Hey, Obama boys: Back off already!

Young women are growing increasingly frustrated with the fanatical support of Barack and gleeful bashing of Hillary by Rebecca Traister.

A little late, Salon. What’s your problem? Anyway, I already said everything in these excerpts:

a growing number of young women are struggling to describe a gut conviction that there is something dark and funky, and probably not so female-friendly, running below the frantic fanaticism of their Obama-loving compatriots

Interviewees expressed vexation at not being able to put their finger on what it was about Obama-mania that creeped them out so badly, while maintaining a deep assuredness that something was not quite right

“Really, have you seen their eyes? It’s this faraway look. It’s scary.”

I have seen that look and wondered if, in the minds of some of his adherents, the thing Barack Obama might be saving humanity from is Hillary Clinton.

Uh huh. I said this two months ago.

Were it her husband -– a man who has exhibited many of these same flaws (and more!) -– in the same place, he might or might not be trailing Obama, but it is hard to picture the kind of seething, violent animosity being flung at him.

I said this too.

When sexism is acknowledged in this primary campaign, it has been attributed to either Chris Matthews or the conservative, Rush Limbaugh, Iron My Shirt brigade. Little open recognition has been given to the possibility that there might be some gender discomfort behind the army of liberally minded Obama enthusiasts. But progressive politics has not always been female-friendly politics; ’70s feminism was born partly in response to the inequities of the antiwar and civil rights movements. It’s certainly possible that the youthful Obama movement has its own brand of female trouble.

“With straight white male progressive friends, I feel something that makes me viscerally angry and afraid — the viciousness of the rebuttals to the suggestion that [Obama's and Clinton's] policies are roughly equal or that Clinton’s have some benefits to them, the outright dismissal of any support of her, the impossibility of having a nuanced conversation … The whole ‘Hillary Clinton is a monster’ theme is so virulent.”

“I don’t think anyone in my peer group, including my parents and my friends, would be comfortable saying, ‘I’m not ready for a woman president.’ They would be ostracized. Saying, ‘She’s had plastic surgery’ or ‘Her attitude is off-putting’ are fine. But these are really expressions of some deeper issues with the fact that she’s a woman.”

“Hillary Clinton is not an attractive personality for a lot of people,” said O’Brien, who noted that it’s “very convenient that the same people who have a sense of discomfort with female authority they prefer not to examine” also object to her personality and record in specific terms, an antipathy they feel comfortable voicing. “What you get,” said O’Brien, “is the energy of the first expressed in words of the second.”

Lossia, the Obama-supporting labor lawyer, explained that with her friends, “I’ve never heard them say anything where I could say, ‘That’s a sexist comment.’ It’s just that I can’t understand why they hate her so much. I just have a feeling that they wouldn’t be as bothered by her if she were a man. But that’s very intuitive … I think some of the guys just have some kind of visceral dislike for her.” Lossia said she has asked why they despise Clinton. “People can always come up with reasons they don’t like the candidate they’re not supporting,” she said. “But no one disliked Joe Biden or Chris Dodd as much as they dislike Hillary.”

I said all this.

To her surprise, at almost every school she visited, young women told her, “My friends or boyfriend or father are progressive guys, but when they talk about Hillary, I feel like they’re being sexist. But I can’t put my finger on what it is.”

“Because their friends were not being specifically sexist, or saying something that was tangibly misogynistic, they were having a hard time talking about the sexism of it.” Valenti confirmed that this “Feminine Mystique”-y problem that has no name was familiar to her. “I spoke to a guy friend who said, ‘You’re being ridiculous. I’m not not voting for her because she’s a woman; I’m not voting for her because she’s a bitch!’ He could not see the connection between the two things at all.” Valenti said he explained away his comment by declaring, “I mean ‘a bitch’ in the sense that she’s not good on this or that issue.”

Valenti has vacillated between Obama and Clinton and has not publicly revealed whom she’s supporting. “But if I say something that’s pro-Obama,” she said, “someone will feel it’s OK to say something to me that’s anti-Hillary that I feel is coming from a place that’s totally misogynist. The same thing happens if I say something that’s pro-Hillary; someone will launch into an anti-Hillary diatribe that doesn’t have anything to do with her as a politician. But because it’s not explicit sexism, it makes it impossible to argue with people, because if you say something, then you’re the wackadoo feminist.”

“Sexism does not have to be 100 percent of what’s going on. It might not even be 80 percent. But give me a break. It’s there. Don’t say that it’s not there.” She went on, “You would hope that people would at least realize that that’s what they’re saying, but they can’t. It’s like they don’t have the vocabulary because they’re so adamantly not acknowledging that that’s going on. They’re busy patting themselves on the back for supporting a black man: Aren’t we cool?”

Perhaps it is thanks to the admitted cool factor that among educated liberal voters, the assumption is that you’re for Obama, that he is the more “progressive” choice. Obama loyalty, like white masculinity itself, has become normative -– if you’re not for him, you’d best be prepared to explain your deviation.

“I have not talked with any straight men on campus who are voting for Hillary. And a lot of the females I know are supporting Obama. I don’t know if that’s because they actually do support him, or if it’s because they don’t want to be attacked because they’re female and they’re leaning toward Hillary.”

I always comment on the massive white guilt and closet Clinton votes neither of which anyone talks about.

She said that her fellow students are “more subtle” about their Clinton support. “I don’t want to say ‘quiet’ about it,” Gruenberg said. “I feel like the kids who are for Obama are much more into marketing and bragging about it. Hillary people are not so much into advertising it yet.”

Perhaps the hesitation to throw a Hillary placard in your window is related to the fear that doing so will make you –- like Clinton herself –- a regular laughingstock.

Hey I had no fear supporting Carol Moseley Braun or whoever and getting laughed at. There are many Clinton supporters we don’t hear from.

Mia Bruch described a recent trip to Ricky’s, a cosmetics shop in New York City. “The only political item was a huge stack of Hillary nutcrackers,” she said. “Obviously, the play here is that she’s a ball-buster. No one is making nutcracker icons of McCain or Obama.” More important, no one would buy them. Ricky’s cosmetic store is not selling Hillary nutcrackers for its health; it’s selling them because there is a market. “People like making fun of Hillary Clinton,” said Bruch simply.

In today’s United States, racism continues to have more damaging economic and social structural implications for African-Americans than sexism has for women. Especially white and well-educated women, who are catching up to their male counterparts, if not in terms of equal pay or domestic expectations or secure reproductive options, at least in their ability to pursue the education and vocation they desire. And that makes them a more threatening group to the population of white men who have enjoyed unchallenged power — in the White House and other workplaces — since the birth of the nation. Those who feel the army of tough ladies breathing down their necks, competing for jobs and salaries and refusing to drop out of the race, are the population of privileged white men from which the elite portion of the Democratic Party is built.

Gender inequality is greatest where resources are most concentrated. I say this all the time.

But a lightly disguised uneasiness with female power, as well as the “we love women, just not that woman” rhetoric will be familiar to anyone who has paid attention to the reception of the feminist movement. It’s the movement of which Clinton has become emblematic -– not because it was her bailiwick, but because she has been exactly the kind of woman that feminism made room for: ambitious, ball-busting, high-earning, untrained in the finer arts of hair care, and unwilling to play dumber (or nicer) than she is.

These women –- and the movement whence they sprang -– have never been the most popular girls in the Democratic Party, even if the party’s male elders have grown up enough to know that they’re not supposed to say so out loud anymore. At least not until they find themselves pinching Clinton’s cheek like Chris Matthews, or accusing her of destroying the party by staying in a race in which she is still competitive. It’s like how Democrats love women, just not those goddamned women with their single-issue reproductive rights obsession that sticks us with Lincoln Chafee and Joe Lieberman.

Men like “women,” not feminists.

In this case, the frustration with the feminist old guard’s reaction to Hillary Clinton is not unmerited.

it’s possible to envision a way in which, rather than simply sealing the demise of the second-wave, this election might give birth to a new generation of young feminists awakened by the harsh treatment of Hillary -– on their own terms and without the voices of Steinems and Morgans to overshadow or boss them.

“When the election started, I felt very postfeminist,” said Wiegand. “I felt like, I’m a woman and I’d love to have a woman president, but I also have many other issues I care about and the Iraq war is a big one, and I’m not going to make my decision just because I’m a woman.” But over the course of the campaign, Wiegand said, “there has been a lot of anger toward Hillary that’s felt really intense and misogynistic. The gloating after Iowa was something to behold. And it’s made me realize we are still dealing with the gender issue. I don’t think we know what to make of women in power, or make of Hillary. I don’t think the world is as postfeminist as I was feeling that it was.”

These 20 and 30somethings will be feminists when they hit the glass ceiling in 10-20 years.