In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Month: April 2008

Why calling out misogyny matters, part 2: When misogyny is used against men

It seems that Barack Obama’s performance during a recent campaign stop at a bowling alley wasn’t manly enough for Joe Scarborough:

During the March 31 edition of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Willie Geist repeatedly mocked Sen. Barack Obama’s bowling performance — which Scarborough called “dainty” — at a March 29 campaign stop at Pleasant Valley Lanes in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Deriding Obama’s score, he said: “You know Willie, the thing is, Americans want their president, if it’s a man, to be a real man.” Scarborough added, “You get 150, you’re a man, or a good woman,” to which Geist replied, “Out of my president, I want a 150, at least.”

Later in the show, after NBC political analyst Harold Ford Jr. said that Obama’s bowling showed a “humble” and “human” side to him, Scarborough replied, “A very human side? A prissy side.” Ford asserted that Obama, who reportedly plays pick-up basketball, is a “heck of an athlete.” Later, Scarborough acknowledged: “I’ll challenge him to a bowl-off. But basketball — he looks like he’s in pretty good shape. I would just have to post low.” Switching to football, Ford also said to Scarborough: “I’d throw him a pass on you, too. I’ve seen you. I think he could probably take you down the sideline on a post route.”

I was not aware that one’s manhood was dependent on one’s ability to hit the requisite number of pins with a big ball while wearing rented shoes.

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Random Media Goodness

Over the past two hours, the New York Times has had two images on its front page (at least that I’ve seen). This one in a story about Olympic athletes raising awareness about Darfur:

athletes

And one that wasn’t exactly this photo (I forgot to grab it while it was up), but similar, in an article about the Final Four:

basketball

Upside: Not only do we have two photos of women on the front page of the Times online, but both images are women playing sports. The first image is paired with a story about a mixed-gender group of athletes; the woman’s image was still picked to represent the group, and she’s imaged in action, not as a sexy, coiffed representation of a cause. Plus, women’s sports are deemed worthy of front-page coverage, which certainly doesn’t happen every day.

Downside: This article about women’s basketball leads with:

Nothing comes between Tina, Kaili and Epiphanny. They are like the friends on “Sex and the City,” only they wear Nikes instead of Manolos, and meet for basketball, not brunch.

I just keep repeating to myself: Baby steps.