Why It’s Not Smart to Call Women Conservatives ‘Whores’
“Conservative women should be strongly criticized. But using gendered language to attack them doesn’t help progressives.”
By Tana Ganeva from the New Mother Jones Report
This story first appeared at Alternet.
When Alan Grayson called a female corporate lobbyist a “K-Street whore”—and was attacked as crude and sexist at the same time that he was lauded as gutsy and honest—he played a role in a familiar script: hero of the left (MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann, Bill Maher) attacks female villain (Hillary Rodham Clinton, Sarah Palin, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin) using sexist language. Progressive feminist’s soul-search about liberal misogyny. Mainstream media talk about sexism for 5 seconds. Then the media move on, and no one learns a thing. Repeat.
It happened again just two weeks ago, when Olbermann called Malkin a “big mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick on it” during the “Worst Person in the World” segment of Countdown. The creepily fleshy insult followed Olbermann’s rendition of Malkin’s e-mails, which he read in a Valley Girl voice to signal her presumed Barbie-doll vapidity. Megan Carpentier pointed out at the time, “A liberal, progressive critique of Malkin need not, and should not, resort to an attack on her looks or her gender or rely on silly stereotypes or imagery that brings to mind victims of domestic violence.”
Malkin, who is actually the worst person in the world, wasted no time decrying Olbermann’s sexist remarks. Needless to say, Malkin is not usually a passionate defender of feminism. Read more
