Post Debate Male Pundits Speak for Women Voters and Get It All Wrong

[Tx4obama]

Post Debate Male Pundits Speak for Women Voters and Get It All Wrong

Romney’s condescending attitude toward women was bad enough last night, but what really got me was listening to male pundits discuss how women voters were no doubt put off by the “petty” bickering of the two candidates. Just two weeks ago, they were telling us that Romney won over female voters by being an alpha male, but suddenly when the President engages in the fight, it’s off-putting to us, according to them.

I wasn’t focused on how they spoke to each other, though petty is not a word I would use for a fight that the media brought on with their two week “weak” “passive” beating of Obama. I was too busy thinking about how Romney wouldn’t answer the question on gun control (neither candidate wanted to go near that one) and how he so easily slipped into blaming single mothers for the problem of gun violence. I was stunned by his comments about women in binders — he clearly assumes that women are so dumb they won’t hear what he didn’t say about his actual policy of not supporting equal pay. And I felt nothing but solidarity with Candy Crowley when he attempted to shame and belittle her for doing her job.

So, no. I wasn’t thinking about how “petty” it was for the two candidates to be fighting it out – that is what the media demanded. They wanted good TV and they got it. Some of us were actually listening to the policies in the first debate and were none too impressed with Mitt Romney’s bully routine, but the media wanted bully boys – they made that clear when they crowned Romney, who brayed and lied his way through the entire debate – the “winner”. This, in and of itself, reeks of patriarchal values — and they can’t even see it.

Less concerned with a boxing match to appease the media’s need for ratings through election season or how impressed they are by regressive alpha male behavior, I was worried about my friends who are single mothers. I was thinking about what my best friend would do without Planned Parenthood for her cervical cancer screening. I was imagining being one of those women in a binder and wondering how Romney treated the women who worked for him. I was thinking I would not want to work for that man. And then I thought I don’t want that man to work for me, represent me.

-snip-

Full article here: http://www.politicususa.com/post-debate-male-pundits-pretend-speak-women-voters.html

A Good Read

[seabeyond]

1. brayed and lied his way through the entire debate – the “winner”. reeks of patriarchal values

right on... to it all

[Blue Owl]

2. And here I thought Chuck Todd was every woman...

Kidding, of course...

[flamingdem]

3. Ah good point, I was kinda buying into the "women don't like fighting" meme

That is BS to criticize Obama as usual.

[hoosierlib]

4. Bravo!

Well put...

[bemildred]

5. Something to notice:

Obama does not try to outshout Rmoney, what he does is stand in the way and keep talking, so Rmoney did not get the floor, or freedom to be heard when it was not his turn, and he is presented with the choice of being more egregious in his disrespect or giving up, which he eventually did, in each case when resistance persisted. That's how you do it, it leaves the blame evidently where it belongs.