I interrupt Inspiration Week to say a few things:
First, some folks need a history review.
Second, I refuse to draw conclusions about "what I can expect a male candidate for President to do for women if elected," from "what a male candidate for President says about Senator Clinton," because there are these things called platforms on which I'd rather base my expectations. Doesn't mean I endorse or approve of everything being said about Senator Clinton right now, doesn't mean I don't hate what the pundits are putting her through either.
Third, if you ask me (and I realize you did not, but when has that ever stopped me?), those tears were phony as hell. Just because Maureen Dowd happens to say so in her typically fluffheaded, spiteful way doesn't mean there aren't others of us saying and thinking the same damn thing. And you know something? We are also women.
Fourth, if you took Pinko Feminist Hellcat out of your feed reader, it's time to put it back in. That has nothing to do with the rest of it--or does it? I report, you decide.
We now return you to your hastily scheduled Inspiration Week.
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12 comments:
I am totally yoinking your title for the next time being here threatens to drown me in THE STUPID™. (Which would be, oh, about... three hours ago? ish?)
Mmm, sweet roasted red peppers with garlic...
Seriously, what tears? All I see is well-timed voice crack. But leaving that aside, you really want to give Maureen Dowd the benefit of the doubt? (That's a genuine question.)
you really want to give Maureen Dowd the benefit of the doubt?
Oh hell no. No, I believe she wrote that just to be her sweet little MoDo self and for no other reason than that she had to fill up those inches somehow and hey, that's what she knows: How to tear down other women.
I just don't want to be lumped in with her because I don't think the emotion was all that genuine and/or might have been staged, you know? That doesn't mean I hate women; it means I'm real dubious about Senator Clinton.
Ah, okay. I wasn't as clear reading it the first time through.
So, question for you. If the emotion was less than genuine, what do you think Clinton was going for? Because given how they were all freaking out about the possibility of losing in New Hampshire, I don't think she could have possibly foreseen it playing out as it did.
If the emotion was less than genuine, what do you think Clinton was going for?
Goooood question. Damn it, I'm not a pundit, I just yell a lot!
My read was "Persecuted Woman With Real Human Feeling Underlying Everything, Bravely Bearing Up Under Pressure." Which isn't totally crazy, because there's no shortage of women who've been there, damned if we cry, damned if we don't.
And that's where the punditry on this, not to mention Edwards' remarks, not mention maybe even my own remarks, has truly sucked--because it's a no-win for her regardless of whether the emotion was true or phony.
If she doesn't get emotional she's cold and unfeeling and ZOMG, potentially emasculating! And if she does, well! This is no job for a mere girl, America!
I don't want to vote for her (though I gladly will if it comes down to that because this is not the year for me to go larking around with third parties), but I don't envy the position she's in, either.
Aaandd... your title just gave me dinner, so there. I was wondering what to make, and boom! There it was.
I was wondering what to make, and boom! There it was.
OMG, and they make the best ersatz bruschetta, too.
Oh would you look at that, I'm all hungry now. That almost never happens.
Thanks so much for the link, Ilyka. The editorial rankled me. The whole oppression olympics thing gets on my last damn nerve. I think she could have talked about the particularly sexist treatment Clinton was getting without glossing over a long and nasty history of racism in this country. (And seriously? The 14th Amendment thing? Shit--that's like having the right to an abortion now. You've got the right in theory, but not practice. For a long time, that was the case with voting rights and Black people, and it's back to being theory and not practice again, given the shennanigans in the last two Presidential elections.)
/rant
I have to agree with evil fizz, if Hillary Clinton thought that deliberately having her voice break was going to save her, she's either a psychic visionary or a moron. I mean, like you said, she's in a bind, but all the media wanted to do was go "OMG, girly woman cries, what a weakling, what a meltdown, she's in over-her-head, she's done." If she did it on purpose, say, gambling that the sexist backlash would cause women to rally to her side, that's a hell of a gamble, I sure wouldn't have advised it.
Well Hillary is being gored (as in Al) something terrible by the media, even if we had any doubt of that previously, the fact that she's now being called fake for "crying" - something that only happened in the heads of hte pundits - proves it.
She is still a douche and I was ridiculously shocked and appalled by the headline or two that read "Hillary wins primary" or words to that effect with out mentioning that she hasn't won The primaries.
Not only was it kind of early but also that notion is just terrible on so many levels.
That Obama hasn't really been called on his fakery yet is probably due in a large part to both male privelage and black dysprivelage - black men aren't stereotyped as cold or calculating or if they are it's not seen as an especially bad thing.
but he's just as much a faker as edwards and hillary, and I think he deserves recognition for that.
First and foremost, they're all politicians, which makes every single thing they do in public highly suspect. Perhaps it is a step toward equal rights that I can just as easily question Hillary's sincerity as Obama's, or Bush for that matter. I don't give her extra nice points for being a woman; she's a politician.
My mom once said, about a female politician, "Well, she proves that "asshole" isn't a gender specific term." I've taken great pleasure in that comment for years.
Yeah, but the point is, what would she have to gain. She'd rather be portrayed as a weak, helpless idiot than an uncaring bitch? I'd say an uncaring bitch is safer for someone who wants to get elected.
I think it's weird, as far as I can tell Clinton and Obama are very much alike on the issues and the whole let's suck up to Republicans and run away crying from scary liberals thing. I don't get why so many people who see her for exactly who she is and don't like it look at him as if he's some kind of superprincipled anti-war Champion Savior Warrior who's going to roll back the last 8 years.
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