Anti-Hillary Protestors Who Inspired Chelsea’s Feminist Email Were Radio Pranksters
Remember last month when a couple bozos in New Hampshire stood up and yelled at Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, to iron their shirts (video link HERE)?
"Oh, the remnants of sexist, alive and well," said Clinton to applause.
The moment had an impact on Chelsea Clinton.
Forwarding the feminist Robin Morgan’s treatise "Goodbye to All That (#2)" on email, Chelsea wrote, "I don’t agree with all the points Robin Morgan makes but I do believe her thesis is important for us all to confront–I confess that I didn’t entirely get ‘it’ until not only guys stood up and shouted ‘iron my shirts’ but the media reacted with amusement, not outrage…"
Anyway, per HotAir, it turns out those "guys" were pranksters from a Boston radio show, the Toucher and Rich Show.
I’m not sure if that means the act was any less sexist, though perhaps it was sexism dressed up as faux-sexism?
Or just idiocy? Or hilarity? I guess it depends on your point of view.
In any case, it’s wasn’t serious. (Unless it was?)
What do you think?
h/t – Newsbusters
– jpt
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Since they were from Boston (pro-Hillary) maybe they were trying to stir up female wrath to help her win NH?
If she had lost NH, as she should have, we would be dealing with Obama vs. Edwards. And that would have been a good contest. Although Obama would have still beat Edwards for the same organizational reasons he beats Hillary.
Posted by: ROB | February 18, 2008, 2:44 pm 2:44 pm
faux-sexism? that’s ridiculous. sexism is everywhere and Hillary’s campaign is creating a massive sexist outbreak. People laugh when women are put down. People don’t laugh when you make a racist remark, however.
Can’t anybody connect the dots? What is wrong with this country.
Posted by: Brooke | February 18, 2008, 3:14 pm 3:14 pm
Sorry, as a black man, I’m offended that you can question whether a biased stunt is just faux bias. If they had been at an Obama rally saying “shine our shoes,” this thread would not exist. Shame on you MEN speculating about the existence of sexism. You have at least been trying to give Obama some critique lately. Thanks for that. But please call sexism what it is and stop insulting those of us who suffer discrimination.
Posted by: tony | February 18, 2008, 3:31 pm 3:31 pm
I,too,had wondered if they weren’t campaign plants, acting deliberately to stir up outrage and sympathy. What they said wasn’t funny in any context. Publish their names and let them explain themselves. There should be blow back on this one.
Posted by: Sara B. | February 18, 2008, 3:47 pm 3:47 pm
The guys who did the prank expected that exact reaction. Bringing up feminism from the Clinton side, which I think they must find amusing.
Taking things personally shows weakness.
Posted by: henry black | February 18, 2008, 3:55 pm 3:55 pm
A sexist attack is a sexist attack, whether it’s intention is to provoke puerile laughter or not. These boys felt empowered by their sex to make an in-her-face verbal assault against a woman who dares to run for the presidency. What was in their hearts is 100% irrelevant.
Posted by: Dan S | February 18, 2008, 4:04 pm 4:04 pm
um – the “protest” was directed towards clinton. why not take it peronsally? she didn’t even take it personally. she brushed it off.
also — obamaniacs were screaming about innocuous statements being racist. why not complain about that?
Posted by: tony | February 18, 2008, 4:17 pm 4:17 pm
Isn’t that how most sexism is played out, as a joke?
Posted by: Firefighter | February 18, 2008, 4:20 pm 4:20 pm
If those two persons, from a Boston radio show, had stood up and yelled, “Hey, Obama, why don’t you come and shine my shoes” .. all hell would have broken loose in the media and among Americans wanting to “bring the country together and get beyond the devisive past.” But, since it was a down-right nasty, ugly and deplorable sexist statement, no media attacked the “good-ole-boys.” Afterall, it was guys being guys.
And, within the black communities, urged on by the media and “black spokespersons,” rather than Obama getting 80-90 percent of the black vote, he would be getting 98-100 percent, if a similar remark had been made to him. The headlines would have been screaming: “Racism,” “Racism,” “Racism”..Obama would not have needed to offer any defense, the media would have done it for him and in a more determined fashion.
Posted by: Percy | February 18, 2008, 4:43 pm 4:43 pm
The fact that they were trying to get publicity for the radio show came out the day it happened. One of the guy even had a ‘Hillary’ sticker on his bag.
But I’m not questioning why it’s news to you, I’m questioning how it could have been news to Chelsea. It was her mom’s security people who dealt with the guys, right?
Posted by: Tom J | February 18, 2008, 5:21 pm 5:21 pm
I want to hear more about the supposed Obama supporters who crash the Hillary rallies and create tension by being rude and disruptive, keeping the rally from proceeding with constant interruptions.
Posted by: irma | February 18, 2008, 6:05 pm 6:05 pm
Toucher and Rich used to work for 99x in Atlanta. Rich pulled the same prank on Martha Burk back in 2003 when she was protesting Augusta National’s exclusive membership policy. (The other side of his “Iron My Shirt” sign read “Make Me Dinner.”)
The best part: Rich gave the reporters at Augusta a fake name. He was quoted online at USAToday.com and in print in the Charleston Post and Courier as “Heywood Jablome.”
Posted by: Peachy | February 18, 2008, 6:08 pm 6:08 pm
Henry Black is right.
Posted by: irma | February 18, 2008, 6:16 pm 6:16 pm
Well, let’s see. It was intended to incite defensiveness in women and forward thinking men. Yeah real funny. Wow, people get paid to be idiots. Too bad, women dismissed it as “Wow, who let in these stupid people?” Not the big defensive backlash they hoped for. Certainly didn’t receive the media scrutiny which is apparently only used for Clinton.
Posted by: Becky | February 18, 2008, 6:18 pm 6:18 pm
Behavior like this will continue as long as their are no repercussions. (David Schuster ring a bell?) It looks like nothing happened to these guys for pulling this stunt. Yep, it’s just a “prank,” yah know? Boys will be boys and all of that rubbish. No wonder radio is struggling to survive. It shows.
Posted by: OhioNative | February 18, 2008, 7:03 pm 7:03 pm
Race and gender is smoke…focus real problem. Religion.
Liwai from China
Posted by: Liwai from China | February 18, 2008, 7:11 pm 7:11 pm
Posted by: Percy,
Here is a fact: she was ahead of him – even with members of his own race. If you want someplace to place blame, blame the Clinton campaign. Their actions turned off many people and not just blacks. I’m not black and even I was offended by the tone and nature of the Clinton campaign. It certainly opened my eyes to the reality of the type of people we are dealing with. Oh and if you think he has 90% of the support of blacks, you’d better do some research…..Anyone with reasonable intelligence, knows the polls that is impossible and not to mention inaccurate.
In fact, I myself got a call the other day from a news organization wanting to do a poll of likely voters here in the DFW of Texas. I don’t mind telling you I flat out lied about everything. Why did I lie? Simple, I am sick of the press trying to make this an election about race and gender. The press should report the news, they shouldn’t be trying to create it. So, you keep depending on the polls instead of using some indep. judgment.
As far as the article, I think real feminist are as offended by Hillary as her and her supporters are about gender jokes.
Posted by: Texas Voter | February 18, 2008, 7:24 pm 7:24 pm
Why doesnt ABC interview the two radio show guys The Both are Hillary supporters who have Hillary08 bumper stickers on there cars and used to have photo’s of themselves with Bill Clinton on their Myspace web pages. Change now of course. On still wears his Hillary 08 tshirt often.
Plain and simple it was a Clinton campaign stunk just like her tears x2
Sad and shamefull
Posted by: Shane | February 18, 2008, 10:14 pm 10:14 pm
I can’t see how their being radio show pranksters makes their action any less sexist. Actually, the question being asked (is it really serious?) shows that sexism permeates our culture (in that sexism is never taken seriously, much less recognized). Racial injustice permeates U.S. culture, but, in some ways, it’s more recognized than sexism. As others have pointed out, no one would have been amused if someone yelled a similar derogatory question to Obama.
Posted by: Tara | February 19, 2008, 12:23 am 12:23 am
I believe a whole lot of people will take sexism more seriously, radio pranksters aside, when a supposedly “liberated” woman doesn’t seek the highest office of the land riding on the coattails of her husband grinning like a cheshire cat.
Hillary and her kind not only don’t get it, but what’s worse is they don’t get that they don’t get it. More shame to add to the pile of a dumbed down America.
So thanks for nothing Chelsea, Gloria, Erica and the rest of Clinton’s pseudo-feminist bandwagon. When y’all can quit defining politics as “the boys club” then you’ll have caught up to me and my girlfriends. We never saw it that way to begin with. That’s a sexist point of view.
Posted by: SE Croft | February 19, 2008, 7:51 am 7:51 am
Sexism goes both ways. Sexism happens when women perpetuate the myth that men are insensitive. Sexism happens when women rail against the “boys club of politics” but create women’s only groups that attack other women for supporting male political candidates. Sexism happens when Hillary Clinton runs for president and bases her claim to “experience” on her marriage to the president. Frankly, I’m a little bit ill regarding all of this gender baiting. It’s the Clinton campaign which initiated this and made it a news story. Make no mistake – Hillary Clinton is trying to divide America.
Posted by: BeninTN | February 19, 2008, 12:12 pm 12:12 pm
As a woman, I have lived my life awash in sexism, which is indeed alive and well.
The existence of sexism, however, has no bearing on Hillary Clinton’s utter lack of ability to lead this country — her management style is to divide and conquer, not to unite and lead.
Nor has it bearing upon her utter disregard for the people she alternately ignores, then purports to represent, e.g. the folks in Michigan and Florida.
Don’t let stunts like this take your eye off the ball, people.
All that matters is what Senator Clinton says versus what she actually does, and regrettably, the two simply do not match up.
Oh did I neglect to mention her lack of ethics? http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8583.html
Posted by: KirstieInNYC | February 19, 2008, 12:34 pm 12:34 pm
The pranksters were probably set up Hillary operatives to stir up sympathy women votes for her–and this trick worked very well. Look for more tricks, like fainting young women to stop Obama’s rallies mid-sentence, and for dirty accusations and more smears on Obama’s record. When will we voters say, Enough! Have you no shame?
Posted by: shirlin | February 19, 2008, 2:07 pm 2:07 pm
The comment was “maliciously sexist”… not doubt about it!
Posted by: Randy | February 19, 2008, 2:52 pm 2:52 pm
Sexism abounds in this country, but Hillary Clinton is not a model for feminism because she lacks the integrity to lead in a moral way. Her campaign is an example that disgraces women. Obama has been strong on women’s rights legislation and Obama inspires people to unite for change, not from elegant words, but from his intelligence, organizational success, and integrity.
Posted by: Samantha | February 20, 2008, 11:20 pm 11:20 pm
I am an Obama supporter but this is not acceptable. I also believe that the media should back off Senator Clinton it is wrong. Not sure I am thinking that this was staged by Hillary or Obama as it smells more like a republican tactic to me. Whatever it is . . . it is unacceptable.
Posted by: dotheresearch | February 28, 2008, 8:59 am 8:59 am
Also folks, we need to remember sexism goes both ways. We have seen that in this race. that said . . . the media should still back off at this point and it was not acceptable.
Posted by: dotheresearch | February 28, 2008, 9:06 am 9:06 am
Merle Haggard wrote a song that was flattering to Hillary. This brought out The Fightin’ Side of Me.
So I felt compelled to counter with this:
The Other Side of Hillary
Dr BLT
copyright 2008
http://www.drblt.net/music/OtherSideHill.mp3
Posted by: Dr BLT | March 4, 2008, 10:33 pm 10:33 pm
Gender bias is definately the highest wall ceiling that Hillary will need to overcome.
For anyone that says that their is NO gender bias in the media… I challenge you to open your mind and research all the stories that came out of the mainstream media in the last 4 months.
Perhaps a revelation to chew over?
Posted by: AC | April 4, 2008, 1:38 pm 1:38 pm