Thoughts on the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics, Politics, Movies, and whatever else happens to cross my mind.
Thursday, May 03, 2012
The condescension of the patriarchy
I'm not sure I've ever seen anything quite like the Obama campaign's The Life of Julia. This slide show walks through the life of a fictional woman ("Julia") who lives her entire life suckling at the government teat provided her by Uncle Sam and Big-Daddy Obama. Government provides her with an education, more education, health care, more health care, education for her child, more money to open a business, more health care, retirement benefits, and, as near as one can tell from the presentation, all at no cost to her.
Obviously, there's not a serious argument being made here. They aren't trying to convince anyone of the rightness of their position; they're trying to convince those people who already agree with the rightness of their position to come out and vote. Even so, there's an astounding amount of question-begging contained in the presentation. For example,
Is there any evidence that Head Start actually provides any long-term benefit?
Is there any reason to suspect that the "Race to the top" program provides any long-term benefit?
Is there any reason to believe that Pell Grants have made College more, rather than less, affordable?
Why is Julia worse off with her health care decisions "place[d] ... in the hands of her employer" as opposed to being placed in the hands of government bureaucrats?
Does Zachary have a father? Why can't he and Julia provide for Zachary's birth and health care and schooling, instead of letting Big-Daddy Obama take care of it?
Where is all of that money for Julia's Medicare and Social Security going to come from if she's collecting from the Federal treasury from the time she's an infant?
The big question that it all begs is this - why the hell can't Julia do some of these things for herself? Why on earth does the government have to do all of it for her? The entire presentation just drips with sexism and condescension, as poor Julia, delicate flower, cannot live her life without the constant and beneficent hand of the government, as provided by Big-Daddy Barack. She's such a weakling that a Romney administration would inevitably result in her destruction.
I'd think a feminist would be appalled by this presentation, but what do I know? I'm not a feminist...
Why would anyone who really believes that Republicans want to prevent insurance companies from covering contraception think that it's a good idea for the government to get to decide what insurance companies must or must not cover?
Possible answers:
"Obviously, there's no real Republican "war on women" - it's all just political kabuki theatre."
"The Republicans have lost power FOREVER! It doesn't matter that we'll give the government the power to control those things - the scary Republicans will never again wield that power!"
"I don't get it. What's the connection between those two things?"
Is there a good reason that I've missed? I'm not seeing one...
This passage about the Italian cruise ship accident has generated some commentary. (For example, here and here.) Rightfully so...
Fights broke out to get into the lifeboats, men refused to prioritise women, expectant mothers and children as they pushed themselves forward to escape. Crew ignored their passengers – leaving ‘chefs and waiters’ to help out.
In heart-rending footage, recorded on mobile phones, British children could be heard shouting ‘Daddy’ and ‘Mummy’ in the melee.
As she waited for a flight home from Rome, grandmother Sandra Rogers, 62, told the Daily Mail: ‘There was no “women and children first” policy. There were big men, crew members, pushing their way past us to get into the lifeboats. It was disgusting.’
It's not, obviously, a laughing matter. On the other hand, in a world in which men have been belittled and ridiculed for any and all characteristics that are stereotypically (that is to say, fundamentally, "male"), where we are constantly harangued and hectored to believe that any differences between men and women are just "societally imposed gender constructs," a world in which fathers are considered irrelevant and marriage is simply about tax breaks for sexual partners, what reason is there for a man to step aside and let the women and children have the lifeboats? The "women and children first" mentality is part of a moral code that has been relentlessly attacked in by the post-modern intelligentsia of the last half century. It's connected to traditional gender roles and traditional marriage, and the post-modern world in which we live has decided that we have no need of those things; that those things are archaic constructs with no utility in our new societies.
Unintended. Consequences.
Again, I go back to C.S. Lewis' The Abolition of Man. The first lecture, Men Without Chests, ends with this passage:
And all the time—such is the tragi-comedy of our situation—we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilization needs is more 'drive', or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or 'creativity'. In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.
Former back-bencher in the Illinois legislature Barack Obama, campaigning yesterday in Lebanon, VA:
Let's just list this for a second. John McCain says he's about change, too, and so I guess his whole angle is, watch out, George Bush. Except for economic policy, health care policy, tax policy, education policy, foreign policy and Karl Rove style politics, we're really going to shake things up in Washington. That's not change - that's just calling the same thing something different. But you know, you can put lipstick on a pig - it's still a pig.
No, he didn't. He didn't even imply it. He used a cliche which allowed others to infer it.
Well, he meant for people to infer it that way.
Well, maybe he did. But maybe he didn't - there are two possible scenarios here. (Unfortunately for the Anointed one, neither reflects well on him.)
Scenario 1: He intentionally invoked Palin's "lipstick" comment from her acceptance speech. He did it to entertain and amuse his base by allowing them to hear him call Palin a pig while maintaining a position of plausible deniability. (As near as I can tell, most people do not consider the deniability to be plausible.) In which case he comes across as an immature boor, someone who cannot resist the urge to stoop to name-calling.
Scenario 2: He used a hoary cliche that he's used before and made no mental connection between it and the Republican Vice Presidential candidate. He was just speaking without a teleprompter and it slipped out. In which case, he's an idiot, once again saying something stupid the moment he goes off-script. Even if it's a phrase that he likes and uses, he should certainly be sensitized to the connection to the word "lipstick" at this point.
Most people, as I say, seem to be assuming scenario 1. Frankly, I've seen nothing whatsoever that leads me to believe that this guy is capable of going off-script and maintaining coherence, so I don't have a problem buying scenario 2.
So I'm willing to buy either of them, and await the Obama campaign's official position - is he an ill-mannered boor or a guy who can't walk and chew gum at the same time?
You're saying that he didn't mean to call her a pig?
Nope. I'm saying that I don't care what he "meant" to say. What he actually said, the actual words that he used and the actual context in which he used them, fall well within the bounds of acceptable political discourse. We know that the words are words he has used before in a context that could not possibly have implied that Sarah Palin, or any other woman, is a pig.
Well, it was certainly a sexist comment, and he should be roundly criticized on those grounds.
No. It is not a sexist comment. It's rude if intentional and stupid if not, but it's not sexist. He used a time-worn cliche. If McCain had chosen Mitt Romney as his VP and Obama has used that same cliche, no one would have noticed. The fact that he chose Palin does not make it a sexist comment, any more than the use of "niggardly" or "eeny meeny miny mo" or "pot calling the kettle black" is racist. For any of us to whine about it is buying into the left's political correctness and I'm not willing to do that. There's nothing wrong with his statement (other than, you know, being factually incorrect.) As campaigning goes, it's perfectly legitimate, and any complaints come across as whining, pure and simple. I refuse to cede to the grievance mongers and identify politics pimps that level of control of the language.
Again, I'm not going to debate whether he was thinking about her when he said it. He may well have been (though I think he's got a strong tendency to speak in familiar cliches when forced to speak extemporaneously). I'm arguing that it doesn't matter. There is nothing inherently offensive about the phrase, the context was appropriate, and since I abhor the left's insistence on flogging thought-crime, I don't want to see it from the right, either.
If John McCain had said it after Hillary Clinton had made a lipstick comment, the left and the media would go nuts.
Yes. So what? I hold the Republicans to a higher standard.
Even so, this is a gaffe, right? Shouldn't they hammer away at it?
If the Republicans make a big deal about this, they'll be mocked by many, including me. That's an old, old expression, and there's nothing wrong with Obama using it. He didn't call her a pig, and I'm going to be ticked off if there's a victimhood/sexism argument made. There is nothing at all wrong with him using that phrase. She's a big girl, and she can take care of herself. The fact that she used the lipstick joke doesn't mean that a common and effective cliche can no longer be legitimately used. Whining is unattractive, and I'm going to be very unhappy if I see any of it from the ticket. They've certainly dished it out - joyfully and energetically - and they can suck it up and take it.
And let's consider one more take on it. Let's say that a) Obama called Palin a pig and b) everyone knows it. How does it benefit the Republicans to whine about it? Take the high road. If everyone perceives him as calling her a pig, it'll hurt him much, much more than her. There's absolutely no political benefit for him (other than briefly amusing the furthest reaches of his base, the people who are going to show up and vote no matter what he says). Really, the Republicans should be quiet and pray that he calls her a pig again tomorrow and the next day.
So what do you think of this ad?
I don't like it. It offends me. There's a certain amount of pleasure at seeing the left "hoist with [its] own petard" but it offends me to have the Republicans invoking Katie Couric to call "sexism" here. And I'm concerned that they're overplaying their hand. Leave the whining and name-calling to the Democrats. Ignoring the comment, or acknowledging it humorously, taking the high road, does not have any potential downside. This approach does.
Like Michelle Obama, I am a “woman of color.” Like Michelle Obama, I am a working mother of two young children. Like Michelle Obama, I am a member of the 13th generation of Americans born since the founding of our great nation.
Unlike Michelle Obama, I can’t keep track of the number of times I’ve been proud — really proud — of my country since I was born and privileged to live in it.
...
I’m just seven years younger than Mrs. Obama. We’ve grown up and lived in the same era. And yet, her self-absorbed attitude is completely foreign to me. What planet is she living on? Since when was now the only time the American people have ever been “hungry for change”? Michelle, ma belle, Barack is not the center of the universe. Newsflash: The Obamas did not invent “change” any more than Hillary invented “leadership” or John McCain invented “straight talk.”
We were both adults when the Berlin Wall fell, Michelle. That was earth-shattering change.
For years, I have been apostate, believing that one voted for candidates based on their records, philosophies, associations and plans. And I have watched as the American left, the Democrats, home of identity politics in America, and their "Amen corner" in the American mainstream press have provided the racial/gender take on every political decision. And I now know, after resisting the truth for years, that Black candidates lose, not because people disagree with them politically, but because conservative voters are closet, or even not-so-closet, racists. Women candidates lose because voters are sexist, intimidated by "strong women."
They have converted me. I have come over to their point of view. I have been enlightened. It is now clear to me that there are no reasons, other than racism, not to vote for a black politician. There are no reasons, other than sexism, not to vote for a female politician.
I have been convinced. The re-education campaign has worked. The truth has been browbeaten into me. I have seen the light.
But I do have just one question remaining.
The Democrats are meeting in Denver in August to choose a Presidential candidate, and that choice will reveal a great deal about the Democratic Party.
Is the Democratic Party racist? Or is the Democratic Party sexist?
Native-Mainer, trapped in Massachusetts, happily-married (18 years and counting) father of four. I've got opinions. Why do you care? You probably don't. But I'm going to put some of 'em out here anyway. I've been working as a computer engineer in Massachusetts and southern NH for the last 20 years, but I'm rarely if ever going to post on any topics related to that. A lot of what I write about will be the Boston Red Sox, as well as the Patriots and Celtics. I started studying Tang Soo Do after watching my kids all do it, and I may have the occasional comment on that. And I will be commenting on political issues that interest me. Which tend to be more national in scope than local.
And whatever else strikes me.
