WOW! Variety censors, but Hollywood Reporter runs it…Hey Hollywood – time to learn about sexism!!!
June 17, 2009 by Gwilym McGrew
A special thanks to The New Agenda’s supporter Gwilym McGrew from California. Gwilym paid to run Amy Siskind’s HuffPo article, “Sexism Against Conservative Women is Still Sexism” as a two-page ad in the Hollywood Reporter. Gwilym figures the folks in Hollywood can stand to learn a thing or two about sexism. Ironically, Variety turned down Gwilym’s request to run a similar ad. Read Gwilym’s story below!
Here is the text of the ad below.
Amy, your article inspired me. I am Republican who had many discussions with my wife (a Bush loving feminist Republican. Bet some didn’t know there was such a thing) and daughter (a Hillary democrat) about all these same issues you wrote about. I worked in the entertainment industry for many years and thought that your article needed broader distribution into that community. We need to enlighten the writers, producers, directors, “suits,” and television news community that many of the attacks on women that have lately hit the news are just wrong. The entertainment industry helps create our country’s collective culture and these folks need to understand that degrading and mocking attacks need to stop. People should argue about issues and ideas and not attack people who are making particular arguments.
As you know I tried to get this ad to run in Variety for last Monday but we were rejected without explanation. It does appear the “editorial” folk there killed the reprint which just amazed me given the evenhanded nature of your article. But then, this is “Hollywood” and they have many sacred cows who pay big bucks to build their image and this makes Variety and Hollywood Reporter financially dependent on these folks. My guess is Variety did not want to bite the hand that feeds it. Thankfully, the Hollywood Reporter came through.
Your article and call to action will stand the test of time and with Letterman still in the news today will certainly be very relevant for tomorrow’s issue of Hollywood Reporter.
Awesome, thank you Gwilym! I totally agree with–no matter what party and what belief, we have got to stop with the name calling and character assassinations. Women and muslims are the only two groups that it is still more or less okay to go after with the public’s and media’s approval, and we have got to keep speaking out and disapproving.
Gwilym—-thanks for stepping up to the plate and standing up for the things you believe in. What you did took admirable courage. I’ve been with The New Agenda from day one and I’ve learned that once our collective voices are heard and people stand up against sexism in the media, it usually goes away because people know better. After the goings-on of 2008, it seems that the media needs to be reminded regularly that their behavior has been bad. Thanks for helping to bring this message to such an important community.
I think it’s great that women and groups who supported Hillary during the primaries are now standing up and defending Governor Palin. Sexism against any woman is still sexism.
However, what has been missing from this story is any mention of the extraordinary evolution of support for Governor Palin by progressive women and men. While it’s good to see Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck stand up for conservative women who have been attacked, neither of them to date has been willing to acknowledge that Hillary was also attacked with the same vitriol as Sarah. I suspect it may be because they were the one’s attacking Hillary and is why they don’t mention her.
The real test of how united people are that sexism against any women of any party affiliation or no party affiliation is still sexism, will be when we see our conservative allies stand up for progressive women with the same passion and commitment that the progressive women and men have stood up for Sarah.
I hope all of our conservative friends will be just as quick to stand up for Hillary or any progressive woman who is attacked in the sexist way Sarah was.
Gwilym: as another guy in ” the industry ” here in Lotus land, I know the courage it takes to take a stand…thank you
Did you know that the top ten hollywood”actors” in earnings this year are all men?
Very impressive. That’s great!
Hollywood’s favorite punching bags…conservative women, christianity, and conservative values, big business (you know the thing that makes America great and gives people jobs.)
Bullies are always insecure…..hollywood is dying.
Really, could the font size used for this article be smaller? I couldn’t read it at all………
Wow… nice article. It’s sad to see that even today, there are “good old boy” networks who will cover each others back to protect each other from valid criticism.
To Kathleen Wynne: I don’t remember Sean Hannity or any other conservative commentator (except maybe Rush Limbaugh) ever criticizing Hillary because she’s a woman, or saying that she is incapable of leading because she’s a woman. We cannot prohibit criticism of people just because they are women.
Thank you for not letting this Icon of american humor carry the torch for the lynch mob of the new century.
Hate is the new industry in Hollywood but it is not working at the box office.
For those who want to read the text, click on the link in the italics section at the top of the page.
I really like and agree with the article. It’s unfortunate, however, that the link to the text goes to the Huffington Post (supposedly a bastion of reason and tolerance), where the vast majority of people not only feel it’s perfectly OK to attack a woman (or a child) based on her sexuality, they then attack the author as not being a “real woman” or a leader (because she’s actually defending ALL women and not just the ones who agree with the “correct” set of political beliefs).
The fact is, women will still be marginalized when they disagree with men (or even other women). I have a dear friend who is a flaming Liberal (so we NEVER talk politics). During the VP debate, I happened to check out a talkback she was hosting, and was disheartened to see her and her friends calling Palin vile anti-woman names, and even attacking her for having a mentally challenged child. As long as women decide it’s fine to attack other women this way, you can be sure that there will be plenty of men who are more than happy to do the same. Anyone who’s ever listened to Olbermann or Bill Maher (noted Palin bashers) knows that the first thing they like to do is attack her as a woman. That should tell you everything you need to know about both of them.
Courage! Thank you for your courage; if more people would stand up, things would be different.
Regarding Hannity, Rush, etc. attacking Hillary, I could be mistaken, but it seems to be they were attacking her ideology, not her family and certainly not her daughter. I did not see or hear them attacking her on a personal level.
What is wrong with so many of the women in Hollywood who go along with the attacks on other women? Have they sold their soul for money and fame? I find it hard to understand.
When the women’s movement began, it was about equal opportunity and about making individual choices. At some point, NOW began to be about “reproductive” choices only, and at that point, began to be insulting to those women who did not/could not share their point of view and non-representative of most women. Ms. Siskind’s article reshapes what feminism should be about–equality of opportunity and freedom to make the individual choices that we as women make for ourselves and our families. Women who are front and center–as Governor Palin is– in the political arena can definitely be criticized for policy positions as long as those criticisms are true, of course. But that was NOT what was happening.
Great ad! Some Hollywood folks really detest those Hollywood trade magazines, Variety & Hollywood Reporter due to their slanted coverage and spin b/c they are pro-moguls, anti-writers, unions, etc. You should mention this censorship to Nikki Finke at DeadlineHollywoodDaily.com, which is a big entertainment business blog. Nikki reveals all the shenanigans of these papers and she uncovers more facts than those loser papers.
Maybe Nikki will be sympathetic, and note the censorship. I don’t know. But she has a large readership (and they’re probably all liberals). If she notes this, more liberal elites will feel ashamed to discover themselves to be sexists.