t budge on Hillary. I call misogyny.
I also think Dems are more likely to openly complain about our candidates’ faults. Repub get into hero worship.
Regarding #6: The only thing I like about her is that she took the best the Republican slime machine had to offer and came out on top, looking classier for it.
I don’t think we’ve seen the best the Republican slime machine has to offer quite yet. That doesn’t start until after the primaries.
I agree with much of this article (although it’s going to take an extreme act of will to vote for any of the candidates, in the general, but particularly Senator Clinton).
However, this point (in comment #2)
Basically, racial slurs are more about rejecting individuals, whereas with sexism there’s a sense of rejecting The Feminine
is incorrect. Rarely are racial slurs about rejecting individuals (or only about). In fact, I can’t think of when they are (though doubtless I am forgetting some scenarios, or something). Still, for the most part, racial slurs, even when used against an individual, are about an entire group rather than just that one person. Otherwise, why use them? That is their purpose.
I think Hillary Clinton has every right to play the woman/sexist card in this election.
It’s very telling that the rules that everyone supposedly has to play by say that you can be outrageously sexist towards a female candidate, but if she breathes a word about that, she’s the one being unfair.
I’m an independent not a Democrat, but all the things that were listed about Hillary irked me big time about Bill, too.
I have to big issues with Sen. Clinton.
One is dynasty–I don’t like the idea of two families holding on to the Presidency for a generation. It seems like nothing more than a sneaky way around term limits, and is undemocratic at its core. Watch Jeb Bush (*shudders*) run in 2016 if Sen. Clinton is elected and wins twice. I’m also not looking forward to re-living the 1990s psychodrama.
My second concern is executive power. Clinton doesn’t seem like the type of person that would relinquish any of the new powers Bush has obtained for the executive branch. And she doesn’t seem that different from him in foreign policy. Its a matter of degree, rather than real difference. They both go in the same direction. See: her vote on Iran.
Nevertheless if it comes down to Benito Giuliani and Hillary, I will vote for Hillary. Giuliani scares me more than anyone.
Nanette, you’re missing my point. Race is tied to actual people, be a group or individuals, but sexism is often about rejecting the concept of The Feminine (along with women as a group or individuals). Which is why you can be sexist towards like John Edwards by making fun of his hair or women so easily embrace sexism against other women, because The Feminine is a quality that even women feel they can run from. You don’t see Bush walking around in a tight flightsuit showing off his package to reject the Black Man Inside, but he’s certainly distancing himself from The Feminine.
I don’t think we’ve seen the best the Republican slime machine has to offer quite yet. That doesn’t start until after the primaries.
Her “stand by your man” routine when Clinton was getting hauled over the coals for that blowjob was superb. She’s probably ready for whatever they throw at her.
It amazes me that many progressives, liberals, leftists, democrats, left-leaning independents, what-have you seem to think Hillary is a conservative, corporate sell-out or whatever. My reason for not ever considering voting for Hillary has nothing to do with her gender. It has to do with the fact that after the first year of her presidency, the progressives, liberals, leftists, democrats, left-leaning independents are going to be thrilled, not able to believe just how far left her every policy, speech appointment, action really is!
I listened to one of the all-male panels refer to the male candidates with their honorifics and surnames in tact but SEN. CLINTON only by her first name or a (usually sneering) diminutive. It’s not shocking with celebs that are household names to sling around nicknames, but when every single damn one of the rivals gets the respect of their honorifics, it’s not a sign of affection.
That’s precisely the reason I refuse to refer to Sen. Clinton as Hillary, even in my writing. I don’t call Edwards or Obama or Giuliani by their first names–why should I do that to Clinton? She’s the only Clinton running this time around, so there’s no confusion as to who’s being addressed. It’s unquestionably sexism on the part of the media people who refer to her as Hillary while addressing the others in the race by their last names, either alone or with honorifics.
That’s precisely the reason I refuse to refer to Sen. Clinton as Hillary, even in my writing. I don’t call Edwards or Obama or Giuliani by their first names–why should I do that to Clinton?
Well the fact that all her campaign signs and bumper stickers say HILLARY FOR PRESIDENT doesn’t really help, does it?
Well the fact that all her campaign signs and bumper stickers say HILLARY FOR PRESIDENT doesn’t really help, does it?
I’d hope that the professionals in the media would do a little more than repeat bumper stickers. I know that’s hoping for a lot.
Isopluvial, I sure hope you’re right. There’s a part of me that wants to see Hillary — I mean, Sen. Clinton — up there taking the oath of office from that stepford dude Roberts, and then pulling a Nelson Muntz HA-ha! and announcing that health care is now free and she’s had Bush and Cheney arrested. That would be so awesome.
You’re missing the point. When the panel of knucklehead punditz refers to all of the prez candidates EXCEPT SENATOR CLINTON with their honorifics and surnames intact, it doesn’t matter if she refers to herself in one particular context by her first name only.
A bumper stick (informal) no doubt has a different salutation than official Senate business (where she’d use a more formal, full signature.) The point is, what respect is afforded the entire group?
SHE’S not responsible nor provoking their rudeness by referring to herself in one context by first name only. The lack of respect the panel of knuckleheads shows her when (by default) they HONOR all the male candidates with their (earned) HONORIFICS and titles or at least the distance of surname, but omit — and pointedly so — ONLY hers, that’s a sign of their rudeness, not a sure sign that somewhere, somehow, she MUST have invited them to be rude to her.
Felagund-
I don’t think you’ll get your wish exactly. But I believe President Clinton (the HRC one, not Bill) will attempt to outdo FDR as far as social programs go.
I can’t prove this in any rational way, only a gut feeling, but I’ll bet that if she gets a bigger majority in the House and Senate, you’ll see much higher taxes, and proposals for: some kind of gov’t involved healthcare, gov’t funded (mabe provided) daycare, greatly expanded leave with pay for many new reasons, lift caps on social security wages subject to taxation, increases on capital gains, and just fill in your favorite fantasy. She will not jerk the troops out of Iraq immediately. It will take two years. Then she’ll gut the DOD budget and expand a host of other domestic spending. It will be the dream of the left. The only gotcha in this whole thing is if the US and Global economy will let her get away with it.
Amanda wrote:
Unless I have somehow misinterpreted what you have said, you have just written that you would vote for a female candidate simply because she was female, at least were there no overriding policy issues. That doesn’t surprise me a whole lot.
But doesn’t that mean, in effect, that if it is acceptable for you to vote for a candidate because she is female then it is just as acceptable for a male to vote for a candidate because he is male or for a white person to vote for a candidate simply because he is white?
Ellie wrote:
Well, Amanda hated it when I referred to her as Miss Marcotte, because she didn’t think my use of the honorific was actualy denoting respect. (It was, but she didn’t believe that.)
However, Mrs Clinton’s campaign posters use “Hillary” without her surname, so your point is somewhat weakened. Had I been one of the questioners, I would have used the honorific, but I can see where her own campaign, by its use of “Hillary” and not “Hillary Clinton” (check out her campaign website as the example) is encouraging the use of the familiar.
SHE’S not responsible nor provoking their rudeness by referring to herself in one context by first name only. The lack of respect the panel of knuckleheads shows her when (by default) they HONOR all the male candidates with their (earned) HONORIFICS and titles or at least the distance of surname, but omit — and pointedly so — ONLY hers, that’s a sign of their rudeness, not a sure sign that somewhere, somehow, she MUST have invited them to be rude to her.
I always thought maybe she wanted to be referred to as “Hillary” because it made her seem warmer or more familiar or whatever other focus group buzz words caused her to use her first name on her sign. Maybe I was wrong.
I have heard the media often refer to Giuliani as “Rudy”, though. The talking heads on cable news often talk of “Rudy vs. Hillary”. And strangely enough, he also uses only his first name on campaign material.
I wouldn’t know which of the two oppressions is ‘worse’, since I only have one. I’m perfectly willing to believe racism is, overall. It sure looks that way to me.
It does seem that sexism is the one that’s currently less visible, and therefore harder to treat. People can’t fight what they can’t see (as Dana so amply demonstrates in his posts above).
If a man and woman of the same race apply for a job (for instance), the man generally DOES have a better chance of getting it IME. “Worse” might be a hard call, but bad enough is bad enough, and I absolutely believe sexism will be the last to go.
I’m only posting again because my other one disappeared. If it’s in moderation, sorry in advance.
Racism may be worse; I don’t know from firsthand experience, but I’m willing to believe that it is.
Sexism seems more invisible, though, and therefore harder to eradicate. Some women are prejudiced against women and the Feminine; a man and woman of the same race are NOT seen as equals.
At what point will you stop outsourcing responsibility for the knucklehead panel’s unprovoked rudeness away from them? In this context their familiarity clearly wasn’t intended as respect nor affection.
Whether the salutation of “Miss Marcotte” is affection or sneering or acceptable to both of you has nothing to do with Sen. Clinton being separated from ALL of the candidates — and targeted for this sneer by omitting her EARNED titles.
Women don’t share one brain or mindset. The knucklehead panel, however, DID in unanimously depriving Sen. Clinton, during this particular discussion, of her earned credentials. It gave the impression — and I believe this was the intention — that she didn’t have the right to be in the group, nor was qualified (nor earned it).
This separation IMO is part of a pre-SwiftBoat softening to continually force her to respond to egregious sexism so that she can then be accused of playing the gender card when she is, in fact, defending herself against sexist pigs who are first playing it themselves.
Amanda, okay, thanks for the clarification.
Dana, you’re deliberately misreading me and you know it. I said that considering how much hatred for women people like you exude, our nation (especially men like you) needs a big, fat dose of growing the fuck up. And realizing that your specific balls aren’t going to fall off under female leadership would probably help you grow the fuck up.
The irony in this is you’re flailing and grasping at straws to preserve a genuine, irrational, oppressive identity politics, i.e. you’re looking for any and every excuse to keep women out of office ‘cause they scare you. Same with the condescending “Miss Marcotte” nastiness. You know you’re going to hell for lying, right? The honorific “Miss” is not the one I use, but that’s okay, because we know you only drop it to infantilize me and put on a big show of what a big, important man you are, despite your 3rd grade fear of girl cooties.
3rd graders. We are a nation of 3rd graders.
Ellie–
When the talking heads refer to Giuliani as “Rudy” is that being inconsiderate and rude as well? I’m just curious. I’ve seen them do it quite a bit.
Boy, dana, you have a most amazing ability to ignore context. If I call all my children by nicknames except for one (assuming a large brood of children), that says something. If I call all my children by given name, except for one, that also says something. In both cases it’s likely that the difference says nothing good about how I view that one child.
AtomicFruitbat @ No. 40
I’ll presume that your obtuseness on this point isn’t deliberate.
The issue isn’t whether first name only=disrespect automatically, but whether the intent in doing so here was to separate SENATOR CLINTON, the only female candidate in the pack, from her right and earned credentials to run for president.
Whether Rudy Giuliani ever used his first name only or some other panel did, uninvited, elsewhere has nothing whatsoever to do with the knucklehead panel’s rudeness, here, in attempting to omit SENATOR CLINTON’s qualifications to run for president, and to trivialize her presence with the implication that a woman didn’t belong there.
And should she respond to this rudeness, gosh, look at all the trouble she “caused” by playing the gender card! (OMFG! Next the political landscape will experience the upheaval of having to speculate about the bathroom in the Oval Office or worry about whether someone makes the gaffe of calling it the Ovum Office!)
If we ever get to be a 6th-grade country, then when 6 male candidates all attack the 1 female candidate during a debate, it’ll mean that they like her. Ewwwww!!!!!!!!
(I’m a 70 year old man that wants to see a woman president in my life time).
It took, oh, about a week after Jenny Shipley was made PM for us to get over her having no Y chromosomes and to get to bitching(*) about her as PM (and Winston as, well, anything). Ten years later, the contest is between John Key and Helen Clark, and nobody gives a damn.
i suspect that once the first woman President is elected, you’ll be amazed how soon it starts to be considered normal - except for the 15% or so who have psychosexual issues.
(*) Strangely enough, “bitching” appears to be gender neutral. Go figure.
See, it turns out that the woman who called Senator Clinton a “bitch” is part of a online forum that gives the presidential candidates nicknames based on the new fellowship candidates on “House”.
I miss Old Fraud (Kucinich?). He was awesome.
@Ellie, so, its ok to call a male candidate by his first name only without title or last name, but to do so to the only female candidate is wrong?
Every time I think how much I prefer Edwards to the other candidates,
and every time I think about how conservative Clinton is, and how little I’ve seen from Obama,
I think about
http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/comments/the_cost_of_being_a_woman_in_science/
and figure that even *as* a feminist and progressive, I’m probably vastly underestimating her—
and, though I don’t have a similar source of numbers handy for racism, him.
It gives me a lot of hope.
Yo, Amanda, I rather vehemently disagree with your number 2 post.
Slurs are slurs are slurs. They are meant to smear the individual to an unpleasant backgound, period
Both racial and sexual slurs denigrate the reality and pertinance of indivials. Both racial and sexual slurs are about beating up on some “Other”.
We have our Michelle Malkin and Ward Connellys, you know, which is why we have terms like oreos, bananas, and apples. Everyone has an ability to sell out.
geez…
And oh yeah, as per your post:
This is not a ritual denounciation.
Just to add a little twist on things…
both Dwight Eisenhaur sp? and George W Bush both ran their elections based on nicknames.
So Atomic Fruitbat might have something.
but then again, outside of the campaign posters, the media usually referred to both of them by their given last name, with a Mr.
I trust that this is educational.
Just to add a little twist on things…
both Dwight Eisenhaur sp? and George W Bush both ran their elections based on nicknames.
It’s a good thing the latter can’t run for a third term, then, because “Vote Shithead” would be hell to get past the FCC.
karpad; Kucinich is obviously the plastic surgeon (Dr. Taub?); they’re both short.
(Amanda: I love Pandagon, but you have the WORST anti-spam measure I’ve ever seen; I’m almost NEVER able to do it right. The last letter is nearly invisible!)
I saw a bottle of that stuff at the liquor store today.
However, Mrs Clinton’s campaign posters use “Hillary” without her surname, so your point is somewhat weakened. Had I been one of the questioners, I would have used the honorific, but I can see where her own campaign, by its use of “Hillary” and not “Hillary Clinton”
And that’s why the pundits all referred to Bush as “W” during the presidential debates instead of “Mr. President.”
Oh, wait…
I agree with the post, but I also have some problems with the perfection with which Clinton is judged. She is, by far the only candidate who has an extensive history we are familiar with.
I haven’t forgotten that B. Clinton threw poor women under the bus in a compromise with the right-wing in order to win the election, but I am also aware that that ship was steered and powered by the wing-nut Congress, not Clinton.
The selection of Republicans is frightening and the wing-nut machine has run this country for over twenty years and frankly I’m sick of it and afraid of THEM. The Democrats for far too long, aside from Clinton, offered candidates to the wingnuts as if feeding red meat to the lions.
I understand and share everyone’s reservations about the Clintons — to an extent. I believe also, and I keep saying this, that no one can hate them more than H. Clinton. They attacked her on every front, they attacked her daughter, her husband. They were violated on a huge level and although I don’t see her taking revenge, I do think the wingnuttery has more reason to fear her than girl cooties — they know she knows their game and knows it well. Remember how she laughed at the Fox News ‘interviewer?” I can’t remember who and the male press ran with it — on the tone of her laugh. She scares the bee jesus out of them.
The progressive movement has grown and changed since the early 90’s and especially the 80’s, and I am confident that any democratic president will have their feet held to the fire and the candidates and particularly Clinton, who is a political animal, I think knows thisl.
Aside from that, I do identify strongly with H. Clinton, if only because I am a small business woman in a non-traditional field and I am constantly fighting off and being ambushed by the same type of sexism that is following her.
Frankly, the media’s obsession with her betrays their willingness to play to the lowest denominator to get ratings (as if we didn’t already know that) and what gets ratings more than sex and teh ladees! H. Clinton musses all that up and the boys are in a dither as well.
This country needs a woman president badly, we women need a woman in a leadership role so, yes, this country can move onto the next grade of accepting women as possibly human.
No, its not all identity politics for me, but the media is pushing me close, if for nothing else, than to prove that my identity is valid.
WTF!
This is totally over the line:
Let’s, as we physists often do do a ‘thought experiment’ instead of McCain ‘being agreeable…’ to this sexist slur on a Presidential candidate imagine if you will it’s Tom Tancredo being addressed by one of his supporters who sez:
. And Ol’ Tom sez: ‘Sounds good to me!’ If I understand you that’s Okay because he’s just doing what he has to do to get the guy’s vote.Right?
This is one of the big things wrong with the current political culture…
It’s accepted that politicians be lying, Racist, Sexist, Nativists on the take from coporate America.
Sorry, but I will take a pass on approving that or anything that even smells like approval of anything even remotely resembling that.
However, Mrs Clinton’s campaign posters use “Hillary” without her surname, so your point is somewhat weakened. Had I been one of the questioners, I would have used the honorific,
Which honorific, Dana? “Mrs.” or “Senator”?
Oh, never mind. “Whoosh”.
Also, PiaToR, I think “bitching”, almost by definition, is not gender-neutral.
It works equally well as an insult when used against men or women, but certainly originated as a “denigration of the Feminine”, as Amanda put it. After all, when men complain, it’s SERIOUS. If a man’s “bitching”, he’s behaving like a “bitch”–feminine, not serious. “Bitching” is what the powerless do–it’s a put down of those who complain while also implying that their complaints are petty.
Sentor Clinton is a strange case for me. I disagree with her on a whole host of issues, and dislike her style. What causes me to defend her anyway, is just seeing the sheer weight of unbelievably childish, petty, stupid, nonsensical, vindictive, mythological, misogynist, feverish horseshit that her detractors hurl at her. The other day I was watching this amazing piece of propaganda on Youtube which not only used incredible right-wing projection is accusing Democrats of supporting Ms. Clinton out of dumb fear, but also made a host of completely spurious, and even nonsensical accusations about Ms. Clinton and her husband, saying that they had killed people, or were in cahoots with other governments- I can’t even remember it all. These were accusations that had been made against Bill Clinton by various extreme partisans, and as I remember, the more sane accusations had been thrown out of court. The less sane accusations had never been considered by anyone but the tabloids.
I hear the unbelieveable bullshit that is hurled at that woman again and again by partisans of the right wing, and worse, reapeated by otherwise completely normal-seeming people. It blows my mind again and again. When I hear adults accuse her of being a bad wife, or say that secretly a socialist, or call her a witch, it is like I am faced with a spoiled, nasty child, ready to start some mischeif, in the body of an adult. I want to reach out and slap that child, thinking that that is the only way that they could possibly remember the lesson that lying is bad, and that words have consequences.
It is the kind of person who is against Hillary Clinton that makes me defend her, despite myself.
Sentor Clinton is a strange case for me. I disagree with her on a whole host of issues, and dislike her style. What causes me to defend her anyway, is just seeing the sheer weight of unbelievably childish, petty, stupid, nonsensical, vindictive, mythological, misogynist, feverish horseshit that her detractors hurl at her. The other day I was watching this amazing piece of propaganda on Youtube which not only used incredible right-wing projection is accusing Democrats of supporting Ms. Clinton out of dumb fear, but also made a host of completely spurious, and even nonsensical accusations about Ms. Clinton and her husband, saying that they had killed people, or were in cahoots with other governments- I can’t even remember it all. These were accusations that had been made against Bill Clinton by various extreme partisans, and as I remember, the more sane accusations had been thrown out of court. The less sane accusations had never been considered by anyone but the tabloids.
I hear the unbelieveable bullshit that is hurled at that woman again and again by partisans of the right wing, and worse, reapeated by otherwise completely normal-seeming people. It blows my mind again and again. When I hear adults accuse her of being a bad wife, or say that secretly a sociali5t, or call her a witch, it is like I am faced with a spoiled, nasty child, ready to start some mischeif, in the body of an adult. I want to reach out and slap that child, thinking that that is the only way that they could possibly remember the lesson that lying is bad, and that words have consequences.
It is the kind of person who is against Hillary Clinton that makes me defend her, despite myself.
Here is that steaming pile of crap on Youtube that I mentioned, if anyone wants to see what I meant.
Luckily, he’s gonna lose anyway.
In addition to everything people have already brought up about the McCain video, I’m also way creeped out by the guy yelling “I thought you were talking about my ex-wife!” Unless I’m mistaken, he’s cracking wise about a clear and direct act of domestic violence, of violence against women. And everyone laughs. Ugh. Because violent misogyny is just so damn funny.
Well, Cara, you can always say “kvetching” instead. That’s a fine old Yiddish word, and it’s gender neutral.
I resent the characterization of certain traits as feminine, and I don’t think we should think of nurturing or assertiveness or anything like that gendered. We may deal with people thinking some generally thought of traits as feminine and so denigrated as such, but the truth is, *any* trait at all that is inconvenient to those who make the demands will be thought of as degraded with whatever terms suitable for the Other.
We really kinda have to try and degenderize and deraciallize traits in our public discourse!
/me looks at Blue Jean’s comment…
aaaaaaAAAAArrrrrghhh!
I’m not sure that “bitch” used in an abstract sense is necessarily sexist. When I was a teenager in Southern California in the 60’s,
bitchin'meant “great”, “fantastic”. Nowadays, saying “life’s a bitch” isn’t quite the opposite, but close. And “bitching” about something is about as neutral as the use of “fucking” as an indiscriminate adjective. The roots may be sexual but the sense is not.“Bitch” gets by because, among other things, it has a legitimate specialized use (a female dog), it has the common usages mentioned above, and because not a few women, including some friends of mine, have embraced its use, however ironically (”Zero to bitch in 10 seconds!” &c).
This sort of puts it in the same category as “nigger”, in that you’re free to use it only if it’s used to refer to you. I’d never use it to describe my friends, not least because I value them for being such strong, competent and assertive individuals.
The lack of parallel terms for male or white isn’t all that surprising, but probably most nasty epithets that aren’t racist or sexist imply a white male. “Asshole” is the first thing that comes to my mind.
“Prick” and “pussy” also have common alternate meanings, but referring to people by their reproductive organs remains generally offensive.
This is another one of those hilarious”they just don’t fucking get it” threads.
Here’s a question: if it’s insulting to call people a genitalia perjorative, which is z more insulting thing to call a man…a prick or a pussy? Why is the chosen term more of an insult?
Here in Florida, Jeb Bush ran for office and had that stupid “Jeb!” logo everywhere. I can assure you that the press did not refer to him as “Jeb!” when talking about him, though (it would be unprofessional to be a journalist and refer to such an important person in such a manner). I can’t help but think that people who are still maintaining that a panel who referred to HRC by her first name and everyone else by their title was not being disrespectful are being insincere (to put it charitably). The lack of respect accorded in that situation is glaringly obvious.
Compare and contrast:
A male among many male candidates;
The only female candidate among many male candidates.
Run it slowly and calmly through the sifting, sorting and comparative pocesses of your mind. Then accept that your obtuseness in this regard, whether deliberate or innate, is why more people aren’t defaulting towards the presumed placement of men at the top of the political heirarchy.
(And thanks for playing.)
Sheesh: prick and pussy are two different insults. The first calls him a malefactor, the second a weakling. I’m really not sure what calling a guy a cunt means; I think it’s chiefly a British usage. My impression is that it’s closer to asshole than wimp, but I really have no idea.
About calling Hillary by her first name: there’s a problem, which you touched on by bringing up Jeb Bush. When I read “Clinton did X” I think of Bill before I realize they mean Hillary. “Senator Clinton” removes the ambiguity, and is of course how she should be addressed. But as a slogan, “Senator Clinton for President” has a problem.
“Clinton” is ambiguous. So is John: Edwards or McCain? Mike: Huckabee or Gravel?
I see promise in Rudy: Rudy Toot Toot! Rudy Fruity! Rudy Patootie! Besides, no one can spell Giuliani.
And, you know, Hillary and Tenzing climbed Mt. Everest for the first time. Perhaps you’d have to be my age for that to be a subliminal encouragement, but we geezers vote.
Then accept that your obtuseness in this regard, whether deliberate or innate, is why more people aren’t defaulting towards the presumed placement of men at the top of the political heirarchy.
Men at the top of the political hierarchy? Gee, the front runner for the Presidential nomination of the political party that controls both houses of Congress and the majority of governorships and state legislatures is a woman. What a sexist nation we live in!
Also, PiaToR, I think “bitching”, almost by definition, is not gender-neutral.
It works equally well as an insult when used against men or women, but certainly originated as a “denigration of the Feminine”, as Amanda put it. After all, when men complain, it’s SERIOUS. If a man’s “bitching”, he’s behaving like a “bitch”–feminine, not serious. “Bitching” is what the powerless do–it’s a put down of those who complain while also implying that their complaints are petty.
Up to you. I was applying it to a collective group of people, including myself.
Am I the only one around who remembers when bitchin’ was the highest term of praise, or was that just local surfer usage?
Hillary Clinton is unique in being the first spouse of a U.S. president to run for office. There’s no way she’s going to be treated like the rest of the guys. First woman candidate, first First Lady candidate, and if elected would make the line of succession sound like a stutter: Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton.
So be it. She’s not my first choice. She reminds me too much of Dianne Feinstein, one of my senators, hawkish and pro-business, well to my right. She’s looking better all the time, but in the primary I’ll probably vote for Edwards or Obama.
Nevertheless, I’d be proud to vote for her next November.
Same here, in Germany. But I wish I could say that the sexism is over once the election is won.*
*Apparently the Economist has praised Frau Merkel for “her mix of intelligence and female modesty”. Oh dear. Then there was the constant assessment of how she’s dressing - whether she’s being stylish enough. (George W Bush giving her a surprise shoulder massage doesn’t count, bc obviously he’d done that with Kohl as well.)
AtomicFruitbat @ 71
Were the office of President held by a woman for the same uninterrupted run of years that a man has — plus one — you’d get to whine all you want about whether SEN CLINTON’s candidacy is sexist.
But not till then.
Now how about answering, disputing, or refuting all of the arguments upstream that you’ve deflected? I think you’ve run out of corner to paint yourself into, and for my part, until you answer the previous arguments, I’m not indulging any new ones.
You know, I agree with you on Clinton, I’d rather Edwards got the vote for a number of reasons, as I am rather leery of Clinton getting the vote for a number of reasons. Honestly though, when I hear people (particularly dems) talking about how they definitely won’t vote if the primaries yield Clinton vs. random republican I can’t help but want to scream at them. I mean what’s the matter with you? Sure I hate “lesser of two evils” voting but that doesn’t mean it isn’t the lesser of two evils compared to just sitting back and letting a guy who thinks Intelligent Design is a valid scientific study of the origin of species into office.
As for the word “bitch” is it just New Yorkers are are other people starting to use it as a gender-neutral term (kind of like guys)? I’d like it if we could get some non-group-specific offensive slurs, I mean Bastard is kind of unfair since it hearkens back to the days when we blamed kids for what their parents did (and to the days when having a kid out of wedlock was considered a sin, we seriously need to modernize our insults).
“Asshole” works for me.
It’s harsh, gender-neutral, and nothing good comes from it.
Ladies and Gentleman, I present you irrational Clintom hatred in its purest form!
Isopluvial:
“I can’t prove this in any rational way, only a gut feeling, but I’ll bet that if she gets a bigger majority in the House and Senate, you’ll see […], and just fill in your favorite fantasy.”
Just fill in your fantasy, indeed.
Look, what do we about H. Clinton. We know about her as a political sister-in-arms of B. Clinton. In this case she is a moderate. We know of her voting record. If you arrange all democratic senators in lweft to right order. H. Clinton will be 25 or 26. Either the most moderate liberal or the most liberal moderate.
So based on the facts, you can claim H.Clinton is not a moderate, but a liberal-moderate. Not more.
Regarding Merkel (not called Angie much), you became used to a woman chancellor fast.
Regarding Miss Marcotte: If I want to needle my female friends. I call them Fräulein. So “missing” Amanda is indeed a form of insult, like calling someone (young) master.
Regarding Hillary. That is not an insult. People who wanted to insult the last pope called him Karol Woityla, people who want to insult the current one call him Ratzinger. If you want to diminish Romney, you call him Willard instead of Mitt.
Hillary makes H. Clinton special like Oprah or John and Paul back in the day. (Or Evita)
There were one or two politicians in Germany who changed their legal name to their political nickname.
“Bitch” should be a title worn with pride. It means you’re a pioneer. The guys resent the fact that they work for a woman, and complain a lot, at first. It gets easier quickly if you’re good at what you do.
Amanda wrote:
You might have noticed that, after a couple of requests, I did drop it. You might also have noticed that I always use the honorific, in reference to everybody for whom I have a last name; that hardly singles out you are one to whom the honorific was aplied to somehow snear at you, unless it is done to snear at everybody. Since I use it in connection with people I do support, that couldn’t be the case.
Ot have you somehow assumed that because I disagree with your politics, I must somehow hate you or “infantilize” you? Has it never occurred to you that I could respect someone with whom I disagree?
Amanda wrote:
How have I misread your statement,
in thinking that is a justification of voting based on identity or group membership? You called that statement “a big admission” yourself.
As for me, I don’t need to look “for any and every excuse to keep women out of office,” because I neither need nor make excuses for how I or anyone else votes: our votes are completely within our discretion, and we can base them on whatever criteria we choose. It is perfectly legitimate for someone to vote for (or against) a candidate necause of age, religion, race, gender, personality, height, weight, appearance, whatever the voter chooses as his standard, because our votes are entirely our own. I was just happy to see you agree to it — sort of — and trying to pin you down on the simple issue: do you take a distinction between whether it is legitimate to vote for a candidate because she is female, but not to vote against a candidate because she is female?
I had this problem in the 90’s. Repubs would make baseless attacks on Clinton-the-male and I would be in absolute shock that not only didn’t the media expose such lies, but they would refuse to criticizes Clinton on his actual failures. The 90’s never get old, it seems.
Exactly. We’ve been down this road before. A lot of good progressives defended (Bill) Clinton because of the outrageous viciousness of his rightwing antagonists. What did we get for our troubles? The Democratic Party (and with it the Overton Window) moved decisively rightward, NAFTA and GATT, further corporate consolidation of the media (as well as an outrageous extension of copyright law), “regime change” in Iraq as the law of the land, “don’t ask don’t tell,” expansion of the War on Drugs and the federal death penalty, and the destruction of our modest welfare safety net. And we would have gotten privatization of Social Security, too, if Gingrich and the rest of the GOP leadership hadn’t decided that they preferred impeachment to working with Clinton on destroying the legacy of the New Deal.
The enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend. Regardless of the intuitions of wingnuts, a (Hillary) Clinton presidency won’t be good for progressives. Look at her policies, her supporters, and her advisers.
The last thing this country needs after the Bush presidency is a center-right Democrat who will institutionalize many of the policies of the Bush years, but will be treated by the press and the GOP as a crazy leftist. Far from being able to improve the Democratic Party after Clinton’s election–as progressive Democrats often promise while supporting non-progressive Democratic candidates–progressive Democrats will spend most of their time defending Clinton from outrageous rightwing attacks (as they were forced to do during the presidency of Bill Clinton).
Short of electing another Republican, there’s no surer formula for moving the country still further to the right.
I will say this for the impulse to fight back against Clinton’s misogynistic critics: it beats the hell out of the inclination to nominate John Kerry in 2004 because nominating a war hero would supposedly insulate the Democrats from attacks on their patriotism. But, as Amanda herself demonstrates in this post, it’s perfectly possible to defend Clinton from the more outrageous attacks against her without supporting her candidacy.
What causes me to defend her anyway, is just seeing the sheer weight of unbelievably childish, petty, stupid, nonsensical, vindictive, mythological, misogynist, feverish horseshit that her detractors hurl at her.
And the left is only marginally less guilty of hurling said horseshit that the right. I have had it up to here with Clinton opponents in the Democratic Party ascribing all manner of psychopathology to everything shes says and does. Substance, anyone?
Whatever, Dana. Flailing around misreading me—pretending that “we need a woman so that assholes like Tucker Carlson and Dana can just get over it already” is the same as “we need a woman BECAUSE I HATE MEN BWAH HA HA”—is feeding the anti-woman machine. Why do you feed it? Gosh, because maybe you’re a sleazy sexist.
Your attempts, by the way, to conceal your rancid sexism have failed in the past. Surely you remember the “feminists ruined the family” egg that’s still on your face? And needless to say, Senorita Dana, your attempts to pretend that using a diminutive honorific on me are “respectful” only work if you think my audience is as stupid as you are.
You might have noticed that, after a couple of requests, I did drop it.
A woman has to say no a couple of times, and then you’ll stop and then continue to whine about how mean she is. And you want a cookie? “I treat women with a full 40% of the respect I offer men! Why are you bitching so much?” Well, Mrs. Dana’s Wife’s Last Name, pardon me if I think your “politeness” is insincere.
I think that our sense of strangeness, of otherness, is greater in contemplating people of different races and cultures, which can lead, in the anxious and insecure, to fear and its attendant bad behavior. But for men, the women they grow up with are usually the same race and culture so seem less threatening. Thus the horrid excesses of racism are surpassing.
But we have further to go to eliminate sexism than racism in America and the world. The practice of racism may be horrifying in many places in America, but the sexism is more stubbornly pervasive. We may practice both, but we preach that racism is wrong while still preaching women’s inferiority.
The most vacuous news readers in this country take it as a given that racism is wrong (however much they may betray a secret racism), but still think there’s a debate about whether women should control their bodies like men control theirs. The impression our culture gives that the fight against racism is further along than the fight against sexism was formalized politically by the fact that black men got the vote more than 50 years before women did.
We may have treated blacks worse than women (even still, black women were, and are treated worse than black men on balance), but we justified both by the false insistence that blacks and women were intellectually inferior, and childlike. Today those who claim blacks are inferior intellectually are more to the fringe than those who claim women are. Witness the “debate” about whether women’s brains are inferior when it comes to science.
I think the reason for this, which makes sexism a much more intractable problem than racism, is that women suffer belittlement from a persistent childhood impression that is universal among boys and girls growing up, and that is that a bigger kid is smarter, stronger, older, in short, the boss. That men seem more aggressive than women on average just ratifies the impression in many male (and female) minds, that men are the adults and women are more childlike.
Black men don’t suffer this disadvantage. One can imagine a day when Asian or African peoples dominate the paler races, but it is very difficult to imagine a universal oppression of men by women.
Sexism is worse than racism. The former is bred of pride, the latter of fear. We want to conquer our fears, but we treasure our pride.
Bitch” should be a title worn with pride. It means you’re a pioneer. The guys resent the fact that they work for a woman, and complain a lot, at first. It gets easier quickly if you’re good at what you do.
Yeah, to you it’s a title worn with pride, or as someone else said, a ‘gender neutral insult’.
To 90% of the country, it is what it always was- an insult toward women.
Amanda Marcotte:
You’re too generous. Damn liberals, always grading on the curve.
Cara wrote:
Senator, at least in the first instance. When writing, I intentionally vary the position title and the Mr or Mrs usage, simply to make the prose better. A panelist directing questions would have less of a concern about prose.
IM
I freely admit to an “irrational” response to HRC.
However, it is not hatred, it is fear. I believe that she is talented, intelligent, has high ambitions, is surrounded by capable, highly driven staff who will work at the edge of their capabilities to assure her victory. I believe she was and is capable of voting for any stinky bill during her senate time in order to establish a moderate-centrist track record. I believe she believes in her own mission so strongly that any action to get herself elected is necessary and justifed. Its just that I don’t like her anticipated position on almost every policy she’s likely to pursue. Not the person, the policies.
Amanda wrote:
Oh, gee, I’m just so offended! It is somewhat interesting, though, that you think the feminine honorifics are an insult. Do you really believe that being female somehow dishonors a person?
Isopluvial,
I wish I could agree with you. Other than wingnut propaganda, what evidence do you have that Clinton is some sort of ultra-liberal?
(And this is what I’m reduced to with Hillary Clinton…praying that the right is actually correct that she’s some sort of socialist. But given her track record in the Senate–and the wingnuts’ track record on everything else–I don’t have much hope.)
It might be that she’s been cultivating moderate-centrist leanings to get elected, with the intent of working at bringing the country into reality once in office.
I know, I know. But I have a dream.
Her positions bother me, but the positions of the girl-cootie whiners scare me more. They’ve got the status quo behind them, and it’s a hell of a lot easier for them to keep giggling in the clubhouse than to grow up. I can at least hope that Clinton wants to do good; I have no such illusions about the adult Boys’ Clubs of America.
It is somewhat interesting, though, that you think the feminine honorifics are an insult. Do you really believe that being female somehow dishonors a person?
Wow, are you really this clueless? Maybe you come from a non-western-European country or maybe you’ve just had your blinders on for the past 30 years, but I don’t know you made it to adulthood without realizing that the “feminine honorific” you refer to is actually a mark of male ownership.
In the “Mrs Husband’s Last Name” construction, it’s not the “Mrs/mistress” that’s the problem: it’s the “husband’s last name”–showing that the woman belongs to the man.
Being “female” is not an insult: being “property” is.
As a Latino, I am tired of the foolish racism v. misogyny “competition,” especially when misogynists of color use it to justify anti-female intolerance and hate as a “cultural” difference or attack the questioning of such bigotry by people of color as “racist.” As long as women and girls are human beings they will be entitled to basic human rights, which bigotry attempts to deny them. That simple fact–female humanity–is undeniable and, thus, cannot be made a trivial matter just because other forms of bigotry exist. Besides, who the hell says one cannot fight misogyny and racism?
I hope that all women and girls will shout down these bigoted fools, especially considering that not only have women and girls always been a source of brutal slavery, but they are currently enslaved today in a global rape trade where “customers” pay traffickers to ruthlessly torture, even kill, women and girls. One knows that if blacks were enslaved today on such a scale in a similar torture trade, it would incite epidemic levels of violent anti-black racism.
Let me put it this way: I’m not scared of a racist attacking me on day-to-day basis (if ever), but my sister always fears a misogynist attacking her–and she has every reason to.
Dana, what do you get out of commenting here? I’m genuinely curious. You don’t get respect or admiration, very few agree with you, you don’t sway anyone’s opinion. It seems to be a pretty thankless job.
Are you really trying to learn anything about the “opposition”, or just kind of trying to be a grain of sand in our collective vagina? (Trying to be a pest is at least fourth grade behavior, so I guess you could say you’re more mature than the average “girl cootie” whiner).
Flailing really is a great word to describe Dana’s output.
I really don’t think we should be bothering with all the question of what ism is worse than what other ism.
Pretty much all isms have fairly complex roles in society that makes it hard to identify what is a “pure” ism. For instance, Jackson’s sister and a white women may fear rape, but the latina might have more reason to fear rape, or to fear the consequences of rape than the white woman. I don’t know if this is the case, but I do know that racism and sexism interact in a myriad of ways.
In the end, it’s just counterproductive to argue or assert whether racism or sexsim is worse. Bigots and sexist (and most are both, because all the isms come from the same place), love the play against the middle with a variety of tactics (mostly several variants of concern trolling) in order to prevent effectual solutions to many general societal problems.
Yeah, to you it’s a title worn with pride, or as someone else said, a ‘gender neutral insult’.
I said that it, used as a verb, was “gender neutral”, and I wasn’t applying it as an insult - I was one of those bitching about the Shipley government.
An interesting point to bring up here is the word “suck”, which my mother informed me was a loaded sexual word when she first heard me use it, way back in the days of the dinosaurs.
To 90% of the country, it is what it always was- an insult toward women.
Mmm - perhaps part of the difference in perspective is that I and the people I talk to are not one of the 90% OR the 10%.
Oh, gee, I’m just so offended! It is somewhat interesting, though, that you think the feminine honorifics are an insult. Do you really believe that being female somehow dishonors a person?
Nope. I think being a woman is great and I wouldn’t trade it for the world But I think treating one sex as defined by their marital status and the other as human beings with their own names is dishonoring, yes.
Why do you think that I’m not a woman unless you define me by my marital relationship? Do you think that because I use the honorific “Ms” instead of the demeaning “Miss” that I’m not a woman? Why do you think “woman” is a category defined by being second class instead of being biologically female and adult? Do you think women are “adults” in the same sense that men—who get to have adult honorifics, by the way—are?
Do you think it’s polite to make a big, head-patting show of how much you don’t respect someone by pretending to respect them? When you call me “Miss Marcotte”, I’m reminded of the way that adults who are belittling children suddenly switch to the honorific. When the child is behaving, she is called by her first name. When she is bad, either by her full name or with an honorific. How many times did I hear growing up, “Miss Amanda Marie Marcotte, get over here and clean up this mess right now!” The fact that you are deliberately addressing me as a child is noted and you’re not fooling a single soul with your disingenuous protestations.
Cara asked:
A few things, actually. Sure, I love tweaking the opposition, but you probably guessed that. Second, it’s actually a bit boring to visit only those sites with which I mostly agree. There is a challenge in visiting sites like this. To me, this is fun! Third, I actually do get a little bit of back-traffic, which a small-potatoes blogger can never resist.
The Liberal Avenger used to be my lib site of choice, but that site has gone downhill in the past half year or so, as LA himself has mostly withdrawn.
Amanda, the honorific “Miss” refers to an unmarried woman; there is no implication made of age or maturity. I already knew your age, 29 when the Edwards campaign flap (where I first heard of you) arose, and I didn’t miss the posting regarding turning thirty.
No, I’m not addressing you as a child; I’m addressing you with the manners instilled in me by my mother, which I believe to be a good set. Perhaps you don’t or can’t believe that, but it’s true nevertheless. I’m guessing that had I been using “Ms Marcotte,” you’d have still taken exception.
As I recall, you didn’t like the way I referred to my daughters, as “our older daughter” or “our younger daugter,” thinking it was some sort of attempt at showing possession. It was, rather, not putting their names out on the internet, my last name being obvious on my site, if not commonly used here. I suspect that I’ll never persuade you of that, either.
Perhaps you don’t believe that a person can respect, as a person, someone with whom he disagrees, rather vociferously, on politics or religion or what have you. You have a growing set of accomplishments that I have to respect: a book about to be published, far more fame and notice on the internet than I have achieved, and a much larger audience. And every human being deserves respect simply for being a human being. Your politics and judgements I find foolish, but so what?
Isopluvial,
fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to the dark side of power…
Seriously, you dislike H. Clinton because of policy positions you anticipate. But you don’t have the smallest scintilla of evidence for your anticipations. All evidence points to a moderate democrat just like B. Clinton.
So I think your irrationalism is not a good guide to political decisions like your next presidential vote.
“Your politics and judgements I find foolish, but so what?”
Right back at ya, Dana.
Having said that, you and your trollish friends do (sometimes) perform a valuable, if irritating, service - we should be able to explain ourselves so that even the least of you can understand. You won’t agree with what is said, but the effort on our part may make us stronger…
Amanda, the honorific “Miss” refers to an unmarried woman; there is no implication made of age or maturity.
But there is an implication made of marital status, which the honorific “Mr.” doesn’t imply, which is what Amanda was actually objecting to. You seem to have overlooked her actual criticism to answer one she didn’t make. How curious.
Dana, what do you get out of commenting here?
I’m going to add to the gentleman’s response by suggesting that being reminded of the misfortunes of others is a great comfort to the smug and self-satisfied, especially when one receives social benefits in proportion to their suffering. It’s even better when one can accuse one’s inferiors of being responsible for their own misfortune, alternately laugh gently at and object virtuously to their accusations of one’s own complicity in their suffering, and turn off the computer and return to one’s own charmed life a little bit more entertained and cheerful.
I think trolls hang out at places like this because it’s just plain boring to talk about their dull, vicious, hateful politics among themselves.
They are a dying breed, anyway. They will lose in the end. Progress doesn’t care how right you think you are when you’re ultimately wrong.
Junk Science wrote:
Not sure how that works, since everyone who visits and comments here has access to a computer and the internet, which makes everyone here better off than a majority of the people in the world.
My family is probably better off than most of the people who visit here, but we’re still not wealthy; that doesn’t make me better than the people who earn less, or worse than those who make more.
But yes, in a lot of cases people are complicit in their own misfortunes. If someone drops out of school, a decision by people who are much too young to be taking such decisions, that person is responsible for whatever bad results obtain from that decision, and the fact he was too immature to take such a decision does not alter that in the least. If someone fathers a child he never intended to, and feels himself unjustly “stuck” with eighteen years of child support payments, we may have sympathy for his economic plight and whatever opportunities he lost, but he is still responsible for the consequences of his actions, whether he intended those consequences or not.
Dana says,
This reminds me of a recent post by Dizzy Buzzkill in which she likens some of her commenters to “tardy, unprepared…freshman boys” in a women’s studies class “who are taking it in order to get what they think will be an east A and to sharpen their debate skills”. These freshman, Dizzy continues, think that “feminism is just a debate topic. An academic exercise….And I’m getting the sense that they think women experience it that way too”.
But for many of us here (both male and female), discussing entrenched sexism is not just a “fun” way to alleviate “boredom”. Perhaps that is why we demand better logic and better faith than Dana demonstrates with such pearls as this:
Finally, Dana tells Amanda,
“Perhaps you don’t believe that a person can respect, as a person, someone with whom he disagrees….”, then finishes up with this:
“Your politics and judgements [sic] I find foolish, but so what?”
Dana may find this point vanishingly subtle, but I don’t broadly characterize the politics and judgments of those with whom I respectfully disagree as “foolish”; neither do my colleagues. Nor do we refer to those with whom we respectfully disagree as “the opposition”. Dana’s language betrays him.
Progress doesn’t care how right you think you are when you’re ultimately wrong.
_Roe vs Wade_ was how long ago? Did winning that de jure battle ensure de facto victory - how many counties lack abortion faculties because of pressure from the Right?
Oh, I think that people can respect someone with whom they disagree. I just think that Dana can’t respect a non-compliant woman, because he needs a false sense of superiority to boost his ego. It’s sad, actually, this need to pester and take potshots—don’t have anything intrinsic to feel good about?
And I’d say pester, not tweak. Tweaking implies cleverness, of which there is none to Dana. It doesn’t take any brains to just be a pain in the ass, and it’s doubly sad that you mix up being an annoying twit with being cute and clever. Male privilege is quite the beast, isn’t it? Having people blow smoke up your ass and pretend you’re smart until you believe it? Sad.
Well, he did say it’s a ‘challenge’ for him when he visits. What the challenge is I’m not sure…I mean besides the obvious ones to his reading ability, intelligence, frame of reference, etc. Maybe he can’t handle Sudoku, but he can type, so here he is to ward off Alzheimer’s.
No, I’m not addressing you as a child; I’m addressing you with the manners instilled in me by my mother, which I believe to be a good set.
Dana, It is completely and patently obvious to every single individual who reads this thread that you are attempting to needle Ms. Marcotte by addressing her as a child. Your protestations convince no-one. Please stop.
@Shah8: The reason I included my sister’s daily fears versus my own, as a latin male, is to show how serious misogyny truly is when its conventional wisdom to dismiss it as a more trivial concern compared to racism (or antisemitism or homophobia). Misogyny is commonly trivialized as “disrespect” while every other bigotry is called out as such. Again, I did it to highlight how serious misogyny actually is. If you actually bothered reading my post, you could tell that I rail against any “competition.”
What I want is for misogyny to be recognized as the bigotry that it is, taken as seriously as any other form of intolerance and hate rather than being confused with either rudeness, frank sexual banter, or “cultural” difference. Basically: for women and girls to be recognized as actual human beings.
Well, no one ever said progress happens overnight. *shrugs* It happens, though, in the end.
I have a collection of articles on women’s status, written by anthropologists (including Alice Schlegel and Peggy Sanday). I recall one article, name forgotten but author is Igor Kopytoff (a memorable name, I think!). Kopytoff explored the question of why the US has so few women leaders, when countries like India and Pakistan, which supposedly lag in gender equality, have or had them. To the best of my recollection, Kopytoff concluded that in the US, the qualities that are considered quintessentially “feminine” and those considered quintessentially “leaderlike” are so at odds that it’s hard for us to reconcile ourselves to women leaders. Whereas countries like India might oppress women in other ways, but there is a strong tradition of deference to older, upper-class women, and class/family connections often trump gender when it comes to leadership. “She is a woman” fades into the background compared with “She is older and high-ranking.”
India, btw, has matriarchal societies - the Nayars and Khasi come to mind. Kerala in the south has a strong tradition of gender equality (it’s where the Nayars live) and ranks very high on literacy and quality of life despite its poverty.
And did you know that the Philippines outranks the US on gender equality? The Philippines has the highest percentage of female executives in the world. A visiting Filipina friend told me she thinks that the US is very sexist by comparison to her own country, in many ways, and that there is a strong tradition of gender equality there - the Philippines were egalitarian until the Spanish and Catholic Church colonized them.
Dana: If someone drops out of school, a decision by people who are much too young to be taking such decisions, that person is responsible for whatever bad results obtain from that decision, and the fact she was too immature to take such a decision does not alter that in the least.
And yet, Dana, from what you’ve previously said on your own blog and elsewhere, you’d rather prevent a 14-year-old girl from getting access to contraception, force a 14-year-old girl to carry a baby to term against her will, force her to drop out of school because she cannot continue her studies rather than provide her with economic help to care for the baby and free childcare so she can continue at school. And now, you say you would also hold her responsible for “whatever bad results obtain from that decision” - your decision, to deny her contraception, abortion, and education.