How are we going to beat misogyny?

I have to admit to being reluctant to comment on Hillary's candidacy, because I believe it is in legislatures that women's political power will be felt the most. The propensities of an individual executive are just that - individual. Women's fitness for office should not be judged by the performance and characteristics of one woman. That said, I was enormously disappointed her campaign met with defeat.

One of the lessons learned is there is still an enormous amount of misogyny in the United States that is tolerated by most people. Sexist remarks can go much further without prompting general outrage and condemnation than can racial slurs. Witness John McCain's laughing response to woman who called Hillary Clinton a bitch at a town hall meeting, and the fact that the day after his campaign had its biggest single day of online fundraising up that point. Imagine how his response would have by necessity been quite different if instead a person of color had asked him, "How are we going to beat the nigger?" Many other examples of woman bashing littered the public discourse about her.

Misogyny is also a theme of the top Emmy nominated television drama of the year, Mad Men, realistically portraying the 1960's workplace when women had almost entirely subservient roles and often endured sexist insults from their bosses. Yes, it's a historical drama and some women characters on the show will rise in the workplace over the long run. But, don't hold your breath waiting for an accurate historical drama in which a focal point is whites keeping down minorities on the job. Such realism would not likely be tolerated even on cable.

If the above observations fail to convince you that sexism fails to provoke outrage in the campaign, see the amazing video of McCain dodging the question of whether insurance companies that pay for Viagra should be forced pay for birth control. Imagine the uproar that would have resulted if he had avoided condemning a policy that failed to pay anything for drugs that would prevent a well-known condition that only affects a particular racial or ethnic group.