No Such Thing as Sexism?
July 19, 2009
by The New Agenda
|11 Comments
This is what we are up against and we need your help!
So many in our country do not understand sexism and how it impacts women’s ability to advance.
Watch this video of The New Agenda’s Amy Siskind defending Judge Sonia Sotomayor. No sexism? Hogwash!
Here’s some examples of sexism against Sotomayor courtesy of Women’s Media Center:
As Amy states, it is because of the women’s advocacy and women’s media watch dog groups which sprung up in 2008 that Sotomayor was defended against sexism. Our organizations are vital to the way forward for women.
Please help us with whatever modest donation you can in our battle to eradicate sexism. The first step is helping people to understand that YES sexism does exist, and YES it is a problem!
No sexism? ” Judge, why are all these anonymous posters saying how mean you are?” The Lindsay Graham question. How earnest. How utterly sexist.
“Do you think you need to think about your temperament?”
No male candidate is subject to the attempted personality makeover that a woman is supposed to endure – oh, and at the hands of very well-meaning, but concerned, white males. But Sotomayor took it like a pro – it certainly was familiar to any professional woman of her stature.
Good job Amy. Thank you.
“How did they get to be all women” Ugh..and of course a hanging cartoon. Good job Amy!
Sorry Amy, but I have to disagree with you. The comment about her temperament might have some substance, but she is proud of her temperament and her remarks about a wise Latina woman being wiser than a white male are totally sexist and probably would not have been tolerated by you if she were a man saying this about a woman. If you would not tolerate it from a man about a woman, it should not be tolerated from a woman about a man. Sexism is sexism, even if it is perpetrated by a woman. When you defend someone who has clearly made a sexist remark, that also scares me.
I am not sure that Sotomayor is a good candidate for the Supreme Court mainly because of her record of being overturned. That speaks more to me than anything else. I also believe she was telling the truth when she said she has more wisdom as a “Latina”, as well as her remarks about making law from the bench. Frankly, both of these statements scare me, having nothing to do with her being a Latina woman.
Amy, I admire you for taking on sexism but I look at things with a skeptic’s eye and believe that nothing is quite what it appears to be – even Judge Sotomayor. Everything from Obama is being shoved down our throats before we even have a chance to make an informed decision, if we even have a voice in those decisions anymore. The more I see, the more it appears that there are a lot of strings being pulled and we are becoming the puppets.
Good job Amy.
J.Sotomayor’s mentor, J. Calabresi, former Dean of Yale Law School, has monitored his mentee’s performance on the bench and investigated rumors her tone and tack were overly aggressive. His conclusion? Sexism is alive and well on the federal appellate bench.
http://thenewagenda.net/2009/0.....ious-form/
Marilyn,
We agree to disagree on this one. White male priviledge is operating pretty strongly among the senators.
You are mistaken on your overturned statistics. A search of appellate opinions by Sotomayor on the LexisNexis database returned 232 cases and three have been overturned. That’s a reversal rate of 1.3 percent. Only five of her decisions have been reviewed by the justices. If you use five as a denominator and 3 as the numerator, the rate comes out to 60 percent.
Judge Sotomayor has probably a longer and more distinquished record than any supreme court justices.
You may not agree with here politics but she is more qualified than the majority of men serving on the court!
I love how attention like this is only paid to the men when they are caught with a mistress or hooker;after the fact, but deep investigations are done into any woman of any appointment and all this controversy surmounts over very little things.
I love the “domineering in discussions” or whatever. lol
seriously have we advanced at all since 1960?
Kiuku, I am asking the same question. It is astounding how so many women do not even recognize sexism. One suggestion I have for The New Agenda is to continue to have Amy on as many panels and discussions as possible but to also start training the Team Captains so they can educate women in their own communities on what sexism is all about.
[...] I am concerned with as a Chicana, a woman, and a human being! When I watched the video that was put up recentlythat showed a compilation of attacks on Judge Sotomayor I couldn’t help but notice that they [...]
Leave your Response
Supporting women.
Ending sexism.
Finding common ground.
We’re in the Media »
Click to see our latest stories in the media
More Stories »Recent Comments
The Latest from our Blog
Archives
Blogroll
Find the New Agenda Online
Subscribe Entries (RSS) | Comments (RSS)
The New Agenda is a 501(c)(4) organization dedicated to improving the lives of women and girls by bringing about systemic change in the media, at the workplace, at school and at home. More...