On one level, it isn’t really hard to understand, though it does require that one accepts the truism that people tend to believe what they want to believe, rather than genuinely evaluating a given situation into which they have poured a lot of emotional investment from a logical and dispassionate standpoint. It’s not like I can claim I’ve nevereverEVER done the same–I’ve been divorced twice, after all, which certainly points to at least a few pretty significant misjudgments on my part in terms of how I perceived another person relating to things that were really important to me. But on another level, it is hard for me to understand folks doing this outside of the realm of the most intimate personal relationships–parents, best friends, lovers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, and so forth. But people do do it all the time outside those situations–they somehow develop an emotional relationship with, for instance, actors–or church leaders–or professional athletes–there’s an absolutely fascinating dynamic involving porn stars that I may specifically write about someday–or, in this case, politicians. They appear to believe that there is some kind of connection there; though they do understand that this relationship is of course utterly one-sided in the concrete sense since the person in question has usually never laid eyes upon them nor even heard of them, they still somehow believe that on some level, somehow, this person cares at least about the idea of them–people like them. This is apparently enough to allow them to develop a full-blown fantasy rig involving what this person is really like! what a great friend this person would be if they had a friendship with them, how just generally awesome this person really is. In short, something very like love, and with it, all the attendant blindness that people tend to exhibit towards a genuinely loved one.
The current angst is based upon the following interview excerpt with Senator Barack Obama, Democratic presidential nominee, with some Christian online magazine called Relevant*:
Strang: Based on emails we received, another issue of deep importance to our readers is a candidate’s stance on abortion. We largely know your platform, but there seems to be some real confusion about your position on third-trimester and partial-birth abortions. Can you clarify your stance for us?
Obama: I absolutely can, so please don’t believe the emails. I have repeatedly said that I think it’s entirely appropriate for states to restrict or even prohibit late-term abortions as long as there is a strict, well-defined exception for the health of the mother. Now, I don’t think that “mental distress” qualifies as the health of the mother. I think it has to be a serious physical issue that arises in pregnancy, where there are real, significant problems to the mother carrying that child to term. Otherwise, as long as there is such a medical exception in place, I think we can prohibit late-term abortions.
Here are some examples of the previously referenced angst:
This is an upsetting bit of pandering–
I want to give you the benefit of the doubt, Barack–
Aw, Barry, say it ain’t so–
Some even go so far as to attempt to repaint his comments as something positive:
Explaining Obama, defining abortion terms
It reminds me a lot of a spouse, a few months after the wedding’s taken place, suddenly being forced to notice that the Sig. O’s arrival time home from work is really getting kinda late and when did your occasional trips to the gym become every other day and–unhappy feelings of suspicion, grimly suppressed by some (“I’m sure it doesn’t REALLY mean anything!”) but now requiring a conscious effort to do so, ranging to scale to “Oh, well, probably’s trying to be more attractive to ME!” and the work hours? “Probably wants to make up more money to do something special for US!”
Barack Obama is not all about women. Rinse, repeat. He never was. Isn’t now. Probably won’t ever be. He has never had to be. He has enjoyed the support of women who have made a point to specify that their feminism is not actually all about women (radical notion, I know!), and numerically speaking, that is enough combined with his legions of male supporters to make him the front-runner.
Barack Obama has never even tried to pretend he was all about women. He habitually refers to professional women in professional interactions as “sweetie,” which is something most of my male bosses in my often overwhelmingly male work environment have a made a point of not doing. He not only had the fewest number of female staffers on his campaign, he paid them less than the men. What has his position on abortion always been? That it should be a decision that the individual woman needs lots of outside input to make, and chided pro-choicers for their lack of pontification about how morally bad abortion really is. His response to all the women who supported Hillary Clinton? “If women take a moment to realise that on every issue important to women, John McCain is not in their corner, that would help them get over it.”
You know, that last part is very true. When the only choices are Obama and McCain, it is quite, quite clear who women and men who care deeply about women’s issues must vote for. I’m certainly voting for Obama and doing my best to encourage anyone I can reach to do so.
But I never played footsie with myself about Barack Obama the “feminist.” It saddens me that so many people apparently did–I thought they were supporting Obama in spite of his lukewarm nature towards the principles and ideals of feminism–actual feminism, you know, the belief in striving specifically for gender equality in all walks of life, social, economic, etc.
Maybe they were confused by the fact that he has an outspoken wife?
Well, as I said above, Obama has no reason to shift gears now–frankly, every reason to become more and more blatant about his real views on the subject. It’ll be interesting to watch the disillusioned and the apologist as the campaign continues on and even more so once the actual Obama presidency gets rolling, I guess. As long as we all keep hard to our intentions to vote Obama ’08 to get him there.
*via Shakesville.
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