Yes, but qua blacks, not qua women - there were masses of women in the States at the same time who were not slaves; the distinguishing characteristic was race, not sex.
You can find all sorts of articles on the Internet, and books too and I shouldn’t wonder, arguing that the moon landings were all faked on a studio set. Granted there’s a great modern mythology about the “Burning Times”, and it’s popular with a certain set of victim feminists, but that doesn’t mean it’s founded on especially solid facts or reasoning.
Because he said “periodically”? Is that now a taboo word like “niggardly”? :rolleyes: As a woman and a feminist, I think I’m fairly sensitive to sexist language. That remark doesn’t even come close registering on my meter. I’d be more offended if people felt like they couldn’t use the word “periodically” when discussing a woman.
It’s not simply “periodically.” It’s also the comment about her “feeling down.”
I’ve often heard men dismiss women by saying “it’s her time of the month,” “she’s PMSing,” and that sort of thing. Is there absolute definitive proof that his words had sexist intent? As I previously posted, it’s a matter of opinion. I think it’s a pretty odd statement that clearly alludes to the fact that he feels his opponent is emotional. Which has happened a few times in the campaign.
Google a bit and you’ll see that I’m hardly the only one to have noticed this.
I’ve read other complaints about this particular remark on-line. And we’ll have to agree to disagree, because it strikes me as utter nonsense.
You know what offends me as a feminist and a human being? The way that the US sucks up to Saudi Arabia–a country with an abysmal record on women’s rights. The fact that the US supported the Taliban in Afghanistan. The goddamn Taliban. Remarks about Clinton being emotional don’t even scratch the surface.
Well, sure, but I don’t seem them as being exclusive. I’m bothered by Matthew Shepard’s murder, and it bothers me when someone throws around gay slurs.
The funny thing is that I don’t consider myself a “feminist,” but when I saw Obama at the presser, I heard those words and thought, “what is he getting at here, exactly?” I don’t know why he went to emotion as a means of explanation for Clinton’s attack. You’re in a political campaign. The other person is supposed to call you out.
Obama’s a lawyer and I think he knows exactly what he’s saying. It’s certainly not an “OMG!!!1! sexism!” comment but it is an odd statement. Why attribute a political attack to someone’s emotional state? He would have been much better off attributing that ad to “the old politics.”
Which would get a more negative response:
Man looks at black woman and says “You bitch.”
Man looks at black woman and says “You nigger.”
Years ago William Safire wrote a column after he refered to a woman as a “girl photographer” and she called him on using the word “girl.” He wrote "Calling a woman a “girl” isn’t as bad as called a Black man a “boy…”
Hundreds of people responded that it is exactly the same, as it is referring to a grown up person as a child.
P.S. It’s also gramatically incorrect. A “girl” photographer would be someone who photographs girls. The correct word is “female.”
People say “Blacks got the vote in 1860.” HA! Black men got the vote in 1860. Black women had to wait until 1920, along with the rest of us women.
Excuse me? “Nigger” was a perfectly acceptable word in the 1800’s, and was used in “Gone With The Wind.” That does not make it correct today. “Girl” hasn’t been acceptable since the 1980’s.
Call Maria Schiver a “girl reporter” and I image she will let you know her opinion on the subject. And her husband might chime in.
If anyone called me a “career girl,” I would put them down a notch.
Years later, Safire referred to a person who had an obviously female first name as a “woman executive.” He got letters on that and apologized, saying "No adjective was needed. If it had been, the correct word would have been “female.”
I don’t see it as a comment about her emotional state, but rather an assertion about the tactics she “periodically” (like, right before a primary) takes when she is “feeling down” in the polls to “boost her appeal”.
It takes a strained reading to assume he’s talking about periods and emotions with this statement. Yes, people often speak in codes, but if this is sexist code, its too cryptic to work with an audience Neaderthalic enough to disregard Clinton because she’s a woman.
I’ve seen the influence of both racism and sexism in this race. But I’m more disturbed by the racism than the sexism (even though it also bothers me) because when you look at the bigger picture, racism has been more costly to American blacks than sexism has been to American women. Blacks are underrepresented in almost everything across the board, are more likely to be poor and entwined in the criminal system, enjoy a lower quality of health, and struggle against a greater social stigma, with more damaging stereotypes to overcome.
Women are underestimated and infantalized and undervalued; blacks are feared and hated and often considered less than human. Neither thing is nice to endure, but I think the latter is worse than the former in terms of the damage it does to one’s psyche.
Maybe I’m feeling overly optimistic today, but I think the difference is that, by and large, the joke about ironing his shirt was just that, a joke. And most of the people there got that.
I’m as stabby as the next person when it comes to gender coded toys and “sit like a lady” and “ho” comments. But no, I don’t think they’re as bad, socially, as racial comments. I guess it’s because I feel like women are so much closer to social equality with men than blacks are to whites.
You know when a group of people accepts and loves you because they can tease you about your foibles and you think they’re funny, not mean, and you can tease them right back. I think it works the same on a social level. There won’t be true equality until we can all joke to one another without getting our collective panties bunched. Only when you can tell a Black joke and have it received no differently than a Plumber joke will there be true equality.
Because only when we’re on even ground will a joke not be threatening. When one is in a defensive position, a joke is threatening. When we’re all relaxed, it’s not.
You can certainly interpret the comment as you see fit. I think your reading, to remove any commentary on Clinton’s emotional state, is much more strained than mine.
I just don’t see how productive it is to attempt to play oppression Olympics, because these factors rarely operate in a vacuum. It’s not just racism, it’s racism, poverty, gender, etc. operating in concert. As I research African Americans in education I am acutely aware of the differentials between the races, especially in health care, incarceration rates, and so forth.
In this campaign, issues of race have been the third rail, and those who have been accused of race-baiting (some fair, some unfair, IMO) have generally been censured or dismissed from the campaigns. But sexist comments seem to get much less attention and rebuke.
I think Shirley Chisholm’s comment is worthy of note as well (from 1969):
Lord knows I’ve been called “sweetie” by enough people in my day, and yeah, it grates, but it’s not something that I feel is strong enough to judge a person’s character by or even get angry about when the context tells me it’s not meant to be patronizing.
There’s no racial analogue to “sweetie” that I’m aware of. And there’s a reason for that.
I’ve read that in the Old South, whites addressed elderly black strangers as “Uncle” or “Auntie,” which was meant to be patronizing but not hateful. (How those so addressed took it is a different question.) (Any black male stranger up through middle age was addressed as “Boy,” with similar intent but just a bit more of the putting-in-place, I should think, young males presenting relatively greater risk of standing up for themselves; I don’t know how they addressed young-to-middle-aged females.)
Okay, maybe I should amend my statement to read that there’s no racial analogue to “sweetie” that I’m aware of that is in common use today. Auntie and Uncle were en vogue in another era.
Also should point out the gaping obvious: men are called “sweetie” too. And by women, of course. It’s just that the political/corporate sphere has been so male dominated and men don’t usually refer to other men with terms of endearments, that it often takes on a sexist feel when a man refers to a woman this way. This isn’t to say that there’s no sexist baggage associated with it, but since women commit the same offense I attribute this phenomenom more to familial and hetereosexual habits making their way into the workplace, than to prejudice.
Go down South and you’ll see that everyone is routinely called sweetie, honey and the like. Usually by someone of the opposite gender.
I don’t get the hate for “sit like a lady”. That seems more like politeness. Heaven knows I’ve told my son to “act like a gentleman” forty million times when he was a child.