Enter the Ellen Jamesians

This primary season was bound to create a national dialogue about any one of a number of deep divides in the U.S. -- class, ideology, race or gender. What I am finding interesting is that in declaring Obama the winner, we haven't really opened up a dialogue on racism, but on feminism.

Witness the cluster of blog posts and articles that have emerged since Tuesday:

"Death of a Saleswoman" (Slate, June 5, 08) -- "You can't be a historic first unless you act like one, and Hillary Clinton has not. In the Wellesley commencement speech that made her famous before she got to Yale Law School, she spoke about "searching for more immediate, ecstatic, and penetrating modes of living." Yet Clinton ran away from the revolutionary aspects of her own candidacy. There's been nothing of the ecstatic in her presidential bid—that mode, instead, has been embodied by Barack Obama. He appealed to voters' desire for liberation and revolution, and on the strength of that appeal won them over."

"The Other 18 Million" (Salon, June 5, 08) -- "I even think when this is over, some number cruncher somewhere might tell us that the backlash against sexism helped Clinton more than sexism hurt her, by turning out more women voters. In fact, tapping into that backlash, and into a feeling of female pride about her quest, saved Clinton's candidacy. Clinton herself bears a lot of blame for the fact that the historic nature of her presidential bid has been taken for granted, because it wasn't what she emphasized in the early phase of her campaign."

"Women in Charge, Women Who Charge" (NYT, June 5, 08) -- "How antithetical Hillary’s earnest, electric blue pants-suited whole being is to the frothy cheer of [Sex and the City], which has women now turning out in droves, a song in their hearts, unified in popcorn-clutching sisterhood to a degree I haven’t seen since the ugly, angry days of Anita Hill and … the first incarnation of Hillary Clinton. How times have changed. How yucky, how baby boomerish, how frowningly pre-Botox were the early 1990s. How brilliantly does “Sex” – however atrocious it may be – surf our current zeitgeist, sugar-coating it all in Blahniks and Westwood, and yummy men and yummier real estate, and squeakingly desperate girl cheer."

"3 A.M. for Feminism" (TNR, June 6, 08) -- "Obama was probably smart not to bring up more of his opponent's shortcomings; doing so would play into the narrative of victimization that became the dominant theme of Clinton's campaign in its final weeks. "Without question," Susan Estrich, author of The Case for Hillary Clinton, wrote in late May, "there is serious disaffection right now among many women about the sense of being shunted aside, told to pipe down and line up, the sense that the Hillary campaign, and Hillary herself, has become a mirror for the frustrations the rest of us have faced as we battle subtle and no[t]-so-subtle discrimination.""

I have to admit, I have been really taken aback by the vitriol that Hillary Clinton's supporters expressed. Perhaps each candidate inspires a dominant characteristic in its base; since I was for Kucinich and then Edwards, maybe we few were just ... prone to goony idealism. Reading through the comments on the Salon piece -- a fine way to kill a few hours -- or on the Judith Warner piece in the NYT lends weight to the theory that Hillary Clinton's most ardent supporters embody self-destructive bitterness.

Look, there's no other way to characterize some of the alleged "reasoning" coming from the pro-Hillary side.

-- There is the "I'll screw reproductive rights for all women, and then you'll all be sorry!" reasoning of voting for McCain.

-- There is the "You can't scare me with Roe because Congress will keep the Supreme Court in check!" fiction. I have news for you, the Senate's track record of standing up to GOP judicial picks can be summed up thusly: the non-coastal Democrats coming to Congress are not terribly, how you say ... "liberal." You really think they're going to be concerned about the gradual shift of the federal judiciary toward the right?

-- There is the "None of the other candidates bothered to stand up against the sexism!" complaint, which boggles my mind. It's an election. Is anyone forgetting the whisper campaign HRC tried to start about alleged secret Muslim Barack Obama?

Look, Hillary lost. It's a sorrow and a pity for her supporters, and it's an eye-opener for people in this country regarding how much overt sexism is permissible in allegedly polite society. The talking piles of hair on the cable "news" channels were pretty much given carte blanche to be sexist douchenozzles, and it is my fervent hope that future generations viewing this footage are as astounded by the dirty borders of acceptable discourse as any of us are over the casual racism and even more risible sexism that appears in earlier pop culture.

But you cannot lay the blame for her losses at the feet of the media, the nation's chauvinists or the insufficiently grateful Gen Xers and Gen Yers who failed to strike a blow for sisterhood. At the end of the day, Clinton was a candidate who squandered a formidable war chest and a presumptive nomination. She did so thanks to a combination of bad political instincts, personnel mismanagement and an unwillingness to deal with all the information in a situation. Those three traits alone suggest that perhaps she's not the best person to occupy the highest elected office in the land. That doesn't mean she's not bright, accomplished and a good senator. It just means she's not the best one in this particular race.

This is a line of reasoning that the people commenting on several of the articles seem incapable of grasping. Instead, they're slamming Obama in crypto-racist terms (They're calling him "arrogant." "Arrogant?" What's next, "uppity?") and tearing him down on weak grounds. For example, the same people who cannot let go of Obama calling a female reporter "sweetie" are perfectly willing to go vote for McCain, a man who called his wife a cunt in full view of reporters. Which do you think is more indicative of a lack of respect for women?

And this is where I lose sympathy for the angry and disappointed supporters. At this point, they're reminding me of one of pop literature's ugliest caricatures of feminists: the Ellen Jamesians.

For those of you who may not have read John Irving's The World According to Garp, one of the big narrative themes that runs through the work is the difficulty of negotiating a gender identity in a world that wants to impose one upon you. One of the novel's protagonists, Jenny Fields, becomes a feminist icon with her book A Sexual Suspect, and attracts a group of radical feminists who cut out their tongues as a protest against a little girl's having been raped and rendered mute by her attackers. The little girl, Ellen James, wants nothing to do with the Ellen Jamesians, but they persist -- and eventually kill her adopted father. The Ellen Jamesians are consumed by an inchoate and unproductive fury, destructive and completely selfish in its sense of assumed victimization. When I first read the book, I was outraged by the way Irving seemed to trivialize women's anger at a society that's fine with them being voiceless victims.

And this week, I'm sorry to say, I was reminded of the Ellen Jamesians over and over in reading comments from Clinton supporters. I do not begrudge these women their anger. What I do object to: the deployment of their rage. It's just stupid and shortsighted.

In the Salon and TNR pieces (and in a chat transcript following the Slate piece), the idea that Obama needs to reach out to these angry women is presented as fact. However, if Clinton's any ounce the stateswoman her supporters think she is, she should also make an effort to reach out to Obama and offer him her ardent base. Sometimes a true act of leadership lays in sacrifice -- in being able to articulate the necessity of acting in the interest of a long-term gain, and to convince the people to follow that sentiment. Without that forward-thinking of optimism, anger produces nothing more than the mute futility of the Ellen Jamesians. All of us should be better than that.

Comments

[Polly]

Yeah, I was really disappointed with the way Clinton dealt with the fact that she was losing--I felt like she played the demographics card quite shamefully (and I never heard anyone from the Obama camp suggest that Clinton wasn't electable because she was a woman). It really alienated me (and I supported her candidacy until then), so maybe it's just the hard-core, I'm-the-victim crowd that's left to be upset by her conceding.

I get a little baffled by it all because, hey, it's not like Obama is a jackass FOX commentator or this dull-witted creature of privilege who never had to earn anything (as G.W. Bush so clearly is). But when my dad talks about his parents' generation and their attitude toward race and ethnicity, he says it was like a foot race--if Group A was ten steps ahead, that meant that Group B was ten steps behind, so if you were in that latter group, you'd damned well better do something about it (and hobbling the group ahead certainly counted as "something").

I think that's part of it--it's an inability to see that progress for one group does indeed make it easier for everyone else. The civil-rights movement didn't make things easier just for Black people--it helped create this cultural and legal mindset that you couldn't hold someone's inherited characteristics against them, and that's been extremely important for, you know, almost everyone.

[megan kay]

"she should also make an effort to reach out to Obama and offer him her ardent base."

She did. She's consistently said she'd support the dem nominee and that she hopes/expects her supporters to go to him and not to McCain. BO, on the other hand, was not as forthcoming with those words. He's the one who has said, several times, that he'll get all her supporters but would she get all his?

I'm really shocked at all this media outrage at her behavior. So she didn't concede. Should she have when she was winning more contests than him? That's just absurd.

[Lisa S.]

I'm really shocked at all this media outrage at her behavior. So she didn't concede. Should she have when she was winning more contests than him? That's just absurd.

Megan, thanks for commenting. FYI: I thought Clinton's speech yesterday was kind of awesome.

I don't think this post was pushing the "she should quit" angle. Rather, I was looking at some of her biggest supporters and the unintentional blowback they produced for her and the Dems. I haven't really had a problem with her staying in the campaign; I've had a problem with the vicious negativity from some of her most ardent backers. It got off-putting to open a comment thread on a story and have anyone who didn't hop on the HRC train dismissed as an "Obamatron" or "Obamabot." That's dehumanizing. And I thought it was kind of ironic coming from folks whose candidate of choice was struggling against a phlanx of talking heads that systematically stripped her of her personhood.

But insofar as when HRC was "winning more contests," there's a good graphic here (http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2008/06/07/us/20080607_RECON_GRAPHIC.html) that illustrates how BO consistently stayed ahead on pledged delegate totals and popular vote totals from February on. I think it's important that HRC stayed in -- for one, it helped fire up the voters and a lot more people are more invested in this year's outcome -- but the math was running against her from Feb. on.

[Shotrock]

It's an eye-opener for people in this country regarding how much overt sexism is permissible in allegedly polite society. The talking piles of hair on the cable "news" channels were pretty much given carte blanche to be sexist douchenozzles.

I'm 40 years old. I've encountered two kinds of sexists in my life. First, the construction workers or frat boys who yell vulgar things at me when I walk by, and when I ignore them, call me a f***ing bitch. Secondly, the male colleagues who pretended to have my back while they attempted to sabotage my career. Which category do you think I realized was the bigger threat?

Hillary's vulgar frat boys were named Chris and Keith. The colleagues who torpedoed her campaign? Their names were Mark and Bill. Those two were the bigger threat to her campaign, and Hillary never dealt effectively with either of them.

Sometimes a true act of leadership lays in sacrifice -- in being able to articulate the necessity of acting in the interest of a long-term gain.

Boomers sacrificing? Boomers interested in a long-term gain, that will advantage other, future generations instead of themselves?

I mean, this "I'll vote for McCain!" attitude is a perfect example. These women were pro-choice when they could get pregnant. Now they're on the other side of menopause, and that issue . . . well, it just isn't that central to the argument anymore, dontcha know?

Look, I didn't realize we needed "change we can believe in" six months ago. I realized it back in 2004, when troops were dying in Iraq and Afganistan and the entire summer was spent debating Swift Boats. vs. the Texas National Guard. It suddenly hit me that the entire reason we didn't have a decent policy on health care or energy or global warming or terrorism or social security wasn't a factor of party politics. It was because the people in charge couldn't STFU about the sixties. It was because the people in charge couldn't see beyond their own wants and desires to what this country was going to look like 40 years in the future, because they couldn't let go of what happened 40 years in the past. And the idea of the United States burning while the Boomers fiddled in Washington for another eight years literally twisted my stomach with despair.

I know this is a rant, and an overly-generalized one at that. I know many over-50 voters aren't selfish narcissists. I know many over-50 voters supported Obama instead of Hillary because they thought he was the better candidate. I know many Gen X and Gen Y voters supported Hillary because they thought she was the better candidate.

I guess the best way to express my feelings is to paraphrase Chris Rock: There are AARP members, and Boomers. And Boomers need to go.

[Becky]

She did so thanks to a combination of bad political instincts, personnel mismanagement and an unwillingness to deal with all the information in a situation.

I completely agree with this. I think that Mark Penn was a disaster for the campaign, and it snowballed from there. However, I'm not sure if Clinton was unwilling to hear bad news from Penn, or if he was subtly undermining her campaign (as Shotrock suggests). Maybe both.

And as for her political instincts, I think she has great political instincts for the 1990's. But she hasn't quite caught up with the new media and the new grassroots yet. It's worth noting that back in late 2004, the Clintons did not want Dean as DNC chair, and were pushing Harold Ickes (among others).

For what it's worth, I'm starting to think that she could have won in 2004.

[megan kay]

He obviously stayed ahead in the counts, but she was winning races. I just read an article about speculation on her quitting was the third biggest topic discussed in the primaries -- starting immediately after Iowa. I agree that the discussions maybe made sense in February, as BO was winning race after race after race and seemed unstoppable, but should she have quit the night she won OH or TX, or PA, or IN, or WV (etc.)? Politicians don't quit while they're still winning.

"I've had a problem with the vicious negativity from some of her most ardent backers."

I think I've encountered at least as much negativity from his most ardent supporters, though. Her shitty supporters are mostly confined at places like Hillaryis44 and the Confluence, and other places that I never go much to, and never have. They aren't mainstream sites. Contrast that with the tones at (vastly more popular) Pandagon and Daily Kos, not to mention the majority of comments at the NYT and WaPo primary blogs.

My huge problem with the primary has been not so much the level of venom spit at her, but her lack of defenders. I think Pandagon and Feministe and Feministing all had more posts (rightly) criticizing her supporters for their shitty behavior than they had criticizing the sexism thrown at her.

I expected better behavior from feminists, feminist allies, and from progressives, and that's why I'm so upset now. (Just to be clear: I think one can obviously be a feminist and prefer BO. I think one is a shitty feminist staying silent during the kind of attacks thrown at HRC.)

Shotrock, for the record, I'm way, way, way under 50, pro-choice, and am seriously questioning whether or not I'm voting for BO. It isn't just the "post-sexual" crowd. (I'm obviously not voting for McCain -- I agree that's senseless.)

[Lisa S.]

I expected better behavior from feminists, feminist allies, and from progressives, and that's why I'm so upset now. (Just to be clear: I think one can obviously be a feminist and prefer BO. I think one is a shitty feminist staying silent during the kind of attacks thrown at HRC.)

I totally get where you're coming from. I agree that not enough people called out the perpetrators of the attacks; I also wonder how much of that was reluctance to come across as a whiny girl, or how much of that was the perception that what HRC fielded was no different than what other candidates have handled.

I think we also agree on the "I expected better behavior ... " part. The difference comes in where we expected the behavior. I was really off-put by the Second Wavers who were all "If you don't vote for HRC, you're an ingrate!" In that case, philosophical differences turned personal and I was like, " ... nope. Can't do it."

And on one last note: it's funny how two people can read some of the same sources and come away with different impressions. I admit: I do not read Pandagon, Feminist, Feministing or Daily Kos, so I'll take your word on those. I was thinking of the WaPo! Also, of Salon, which has some truly crazy letters threads, and of the SF Chronicle.

EDITED TO ADD: I want to thank you for taking the time to comment on this as much as you have. Personally, it's been very illuminating for me and I appreciate your patience and civility.

[Z. Mulls]

Wow. I was just leaving a comment elsewhere and it struck me about the Ellen Jamesian connection. I went out googling for a good Ellen James link and found this post -- making the exact point that I had in my head (and doing it quite well, I might add).