From CNN’s website:
Within minutes of posting a story on CNN’s homepage called “Gender or race: Black women voters face tough choices in South Carolina,” readers reacted quickly and angrily. […] Many took umbrage at the story’s suggestion that black women voters face “a unique, and most unexpected dilemma” about voting their race or their gender.
CNN received dozens of e-mails shortly after posting the story, which focuses largely on conversations about Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama that a CNN reporter observed at a hair salon in South Carolina whose customers are predominantly African-American. […]
An e-mailer named Tiffany responded sarcastically: “Duh, I’m a black woman and here I am at the voting booth. Duh, since I’m illiterate I’ll pull down the lever for someone. Hm… Well, he black so I may vote for him… oh wait she a woman I may vote for her… What Ise gon’ do? Oh lordy!”
Another CNN reader pointed out that (since the media has written off John Edwards) white men also are, by CNN’s standards, choosing between voting their sex or voting their race. Yet, mysteriously, CNN isn’t writing stories about that.
(Curtsy: The Debate Link)
That’s quite the story when you think about it: All the white males in the U.S. who have never had to consider a presidential candidate that isn’t of their white and male demographic. Oh the dilemma.
Well, what else are they supposed to base their decision on? I suppose they could choose the candidate who offers a better healthcare plan…except that both candidates’ healthcare plans are the same. Or they could choose the candidate who has taken a firm stand against war…except that they both offer the same wishy-washy position there too. Or they could choose on the basis of the candidates plans for improving the econ…oh. Same there too, huh?
Mostly, we white male democrats just sit down by ourselves for some quiet introspection, and decide whether our racism or our sexism is most central to our self identity.
Either that or we just vote for Edwards anyway.
Also, Gravel hasn’t dropped out yet. We may be the final safety valve before we are forced to change our registration to Republican.
This is a curious thread, coming immediately after the thread “Colorblindness, Innarticulate Reporters, and Race.” There, Rachel S bemoans the fact that people fail to distinguish between racial identity and racial ideology/issues, and between “should racial issues/identities matter” and “do racial issues/identities matter.”
I would be taken aback by the ASSUMPTION that ONLY a candidate’s demographic characteristics would matter to any specific voter. But I don’t find anything especially offensive about the idea that demographic characteristics could determine some people’s votes and could influence many others, or the idea that the current election poses a unique set of challenges for the affinities of black women. During all the decades when people speculated openly about how voters would respond to having a Southerner or a New Englander on the ticket, I don’t recall all this indignation about the assumption that voters might take demographic characteristics into account. And given the demographics relevant to the South Carolina Democratic Primary, it strikes me as naive or disingenuous to act as if they don’t.
Also, as noted above, the idea that people would choose a candidate based on the issues kinda falls by the wayside when the candidates adopt such similar positions on the issues.
During a gathering of progressive friends over the weekend, we talked remarkably little about politics. Refreshing, really. But we did discuss this topic: Do you treat this election symbolically (or tokenistically, if you prefer) as an opportunity to strike a blow against racism or sexism? And if so, which cause do you favor? I generally find it pointless and distasteful to ask people hypothetically to rank their opposition to racism and their opposition to sexism. But the question is no longer so hypothetical, so the question is no longer pointless. Just distasteful.
At a gut level, I feel that the vitriol hurled at Clinton exceeds the vitriol hurled at Obama. I speculate that people feel a greater reluctance to appear racist than to appear sexist. And I will admit that this dynamic makes me more sympathetic to Clinton’s cause. This may be a goofy way to pick the leader of the free world, but I can think of goofier ones.
That said, I also like the idea querying white male voters: Are you more attracted to a candidate that shares your race or your gender? Of course, the existence of the Edwards and Gravel campaigns clutters the narrative. I rarely conclude that the media needs to focus more attention on the oh-so-overlooked perspective of white males, but this might be the exception.
Bjartmarr: Caroline Kennedy’s endorsement of Barack Obama explicitly acknowledges the similarities between Senator Hillary Clinton and Obama, but then bases her endorsement on her feeling that Obama is more “inspirational.” Perhaps a nebulous standard, but it is at least more substantive than that offered by NOW of NY – which, FTR, National NOW has distanced itself from.
I actually think that the reason that Caroline Kennedy (I know, she’s using her married name, but I just remember that little girl watching and her little brother saluting as her father’s casket drove by) gives is entirely legitimate if you can’t split the candidates on any other basis. One of President Bush’s huge flaws is that he is not particularly articulate and does a poor job communicating his vision and inspiring people.
No.
I have voted for candidates that do not share one or the other of those characteristics with me over one that shared both. In at least one case I have voted for a candidate that shared neither of those characteristics with me over one that shared both.
Thank god. CNN deserves more of this.
Raspberry. Whew.
Another CNN reader pointed out that (since the media has written off John Edwards) white men also are, by CNN’s standards, choosing between voting their sex or voting their race. Yet, mysteriously, CNN isn’t writing stories about that.
Maybe CNN presumes that all white men are voting in the Republican primary.
I’m surprised that no one has commented here about NPR’s All Things Considered having pundits say explicitly that white men were going to have a tough time making decisions about voting for someone who was not a white man. Truly disappointing (unfortunately, not very surprising).
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Robin Morgan appears to have reached a similar conclusion.