I was perusing the news this morning when I spied something that made my blood run cold. Hell is apparently actually freezing over as you read this, which just goes to show, never underestimate the possibilities in life.
The earth shattering cause of this unexpected agreement? I have finally found something on which Sarah Palin and I concur.
What is this astounding point on which there has finally been a meeting of the minds? The size of Sarah Palin's mammary glands are not something that anyone, other than Sarah, and perhaps Todd, should be thinking about, much less speculating upon. Her breast size is not related to her intelligence, her experience, her ideas, her job performance, her political stance, her faith, her ability to advocate for her own positions, or anything else that is appropriate for the realm of public discussion.
Don't get me wrong. The public persona is all fair game, when you throw your hat into the political arena, for the media, the opposition, her supporters, her detractors, or the population at large to comment upon. And regardless of whether she currently holds office, she is still a political animal, and remains a very public figure given the content of her speeches, her public statements whether on Facebook, Twitter, or in the media, and the groups to whom she presents them. But her physical appearance, particularly over something so personal, the question of whether or not she has had a boob job, should be nobody's business but hers, no matter what you think of her.
Just to throw out a disclaimer here - I have agreed with her on one or two other points over the last couple of years. For example, she probably does have something to contribute to the discussion of oil drilling versus other types of energy, although we should all recognize her personal territorial biases in the discussion.
I also agree with her that her children, as all children, should be totally left out of the news cycle, unless they themselves go looking for publicity, whether they are the children of politicians, athletes, celebrities, or whomever. The children have not asked for the notoriety, and they should be given their privacy, especially as vulnerable teenagers, where they will make many mistakes.
I don't think having them stand on stage with their parents during the campaign [or attending a premiere or otherwise appearing in public with their parent] constitutes a license to humiliate them, either, whether they are Sarah Palin, George Bush, Bill or Hillary Clinton, Will Smith, or even David Letterman, regardless of whether or not they observe the same rules. Two wrongs still don't make a right, and children should be off limits. Period.
So it's not completely unheard of for me to agree with something Sarah Palin says. But it's safe to say that those occasions are pretty few and far between, so it does make me take notice of the moment.
Which brings us back to the subject at hand. I would have imagined by the 21st century we would have moved beyond judging women by their bodies instead of their minds. I am so disappointed to be reminded, once again, that my hope was a pipe dream. Nothing has really changed, even in our so-called enlightened society.
Are men occasionally judged on appearance? Well, Al Gore would probably say that they are, but it doesn't seem to interfere with his being taken seriously when weighty topics are under discussion, even when he says something ridiculous. I am not a fan of Nancy Pelosi, either, but it is her leadership and political philosophy with which I have a problem, not her choice of clothing or her hair style. I don't recall attacks on the personal appearance of Dennis Hastert, even when his opinions differed from the opposition, no matter whether I found his personal appearance pleasing or not.
I wonder when we, as a society, will move beyond a discussion of appearance and into a discussion of ideas and facts if a woman is part of the conversation? When will the stuff in your head, if you are a woman, be more important than what is in your breasts?
For those who dismiss the subject of unequal pay for equal work, this is Exhibit A for why it matters so much. Women make up half the population, and yet, they are routinely dismissed as the lesser half in a variety of subtle and not so subtle ways. It is this inequity that hurts all of us, as our girls consistently set the bar lower for themselves, and fail to reach their fullest potential.
We are denying ourselves the option of having the best minds available, if we don't do everything we can to encourage all our children to reach for the highest goals. Marie Curie was the first woman to receive the Nobel Prize, and is one of the few who have received a Nobel in two different disciplines, but it is still a prize mainly for men 100 years later. One can only wonder how many cures we haven't discovered, how many questions have gone unanswered, how many inventions remain unknown because we continue to treat half the population as second class. I wonder whether AIDS or the Gulf oil catastrophe could have been averted if more women had been involved in research and design.
Women make up more than half of the population, but women are a fraction of the total U.S. Congress. Is it because women are less dedicated? Is it because women have lesser goals? Or is it, in fact, because women are denied the opportunities from the beginning which are required to be politically successful at that level? If it is still a gamble for a woman to run for school board or city council in their area, how do you move beyond that to higher office?
Here are some statistics with which we should all become acquainted. Despite women comprising over 50% of the population in total numbers, only 17% of the Congress that passes the laws we all must live with are female, and most of those women are in the House. [A point worth noticing is that of the 90 women in Congress, 77% of them (69) are Democrats, which means Republican, conservative women are particularly under-represented.]
The numbers are not much better at the state level, where six states out of the 50 are currently governed by women, and the state legislatures are only about 25% female across the country. California, with the highest population of any state, has never had a female governor, and the current female candidate is considered the underdog, despite her experience as CEO of EBay, and throwing tens of millions of her own dollars into the campaign. In the 100 largest cities in the country, women are mayor in only seven of them, SEVEN. I don't know about you, but I consider that abysmal.
If you think it's just politics, here are some more facts that should get the attention of anyone who worries that their daughter will have less opportunity to succeed in life than their sons. According to CNN Money today, of the Fortune 500 companies, a dismal FIFTEEN have a woman CEO. Women don't do any better in the next 500 either, as there are only an additional 13 women serving as CEO's in the Fortune 1000. That is a total of 28 women running the top 1000 companies in this country.
Sadly, this is actually an improvement over last year, when there were 12 and 24 women serving as CEO in each group respectively. While women can and frequently do have different goals and ambitions from their fathers, brothers, spouses and male classmates, that does not explain this level of disparity. It is a problem which is ultimately costing us all, and the consequences are not measurable, because we simply don't know how much we have lost by excluding women from the top leadership in everything from the government to our most influential companies.
None of this is to denigrate the importance of men, and I wouldn't want anyone to be led astray on that point. Men and women have very different qualities, and generally speaking bring totally different skill sets to the table. I believe a part of the problem, in fact, is in our quest for equality. As women, we worry so much about being taken seriously that we focus on our similarities, and have failed to value our differences, which are the real strength of having two genders to begin with.
What, then, do women bring to the table that is unique and special, and which we should value, whether in private life or in the public realm? Women are, by nature, more verbal, collaborative, and generally tend to value consensus more than men. Women tend to discuss issues more thoroughly, and are more likely to look at potential problems in advance, so we can have a game plan at the ready in case of disaster. (Gulf oil spill look any differently from that perspective?) In my own parlance, I would say women are more actionary, while men are more reactionary, by nature.
Even women in positions of high power and prestige tend to exhibit these common female traits to the greatest extent that they can in an arena where manly traits are so much more valued.
This is not just an anecdotal observation. Research has shown that the brain acts differently in men and women when shown the same stimuli, and that research has supported what we instinctively know. Women brainstorm their way to a solution, men act on their experience to find a solution. Ultimately, the desired outcome is frequently achieved, even though we arrived there by different methods. And it is the outcome, that we should be focused on, not the route that got us there.
It saddens me to see any woman, no matter who she is, reduced to a set of physical criteria, at the expense of her ideas. Whether or not I agree with Sarah's stance on anything is less important to me than whether or not, as a woman, her stance on serious issues is taken seriously by the entire public - which includes both genders.
Sarah Palin has become very adept at using her femininity to her advantage, and I have heard criticisms leveled against her for it. But until women are given the same opportunities of power and leadership as men, and evaluated by the same outcomes based criteria as men, the content and quality of their ideas rather than their breasts, their fashion sense, or their faces, I say go for it. If the age old double standard is going to be used against her, she has a right to co-opt it and use it to her advantage, as well.
Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream long ago, that his children and my children and your children would, one fine day, be evaluated on the content of their minds, rather than the color of their skin. I would expand upon that dream, because I dream that someday my daughter will be taken as seriously as my son, not for the beauty of her face, but for the intelligent mind and caring heart that resides inside the ephemeral exterior.
