Hillary Clinton is taking an unnecessarily cruel beating by the media. She should NOT have to prepare for future criticism involving her husband’s sex life, her hair, her wrinkles or her ownership of female sex organs. It’s completely unacceptable that our news outlets are giving air time and print space to discussing so many aspects of her personal life instead of, I don’t know, discussing her policy platform.
Clinton is certainly not the first or only woman to get slammed by the press for all the wrong, truly juvenile things, but she is a noteworthy example because this time the cruelty is taking place because people are freaked out that women finally got sick of not being President. And it turns out she’s really smart and put-together and kind, which means that LOTS of women are probably all three of those things, which means that lots of them might try to be President, which means America is going to have to take its daddy issues outside the Oval Office.
The National Organization for Women just released a series of YouTube videos about Hillary Clinton, one of which is entitled “Mad as Hell: Sexism in the Media.” It’s not very well put together, but the point it makes is clear: the way male-dominated television programs talk about women is outrageous. In particular, their petty emphasis on Hillary’s “bitchiness” and the like is horrifying. The men shown in the NOW video are clearly so intimidated by encountering a woman operating at approximately quadruple their intelligence level, that they turn 12 all over again and call her names. It is the grownup equivalent of pushing the girl you like down in the playground and telling her that horses are dumb because you know from spying on her that horses are her favorite animals. These men can’t handle feeling inferior to a woman, like maybe they might be out of their league with her. And they get paid a lot of money and airtime to revert to elementary school antics.
So Hillary gets called a bitch on TV every day. Consider that. Consider that the equivalent words applied to males are not allowed by the FCC. It’s literally against the law to trash talk men on national television. AM I THE ONLY PERSON BOTHERED BY THIS? Either both sexes are sacred and untouchable by gossip, or both get dragged through the mud together, I say.
Here are a few of the more savory examples of media sexism I got from the YouTube video, which merit very little explanation:
“At Thursday’s gathering, she turned into a scolding mother, talking down to a child, resembling someone with Multiple Personality Disorder.”
“IT CRIES. After decades of stripping down all trace of human emotion, femininity and humanity, Hillary Clinton actually broke down and actually cried yesterday.”
“Men won’t vote for Hillary Clinton because she reminds them of their nagging wives. When she speaks, men hear ‘Take out the garbage!'” (Complete with whiny voice and finger wagging, thank you Fox News.)
“Let’s not forget she’s a front runner for President only because her husband messed around.”
“It’s OK for her to be tough. She is tough. But if we’ve learned anything from the Lorena Bobbitt case, it’s that there’s a lot of resentment there.”
This last comment, made by Tucker Carlson on MSNBC, gets at the heart of the matter.
Lorena Bobbitt cut off almost half of her husband’s penis after he raped her. Oh! Didn’t know that part of the story? Huh. So, Hillary is like Lorena. She also cuts off penises.
No, wait. No she doesn’t. But she DOES threaten masculinity as the dominant force in U.S. politics, as would the sudden and violent castration of every male figure in power. So Tucker revealed his terror that Hillary is more woman than he’ll ever be man. And he thought he was so clever. Poor guy.
Side note, women: stop marrying men who say things like “she reminds them of their nagging wives.” You’re nagging because you married an idiot who can’t do anything. Stop marrying idiots. Start getting jobs at news stations, and stop watching shows that employ men to throw around the word ‘bitch’ unless they let you say ‘dick’ just as often and for just as much money.
And say it really loudly. Make up for some lost name-calling.
