Doctor My Eyes, by Martha Thomases – Brilliant Disguise | @MDWorld

April 18, 2015 Victor El-Khouri 3 Comments

The last eight years have been ugly in terms of our political discourse.  Rabid right-wing extremists think they are being witty when they use racial stereotypes to criticize the President and First Lady.  They refer to Michelle Obama as the President’s “baby mama.”  They accuse the President of not being a “true” American.

This is a form of political speech referred to as the “dog whistle,” and it is particularly vile because so many politicians are shocked — shocked! — to think you understood what they were saying.

We’ve had eight years of racial dog whistles.  With Hillary Clinton declaring her candidacy, we’re going to have at least 18 months more of dog whistles about gender.

There are a lot of things I don’t like about Hillary Clinton.  I find her foreign policy views much too hawkish, and I think she’s too attached to the corporatist wing of the Democratic Party (which is far too similar to the corporatist wing of the Republican Party).  She used to sit on the Board of Wal-Mart, which I think is one of the world’s worst companies, right up there with Coca-Cola and McDonalds.

There are a lot of things I do like about Hillary Clinton.  She’s smart and she does her homework.  She actually listens to people and their opinions, unlike so many politicians who seem to be thinking of their next sound-bite while waiting their turn to speak.

None of these things involve her being a woman.

I appreciate that she’s an accomplished woman in a field that continues to be dominated by men.  It’s easier for me to imagine how she feels in certain situations.  Still, it won’t matter how “relatable” she is if she doesn’t propose policies that do something about income inequality, climate change and reining in our bloated military.  Actually, I’d like her better if she was Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders.

That’s not how our media tends to discuss her.  At the supposedly liberal New York Times, columnist Maureen Dowd writes about Hillary as if Clinton is trying to sit at her Cool Kids table without first kissing Dowd’s Popular-Girl ass.  If I were to subject Dowd to the same pop culture psych profile trolling she employs with Clinton, I’d have to assume she wants all the male attention, and won’t let any other women enjoy the spotlight.

This gentleman merely wanted to make a clever little toy, and found himself denounced by bigots of several stripes.

And then there are just lunatics.

As long as women (and people of color and queers and immigrants and more) are considered to be something other than normal (which is how white, straight, Christian cis men think of themselves), we won’t be judged fairly.  We won’t be able to get the medical care we need, even with a doctor’s prescription.

Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio are running for president.  There’s a possibility that Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal may run as well.  Will we see them attacked as “demographically symbolic?”  Will we be exhorted to “take our country back?”

I doubt it.

Martha Thomases, Media Goddess, wishes her friend Randy Dipentima a most wonderful birthday.