Is 'polarizing' a sexist word? It is acording to Hillary super supporter group

[cali]

Hillary Clinton has been in the public eye for a very long time, which means much has been written about her -- including quite a few adjectives. But some of these adjectives are now off-limits.

That's according to the Clinton "Super Volunteers," who have promised to track the media's use of words they believe to be sexist code words. The New York Times's Amy Chozick tweeted a missive she received from the group (which we would note is almost definitely not connected to official Team Clinton) on Wednesday:



A group called HRC Super Volunteers just warned me "We will be watching, reading, listening and protesting coded sexism..." (1/2)
4:05 PM - 25 Mar 2015

2/2 Sexist words, they say, include "polarizing, calculating, disingenuous, insincere, ambitious, inevitable, entitled, over confident..."

<snip>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/03/26/the-13-words-you-cant-write-about-hillary-clinton-anymore/

[winter is coming]

1. So, simply because HRC is female, we're not supposed to use words that describe her?

Isn't that sexist?

[leftofcool]

2. Well, do we see "all" these words often applied to male politicians?

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

4. Yep! (But they're usually Republicans. :) )

nt

[morningfog]

6. Only to to polarizing, calculating ones.

[PassingFair]

9. +1

lol

[Bettie]

16. I've seen all of these applied to both male and female public figures

politicians and others.

Polarizing, for example, is a word used to describe Bill Clinton as much as Hillary.

Disingenuous, entitled, both applied to Mitt Romney and were used.

None of these particular words are sexist.

[arcane1]

3. If "insincere" is sexist, I'm going to need a new dictionary to describe republicans

Heck, all of those words apply to Ted Cruz!

[hifiguy]

5. This is getting well beyond pathetic.

Millions of us are NOT going to passively sit down and have this warmongering corporatist and best buddy/apologist for the likes of the criminal Lloyd Blankfein and war criminal Henry Kissinger foisted upon us because it is "inevitable."

And here's the etymology of the word "polarize" which comes from the field of optics, fer chrissakes:

polarize (v.) Look up polarize at Dictionary.com
1811, in optics, from French polariser, coined by French physicist Étienne-Louis Malus (1775-1812) as a term in optics, from Modern Latin polaris "polar" (see polar). Transferred sense of "to accentuate a division in a group or system" is first recorded 1949 in Arthur Koestler. Related: Polarized; polarizing.

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=polarize

[rjj621]

7. Those words

apply to pretty much every politician. Let's cry sexism because we don't like those words being applied to her. In the primaries we will be sure to use those very same words to describe her opponents.

[thucythucy]

8. I don't know if I'd called it "sexist" exactly,

but there is definitely a weird double standard when it comes to Clinton--or perhaps that applies to any Democrat.

Take the way Time magazine chose to portray Hillary as opposed to Jeb.

For Jeb, the cover was of him as a young man, outdoors, well-lit, highly complementary, among his family, and the tag line was "Jeb and the Family Business" or some bullshit like that. Just good ole 'Mericans enjoying the day. Pop and the kids. How wholesome.

For Hillary, dark profile, all alone, all features blotted out, dark blue featureless background... You could almost hear the Fox scare music over the tag line they chose for her: "The Clinton Way: They write their own rules? Will it work this time?"

I'm glad there are folks out there willing to call the media on this crap. Any Democrat who is nominated for anything should consider this sort of measure, just to counteract all the right wing BS that will inevitably be flung his or her way.

[OnyxCollie]

10. When "super supporters" are desperate to protect

their idol from warranted criticism, "polarizing" becomes sexist and "used car dealer" becomes racist.

[woo me with science]

56. +1

[LittleBlue]

11. I'm still waiting for her to deny her husband's racist comments on Obama

That "a few years ago" Obama would be their servant. That the idea of a black president was a "fairy tale".
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026328379

When she or Bill does that, we can talk about words that describe her. We used most of those terms to describe Mittens

[arcane1]

14. Isn't the "fairy tale" a reference to Obama's position on the invasion of Iraq?

From the post:

In New Hampshire, on January 7th, he made his most famous remarks of the race, calling Obama’s record on Iraq “the biggest fairy tale I’ve ever seen!”


Was there a different use of the term "fairy tale" that I missed?

[former9thward]

28. I think the "servant" part comes from his "coffee" remark to Kennedy.

'Game Change' Excerpt: Bill Clinton On Obama: 'A Few Years Ago, This Guy Would Have Been Getting Us Coffee'

--In lobbying the late Sen. Edward Kennedy to endorse his wife, former President Clinton angered the liberal icon by belittling Obama. Telling a friend about the conversation, Kennedy recalled Clinton had said "a few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee," the authors paraphrase. A spokesman for the former president declined to comment on the claim.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/10/game-change-bill-clinton-_n_417546.html

[guillaumeb]

12. so if I said:

that George W. Bush was a polarizing, calculating, disingenuous, entitled clown who was given every job he ever had, including the Presidency, by his father's friends,

would THAT make ME sexist?

[Savannahmann]

17. I guess it depends if Bush had a legion of super supporters.

I wonder what these super supporters are doing when it's not an upcoming election? Do you think that they get behind a sporting franchise, like say, the Washington Nationals.

Hey, if they are cheering a sports team, wouldn't that make the super supporters a completely different type of supporter?

[guillaumeb]

39. glad you did not say what type of supporters

[JI7]

13. in context i can see how things like this could be sexist

[sadoldgirl]

15. This happens when one becomes

a fanatic without rational thought.

[Warren DeMontague]

18. Ted Cruz is polarizing, isn't he?

[Oilwellian]

19. Here's their Twitter page

https://twitter.com/HRCSuperVols

I smell Republican morans playing games on Twitter. It's just too stupid to come from Democrats.

[foo_bar]

38. "...the sexist pigs at @MotherJones"?

Yeah I reckon it's a prank. Not sure how many republicans have heard of MoJones tho, I'm thinking friendly fire.

[gollygee]

20. It probably depends on context

The word in and of itself isn't, but if an article said she was a polarizing presence because she's a woman, obviously that would be sexist.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

21. What a &^*#$% insult to the genuine fight against sexism and misogyny.

If she wants to be president she is going to have to deal with regimes that won't allow women out of the family home without being escorted by their husband or father, where women are stoned for being the victims of violent rape. And then there will be domestic talk radio. Yet, we're supposed to believe she can't weather gender-neutral terms that are applied universally.

I want a woman president that when asked, "What do you think about so-and-so calling you a 'bitch' during last week's radio broadcast?" she will look the reporter dead in the eye and say, "You ain't seen nothin' yet. Next question."

[winter is coming]

22. No wonder some of her supporters go into a tizzy every time Warren's name comes up.

The "redefine sexist" ploy would be harder to pull off with another female candidate in the race.

[hifiguy]

23. Indeed it would.

[AtomicKitten]

52. It's from her 2008 playbook.

Captured brilliantly by Rolling Stone.

[Man from Pickens]

53. this vocabulary list

is basically a description in all that ways that she turns people off

[octoberlib]

24. Apparently any criticism whatsoever of Hillary is sexist.

HRC Super Volunteers @HRCSuperVols · 8h 8 hours ago
Hey @lessig, you should start a Mansplaining Super PAC. #Sexist #FakeLiberal http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/warren-drafters-rally-against-money-politics … :large #ReadyForHillary

[winter is coming]

25. Are we sure these "HRC Super Volunteers" are actually Hillary supporters?

Anyone with half a brain can see this is going to backfire spectacularly. Could this be ratfucking?

[octoberlib]

26. There's a good possibility. It's just too stupid.

[Jim Lane]

45. That was my first reaction, but it appears to be legit.

See the information posted by suffragette in #43.

It seems it's an actual Hillary supporter -- quite possibly only one, and one with no sense of perspective, but an actual supporter rather than a Republican staging a false flag operation.

Of course, as this thread shows, it's having the same anti-Clinton effect as if it were a Republican false-flag operation, and a fairly successful one at that.

[Thinkingabout]

27. This happens often, especially when writers doesn't have others interesting to describe people

Who are important.

[WillyT]

29. And This Is The Person We're Supposed To Support ???

[gollygee]

30. She didn't say this

A group of supporters said this. It didn't come from her.

[WillyT]

31. Then Maybe She Ought To Denounce It...

[gollygee]

34. Publicly denounce everything any supporter says about her?

That's ridiculous. And I suspect this is taken out of context. I doubt it says that word is in all cases sexist. It probably is looked at as a word that potentially could be used in a sexist context, such as if someone thought that it would be polarizing to have a woman president.

[WillyT]

36. Question: Has It Been Polarizing To Have A Black President ???

[gollygee]

37. If various media sources kept saying during the election that it would be polarizing

that would be racist. That's parallel here. Your question is irrelevant.

[H2O Man]

32. Silly.

I am not impressed by those around her.

[betterdemsonly]

33. Let them take issue with the word inevitable. Half her supporters will

get banned for misogyny.

[Gormy Cuss]

35. Is 'articulate' racist?

No, not by itself but contextually when it's used as one of the first adjectives to describe an African-American it most certainly has been used with the connotation of "unlike most of them."

So, look at that list and ask yourself if when they're applied to certain women if there may be a similar subtext, only in her case highlighting the negative ways she's not like most of us.

[Jenoch]

40. What a big pile of steaming

shit (is that sexist?).

Just because she gets criticized does not automatically make those adjectives sexist.

[TheKentuckian]

41. Fuck those morons. Bring it motherfuckers, nobody is intimidated by those twits.

[RiverLover]

42. Mitt Romney: polarizing, calculating, disingenuous, insincere, ambitious, inevitable, entitled, over

confident.

Does this mean Mitt is actually a woman?

[suffragette]

43. Looks like one guy named John West was the source of this

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3012951/Shadowy-group-say-reading-written-Clinton-evidence-sexism.html

A posting in the HillaryNationalDelegates Google group suggested the effort was spearheaded by West.
And West's LinkedIn says he has served as the coordinator for the National Hillary Clinton Delegate Network since her ill-fated 2008 bid for the White House.
It also states that he helped 'spear head the nominating petition drive among her delegates to place her name into nomination at the 2008 Democratic Convention.'

~~~

In a phone interview with Daily Mail Online on Thursday West said he is involved in an online community of roughly 600 Hillary Clinton supporters who are 'loosely affiliated' and have stayed connected through social media since her 2008 campaign.
While he consulted with a few other members of the group before mass distributing his warning, West said he acted alone in sending it.
'I wrote it as an individual,' he said, and made clear that 'we will responding back, like any consumer.'



Much more about him at the link.

[joeybee12]

44. They're definitely right about ambitious and over confident...

When men are ambitious, it's because they're supposed to be...when it's applied to a woman, it means there's something wrong.

[Gore1FL]

46. The Twitter feed is an obvious attempt at trolling.

https://twitter.com/HRCSuperVols

[Oilwellian]

48. I thought that as well

Post 43 seems to expose who is behind it. The guy is a little creepy and a devout Hillary fan..


In this photo posted to his Facebook, West appears with a cut out of the former first lady. West's LinkedIn says he has served as the coordinator for the National Hillary Clinton Delegate Network since her ill-fated 2008 bid for the White House

There is no National Hillary Clinton Delegate Network.

[bettyellen]

47. I wouldn't say so. But it's s tweet, so who cares?

[hatrack]

49. Please explain how this differs from Rick Scott banning the words "climate change"

Farcical little language rules that don't do anything except
(A) piss most people off and
(B) make their authors and enforcers look petty, weak and laughable.

Oh, sorry, didn't mean to get all coded sexist on you there!!!

[LiberalAndProud]

50. Good luck with that.

It's not likely to catch on or to be received well, but whatever floats their boat, I guess.

[DonCoquixote]

51. "polarizing, calculating, disingenuous, insincere, ambitious, inevitable, entitled, over confident..

words that describe most male and female politicians.

[Blue_In_AK]

54. This is getting ridiculous.

Of course, it's not a sexist word, and neither are any of the other ones.

[Scootaloo]

55. Clearly presenting a strong case for the candidate