On Sexist Media Coverage of Hillary Clinton

Espousing feminist viewpoints is so often really not cool -- in fact, feminists even have our own joke about how humorless we are:

JOKE: How many feminists does it take to change a light bulb?

PUNCHLINE: That's not funny.

(And that's the clean punchline.)

Whether they call themselves a feminist or not, many women and many men have noticed how different mainstream media coverage of Hillary Clinton's run for the Democratic nomination has been from coverage of male candidates. From her tone of voice and her style of dress, her eyes welling up with tears to her credentials as a senator, Clinton's run for the Democratic nomination has been awash with the most dispiriting ridicule I have seen in my (albeit short) lifetime.

(Let me say right up front that I voted for Barack Obama in the Connecticut primary -- in fact, I took a Metro North train back home to Connecticut to vote for Barack Obama in the Connecticut primary in the flesh. So I can tell you all about why Hillary Clinton gives me the heebie-jeebies -- but that conversation will include words like "Mark Penn," "Wal-mart" and "Iraq War," not "crying" or "nagging wives.")

Surprise, surprise, feeling protective of Hillary Clinton when media coverage manhandles her as ball-busting, overemotional or Anne Boleyn-grade manipulative is regarded as really not cool. And I don't say this because I think I am a martyr or I enjoy feeling like one -- I say it because I've had some frustrating conversations, mostly with men, who think one of two things:

1) They don't see the coverage as sexist or offensive altogether, or

2) They do think it's "a little" sexist but Hillary's such a uber-rich, out-of-touch, shady Republicrat, anyway, that it's just a sexist tint to a legitimate criticism of her smarmy ways.

So it was my distinct pleasure on Thursday night to attend a discussion, "From Bella to Hillary: Women, Media and Politics" at New York City's The Paley Center for Media to discuss how mainstream media coverage of female candidates has changed from the 1960s and 1970s, when women's and civil rights activist Bella Abzug ran for Congress.

Pat Mitchell of the Paley Center converged a slam-dunk lineup: radio host Laura Flanders, president of the Women's Media Center Carol Jenkins, former editor of Ms. magazine Suzanne Braun Levine, veteran television journalist Marlene Sanders, feminist writer (and generational icon) Gloria Steinem, author Mary Thom, and president of the White House Project, which seeks to elect more women to Congress, Marie Wilson.

Veteran TV journalist Marlene Sanders opened the discussion by lamenting, "It seems like we've been doing this forever," to which the other women soberly nodded their heads. Sanders explained to those of us born in the '80s that there were practically no women in politics in the 1960s or 1970s - other than the wives and daughters, who she was often asked to cover. Furthermore, men in journalism were often clueless about the implications of the blossoming women's movement.

In charged Bella Abzug, who former Ms. editor Suzanne Braun Levine noted wasn't "polite" or "motherly" -- and therefore, everyone from the conservatives to the peace activists were wary of. Bella's style was to demand, not ask, and -- for better or for worse -- many women who worked along side her are proudly scarred from a Bella Azbug tonguelashing. (She apparently used to say, "I'm only yelling at you because I respect you!")

Writer Gloria Steinem offered context for how women challenging sexism in the media and in politics were ridiculed, which those of us who work in feminist activism today can sympathize with. "We've moved from ridicule and invisibility to serious opposition," Steinem explained. "First [a movement] is ridiculed, then the next wave is 'it's not news anymore.' First you didn't need it and now it's kind of silly and you don't need it anymore!" Steinem's been around long enough to see feminism's successes of the 1960s and 1970s -- such as legal protections for women in the workforce, civil rights, the public acknowledgment of domestic abuse and sexual assault, legalization of safe abortions, and the widespread use of the birth control pill -- only to see the backlash rear its ugly head in the most Eisenhower-esque incarnations. To Steinem's eye, lately the "misogyny level has gone up."