There is some controversy about the tendency for her to be referred to as “Hillary” in the media, the claim being that it shows disrespect (possibly because she’s a woman?)
Here is a piece from the Chicago Tribune that discusses the issue. The writer makes the comment that Clinton’s website doesn’t exactly shy away from calling her by her first name (the headline being “Hillary for President,” with no reference to either of her last names at all).
So, what do you think? I distinctly remember that her campaign signs for her senate run said “Hillary for Senate,” which at that time was thought to be an attempt to distance herself from her husband’s problems. While I can understand her desire to do that, I think that the media can hardly be blamed for following suit in how they refer to her.
Hell, I for one think it isn’t disrespectful in the least bit. In fact, I would say that having a “nickname” as a common name is really a boon for her chances. Notice on the other side that Rudy is also common. This goes back to his days in office in New York, sure, but still. Who else goes by a first name? Regan was called Ronnie, but you won’t hear that on the news. Bush sort of went by W, although nobody really called him that after he became despised. I’d say that if someone calls you by your first name, they like you. Remember “I Like Ike”?
I think the tendency to use first names means familiarity, so I don’t think it has much to do with respect or not.
To clarify, I don’t think Hillary or her staff is making the claim that it is disrespectful to use her first name…I think it’s more Hillary supporters/average citizens who are put off by it.
Not disrespectful, and nothing to do with the fact that she’s a woman. (The Rudy or Ike examples are good ones.) But anyone who has a problem with it needs to face a certain fact: whenever there are multiple people with the same name in any arena, nicknames usually come into play. Bill Clinton was the first Clinton on the national scene. We now need a different name to refer to Mrs. Clinton (and, let’s not forget, “Hillary” came into common usage long years before her election to the Senate; it’s tough to drop old nicknames–just look at John Mellencamp). In my personal life, I know so many people named “Jonathan” that they all have nicknames to differentiate them. It’s quite a chore, it upsets some of them, but tough; rename yourself.
Well, she doesn’t really have the option to go by last name alone, the way most candidates do. When someone says “Clinton,” people will be much more apt to think “Bill” than “Hillary.” I suppose “Mrs./Ms. Clinton” would work, but that’s much more off-putting than Hillary.
I would think that with all of the disparaging nicknames used for the last few presidents (Shrub, Slick Willie, the Wimp…), that being known by your first name would be a good thing.
Yeah, I think a lot of people (including Hillary herself) do the same.
I tend to be a little knee-jerk when it comes to noticing/objecting when women are treated differently from men in the media, but in this case it doesn’t bother me. I think she has good reason to want to be thought of by her first name.
It’s not any more disrespectful than “Dubbya” was.
It’s just a way to distinguish politicians with the same last name. When Bush was running for pres, they never just said “Bush,” because it didn’t distinguish him from the senior.
“Hillary” is a way to distinguish the current politician from the previous one. It’s a useful nickname, in my opinion.
I think the big reason is that if people called her Clinton, there’d be confusion between her and her husband. As I recall, George W. Bush ran into similar confusion when he was running (in his case it was probably greater because of having the same first name as his father). I’m guessing if Senator Clinton gets elected President, we’ll see her becoming the default Clinton the same way as the current President has become the default Bush.
Is it disrespectful to refer to Prince as Prince or to Madonna as Madonna?
It’s a different business, but I’m sure most people would do a triple take or not even know who are you talking about if you ever mentioned Ms. Ciconne (heck, I don’t even know what her married name is).
I suppose if you said it with a sneer, or referred to her by her first name while referring to other candidates as “Mr. Edwards,” “Sen. Obama,” or “Gov. Richardson,” that would be disrespectful. Otherwise, no prob, Bob.
Now if only she could decide whether or not to insist upon “Rodham.”
I suspect that the “debates” over whether Senator Clinton should be called “Hillary” are on the same line as the “debates” over whether the black community finds Senator Obama “black enough.” They are passionate little diatribes among a very few pundits and bloggers that are not serious discussions among the vast majority of the population.
When the “Is he black enough?” question arose, there was a lot of commentary on whether such questions reflected one sort or another of racism within the black community, but when we started digging up sources for all this concern, we kept coming back to the same two or three writers who were commenting on the discussion without ever pointing to an actual poll of the feelings of the black community or discussions internal to the balck community challenging his “blackness.”
Now I see what appears to be the same sort of thing. We have a few comments from a few writers on whether someone else (vaguely described or only rarely named) is being offended. I have not seen long lists of letters to the editor in which citizens are voicing their complaints that the media is being disrespectful. I have not (yet) seen any diatribes from prominent feminists condemning the practice. I suspect that someone, somewhere, wondered (in print or aloud) whether it was really appropriate and the topic made it into the pundit/blogger circles as something to write about without anyone actually taking the time to discover whether anyone was really taking offense.
It is a meta-debate on the topic of whether we ought to consider being offended.