I'm a Hillary fan. I think she has shown concrete policy plans that Obama has not, I appreciate her desire to reform health care, and I respect her experience in the White House during Bill's presidency, as well as on her own in the US Senate. I don't think her initial vote for the war in Iraq is a deal-breaker, since many people on both sides of the aisle thought the war was a good idea at the beginning. I also really enjoyed reading her autobiography, Living History.But, perhaps the real reason that I want her to win the presidency is because I think it's time that this country recognized that a woman can be president, too. I wouldn't vote for just any woman, but since I agree with Clinton's politics, she has my support.
This past semester, I helped grade for a cultural studies class about the body and issues of representation. One of the issues that we discussed was the complicated ways in which women in power need to be both feminine and masculine--if they're too feminine, they're accused of being weak, ineffective leaders, but if they're too masculine, they're called power-hungry and controlling. Hillary Clinton was one of the women that we looked at more in-depth, and since then, I've been paying a little closer attention to the attention that has been shown her by the media, as well as the way she's presenting herself through her own campaign.
Here are some things that I've found particularly interesting:
The picture of Hillary on the left is a picture of her greeting an old friend. Apparently, the friend surprised Hillary, catching her off guard, and some photographer managed to catch her at just the wrong moment. This picture was on the "most-emailed" list at YahooNews for several weeks. I find it interesting that her looking, well, slightly evil, is considered newsworthy, not only by the media, but by those who email it to their friends.Also, as I've been looking for a "Clinton for President 2008" bumper sticker, I've come across some interesting t-shirts and
stickers. There are quite a large number of shirts that call Hillary a bitch, or even more than that, suggest that her wanting power is a negative character trait. The shirt on the right is one that encapsulates these ideas--the crown on Hillary's head, in particular, is something that I find interesting. Doesn't everyone who run for president want power? I seriously doubt that anyone who runs for president does so merely out of the goodness of his heart. I would imagine that everyone who runs for office does so to some degree because they want power. Yet when Hillary runs for president, suddenly she's "Queen Bitch" and her desire for power is inappropriate.
I'm also interested by the ways that both the media and Hillary's own campaign tries to counteract these negative images of power by embracing her more feminine side. Her video that announced her candidacy, found here, was set in a living room, rather than an office, with soft cushions, curtains, and even flowers in the background. Her continued emphasis on the idea of conversation, by working to talk to people in their living rooms and by even using the phrase "let's chat," brings to mind stereotypical women's spaces and activities. The bumper sticker on the left is another example of this--the soft pink color and the gentle cursive lettering is something you certainly wouldn't find on any of the male candidates' promotional material.
Perhaps the most obvious difference of all is the way she's named herself as a candidate. While we've known all past presidents by their last names--Washington, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Kennedy, Reagan--she has branded herself as a first name. Take a look in the official Hillary Store. Everything says "Hillary for president" rather than "Clinton for president." My initial thought was that perhaps it was a desire to separate her campaign from her husband's, or at least to differentiate between the two. But her campaign has embraced Bill's help, drawing on his expertise and his connections to raise funds and even make ads. When George W. Bush ran for President, he was known officially as Bush, so it seems that the issue at hand is less the issue of the same name and more to do with Clinton's gender. Even in the most basic aspects of her campaign--what she's known as--Hillary Clinton is forced to walk the thin line between being a weak, feminine candidate, and being a power-hungry man-eater.
Other examples you can think of?
