DYSPEPSIA GENERATION

We have seen the future, and it sucks.

Obama’s Sexist Double Standard

14th April 2013

Cathy Young calls him out.

This deplorable history of sexism is very real. Yet to insist that any mention of a woman’s attractiveness must therefore be off-limits in any work-related setting is, in effect, to let sexism win. Such a taboo subtly perpetuates, rather than undercut, the notion that a beautiful woman is unlikely to be smart or competent (after all, even to acknowledge her beauty implies it’s the sole basis of her success!). It also promotes a blatant double standard: since men do not face the same cultural burden of being “the fair sex,” a female politician can compliment a man’s good looks with impunity. (Would eyebrows have been raised if Hillary Clinton had referred to San Francisco’s mayor Gavin Newsom as the country’s best-looking mayor?)

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