Women and Politics

This post was submitted by Jean Qiao, WCF Communications Fellow

The defeat of Martha Coakley on Tuesday meant a field day for political analysts and bloggers, all trying to concoct reasons and theories on why an extremely qualified woman lost her battle to the Senate in a historically liberal state. Everything from her laziness to her personality have been scrutinized and analyzed to no end.

But what the media outlets do not realize is that by focusing all their efforts on scrutinizing both Coakley and Brown, they easily put Coakley at a disadvantage. How easy? Easy as 1, 2, 3.

1.    Give Coakley a nickname that sticks

When Martha Coakley refused to answer a campaign finance question in early October, Boston Herald columnist Lauren Beckham Falcone deemed her an Ice Queen. Imagine the way this rather catchy nickname was spun in the mainstream media and in the online blogging community. Would you want to vote for a woman who shows little to no emotion and is known as the “ice queen,” or would you rather give your vote to a young and attractive lad who has a smile that can light up an entire room, despite his stance on issues? Oh and slap in a strategically-selected photo of Coakley with her scariest facial expression right next to an airbrushed image of Brown waving to his supporters. The juxtaposition is lethal.

2.    Knowledge of sports = a good Senator

When you’re from the Northeast, baseball team affiliations can make or break a friendship. And in a special election campaign, apparently it can make or break your victory. Former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling made quite a splash after she mistakenly called him “another Yankee fan.”

Surely someone who is running for office in the state of Massachusetts should be able distinguish all the Yankee team members from the Red Sox team members. If you can’t do that you’re obviously unfit to be a member of the United States Senate who spends a majority of their time in Washington.

3.    Post nude pictures online of the male candidate

I clearly remember when Cosmo released rather revealing pictures of Scott Brown, who said he was a former model. Most of the responses ranged from, “oh my gosh what a stud,” to a general sense of apathy. Apparently it was no surprise that a male politician running for office wearing absolutely nothing evoked such an apathetic and even a little bit of a positive response. Conservative journalist Kathleen Parker wrote:

“He’s Joe Six-Pack with a law degree and 30 years in the National Guard. A lieutenant colonel with the Army Judge Advocate General Corps, he’s also a tri-athlete and a Mr. Mom to his busy wife, Boston TV news reporter Gail Huff”.

Imagine the kind of response Coakley would receive had the media found and publicized nude pictures of her. I can just see it now: Ice queen-baseball-hating Woman reveals nude pictures of herself. Something tells me that would not have been spun in a positive light. I dare say that if she even made it past the primary, the nude photos would completely overshadow and ruin her campaign. The double standards at play both here and in all political races across the country are painfully obvious.

When will you female candidates learn? You can’t be too emotional, that makes you seem weak. But don’t be too cold, that makes you an Ice Queen. Definitely don’t focus on your gender, but don’t ignore it either.

Talk about your family and kids, but not too much, because a busy candidate can’t be a good mother. If you don’t have kids, you’d better be extra warm and fuzzy.

So how can you act, you ask? That question remains unanswered. Why? Because our society has developed so many extreme stereotypes for women that we no longer know how to respond. We don’t know what’s safe.

As a result, female candidates end up trying to traverse the icy trail of double standards, attempting to choose between one extreme over the other, floundering around in the middle, or just trying to be themselves.

Hillary Clinton has always been a strong leader who doesn’t take any crap. But it wasn’t her experience or vision that won over some voters, it was the fact that she cried on television. (”Oh good, she does have emotions, I had no idea”). Would voters ever need to see a male candidate cry to earn their support? Of course not. But apparently Clinton had acted too removed, too hard, too much like…a man for people’s taste.

But if Clinton had come out of the gate overflowing with emotion about women and her campaign, she would have been blasted for being a sappy female.

Meanwhile, Martha Coakley has repeatedly been called “icy” and is now criticized for not emphasizing the historic nature of her campaign. But should a female candidate dare express that her gender is indeed one of her many qualifications, the response I always hear is, “I won’t vote for a woman just because she’s a woman.”

It seems women just can’t win. And believe me, it’s not just women pointing this out (nor are women excluded from judging based on stereotypes). To POLITICO, Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) recounted that despite her overwhelming win in Massachusetts, Hillary Clinton still faced sexism from voters there.

McGovern also brought up how a local paper concluded that Coakley’s new hair and makeup style were to blame for the race tightening:

“They wouldn’t write this about a man,” McGovern said. “I still think we have a long way to go to make this an equal playing field.”

James Carroll of The Daily Beast describes Massachusetts’ rich and long history of misogyny toward female candidates:

“The short of it is that the most liberal state in the nation … practices the politics of misogyny. When it comes to positions of real power, no women need apply. Martha Coakley was croaked by an electorate that could not get past her gender.”

Martha Coakley’s loss in the special election for the Massachusetts Senate seat leaves many of us angry that the “progressive” state of Massachusetts continues to squeeze out women. It also leaves us frightened about the future of women’s reproductive rights in the health care bill.

Without Coakley, preventing attacks on choice in health care reform looks bleak. And if Massachusetts serves as a thermometer for the way our country is viewing female candidates, we’re in big trouble.

It’s 2010, folks—when will the double standards stop?

I know that nothing good ever comes out of the mouths of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. Ever. That said, we can no longer ignore the disgusting filth and misogyny that they are spewing over their air waves.

Exactly when did it become acceptable to call a Senator a prostitute? And not just call her a whore, but go on for almost two minutes with a “metaphor” about exactly how she’s a whore?

This vile transcript of Glenn Beck and Pay Gray talking about Senator Mary Landrieu speaks for itself (click here to listen to the audio from Media Matters):

“She may be easy, but she’s not cheap. We’re with a high-class prostitute. Right. You’re not at Motel 6…you’re not in a back alley saying “what do you say, five bucks?” No no no. This one comes to your four seasons hotel room and does it right and doesn’t dress really slutty dresses nice, you might even think she’s the wife of the CEO.”

“There’s nobody that’s going to look at her and say ‘oh my god that’s a whore,’ you’re going to look at her and say ‘oh, wow, she’s classy’ and then when somebody whispers, ’she’s a prostitute’ you think OK yeah but she’s not cheap.”

“You’ll dismiss it because it’s like well yeah she’s not getting 20 bucks an hour right? Exactly. This is high class. She’s the one when you say, ‘you’re a HOOKER! You’re like you know having sex for 100 bucks,’ she says, ‘It’s not 100 bucks, it’s 5,000 bucks,’ and then you respect her.”

“Then you’re like ohhh. It’s the type of high class prostitute that actually purchases a wedding ring so that when she’s walking through the plaza, people think that she’s actually married to the person she’s walking into. That’s how classy she is. You don’t sell your principles for $50 on a street corner. No no no. $300 mil and a 3 page definition - that’s how you sell your principles.”

Not one to shy away from any opportunity to bash a woman, Limbaugh added on his show that Landrieu “may be the most expensive prostitute in the history of prostitution.”

Why were these chauvinists calling Senator Landrieu a prostitute? It doesn’t matter. This kind of blatant misogyny and disrespect are completely unacceptable. I’m shocked that these anti-woman figures are still allowed to speak in any kind of public space—let alone paid to do so.

No wonder women don’t have equality in public office, with these kind of attacks on women being launched and greeted with ambivalence and even acceptance.

Speak out against Beck and Limbaugh today:

Email Rush Limbaugh, ElRushbo@eibnet.com

Email Glenn Beck, me@glennbeck.com

Sign our petition to Limbaugh and Beck here.

This kind of misogyny against women elected officials, candidates, and public figures will not stand. If we value women in our society at all, we have a responsibility to speak out against this kind of hateful speech.

The recently-released Shriver Report has provided us with the knowledge that women are now half the paid US workforce as well as a jumping-off point to discuss the state of women’s equality in general.

What we know: women have come a long way in the past few decades. We hold a higher percentage of college degrees, diverse jobs, and public offices.

What we also know: our progress has stagnated. And, as Joanne Lipman writes in the New York Times, the measurable progress we’ve made hasn’t translated to progress in our attitudes toward women.

“Certainly, when you look at the numbers, women have made tremendous strides over the past 25 years. But in the process, we lost sight of something important. After focusing for so long on better jobs and higher pay, maybe the best thing — the enduring thing — we can do is make sure respect is part of the equation too.”

Lipman pointed out the atrocious woman-bashing that has ensued in our society at all levels: in politics, media, entertainment, and the internet. Case in point: Martha Coakley being called Ice Queen. Olympia Snowe being called Jezebel.

Why have women gained ground in our workforce but not in our minds? How do we work to address “concrete issues” like health care reform as well as our attitudes toward women; close the wage gap as well as the respect gap?

My usual answer to these kinds of questions is to elect more women to public office. But maybe it’s not that simple this time. Of course, I do think that having more women in positions of power is essential to changing sexist mindsets and implementing policy to erase inequality.

However, as we experience the growing pains of expanding women’s representation in politics, we will inevitably come up against even more misogyny and sexism (read: Rush Limbaugh and Fox News). What we decide to do in the face of these growing pains will determine our fate.

Do we ignore the sexism and keep on truckin’, hoping it goes away on its own? Or do we stand up and say enough is enough? Women are the only demographic for which it is still acceptable to viciously and openly attack in the public sphere. Why do we allow that to continue?

To truly begin to unravel the archaic stereotypes still held about women, it will take all of us speaking out. Otherwise, we will only achieve equality in numbers alone.

Do we want to arrive at the day where we’ve finally achieved gender parity in public office only to still be called Ice Queens and Mean Girls? I know I don’t.

I was saddened to hear about the recent sexist attacks against Martha Coakley, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins.

As a former Congressional candidate, I know exactly how it feels to be attacked simply for being a woman. I never realized just how sexist politics is until I decided to run for office.

My local paper ran an unacceptable quote about me on the front page during my race. Now, I’ve decided to tell my story on camera to bring these kinds of misogynistic attacks to light.

Click here to hear my story and help us put a stop to sexist attacks.

Help us fight sexism in politics today: we’ve provided the emails of all four recent offending members of the media so you can contact them and speak out against their offensive sexist rhetoric.

I’ve attended Netroots Nation in the past as a candidate, which helped propel my online campaign to a whole new level. This year, I had the pleasure of attending Netroots as the President/CEO of WCF, which was a tremendously enriching experience.

It was inspiring to listen to and meet women like Pam Spaulding of Pam’s House Blend—who I watched win one of the first annual WMC Women in Media awards earlier this year, presented to her by Gloria Steinem.

Of many panels I attended, one that especially stood out to me was about feminist blogging, organized by former WCF blogger and PunditMom, Joanne Bamberger. What a thrill it was to hear Amanda Marcotte, Jill Filipovic, Samhita Mukhopadhyay, Lindsay Beyerstein, and Pam talk about their pioneering work as feminist bloggers! These remarkable young women leaders are the future of the movement.

What really stood out for me was that as women bloggers, their very presence on a blog required the addition of “trap doors” and enhanced “TOS (Terms of Service)” due to the instant misogyny their presence elicited. Striking. These are the hurdles that men never experience.

There are also, of course, challenges that are unique to women candidates. We all agreed, audience and panel alike, that we cannot let blatant sexism thrive in our political system anymore.

I shared my story of when I was running for U.S. Congress in 2008: My local paper plucked from the internet this juicy tidbit and decided it was appropriate to run day after day on the front page (I apologize for the profanity):

“Sammy Bennett is a phony political wh***, who makes cheap political opportunists look like fuc**** Mother Theresa. Even her c*** is made of plastic.”

Yes, folks—misogyny is alive and well. We must create a unified force against all kinds of institutionalized and accepted sexism, whether it be as blatant and crass as I encountered, or more covert.

With the support of the amazing women activists and bloggers I met at Netroots, I know we have the players on the field to fight—and one day win—this battle.