The Art of Insulting Women

Today at her Women For Hillary grassroots organizing event, Hillary said,

... there is one particular candidate who delights in insulting women every chance he gets.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks at a 'Women for Hillary' grassroots organizing meeting, Thursday, Sept. 10, 2015, in Columbus, Ohio. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

It is a practice not reserved for Donald Trump.  It comes from every side.  Perhaps it is embedded in the male psyche.  I don't think men even know they are doing it.  It seems to come from a deep-seated concept that whatever men devise, develop, or craft is inherently of greater value than what women devise, develop, or craft.  Whatever you offer, then, is immediately and routinely rejected in favor of their product which clearly is of much higher value because it is theirs.  That should be obvious to you.  Why would you even question it?

I am not saying all men do this.  Many do not.  But women run into it in the normal course of a day or a week, and it is not restricted to a political party.  Men who call themselves Hillary supporters have "improved" statements I have taken directly from Hillary.

Remember this?

Hillary Clinton: Economy + Women + Families = NOT a Women’s Issue

I made a hashtag of it that I sometimes use on Twitter.  A male Hillary supporter corrected me to "Not just a women's issue. "  I pointed out that the words were Hillary's.  Discussion ensued because it should have been obvious to me that the revised version improved on Hillary's original. They even correct Hillary.

When I write an original post like this, an opinion or a defense, I put time, thought, and reflection into the process. The longer ones might take hours.  I will write, walk away, take care of other chores, take a shower, come back, read, and revise.  The finished product never reaches my ideal  but is always an improvement on the first draft.

Sometimes there will be a speech.  I will take notes and screen shots, fashion the notes into a narrative, maybe grab the C-SPAN link to the video which will not be embeddable here, and post it all.

Then I will share the link on Facebook.  Suddenly a page that had been dormant for hours will come alive as some fellow's meme with a Hillary quote from 2008 or the link to the speech on C-SPAN supplants what I posted.   Sure it can be a coincidence once in awhile.  When it happens every time,  how would I not receive the subliminal message?

The art of the insult to women is alive and well in all quarters.  We all know it.
I have seen male Hillary supporters post blonde jokes.  Hillary supporters!  When I have called them on it I have been told I have no sense of humor.  Actually I do.

I cannot quite wrap my mind around it.  Is it that Hillary is somehow a separate entity despite talking about her hair color and all that women know goes into looking as smashing as she did today?  But no, since men also have ideas on how she can better handle whatever the latest attack -  right now her emails and server.  Then I wonder, is she the one they really want?  Or do they want this Hillary to act like a man?  Or have they bought into the Hillary Superwoman concept?

As I said, it is not all men who do this, thank goodness, but I have encountered my share of it, and I bet you have too.  It was heartening today to see Hillary launch Women for Hillary and speak out on insults to women.  It was a comfort to feel close to the sisterhood even though it was only virtually close.  It would be even nicer to see our Hillary campaign brothers support our efforts and defend us against the insults rather than engage in the subtle deployment of them. It could begin with actually reading this post rather than flushing it down the Facebook page with a link to the NYT video on top.