Sarah Palin's Retrograde Gender Politics

[marmar]

from the American Prospect:



Sarah Palin's Retrograde Gender Politics

Don't be fooled. Palin is not on the ticket to bring gender balance to the White House. Her primary role is to reinforce traditional ideas of masculinity and femininity.

Courtney E. Martin | September 15, 2008 | web only



Observers of contemporary politics, especially those who follow the high drama of presidential campaigns, are plagued by many questions. Most vexing, perhaps, are those concerned with the role of gender in public life. Why is testosterone the coveted elixir of political power? More specifically, what anxieties have made the ‘wimp factor' one of the most important variables in determining the outcomes of elections? First coined in 1988, this phrase…denotes a male candidate's deficient manhood. --Stephen Ducat, The Wimp Factor


The McCain campaign has spent the last two weeks trying to convince American voters that Sarah Palin is just the jolt of estrogen that the country needs. She has five kids; long, pretty hair; and the teeth-gritting, fist-clenching fierceness of a mother about to pull a car off her toddler. Reuters, in fact, reports that after her deus ex machina appearance at the Republican National Convention, McCain suddenly shot up 12 points ahead of Obama with white women. (He was 8 points behind before the confetti fell in Minneapolis.)

Palin may have been plucked from obscurity to appeal to women voters who are aching for a maverick in mom's clothing, but don't be fooled. Palin is not on this ticket to bring gender balance to the White House; her primary role is to reinforce the almighty power of traditional masculinity.

From her first public speech as VP candidate, she's been driving the point home. Of Obama, she quipped, "This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word ‘victory.'" Notice that he's not just a candidate giving an address, but a man, a man who doesn't have the balls to go after outright victory. There is ample evidence that the war in Iraq is not a win-lose equation (and never really was), but a complex, messy civil entanglement with multiple competing interests, close to 5,000 American lives lost, and $200 million spent daily. Despite these cold hard facts, Palin chides Obama for not appealing to vulnerable Americans' need to feel like invincible winners again.

And, in perhaps the most offensive display of her "wimp factor" agenda, she attempted to discredit community organizing by feminizing it. She sarcastically told conventioneering Republicans (along with millions of Americans watching on television), "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a ‘community organizer,' except that you have actual responsibilities." It was an eerie echo of what oblivious men in positions of traditional power have been saying for centuries: that the work of community building -- whether it be child-rearing, elder-caring, teaching, nursing, social work, or, yes, community organizing -- isn't really work at all. That, despite being the backbone of our economy and the heart of our civic life, it doesn't count because it doesn't involve power suits and bottom lines. What makes this ridicule of community-building even more ironic is that the GOP is simultaneously glorifying Palin's role as caregiver of her own sprawling family. ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=sarah_palins_retrograde_gender_politics