On Fri, 6/12/09, Videmus Omnia wrote:
Why should Letterman get any benefit of the doubt on this? Has he shown any prior class or restraint in regards to the Governor or her children? The guys sexualizes Palin and her daughters every chance he gets, look at his history.
I was actually shocked to read your piece after your previous defense of Bristol - because, even accepting a hypothetical premise that Letterman was attacking Bristol instead of Willow, the subtext of your piece is that attacking Bristol is OK - and that's it's somehow wrong for Governor Palin to defend her children. Victor Davis Hanson explains it better than I ever could, but his feelings on this are also mine (as the father of 3 daughters). Even the National Organization for Women disagrees with you. I say this as a friend, but you are being tone-deaf here and I encourage you to talk to some people who don't normally follow Palin or politics the way that you or I do.
A line has to be drawn and the people who go after the Palin children need to be confronted. I would feel exactly the same way regardless of whose children were being attacked, even the President's daughters. If the line is not drawn and people are not made to feel some pain, then it becomes acceptable and next we'll be hearing jokes about Piper Palin turning tricks.
On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 12:16 PM, amanda coyne wrote:
I never, ever said it's okay. But Bristol has allowed her sexuality to be played out in nearly every major media outlet in the country. You might argue it was ultimately for good cause. I'll give you that, even though I don't believe that one hapless teenage girl is going to look at Bristol's rather glamorous life--a life made glamorous because of her situation--and decide not to become a teenage mother.
So, it's a choice between throwing Bristol and Willow to the wolves. An absolutely horrible choice, but why in GOD's name choose Willow, the one who has remained relatively unsullied in this whole Palin drama? The one who actually might have a chance at a normal life?
Here's where I'm coming from, and it's probably why I'll never be considered a great thinker or a writer: I'll choose people over principle any day. That means, in this case, I could care a less about fighting the "bigger cause," when in the process, one 14 year old girl is behind humiliated and shamed in front of the whole country
On Fri, 6/12/09, Videmus Omnia wrote:
Who humiliated Willow? I just don't get it - Letterman says a Palin daughter was impregnated at a NY baseball game. Willow was at the baseball game. Bristol was in Alaska. Anyone who was paying the least attention to Palin's Outside trip knows that. And how is defending her "throwing her to the wolves"? The only people saying this are you, Keith Olbermann, some dumbass at TNR, and crazy blog commenters. Wake up.
What do you mean, Bristol "allowed her sexuality to be played out"? These vultures were all over it long her before she made a pro-abstinence statement, even before she turned eighteen. It was the reason the McCain campaign had to make an announcement about Bristol's pregnancy, because of the insanity of the Trig Truthers. Do you think they would have let Bristol alone had she not made her one-day media appearance? There is zero indication of that. Bristol attempted to put a silver lining on the cloud that the media has placed over her life, and it's only used as justification for further attacks. "Sit down and shut up, Bristol! We will snark about you, but you have no right to say anything or we will attack you further!" I can't believe that has become your mindset.
I don't give a damn about fighting a greater cause in regards to this. I will be honest with you on this and am telling you this as someone who likes you and admires your writing. At C4P we are all political junkies and we dissect EVERYTHING Palin does from a political angle all the time. We discuss it endlessly. But the political never came into our minds when this Letterman thing happened - it was pure personal outrage and I don't give a rat's ass whether condemning Letterman has a positive or negative impact on Palin's political prospects. Neither does any other C4P editor. I suspect she may feel the same way.
You're right - Willow was mostly unsullied until Letterman sullied her. Bristol is a slut, Piper is a school-deprived little girl (according to Tina Brown) who has designer handbags, Trig is a "prop" who isn't really the Governor's child.
And don't get me started on Track. Google his name to see the smears - the smears are the only hits you will get. As a military man, this outraged me to no end and was my motivation for getting into pro-Palin blogging - if you'll look, you'll see my Track Palin piece was my very first published at C4P. Nothing is out of bounds -- though this honorable young soldier has done nothing to put himself in the public eye. The work that Track Palin does, escorting Provincial Reconstruction Teams in Diyala Province, is dangerous as hell. Diyala is a rough province and the PRTs are a special target for terrorists because they are so effective with the local civilians.
Has anyone besides C4P ever tried to write about Track Palin and his unit? Have you, or anyone else, ever condemned the smears against him and the Palin children?
I find it odd that you are perfectly willing to give Letterman the benefit of the doubt, but I can't really recall any occasion recently where you have given Governor Palin the benefit of the doubt on a single thing.
On Tuesday Jun 16, 2009 at 10:16 PM, amanda coyne wrote:
I abhor this whole business of smearing. As you know (and are always quick to point out on C4P), I've flirted with it a few times myself and always feel a little ill after. (But never about Track. I didn't even know about those blogs. Despicable.) Â What's particularly interesting is that the people who have chosen Palin as their mark are most often the people who cry foul when they see the same kind of thing, leveled against someone whom they find politically acceptable, Â on Fox or hear it talk radio. The tone may be slightly different-one bellicose the other sneering--but they're just really doing the same things and reaching the same types of audiences.
I try to give both sides of the Palin divide credit though. I try to remember that both are truly doing what's best for the country. I sometimes even get a chuckle imagining taking the most vitriolic representatives from both sides and putting them in a room with some beers. I betcha at the end of the night there'd be some slaps on the backs, promises to stay in touch, and eventually invitations to birthday parties, etc... (case and point: the interview Phil Munger had with Talis Colberg)
It's hard, as you and I know, to hate people you know particularly public officials or personalities. Particularly when they show touches of humility and humor.
Maybe that's why, as you say, I gave Letterman a break. I see humor there with an occasional glimpse of humility. I believed him when he said that he or his writers or whoever was thinking about Bristol when he made that joke. It was a bad, tasteless joke, but it only made sense in the context of Bristol. I also believe him because he said so, and I don't understand why I wouldn't. If someone steps on my toes in a grocery store, and tells me it's an accident, I'd like to think I'd believe that person, even if I suspect otherwise. Unless, of course, there was something in me that really wanted to believe that I was being hurt on purpose. Unless I got something out of it. Which is what I have been accusing you all, and to a lesser extent, Sarah, of doing, at the expense of Willow.
I'm ascribing motives, and I don't have the right to. (In essence I'm doing exactly what I'm accusing you all of.. heavy sigh) Regardless. Might at least we agree that none of this would be happening if the ink still wasn't drying on the cover of the People magazine featuring Bristol? This is not the same thing, by the way, as suggesting she "asked" for it. But didn't she, at the very least, open herself up for it, with, seemingly, her mother's blessings?
Yes, the media, as you said, went after Bristol hard at first, but you are wrong to say that it all had to do with the Trigg rumor. We in Alaska had been hearing for a while that she was pregnant. My husband even called Bill McAllister the night before they announced Bristol's pregnancy to ask about the rumor, and he wasn't the only reporter doing so.
But it would have died off after the election had Bristol stayed out of the glare. She didn't, and I do respect Bristol for that. She's carving a life out for herself that is so much more interesting than the one she seemed fated for, even if the mission of that new found life can seem contradictory given her circumstances. I also give huge credit Sarah for allowing her that life. I don't have any idea how it effects her political future, but I do know that it's a gamble, and I'd like to think that she's taking that gamble for Bristol.
I don't know this, but I'll give her the benefit of the doubt, in the same way I give Letterman the benefit of the doubt. Why not do so? Â It seems so much the kinder, softer way to approach this whole thing. Â And when I say kinder, softer way, in this case, I mean, again, for Willow.
Listen, here's what I'm most objecting to: Willow has been put in the middle of something that's entirely too big for her. For Christ's sakes, you guys are talking about taking Letterman's job! Â Do you know how big of a weight that could be for a 14 year old girl? Do you know how that might send her writhing with guilt?
You might not understand this because teenage girls have so much more a complicated relationship with their emerging sexually than boys have, but I can say this from experience: Â To be a teenage girl is huge burden and much of that has to do with the sexual hold they have over others. It's a hold and a power that about which many girls feel a nearly unbearable combination of guilt and shame. And that also can be caught up with some sort of power-trip, which also feels really wrong.
I don't know Willow. From what I've seen, she seems like a perfectly nice, well adjusted girl. And I do hope she stays that way. Â Maybe she's fine with all of this. Maybe she's just chalked it up to a creep with a big mouth and moved on. But I know many young girls who wouldn't be fine with it. Who would be wracked. Who would be so absolutely humiliated that the thing that they're struggling with most is the talk of the country, and that this old man might lose his job over it.
I know many girls who would escape to their rooms, hoping it would all just go away, and fervently hoping that the guy was talking about someone else, someone who is older and who could handle it better.
I'm surprised, again, that you all don't see the possibility of that. And won't let her in that room with grace and privacy.
On Wed, 6/17/09, Videmus Omnia wrote:
Like Governor Palin, I am inclined to accept Letterman's apology. (His first "apology" was nothing such.) But he seemed sincere and contrite, and I will judge him by his actions going forward. If there is no repeat of sexist or misogynist humor, or attacks on the Palin children, then I will know his apology came from the heart.
A couple of premises that I don't accept: It's not OK to attack Bristol. She was tabloid fodder long before she did anything to place herself in the public eye. Even then it was not the Governor's doing, but her own. Van Susteren put up a blog entry a few days ago (responding to a letter to the editor in the Fairbanks DNM!) that the Governor had no involvement. As for People magazine, they would have done a story on Bristol whether or not she participated. She was proactive and controlled the message to her benefit, while advocating for a good cause - I admire her for that. Stick to criticism of abstinence advocacy if that's your thing, but don't insinuate she is a slut or a whore, as Letterman did. (And that's if we assume good faith that his jokes were about Bristol.)
In regards to Willow, it wasn't the Governor who put her in the public eye over the Letterman controversy. That angle had already exploded in the conservative blogosphere and been picked up by multiple media outlets before the Palins ever commented on it. It's wrong to blame the Palins - if blame needs to placed for that, then put it on us at C4P, Jim Treacher, Moe Lane, and the other bloggers who first called attention to this.
There was a huge "final straw" component to this controversy - there has been a growing undercurrent of anger at the attacks on the Palin children, and not just from conservatives. Many women have daughters or sisters or friends who found themselves in Bristol's position. And many men have still been raised with some concept of chivalry and courtesy. Attacking a young teenage mother, or referring to a respectable married woman as "slutty", is beyond the pale by any decent standard.
But ultimately when it comes to Willow, I think you have to recognize that the Palins themselves are the best judges of what their children can handle. I have experience in raising girls, and my approach is that it's best to teach them to be assertive and confrontational when put down. I suspect their approach may be similar, though of course I have no way of knowing. But shrinking away only encourages further victimization.
Anyway, my two cents. Thanks so much for the enjoyable conversation!
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