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...so is her candidacy, her husband and her policy ideas.
...surely that, could be misogynist. Except Dan didn't write that.
http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archive…
And btw, the statement "if you don't get it, I won't explain" is the universally recognized term for "you're right, but i don't want to admit it."
And yes it would have been funnier if it had been her beard, but I'll take what I can get.
@27 oh please do. surely you have time to post a few more smug, condescending comments here.
http://boyculture.typepad.com/boy…
Merry Christmas ;)
-D310
http://boyculture.typepad.com/boy_cultur…
Hey sugar-tits, just keep your teeth outta the way, and there will be no wear on anyone.
I am absolutely certain Dan would rather post a photo of Rick Santorum with a hot dog in his mouth.
For the record, "And if you don't get it, I'm not going to waste my time explaining it." literally means "I only talk to people who believe exactly what I believe." Great job, Kim Jong-il!
I respectfully disagree, for reasons not unlike (though also not coinciding with) those of previous posters.
If you guys/gals don't want to explain where the misogyny is in the sexual subtext of this photo of Ms Bachmann, then I won't make guesses. I think I know what you're talking about, and I could counterargue, but hey -- maybe I'm guessing wrong. So for the time being, all I can say is "I don't agree".
If you didn't want to engage in a discussion, then why did you post a comment here at all? There are some quite normal people here who would like to hear your perspective, but by assuming this was not the case you simply contributed to the already sad level of argumentless accusations that the internet is so renowned for. What a pity.
How hard is it to avoid this sort of photo opportunity? I mean - no paparazzo out there is following me with a camera *and yet*, I still try not to jam bananas, corn dogs and particularly phallic ice creams into my festering maw in public, just 'cos I think it's - you know - kind of indecorous.
And the nails! Speaking as a woman who has to balance a fondness for nail polish with a desire to work in the real world, I can guarantee you that she can't type or hold a pen with those. She also can't wipe her arse without penetrating the paper.
You're joking, right? Please, tell me your joking...
Now I'm off to a take back the night march with my fellow members of my womanist club, The Unshorn Sisters of the Apocalypse. Ta ta!
If you didn't want to engage in a discussion, then why did you post a comment here at all? There are some quite normal people here who would like to hear your perspective, but by assuming this was not the case you simply contributed to the already sad level of argumentless accusations that the internet is so renowned for. What a pity.
*crickets*
Maybe "I was into misogyny when it was underground?"
Seriously though, if you're going to make claims, have the decency to back them up. Otherwise you're just a troll.
http://llamabutchers.mu.nu/archives/Romn…
Besides--Michelle Bachman hates women too. Feminists: Michelle Bachman IS. NOT. YOUR. FRIEND.
Yeah, but it's always sexist when it's ugly feminists.
BTW, having had blowjobs from both conservatives and liberals, I can say, the conservatives gave better head and more than likely swallowed.
@69, sorry sugar-tits, was this your thesis?
Do not tease or feed the ^^^trolls^^^ (I've got your answer right here, troll).
I disagree. This happens all the time -- right-wing blogs publish funny, strange, stoopid-looking photographs of liberals all the time (just google "Obama") and I don't see anyone here raising their voices about that. Are you really that sure?
This suggests said photos of politicians putting things in their mouths are offensive by means of the cultural edifice you mean, but not that they are misogynistic. I suppose there is no doubt in anybody's mind that this picture of Ms Bachmann, and the previously posted picture of Mr Santorum, are offensive. And that is the point -- these pictures are meant to be offensive.
But 'misogyny' is not synonymous with 'offensive', as far as I can see. Unless, as someone wrote above, anything that is offensive to a woman is now supposed to be misogynistic, which would make the very term 'misogyny' redundant. Also, would this imply that anything offensive to a man is per se misandric -- so that the previously published photo of Mr Santorum now constitutes an example of misandry?
In sum: if offense = sexism, then there is a conceptual problem here, one that is in fact very anti-feminist. It's the exact opposite of what Betty Friedan and Simone de Beauvoir stood for.
Likewise your insistence that providing no argument wins the discussion. It's also very typical of right-wing extremists: Fox News is full of the same kind of smug.
"If you didn't want to engage in a discussion, then why did you post a comment here at all?" is an excellent question. One to which I haven't an answer.
Well, may I suggest then that you don't post further comments, at least until you've pondered my question and found an answer? Both you and us will be wasting less time.
And here's my reaction. Yes, cultural stereotypes are at play that lead to certain interpretations of a photograph, interpretations colored by said stereotypes -- to wit, Obama eading fried chicken would cause certain kinds of racist images to pop up in the viewers mind that probably wouldn't be suggested by a White politician in a similar situation.
But think a little about one of the implications of this fact: the "avoidance" factor. Here are a few points:
(a) would said stereotype be helped, or in fact covertly strengthened, by avoiding such photographs? After all, some Black people sometimes eat fried chicken, and I'm not going to say they should avoid doing so, especially in public, only because of possible PR consequences.
(b) even though a photograph of a White politicial likewise eating fried chicken wouldn't 'justify' or 'excuse' the Obama photo, putting them together would have one interesting effect: to make people realize this difference, and start caring about it. The more consciousness of subtexts there is, the better.
Likewise for the photo of Ms Bachmann. The stereotypes about women submitting by giving blowjobs don't disappear if you avoid using them to make fun -- and juxtaposing her to a similar photo of a male candidate does make said stereotypes more visible, which is a good thing.
It's in fact a step in the right direction -- since, I suppose, we can all agree that winning the fight against social stereotypes will imply that, someday, a similar photo of a woman (or of a Black man eating fried chicken) will be publishable and offensive without suggesting said stereotypes? That such a situation would indeed suggest a better world? And that the way to get there is not by hushing said stereotypes, but by actually bringing them in the open?
Louie C.K. did, a while back, this clip on the word 'faggot' and its cultural context. The information is not really accurate, but that's not the point. The point is, to me, is that it suggests something I think is true, namely, that avoiding the word 'faggot' out of respect for homosexuals and the suffering social stereotypes cause to them is more a covert way of lending support to said stereotypes than a way of fighting against them.
The (typically liberal-progressive) view that using stereotypes can only strengthen them, and that hushing them or mentioning them only in critical analyses can only contribute to weakening them, is simply flawed. Human beings, the societies they build, and the interpretations they give to what they see around them just aren't that simple. (Or else, how ever could movements against said stereotypes even get started?)
(Talk about rode hard and put away wet...)
Peace.
Also, corndogs look disgusting even without all the BJ jokes.
"Oh look honey, I finally pulled out that last remnant of my dead soul that's been stuck in my esophagus all week!"
"Bachman's allergic reaction to babies and butterflies flares up once again at summer festivities, causing a swollen tongue which she has to hold up with a napkin in order to keep her head from falling off."
There are more, I'm sure...
It's that while they, being nominally intelligent compassionate beings, form tight circular time-burning firing squads of outrage around the casual use of the word "bitch" or around a goofy photo; the Right, being made of empathetically impaired homicidal dip-shits, will form rhetorically entrenched and disciplined artillery barrages and destroy entire institutions for the selfish benefit of the wealthy.
And by "love" I mean dispair to the point of spite.
Keep up the good work, lefties! (And by "good work" I mean: "thanks for nothing you fucking morons.")
your boy Rick came in better that expected in Iowa and with Pawlenty out moves up to third!
Pres Bachman...Pres Santorum......which does it for you?
silly question!
Danny wetdreams pumping santorum INTO Santorum.
while
Michelle just has nasty lady bits.....
There is something inherently dangerous with being idealistic/progressive: the danger of falling into dogma and seeing the world through (self-imposed) colored glasses. Call that an occupational hazard. It takes extra effort to keep one's mind awake and working and not fall pray to disputes over trifles and/or minutiae -- while at the same time understanding that the are true points behind the trifles and minutiae (because, you know, there are important points hiding there, about sexism and the media and stereotypes and cultural contexts and what can or should be done about them).
To the right-wing it is easier because the colored glasses are acquired much earlier, with their mother's milk -- they actually never saw the world in any way other than through their colored glasses, so they aren't usually aware that there is a world independent of that color. Lefties are prone to doing that, but righties are born doing that. That's still a significant difference.
(I'm referring of course to the more extreme subgroups under right- and left-wing; there are, after all, also reasonable moderate people on both sides. They're hard to see in the current climate, but they are there.)
One BIG problem is not understanding what ideals are actually real and worth fighting for, and what are merely signaling a superficial self-righteous identity.
Jesus Christ. These people just screaming "misogyny" at every gendered pejorative and every stupid puerile photo with a woman in it accomplishes precisely nothing. It's just pissing higher on the tree than everybody else "THIS IS WHAT I BELIEVE! AND YOU'RE ALL BAD!"
Take the shit the Dan get's for using a particular word or using a particular picture. The guy has solidly worked to make a better existence for a large disenfranchised group. fuck. Most of us have voted, worked, donated to causes to promote equality. That ain't good enough. We gotta use the right words and watch the right movies? Well. I say to those people: fuck right off.
If they're sooooo exhausted from having to compulsively point out this so-called "misogyny (or whatever the flavor of the week is)" over and over... well gee, maybe they should question why their investing so much energy on a losing battle? Maybe they should consider they get off on being martyrs.
Not only that the perpetually offended signalers don't get to define the terms in every single instance. It's all POV not a law of physics.
They may want to consider that they might be wrong. Radical, I know! It's possible there are varying contexts for these kinds of things. OMG! Controversial!
This country has been driven so far to the right in the last fifteen years I hardly recognize it. And the Right has done this with an army of incompetent mouth breathers who don't HAVE any ideology other than relentlessly rooting for their team in spite of the personal damage done. It's amazing.
The left is so bogged down parsing molecules of personal ideology and installing ideological purity tests based on vocabulary they can no longer see a big picture. It purges and turns-off a huge portion of people who would normally identify with the big picture. Oh. But who needs all those "misogynists", right?
In the end we don't sacrifice shit to make real changes. Except what's convenient. We all want other people to change what their doing, what their saying, how their saying it. Hows that working out?
I pretty fed up with it.
If it were a bunch of non-sexualized insults against a bunch of politicians that Dan disagreed with (for instance, taking comments out of context, or making fun of the kind of tongue slips anyone makes when public speaking), I wouldn't have a problem with it. Immature, but not offensive.
But here we have the mixture of a sexual and a political attack. And that is a problem. It's attacking politicians for their sexuality instead of their views. It's especially a problem when the politicians are women, since female sexuality is already so stigmatized and condemned. Using this image in the context of a political attack is supporting the idea that it's an insult or a bad thing when a woman sucks dick. And as a guy who likes sexual women, I am opposed to this for completely selfish reasons.
By verbally de-enfranchising your opponents rather than engaging with them in a civil way, you're basing yourself on precisely the kind of strategies that you should be fighting against. Or, to put it differently, who's exactly participating in the kyriarchy -- @97, or you? And why?
There is a lot of truth in what you said, but consider this: is it the case that avoiding such images is going to weaken said stereotypes, or is this simply silencing and pretending not to see the problem? (Consider the case of the Louie C.K. clip I mentioned above, about the word "faggot".)
A world in which you cannot mock people for putting things in their mouths without apparently "reinforcing" stereotypes about blowjobs being 'bad' or 'ridiculous' or 'implying submission' has something wrong in it that goes beyond the mere stereotypes that you're fighting against. Do you see my point?