To Pimp or Not To Pimp: NBC's Shuster Suspended for Chelsea Clinton Remark

Posted by Jane Hamsher, Firedoglake at 7:40 AM on February 9, 2008.

I put up the poll yesterday asking if Obama's "claws" comment was sexist because I thought it was something that could justifiably be interpreted either way and would act as something of a Rorschach test about where people who read this website stood. I intentionally didn't say what I felt about the statement and my hunch that my personal response could not predict what others would think was born out by the fact that only one of the 359 comments reflected my own reaction.

Women represented 49% of those responding and men 51%, which is pretty much in line with what other surveys have indicated is the readership for this site -- men comprise a much higher percentage of the readership of other blogs. Of women who responded, slightly more (27% to 22%) found the comment sexist than non-sexist. Men were nearly twice as likely (18% to 33%) not to find it sexist.

Even more interesting to me was everyone's attribution of my motive for putting up the poll, or their assumption about what my feelings on the subject might be. Which was actually much more about them and their individual need to view this race through a particular lens than anything else. So I appreciate the time everyone took to respond, it gave me a better feel for where our readership is at. (And no, I'm not going to say what I think because I don't want people to feel judged one way or the other in the situation. I appreciate everyone's honesty and let's leave it at that.)

And on that awkward segue, I'll bring up the latest contretemps -- comments made by David Shuster to the effect that Chelsea Clinton was being "pimped out" by the campaign. It may surprise everyone but I actually wasn't bothered by them. The phrase is ubiquitous, I use it all the time and although it is a loaded term my initial impression was that in the wake of all the truly awful sexist stuff that's come down the pipeline from MSNBC over the course of this campaign, much of which I have personally railed about, this just didn't fall into that category.

At first I thought it might be because I know Shuster and don't think he has the women's issues that many on MSNBC seem to have, and maybe that was affecting my assessment of the situation. But I wrote a post recently about Ben Affleck appearing at a press conference for the SEIU in Boston, and shortly after it went live someone involved in helping me put together the story sent me an email wondering what the hell I was thinking linking to a headline that said something on the order of "Boston Mayor Pimps For Healthcare Workers." I wasn't sure what they were upset about either at the time, but after a moment I realized that the term probably didn't strike others as being as inert as it did me so I changed the link.

I understand that this situation is different, we're talking about a young woman and Hillary Clinton has been on the receiving end of a lot of really misogynistic and disrespectful shit from MSNBC and that on the heels of that, a comment which overtly compared her daughter to a prostitute probably did not sit too well. Still, if you asked me, I'd say that while I certainly understand that others might feel differently, for me this was a minor infraction.

Nobody did (ask me), but I thought I'd say so anyway.

Update: Wow, Shuster's been suspended. I guess we can safely conclude I'm often a minority opinion on these things and frequently out of the mainstream, but I have to believe he's largely paying for the sins of Matthews.

Tagged as: clinton, shuster, sexism, obama, msnbc

Jane Hamsher is the founder of FireDogLake. Her work has also appeared on the Huffington Post, Alternet and The American Prospect.