Michal Coren gets it wrong even at the best of times. I can always count on the Sun Newspaper to annoy me enough to blog about the inanity that fills its pages.
I really want to agree at least once with Coren before I die and with the opening sentence of his article I though today would be the day.
“These are sad days for the American right.” intones Coren.
My eyebrow twitched, would this be the day? Naa… It would be easier to smash an atom with my shoe then agree with Mr.Coren. Case in point – next sentence (italics mine):
“The Republicans have no credible leader, Rush Limbaugh has conquered the art of perennial outrage and the men in smart suits and women in shrinking skirts at Fox try to outdo each other in their use of hyperbole.”
Very nice ass-hat. ‘Smart’ men and sexualized women. Isn’t institutionalized misogyny great?
“The tragedy is that all this comes at a time when we have one of the most worrying presidents in American history. Then, just as we think it can’t get any worse, comes the dream ticket of Sarah Palin and Carrie Prejean, both former beauty queens and both proving that jokes about beauty queens are somewhat justified.”
Ah, yes. Beauty queens are always stupid. Check. Throwing a “somewhat justified” does not fix the message. Just like after punching someone in the face then saying ‘sorry’ does not mitigate the initial transgression.
“Actually she is an ordinary, nice woman blessed with beauty, a devoted husband and a good family. It really should end with that. But no.”
Bra-vo! She should be constantly pregnant, barefoot and in the kitchen too. Sex class! Back to the galley with you and make me a sam’ich bitch.
“Palin wants power and is willing to close her eyes to the facts as she marches forward in glorious denial. Perhaps most chilling is how so many conservatives refuse to accept the obvious and twist into awful shapes trying to justify the woman’s failings.”
The ‘facts’: You are a woman and should never ever aspire to power. The public sphere is not your domain and how dare you even contemplate running for the highest office in the land. How could the Right even think of backing a female candidate? Patriarchally speaking, we have not gotten past the archetypal feminine “built in” flaws! The horror.
“Her daughter Bristol’s pregnancy,[…] Yet, where was your relationship with your daughter, one that would have indicated to you in numerous ways that the girl was hiding and doing something that was wrong?”
Because mother daughter relationships are always open and communicative, if only you’d just play your role and tend to the children. I guess Mr.Palin does not get the whole ‘girl’ thing and could not spend the extra time strengthening his role and bond with her daughter, his culpability is never questioned, while hers is immediately put front and center.
Awesome. Could this patriarchal values 101 lesson get any worse? Of course it does, the ass hattery kicks into overdrive as Coren trashes Carrie Prejean. What follows is his cogent response against her arguments(insipid as they my be). Hmmm…calculating the possibility my previous sentence being true…err… did I mention the smashing atom thing with my shoe… ?
“Carrie Prejean is an even more frightening example of right-wing hypocrisy. Her now famous defence of genuine marriage — only between a man and a woman [Wow, parroting the hetronormative standard. You go girl!]. […] she has posed almost-naked for photographs and that she made at least one graphic sex tape for a former boyfriend. We’re also supposed to believe that her recent relationships with young athletes have all been entirely celibate.”
What?! Pose nekkid for pictures? How dare you, whore! You are a public figure and you go off parading your sluty-slut-slut-lifestyle for all to see? No, no. You keep your sexuality ensconced in terms of patriarchal expectations or it will be a extra slut-shaming lightning round for the likes of you, after-all it isn’t your sex life for heavens sake.
“What she does on her own time is her business, but a moral position demands consistency and so should the response of social conservatives. This woman has even less right to speak for the American right than does Sarah Palin. And that, I’m afraid, is something I thought I’d never say.”
If only the italicized phrase applied to women…
So the calculus is in. If you have taken nekkid photos of yourself, and/or had sex with more than one partner (outside of marraige…ohhh the vapours take me now) as a woman that is an automatic disqualification from being in the ‘moral’ category.
The burning nuclear stupid burns! No Mr.Coren the morality of women is not intrinsically tied to their ranking in the Sex class. Women are autonomous beings capable of thinking outside of their imposed gender roles.
You should try it sometime.
I do not endorse what Mrs.Palin or Ms.Prejean represent, it is social conservatism of the most repugnant variety. Would it be too much to ask that we tackle their arguments as opposed to their gender?
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
5 comments
August 3, 2010 at 6:05 am
Jennifer
Sarah Palin should be trashed. How can anyone defend such a bimbo?
She is a hypocrite in full and continues to show her true colors as time passes on. The sheer amount of times this woman has contridicted herself is astounding.
Now for Carrie Prejean…
Understand this “The Arbourist”
Like Sarah Palin, when someone preaches from the pulpit of “conservative” family values…THEY BETTER WALK THAT LINE. This has been the issue with both these woman. This has NOTHING to do with gender. They preach how family values are important…how sex before marriage is wrong…Then their actions prove otherwise.
This is the issue. Their hypocrisy. Both these women need to STFU because the more they open their mouths, the more they look like fools.
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August 3, 2010 at 11:19 am
Vern R. Kaine
Based on their lack of depth regarding ANYTHING either has talked about, the only end Palin and Prejean seem to be pursuing to me is CASH – pure and simple.
And Jennifer, I agree – the more they talk the more foolish they sound. I think Palin has been out of her league the moment she entered Federal politics and worse, the “celebrity” arena. I don’t think she’s being necessarily hypocritical, I just don’t think she has any depth to what she publicly presents herself as standing for to really have a position to be hypocritical to.
As for Prejean, I don’t think she actually posed naked and based partly on that may not deserve as a heavy of a “hypocrite” label as one might wish to affix to her. Instead, the pageant queen to me that was the real hypocrite was Tara Connor.
To be clear, I understand people make mistakes and can have less than perfect pasts, but I think her sort of past is more appropriate for a Playboy Playmate or even a CEO for that matter, not a “Miss Teen”. I think where we have teens as role models we shouldn’t be rewarding a past like that with all the things most teenage girls today crave.
Perhaps from a feminist point of view that’s all irrelevant (forgive my ignorance/naivety, but do real feminists (still) hate pageants?), but if we’re talking hypocrite public figures here, I think Connor is far more deserving of the label than Prejean.
Arb – nice call on the Fox “suits vs. skirts” thing. A real journalist should know better. Regardless of what one thinks of Fox’s slant or format, their commentators are not bimbos by any stretch.
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August 3, 2010 at 1:52 pm
The Arbourist
Sarah Palin should be trashed. How can anyone defend such a bimbo?
As stated in the post I was not defending the arguments either Palin or Prejean makes, what I was hoping to highlight is the intrinsic mysoginy that is built into our culture that is always working against women in whatever role they are allowed to fulfill in society.
The sheer amount of times this woman has contridicted herself is astounding.
Her arguments are poor, and she has made several glaring errors and I hypothesize will continue to do so. But let us judge her by her arguments, not by the gender she happens to occupy.
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August 3, 2010 at 1:57 pm
The Arbourist
I think where we have teens as role models we shouldn’t be rewarding a past like that with all the things most teenage girls today crave.
So what do you think we are teaching young girls right now? I mean look at any ‘teen’ magazine and witness the litany of messages on how to be pretty, stylish and cute. We groom our women for their role in the sex class, where their worth is determined on how good they look to men. Ironically, we slam and slut-shame women who take their role seriously as sex objects and denigrate them for their ‘immoral’ behaviour. It is a neat catch 22 that women are in.
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August 3, 2010 at 5:06 pm
Vern R. Kaine
“So what do you think we are teaching young girls right now?”
I agree, which is all the more reason why I would hope there is SOMETHING out there that says that if you don’t succumb to all those pressures there’s an obvious, tangible reward for doing so.
“It is a neat catch 22 that women are in.”
I agree totally that it’s a horrible catch 22 (sarcasm noted with “neat”) that I fear is still in its very early stages as far as damage done.
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