Capitol Hill Blue Forums Misc. Topics The Media "We scream, We Swoon, How Dumb Can We Get?"

toots - I want to make sure I understand what you were saying:

You're suggesting the article was planted by the Clinton campaign (or someone associated with the campaign) in order to make women so angry they would vote Clinton just out of anger, is that correct?

If that was the case, would it not have been better to plant an article in the Washington Post prior to the Potomac primaries, rather than a month after?

I must confess that I too am a bi-door opener, 2wins. Curtesy has its place. Probably a Southern thang.:-)

But, lest anyone think I am trivializing real sexist conduct by speaking of "holding doors open", I am not. Sexist conduct which, in my opinion, is of consequence is that which prevents another person from pursuing her right to "pursue happiness" while not infringing upon the rights of other individuals in doing so. It is a natural thingie (Do I need to explain the difference between nature as environment vs nature of man (as in human being), again).:-)
Yours,
Issodhos

And with the exception of the evangelical thing (Dems got their own social 'evangeliticals' and other control freak activists of religious fervor seeking out other Americans to denigrate, reduce to second class status, mock, and legislate against) do you really think the two establishment selected Dem "Acceptables" are "new" in any real since of the word -- I mean other than skin color and sex? Really?:-)
Yours,
Issodhos

Issodhos, you are wandering into off-topic territory.

As I am:

I'd like to put a bit of perspective on the "good manners" topic. Guys, I know you think this is very, very important. But I was 35 years old before I met a man who cared which side of the sidewalk I walked -- and he was the same man who would get extremely drunk and wake me up at 2AM so he could scream at me.

The manners you talk about are nice, and they have a purpose. But don't think for a minute that women will take them as a genuine indicator of your concern for us. We know better. Manners and regard for women may walk hand in hand. Then again, they may not.

Actual respect is, I'm afraid, more important to me than who holds the door open. And actual respect for women as human beings is what is completely missing from this newspaper article.

Agreed and what makes it sadder is that it's a woman doing it.

The discussion of manners is merely a means to avoid discussion of real sexism, as issodhos points out above.

The author of the article in question has written other pieces in a similar, if not so blatantly biased, vein. She has been identified as the Catholicsm editor of beliefnet and is reported to be a graduate of Harvard and Stanford. I doubt she's advancing anyone's agenda, other than her own.

When I read this column, on another blog, I found myself in partial agreement while reading the first couple of paragraphs. I don't understand women swooning, especially over a political candidate. So, I kept reading. And then my blood started boiling. No need to explain why, everyone here gets it.

What is so upsetting is that this kind of pap is being written 40 years after the feminist movement began and that the Washington Post would even publish it. Would the WaPo have published a column that contained just half of the stereotypical remarks this one contained if the stereotypes were racist? We all know they wouldn't.

Women have come a ways, but there is a lot longer way to go, apparently.

Maybe we need to create a unisex species, and of course one color, and maybe we could, just for grins, throw in a neo-religion that believes that the higher purpose, meaning to life, and all the other stuff is to get off the planet earth and find a planet bit more friendly. You know, find a planet with more unisexes, one color {same as the earth unisexes, of course)folks who have the same neo-religion...except they dig their planet because everybody is happy there and, heck, they don't even know what politics or taxes are.

Ahhhhhhhh, we should be so lucky!

I know Julia, you're going to say this is off topic, but is it really?

Actually, no, I wasn't going to say that at all, but since you mention it -

Hekate and Issodhos have hit the nail on the head. The central issue here is that the article is both ignorant and wrong. Everything else is extraneous.

The point of the article, and of the thread, is prejudice. This article is absolutely full of it. The response I was really hoping for was "wow, this writer is whacked."

Challenging writers like this is far more important, has far greater effect on the lives of women, than any number of gentlemanly actions. When we sidetrack ourselves into discussions of who opens which door, we allow that prejudice to stand unchallenged, because we never address it directly.

Interestingly, I think all the women responding to this thread addressed the faults of the article itself (as in, "Wow, this writer is whacked!), directly. Most - not all, but most - of the men did not. I truly have no idea what that indicates, if it indicates anything - but I find it interesting.

I confess, I did not take the time initially to read it through all the way, and every detail... when I did, this is what I thought:

The first part of what she's saying has an element of truth to it - but her conclusions seem to be that not only is it true of significant numbers of women (debatable), but IT IS OK, JUST RELAX AND ACCEPT IT. What?!?

That phraseology reminded me of other egregiously (practically criminally) bad 'advice' from decades past...

So, I figured this is probably just some individual fringe-element opinion, and had to wonder why it was published (actually, though, after thinking about it a bit, it reminded me of some whacko columns by Betsy Hart - whom I've never read before except she appeared a few times, inexplicably in my opinion, right here on CHB). But even so, I still don't understand how anyone, even those on the right, would want to say "Just relax and accept that you are dim".

And incidentally, if she's associated with beliefnet, is that how *they* want to be represented?? Hmm, actually that explains things - a little.




But, actually there is another question - what exactly *is* the motivation of the Washington Post here?

First, WaPo publishes something entitled "...How Dumb Can We Get?"
and then encourages people to write in comments, which they will publish, preferably with the title "Smarter than you think..."


Is that an attempt at honest debate, or a cheap ploy to sell ink?

Is that really what our newspapers are for? Are they that jealous of strident polarizing talkinghead/blogger infotainment agents provocateur?