Imagining Sarah
September 25, 2008
by Sheryl Lee
|New/old twists in the Sarah Palin media narrative.
The writers on Slate’s XX Factor blog imagine Sarah Palin exploited as a sexy maneater by her own people, they question whether charging the McCain camp with sexism for “handling” Sarah Palin is not itself sexist, and they consider that perhaps Sarah Palin frightens men, and so the McCain camp keeps her locked up.
Hanna Rosin finds the Washington Times photo of Sarah Palin, shot from behind Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, “amazing” and wonders whether conservatives are promoting the idea of Palin as a Vampire-Vixen.
“Palin, radiating confidence, looks like she wants to ravish him, if not suck his blood.”
“The image conveyed by this photo, featured in a friendly conservative paper is: That is one MANSLAYING v.p. candidate we got.”
“This, plus the “Hottest VP” buttons, plus the action figure in a miniskirt, makes one suspect that conservatives are promoting the sexy Christian girl image rather than offended by it, as they claim to be.”
In “Free Sarah Palin”?, Dahlia Lithwick questions whether the charge of sexism aimed at McCain’s team’s perceived sheltering of Palin does not deny her autonomy, and is therefore itself sexist.
Campbell Brown is not the first commentator to claim that the McCain campaign’s monthlong muzzling of Sarah Palin represents “sexism” although she’s probably the most forceful. Andrew Sullivan has also railed against the sexism of the McCain campaign—which has more or less treated Gov. Palin like the Bush twins were treated—adorable but off-limits.
Not sure what I think about the tactic of blaming the boys for this, though. On the one hand it’s a clever response to the Palin trick of turning every quirk of every eyebrow into “sexism.” On the other, I can’t help but respond to it the same way Nayeli reacts to the grotesque “Declare Yourself” ads. Is this really about someone else’s choice to sew Palin’s mouth shut? Yuck. Why do we keep talking about women as though they lack any agency? Are we really going to condemn the McCain campaign for treating her as an object, with demands that they “free” her? I understand why smart women in the media are enraged with Palin’s refusal to engage them. It’s appalling. But I don’t think it’s good for women to direct that rage at her male keepers, handlers, or advisers, either.
Aww, Isn’t She Cute? writes Hanna Rosin.
Dahlia, my suspicion is that the McCain campaign doesn’t really know what to do with her. They are afraid not that she’ll say something stupid and embarrassing but that she’ll say something too street-smart, or wicked, or aggressive. A woman with her reckless confidence might be appealing to conservative women but not necessarily to men. Based on nothing but my intuition, I’m guessing part of the reason the Palin effect is fading so fast is that they’ve tried so hard to turn her into a pet—adorable, as you say, but mute. So now she’s fetching but useless. And who else could we blame but her male handlers? It can’t possibly be her choice. One suspects she would love to take the liberal media on, given the chance.
There’s a meta-narrative here: something about how a woman is the property of men, and even a powerful woman is more like a wild animal than a human, and still property. Of the three bloggers, only Dahlia Lithwick notes that if Palin possesses volition and agency—if she’s an actual human being—she might be found responsible for her own decisions.
One thing is clear: a woman in a position of power, in the spotlight like this, is an utterly unfamiliar concept to all of us.
POLITICAL CORRUPTION JUST AN EVERYDAY AFFAIR FOR CONGRESS
http://hillaryloyalistnowformc.....ilout.aspx
She reminds me so much of my older sister – smart, determined, tough, the only difference being my sister is hard corp Liberal. If she becomes VP I suspect we will all see a woman none of us expected. That 80% approval rating she has as Governor keeps coming to mind along with the fact that her mate is part Native and works in the oil fields, or has , along with commercial fishing. Quite a contrast IMO, then there’s the fact that is not innately afraid and repelled by a metal object called a gun. She walks equally confident in the world of ideas and action. I’m willing to give her a shot – who knows, maybe ‘squirrel jaw’ will fall over dead a week into office and we have our first woman President – yehhh, she would probably feel like the first woman to fly a combat mission in Iraq felt, if that happened, but Ma McCain looks pretty spry at age (?) so that probably won’t happen……
People who see and listen to Governor Palin in person come away feeling confident that she is qualified to be our next VP, but her television interviews make her look scatter brained and vapid. I took the time to watch some video of her gubernatorial debates, and she seems very capable. Is it that her TV interviews are being deliberately edited to make her look stupid, or is she overwhelmed by nerves? I am looking forward to seeing her debate Biden, Since none of that video will end up on the cutting room floor, we will have a better picture of her. When I look at candid photos of the other candidates, I realize that depending upon the bias of the people showing the photos, just about anything can be implied. There’s a photo of Hillary Clinton that makes the rounds on the right wing blogs that makes her look like a banshee. Obama is either haloed or has his nose stuck up in air. Palin is an attractive women and it’s obvious that photographers are trying to catch her in “vixen” mode. No campaign wants to subject its candidate to abuse by the media whatever the motive. If we had a fair and unbiased media, I’m sure we would be seeing more of Palin. This is still uncharted waters.
Well, I don’t know about you all, but having seen that clip of the Katie Couric interview, I’m also eager to see her in debate. There’s just no way she got to be where she is without being articulate and informed on the issues pertinent to her constituents.
I remember this one time, years ago—I was flipping through the tv channels and paused on some PBS show featuring a black British woman. I don’t even know what the show was about, really, but it switched modes in a way that was quite eye-opening to me, the viewer.
First, it showed the woman dressed in some colourful sarong-type dress, with her head wrapped in coils of fabric, walking around her apartment, talking calmly to someone who remained out of the frame and voiceless to the viewer. She carried herself with quiet dignity, spoke with gravity, and took us around her eclectic and charming home.
The scene changed, and she was in the same outfit in the same space, but she was seated, with bright lights on her, making her clothing and the decor of her home look saturated with colour and garish. Where before she was statuesque and lovely, the lights and the positioning of her body now made her seem fleshy and grotesque. The interviewer asked her questions in a stacatto manner – with a lot of press – and the woman answered, but now, instead of seeming dignified and serene and wise, she seemed slow and foolish and bewildered.
I was stunned at the difference the staging and the interview style made in my impression of this woman. It made me very sad for the way we treat people who are different from us, for how casually we deprive people of their dignity, and I have never forgotten it.
Something I missed in the post: Rosin wonders whether “conservatives are promoting the sexy Christian girl image rather than offended by it, as they claim to be.”
In our Puritanical, porn-obsessed culture the two go hand-in-hand: Desire is underscored by shame. Purity and innocence are fetishized. There’s nothing unusual about demanding respect for Palin’s virtue, while publishing sexualized images of her.
I think it is unfortunate that Palin’s appearance and style (feminine, approachable, attractive) have been used to diminish her, as Hilary’s was used against her. Two accomplished women are criticized as being too barbie or shrew like. One’s voice is “too domineering”, and the other “too twangy” . It seems you can’t win as a female unless you are unremarkable to the point of silent, plient invisibility.
Maybe that is the main objective.
Leave your Response Want an avatar? Get a gravatar!
Community Room
February 6, 2012 at 4:25 pm
January 30, 2012 at 2:36 pm
January 26, 2012 at 4:38 pm
January 23, 2012 at 1:04 pm
January 15, 2012 at 11:37 am
January 9, 2012 at 6:36 pm
January 7, 2012 at 10:10 pm
January 5, 2012 at 9:31 am
BUILD your NETWORK
Our Network of College Women
Protecting our Teenage Girls
We’re in the Media »
Click to see our latest stories in the media
More Stories »Recent Comments
The Latest from our Blog
Archives
Pioneer Mentors
Blogroll
Find us Online
Subscribe Entries (RSS) | Comments (RSS)
The New Agenda is a 501(c)(4) organization dedicated to improving the lives of women and girls by bringing about systemic change in the media, at the workplace, at school and at home. More...