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• Thursday, August 28, 2008 09:37 AM

  markmadrid I've thought about this quite a bit

  And this concerns sexism, not whining.

  But if you call a woman names with historical sexist associations, whether or not you like this woman, whether or not you would use these same terms for a man--it qualifies as sexist behavior.

  Many people behaved in sexist ways towards Clinton and justified their behavior by saying that they didn't like her. Look--if you only use the word twat about women you don't like--sorry buddy, that's still sexist.

  And what I mean by respect is not that you worship her ideas or respect her ideas--attack her ideas if you like, or even her style--but attacking her personally with words with sexist associations is not okay.

  I'm glad that you feel Clinton's campaign transcended gender--that's great. But a writer below was chastised for attacking female supporters of Clinton by referring to their big girl panties...he was criticised for sexism--by people including myself. His justification was that he didn't like these people--because they might be helping to elect John McCain...but that didn't get him out of hot water either. And by the way this is not about my liking Maureen Dowd--sometimes she drives me nuts--although I do find myself reading her columns. I say this also because I've seen many attacks on Joan Walsh and other women on salon. The justification is always that they "deserve" it. I just don't agree.

  And if Clinton's campaign is going to have a legacy in the Democratic Party--let it be that women don't deserve to be harassed with historically sexist language, any more than black people deserve to be harassed with historically racist language.

  —doloresflower Read doloresflower's other letters
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