Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Gloria on Hillary

This blog has taken on a Hillary slant today, hasn't it?! Just got around to reading Gloria Steinem's op-ed in the Times today and it's quite the rallying cry. All I'm saying is, sometimes I wonder.

So why is the sex barrier not taken as seriously as the racial one? The reasons are as pervasive as the air we breathe: because sexism is still confused with nature as racism once was; because anything that affects males is seen as more serious than anything that affects “only” the female half of the human race; because children are still raised mostly by women (to put it mildly) so men especially tend to feel they are regressing to childhood when dealing with a powerful woman; because racism stereotyped black men as more “masculine” for so long that some white men find their presence to be masculinity-affirming (as long as there aren’t too many of them); and because there is still no “right” way to be a woman in public power without being considered a you-know-what.

(thanks to Justin for pushing me to read it earlier than I otherwise would)

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