Political attacks on women must stop
Imagine this. A candidate for a major federal party is speaking at an outdoor rally to a fairly energized crowd.
Suddenly, that crowd, many of them smiling, starts to chant: “Lock Muslims up! Lock Muslims up!”
The candidate, captured for a few seconds on video, clearly smiles, and as the crowd continues its hateful chant, he raises one arm and begins to keep time with them: “Lock Muslims up!”
It’s all over in a flash, and later, despite clear video evidence of him smiling, when questioned about the chant, the candidate claims: a) he was “mortified” by the hateful language; but b) it isn’t up to him to “tell people how to feel.”
That candidate would be toast. He would be finished politically for allowing, even for a split second, a dangerous racist chant to go on under his watch instead of immediately frowning, raising his hand in a stop gesture and strongly telling the crowd: “We don’t talk that way about Muslims, or about any group.”
So tell me, why is it OK, even for a few seconds, to allow a crowd to yell about a woman leader, in this case, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley: “Lock her up!”
That candidate, Chris Alexander, seeking the leadership of the federal conservative party, has been roundly condemned for his do-nothing-in-the-moment reaction last weekend to the chant, including by members of his own party.
Interim Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose said the chanters were acting “like idiots.”
But the real problem was Alexander. It was his moment, standing on the steps of the Alberta legislature, to be a leader. He failed it. We will see if his leadership bid survives this moment. My feeling is it should not.
After all, we know where the chant “Lock her up” comes from. It was part of now U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s sustained, misogynist and untruthful campaign against his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. And it was very successful, both as a device to demonize Clinton, and as a gateway to many more disturbing gender-specific insults, which were not delivered with smiles but with rage: “Trump the bitch,” being one of the more printable ones.
This direct attacking of female politicians has to be vigorously called out in Canada, no matter how cornily derivative and even meaningless the “Lock her up” chant is. NDP Premier Rachel Notley has, as far as I know, not even been falsely accused of a prison worthy crime.
Her sin is to be a quietly assertive female leader in oil country, intent on both improving a desperately sinking economy while implementing climate-change strategies to protect the future.
Those who yelled “Lock her up” looked pretty benign and stupid, frankly, but wait till the chant moves to Ontario and picks up steam. Wait till it’s Premier Kathleen Wynne’s turn to hear “Lock her up!”
The bigger question is why are we standing by when female political leaders are being subjected to this offensive crap, including hate-filled sexist tweets and other social media insults?
A week or so ago, Alberta member of the legislature Sandra Jansen stunned the house by reading a string of viciously sexist messages — “traitorous bitch!” directed at her after she switched from the Conservatives to Notley’s NDP: “Now you have two blond bimbos in a party that is clueless,” read one of them.
A female colleague of mine wrote witheringly that Jansen was engaged in a “self-pity party” and should instead “man up” and face those insults alone instead of exhorting her colleagues to acknowledge and decry them.
Really. The only person who needed to “man up” last weekend was Chris Alexander, and he failed miserably, both as a man and as a leader.
Hate against women has no ideological home. Left-wing radicals from the ’60s were scathing in their attempts to demean their female counterparts and keep them in their place. A bed was often mentioned as a good place for them.
That’s partly why, as second-wave feminism gained steam and women fought for every inch of their rights, for equality in the home and good jobs and real political power, that the phrase “the personal is political” became a mantra for women. They knew that even well-meaning men who loved them would have trouble with them holding and wielding real power.
Sexist insults are personal, but they are also political. I am beyond fed up with anyone — academics, politicians, pundits — excusing or downplaying this public sexism and vitriol directed at female leaders. It hurts us all. It takes up valuable space and time to fight against it.
Take this column for example. I had planned to write about the women who had inspired me this past year and instead I had to use it to knock a puny man who didn’t even have the balls to shut down a feeble “lock her up” chant directed against a woman whose strength should make him hang his head.
You’re familiar with the great movie line “Nobody puts Baby in a corner?”
Well, nobody shouts “Lock HER up” or smilingly allows it, without getting a whupping from me.
This isn’t a self-pity party, it’s a power posse of women from all walks of life who have had enough. Judith Timson writes weekly about cultural, social and political issues. You can reach her at judith.timson@sympatico.ca and follow her on Twitter @judithtimson.