Rant - "the woman candidate"
Aug. 30th, 2008 07:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
doc_strangeThose of you expecting a rant against the Republicans on this score, you're about to be disappointed. Nor is it praise for them. Nor anything about the Democrats.
Let's talk a little about Governor Palin. Oh, wait, don't I mean "Sarah Palin?" No, after all, we complained the press weren't calling Senator Clinton by her title while calling her opponents by theirs, as that's demeaning; but Palin, we're gonna never use her title? Strike one. You know who you are. Shame, shame. You can demean her by leaving off her office when you buck the party and fight your way to an office supervising over half a million people and over a half a million square miles.
If she were less comely, I suspect her actual history of 2 years in office might be in discussion rather than her looks. Admittedly, of course that's not a long time in high office - but how about we actually, you know, discuss it? Senator Obama is just as inexperienced and he's at the top of the ticket, and we HAVE discussed it.
Yesterday and today, I've read (all from people I took for social liberals) comments on her being a "bimbo," a "whore," a "walking uterus," "a token," and even some worse. Very interesting. Not a word on her actual 2 years as governor - for example, bucking the party on constitutional issues on the advice of the state attorney general, bucking party line by obeying court orders, renegotiating critical contracts with big oil, and opening up pipeline bids to international takers (Canadian company won), etc. I guess I have to ask if her 2 years as a governor are too little, then why are Obama's as a Senator not? Closet misogyny, that's why. If McCain had picked Liberman, would we be talking about the token Jew, a Kike, a Himey? Would Jindal be a token Indian (and he's really, really young), or called a "baby [ethnic slur here]"?
The obsession of looks->negatives is mostly coming from the general left, and maybe that's slanted because my friends' list is generally very left - but reading this outpouring of misogyny - and it is, you deniers, it is - I can only wonder if the left has more closet misogynists than the right.
During Senator Clinton's campaign, the media - even the left media - did some rather amazingly (closet) misogynistic things. They commented on her clothes and makeup as much as her speeches and positions. They made rude predictions on former President Clinton's role in the White House, and they questioned whether "having a woman in the White House" would affect our miltiary bearing. Rather a surprise for me how entrenched in the core of all US society misogyny is.
Senator Clinton complained about it, and, damned if she wasn't right.
And now we have it - worse, with real acid - for Governor Palin. Rather a disappointment for me, a disappointment in many of my friends. It's like discovering many of them are closet anti-Semites who believe they aren't prejudiced. "Hey, it's OK, I'd vote for a Jew candidate!" Uh, huh.
Why not discuss her as a candidate, rather than by her looks, as a "bimbo" for the right, etc.? Why is she not "the Republican Candidate"?
Remember the Saturday morning PSAs on prejudice?
"Who's Senator Palin, Jimmy?" "She's the Republican's woman candidate." Uh, huh.
Noooo, that's not showing a prejudiced core. No, sure isn't. Uh, huh.
My friends list is being trimmed, permanently. I will not remain "friends" with people whose souls are full of acid but who think they are full of balm. Those of you full of acid and happy to admit it, please stick around. You at least are honest, and sometimes a lot of fun.
Let's talk a little about Governor Palin. Oh, wait, don't I mean "Sarah Palin?" No, after all, we complained the press weren't calling Senator Clinton by her title while calling her opponents by theirs, as that's demeaning; but Palin, we're gonna never use her title? Strike one. You know who you are. Shame, shame. You can demean her by leaving off her office when you buck the party and fight your way to an office supervising over half a million people and over a half a million square miles.
If she were less comely, I suspect her actual history of 2 years in office might be in discussion rather than her looks. Admittedly, of course that's not a long time in high office - but how about we actually, you know, discuss it? Senator Obama is just as inexperienced and he's at the top of the ticket, and we HAVE discussed it.
Yesterday and today, I've read (all from people I took for social liberals) comments on her being a "bimbo," a "whore," a "walking uterus," "a token," and even some worse. Very interesting. Not a word on her actual 2 years as governor - for example, bucking the party on constitutional issues on the advice of the state attorney general, bucking party line by obeying court orders, renegotiating critical contracts with big oil, and opening up pipeline bids to international takers (Canadian company won), etc. I guess I have to ask if her 2 years as a governor are too little, then why are Obama's as a Senator not? Closet misogyny, that's why. If McCain had picked Liberman, would we be talking about the token Jew, a Kike, a Himey? Would Jindal be a token Indian (and he's really, really young), or called a "baby [ethnic slur here]"?
The obsession of looks->negatives is mostly coming from the general left, and maybe that's slanted because my friends' list is generally very left - but reading this outpouring of misogyny - and it is, you deniers, it is - I can only wonder if the left has more closet misogynists than the right.
During Senator Clinton's campaign, the media - even the left media - did some rather amazingly (closet) misogynistic things. They commented on her clothes and makeup as much as her speeches and positions. They made rude predictions on former President Clinton's role in the White House, and they questioned whether "having a woman in the White House" would affect our miltiary bearing. Rather a surprise for me how entrenched in the core of all US society misogyny is.
Senator Clinton complained about it, and, damned if she wasn't right.
And now we have it - worse, with real acid - for Governor Palin. Rather a disappointment for me, a disappointment in many of my friends. It's like discovering many of them are closet anti-Semites who believe they aren't prejudiced. "Hey, it's OK, I'd vote for a Jew candidate!" Uh, huh.
Why not discuss her as a candidate, rather than by her looks, as a "bimbo" for the right, etc.? Why is she not "the Republican Candidate"?
Remember the Saturday morning PSAs on prejudice?
"Who's Senator Palin, Jimmy?" "She's the Republican's woman candidate." Uh, huh.
Noooo, that's not showing a prejudiced core. No, sure isn't. Uh, huh.
My friends list is being trimmed, permanently. I will not remain "friends" with people whose souls are full of acid but who think they are full of balm. Those of you full of acid and happy to admit it, please stick around. You at least are honest, and sometimes a lot of fun.
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Re: Rant Response
Date: 2008-08-30 08:21 pm (UTC)But at least you didn't call her sexist names [er, excepting the [n]ILF thing], and the Wonder Woman reference was pure genius. Of course, Wonder Woman was supposed to be a symbol of forward-moving feminism. [pauses... blinks] Yeah, yeah, I know.
And if this thought experiment helped get you to write some more about the actual issues on which you are guiding your choice, then that's even better.
Re: Rant Response
Date: 2008-08-30 09:06 pm (UTC)The funny part (to me) is that I'll write about the actual issues on which I'm guiding my choices on your blog - but not on mine, for the most part. My primary goal is not *specifically* to get people to think, but rather to get them to laugh. If I can also associate an issue with a joke in people's minds, and influence them subtly in what I think is the right direction, I will - and that won't always be the moral high road, and I know that. Humor isn't nice - humor hurts.
Should I take your response to mean that you think we, as pundits (to whatever extent), should aim for the moral high ground?
And, if the conservatives aim low, is it OK to lower our aim? Heinlein reminds us that "It may be better to be a live jackal than a dead lion, but it is better still to be a live lion. And usually easier." And so I wonder.
What do you think?
Re: Rant Response
Date: 2008-08-30 09:38 pm (UTC)If you aim for social change, aim high, where your own actions won't reverse progress.
If you aim for social change through humor, study Lenny Bruce and Belle Barth.
This fortune cookie will self-destruct in 5...
Re: Rant Response
Date: 2008-08-31 04:00 am (UTC)