Thursday, March 24, 2011

Why Should We Care What NOW Thinks of Bill Maher’s Sexist Palin Slur?

Lori ZigantoPosted by Lori Ziganto Mar 24th 2011 at 4:58 am in Democrats, Featured Story, Palin, Sexism

On Friday night, the abhorrent idjit known as Bill Maher used a crass and offensive slur about Sarah Palin. It is one that I will not repeat here, but suffice it to say it is a favorite misogynistic epithet of the lofty, oh-so-enlightened leftist set. I’ve been called it many times in hate emails and even on Twitter. It is usually prefaced with “dumb” and is second only to their top favorite term used to describe women; a term that starts with the third letter of the alphabet. Frankly, this isn’t very surprising coming from the trollish Maher. He clearly has women issues, as he’s shown many times in the past. As well as, I suspect, “compensation” issues. Hello, small man’s complex!



What was more infuriating, although also not very surprising, was the lack of media response. John Ziegler, quoted in an article on FoxNews.com, said the following:
“If a conservative used that language to describe Hillary Clinton, we wouldn’t be hearing very much about Japan or Libya,” said John Ziegler, creator the documentary “Media Malpractice.” “If they said it about Michelle Obama, the media would be going 24/7 with the story.”
Absolutely true. Sexist slurs against The One’s wife would not be tolerated. It’s only okay if you think the subject of the slurs is super icky, like that “chick from the sticks”, bitter clinger Sarah Palin. The Fox News article went on to explain that the National Organization for Women (N.O.W.) at first chose not to comment on Maher’s grossly misogynistic remark. The reason given was that it is a “known fact that NOW does not correspond with Fox News.”

Oh, really? They hold women who merely watch Fox News in such contempt that they won’t even deign to try to speak to them? Well, you know what is a “known fact”? The fact that N.O.W. does not give a rat’s patootie about women.  Matthew Vadum, also quoted in the article, said the following:
NOW really ought to change its name to National Organization for Liberal Women because as far as it’s concerned conservative women aren’t real women at all.”
While it’s true that N.O.W. has nothing but disdain for conservative women, I don’t think the above is entirely correct. N.O.W. might be an organization of Liberal Women, but they certainly aren’t for them. A better name would be the National Organization for Useful Idiots. N.O.W. proved that themselves with the statement they eventually grudgingly gave in response to Maher’s vile comment. They were shamed into giving some sort of response due to the cries of “Where is NOW? What does NOW have to say? Will they denounce this?!” This infuriated me further.


Because I say “who cares what N.O.W. has to say?” Why on earth would we give them any credence at all by expecting them to make a statement? About anything? What right do they have to claim to be an authority on women? The same thing happened when the odious site Gawker published a disgusting ‘article’ about an alleged one night stand (with no “stand”) with Christine O’Donnell. N.O.W. was shamed into making a statment then (one that basically said “she’s totally a slut, but slut shaming is bad) and people fell all over themselves in a rush to praise them and “give credit where it is due.”  Baloney. There is no credit due, nor will there ever be.

Both statements in regards to the sexism aimed at O’Donnell and at Palin were half-arsed at best. They weren’t “defenses” so much as insults and ridicule rife with hypocrisy. The latest statement goes one further and suggests that the systematic misogyny that has been aimed at Sarah Palin is all a nefarious plan by conservatives to “distract.” No, really:
“You’re trying to take up our time getting us to defend your friend Sarah Palin. If you keep us busy defending her, we have less time to defend women’s bodies from the onslaught of reproductive rights attacks and other threats to our freedom, safety, livelihood, etc,” wrote Bennett. “Sorry, but we can’t defend Palin or even Hillary Clinton from every sexist insult hurled at them in the media. That task would be impossible, and it would consume us. You know this would not be a productive way to fight for women’s equal rights, which is why you want us stuck in this morass.”
It’s our fault the Left is vile and anti-woman, you see. We are tricking them into doing it so that we can hatch some evil plot to restore The Patriarchy ™. Sarah Palin is just our prop – and a dum-dum, of course, hence their use of “your friend, Sarah Palin”. I’m only surprised they didn’t say our “cute little friend”. Sarah Palin just happens to be a woman whom they despise even more than usual, because she had the utter audacity to not abort her child.

What more will it take for them to be discredited as a “women’s” organization? They endorse men who call female politicians “whores” – even the fact that Meg Whitman is pro-choice wasn’t enough for them. She wasn’t a Leftist. That is all that matters. They ignored the attempted smears of Governor Nikki Haley. They were silent when venom was spewed at the women featured in the movie “Fire From The Heartland“. They were, and still are, supportive of serial sexual harrasser and manslaughter Ted Kennedy because his sweet, sweet Liberal policy was more important. They were silent when it was suggested that skirts were checked to ensure women in Congress had girly bits prior to voting.

N.O.W. doesn’t wish to ‘correspond’ with Fox News? I think that Fox News should never, ever try to extract statements from N.O.W., nor should any media outlet. Unless, and only unless, they make clear that they are not a women’s group, but a Leftist organization only. While N.O.W. holds conservative women in particular contempt – they unabashedly do not hide the fact that they despise them – they aren’t really for any woman. Every belief that they espouse, every policy they push, every agenda they embrace is harmful to all women. Even the women who continue to misguidedly support them.

They do not, nor should they, speak for women. They are not, nor should they be, looked to as an authority on anything at all, women included. Their For The Woman ™ card expired long ago and  it is now time to confiscate it and cut it up into little pieces.

It is harmful to women to continue to give them credence, when absolutely none is deserved, by expecting them to issue “statements”. Who the hell wants them to? I certainly don’t. I need ‘feminists’, including the alleged ones at N.O.W., like a fish needs a bicycle.  They’ve done nothing but harm to women and to continue to give them credence by wanting them to – or expecting them to – issue statements is insulting.

Women don’t need the likes of NOW “defending” them. Sarah Palin knows this. She is often accused of “playing the victim” too often and the reason given is that she stands up for herself and issues her own statements in lieu of waiting for others to do so. That is the opposite of victimhood. She is not relying on the likes of N.O.W. or other faux women’s groups to “defend” her.

She has come a long way, baby. It’s far past time that we all do. The first step is hammering the final nail in

N.O.W.’s coffin (violent rhetoric be damned!) They should be marginalized as the group full of useful idiots that they are.

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