Meghan McCain's 15 Minutes

[stardust9121]

She’s not a shrewd operator, she’s a lost little girl.Meghan McCain, I was so wrong about you. Just a little more than a year ago, during her father’s failed campaign for president, I wrote a piece for Slate about how McCain had learned to cannily manipulate her very blond public image to its full advantage while still maintaining a modicum of

Comments

[siderealdays]

I don't know anything about Meghan McCain or her attempts at politics (and I haven't seen the picture), but the commentary in this article is ridiculous. She's wearing some kind of low-cut t-shirt and she took a picture from an angle that's flattering to her face, so that = softcore porn??? And this - "in the bombastic manner favored by teenage girls who are so cripplingly racked with self-doubt that it takes a missile-silo full of oomph to cover it up." Oh really? Any teenage girl who has self-confidence is really just so crippled that she can't, um... talk or do things except when she's talking or doing things?

What teenager isn't a little insecure? Why is it specifically girls? Would someone have cared to write this article if Meghan were a young man with a completely bare chest?

[mycophobia]

Would someone have cared to write this article if Meghan were a young man with a completely bare chest?

Er, I would. o___o

I mean, I agree with you for the most part, but I think it would go equally for both sexes. In my head anyway.

[box_in_the_box]

As I said below, maybe it's just me, but I think it's kind of bullshit that Meghan McCain's supposed credibility as a political pundit is being tainted by her snapping a MySpace shot of herself in a tanktop, when warmongering gargoyles like Charles Krauthammer and Bill Kristol can spout 100-percent provably untrue rhetoric for years, which has directly led to the deaths of millions of military members and civilians as a result of our country's policy-makers taking them and similarly devoid-of-conscience fuckholes seriously for years, and yet, THEY'RE still treated like legitimate commentators.

I GUESS I KNOW NOW THAT THAT'S TOTALLY OKAY, UNLESS THEY START SNAPPING SHOTS OF THEMSELVES IN BANANA-HAMMOCKS, AMIRITE???

[taiki]

Why aren't Conservatives attacking Obama for showing off some of that hot beefcake when he was in Hawaii? it's totally stupid.

[box_in_the_box]

Well, to be fair, he wasn't the one taking photos of himself in that instance, but yes, it's still fucked up that MAN SHOWING OFF HIS HOT BOD = STUD, while WOMAN SHOWING OFF HER HOT BOD = SLUT.

I mean, if you think about it, this means that conservatives are so devoted to preserving such gender-based double-standards that they're even willing to PASS UP AN OPPORTUNITY TO CRITICIZE OBAMA to do so, and considering that these are the same people who are willing to align themselves with birthers and deathers and every other damn bullshit faction to attack Obama, that REALLY shows how much they're willing to sacrifice, just to preserve sexism itself.

[taiki]

Ah, this is what it must mean to be a "values" voter. Valuing sexism and puritanical morals over EVERYTHING.

[box_in_the_box]

Similar example: Over at the conservative blog Big Hollywood, when Obama created a huge flap by comparing his bowling skills to that of a Special Olympics athlete, several of the BH regular bloggers actually defended Obama's joke, even though it clearly pained them to do so, on the grounds that to do otherwise would be "giving in to the PC police." All I could think was, "Wow, considering all the other stuff you're willing to criticize Obama for, you must be REALLY COMMITTED to making fun of those less fortunate than yourselves, if you're willing to defend a man whom you HATE, when he does so."

[mindrtist]

I'm sorry, I just feel the need to tell you that everytime I see Krauthammer's name it makes me want to smash hot dogs.

[box_in_the_box]

It sounds like a pro wrestler's name.

Or a German porn star's.

Either way, somebody who would shout, "GET READY FOR THE KRAUT HAMMER, BITCHES!!!"

[siderealdays]

The article makes two really contradictory criticisms.
1. She's a stupid child, posing provocatively for attention because she doesn't have the intelligence to make her relevant in any kind of ~serious~ political discussion.
2. She's an adult who knows exactly what she's doing and therefore she is a big slut, and her opinions are worthless and she should not bother voicing them.

Both of these are directly related to her being female, having breasts, and female breasts in North America's culture being seen as innately sexual (and dirty/obscene/offensive). Putin's in a billion pictures without a shirt on, but I've never seen people write that he should stop being involved in politics because all he does is play judo and wrestle tigers (they have other issues with him to write about). Why is her t-shirt being used to question her right to voice her opinions and to insult her self-esteem?

[mycophobia]

i know. i agree with you. but had it been, for example, nicolas sarkozy's son - if he had a twitter and posted a picture of himself shirtless - i would still be like ":|"
i just don't know, something about it still rubs me the wrong way. i don't think it makes her a "slut" or whatever, and i don't think that she's any less intelligent, or that somehow her opinions are somehow invalid now. ugh, i'm so confused about this whole thing, i don't even know. it's so hard with twitter now to distinguish the lines between personal/political life. don't mind me

[bellichka]

I agree. I think what bothers me the most is that there's only one reason a person would post a picture of themselves like that - attention. Plain and simple. The idea that she ~innocently~ looked at that picture and said "it's just me in my PJs!" is laughable - and if she did, she's dumber than I give her credit for. She's just pissed that the attention was negative, and not what she was expecting. She then PERPETUATES the controversy by bitching about it on twitter, "oh I'm going to delete my twitter!" "oh I'm not going to delete!" "oh I am!" and then writing an entire article about it. It's bull.

[trf_chan]

THIS, so much.