Earlier this week, Rebecca Traister wrote a story for Salon about the subtle (and not-so-subtle) misogyny that young women were starting to notice in some of their Obama–loving male peers. The story got a few letters. (Actually, 1162. You should read them, if you have a million years.) Meanwhile, in a little bit of journalistic synergy, New York magazine this week has a story that asks the question, "Has Hillary Clinton's campaign caused a feminist reawakening?" Much like Kate Zernike wrote about earlier in the Times, writer Amanda Fortini sees postfeminist women reinvigorated by the "Iron my Shirt" treatment that Clinton has been getting. The whole story is worth reading, but here's a quote:
"It might be said that the postfeminist outlook was a means of avoiding an unpleasant topic… Who wanted to think of gender as a divisive force, as the root of discrimination? Perhaps more relevant, who wanted to view oneself as a victim? Postfeminism was also a form of solipsism: If it's not happening to me, it's not happening at all. To those women succeeding in a man's world, the problems wrought by sexism seemed to belong to other women. But as our first serious female presidential candidate came under attack, there was a collective revelation: Even if we couldn't see the proverbial glass ceiling from where we sat, it still existed -- and it was not retractable."
Shares