\ We all harbor prejudices. Some of us do all we can to eliminate them while others of us wear them proudly, but all of us possess them because it's impossible not to. Prejudice is the result of judging what we don't understand, what we have no experience with. And as we can't have experience with everything, prejudice, ranging from the inoffensively mild to the viciously strong, is the natural result. Most of the time, these prejudices, when encountered, are annoying and disappointing, but they are handled, absorbed, disposed of. But when prejudice plays a role in electing, or not electing, someone to the presidency of the United States, widely considered to be the most powerful position humanity has ever created, then prejudice can't just be shrugged off. It must be acknowledged, put up to societal scrutiny, and then dealt with. With regard to the role sexism played in the 2008 Presidential Election, this is what Ms. Traister has set out to do.
Using her own voting vacillations in 2008 as the backbone of her tale, Ms. Traister fills out Big Girls Don't Cry with an examination into the sexism that plagued, primarily, the Democratic nomination and, secondarily, the wider contest for the presidency. Though she touches on other political women, Ms. Traister concerns herself mostly with Hillary Rodham Clinton, chronicling not only the treacherous ground she was forced to walk by dint of being the first female candidate for the office with a serious chance of victory, but the extent to which the news media seemed eager to write her off once it was clear Barack Obama was going to be a major force in the election. Ms. Traister's argument is no more powerful, here, than when she asks, in the wake of Ms. Clinton being told by media members to quit the race to spare Mr. Obama the bloody fight, if a man in Ms. Clinton's position would have been told to make the same sacrifice. Wouldn't he be heralded for fighting bravely on for what he believed in rather than, as Ms. Clinton was, being blamed for making the nomination gorier than it ought to have been?
By Ms. Traister's reckoning, the media was not alone in doing a disservice to female candidates in 2008; female voters too have some responsibility to bear. Hillary Clinton, the first woman in U.S. history with a clear shot at the top job and women sided more with Mr. Obama than with Ms. Clinton? Ms. Traister believes that Ms. Clinton's transformation from a staunch progressive into a pragmatic centrist alienated women. But more over, the expectations women had for Ms. Clinton made her impossible for them to like: too dainty, too strong; too cold, too emotive; too nasty, too weak. So many excuses generated to explain away the fact that they were throwing away an opportunity to make history.
Ms. Traister presents a clear and convincing case for the sexism that helped derail Ms. Clinton's candidacy, but I'm not so sure that Ms. Clinton's difficulties, with women, with her messaging, and with the media weren't more the result of her being a first. Mr. Obama dealt with similar difficulties. He had to win over African Americans who thought he was too white, whites who thought he was too black, all while avoiding any talk of racism which, if broached, would surely swallow the campaign whole. I sympathize with ms. Clinton. Ms. Traister makes eminently clear the extent to which Ms. Clinton had the deck cruelly and unfairly stacked against her. But I doubt it will be this way the next time a serious female candidate runs. We evolve, particularly when we are forced to witness inequities. We evolve and we better appreciate what we've taken for granted. I suspect, however, this is cold comfort to Ms. Clinton who, though she made her fair share of errors, deserved a fairer fate. Delightfully written and excellently argued. (3/5 Stars)
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