Is the Washington Post serious?
There was cleavage on display Wednesday afternoon on C-SPAN2. It belonged to Sen. Hillary Clinton.
She was talking on the Senate floor about the burdensome cost of higher education. She was wearing a rose-colored blazer over a black top. The neckline sat low on her chest and had a subtle V-shape. The cleavage registered after only a quick glance. No scrunch-faced scrutiny was necessary. There wasn’t an unseemly amount of cleavage showing, but there it was. Undeniable.
It was startling to see that small acknowledgment of sexuality and femininity peeking out of the conservative — aesthetically speaking — environment of Congress. After all, it wasn’t until the early ’90s that women were even allowed to wear pants on the Senate floor. It was even more surprising to note that it was coming from Clinton, someone who has been so publicly ambivalent about style, image and the burdens of both.
This is journalism?
Update [2007-7-20 15:28:2 by BooMan]: Per Brendan’s request, you can email Robin Givhan here.
Here are my emails to her:
In an era when this administration’s power grabs have created a new crisis
almost daily, you use your constitutionally protected powers to obsess over
Clinton’s breasts?
How humiliating for you.
Her response:
Dear **,
Actually I was obsessing over cleavage. Not breasts.
All the best,
Robin
and my final:
So long as you have your priorities straight. Must be great to have such an important job.
could you post that clown’s email?
good for you.
And her response is meaningless.
That distinction is so supercilious and hypocritical that Givhan’s reply to you makes me more sick then her article. Writing about a major politician’s tits would be vulgar and disrespectful, but writing about her cleavage is perfectly fine: see how clever I am?
She is so very clever. Nevermind that cleavage exists only because of breasts. She’s not talking about boobs; she’s talking about the space between boobs.
Maybe Robin has a thing for Hillary. But it is most assuredly not news. Yuck. Blame the WP editors for letting that go to print.
you know, you have to be really fucked up in your head to write an entire article about a 60-year old woman’s tits.
Now don’t get me wrong: as a straight male, I love me some tits. Tits make life worth living.
But speculating on the tits of an old lady like Hillary is about as appealing as speculating about old codger Fred Thompson’s cock size or George and Laura Bush making love. YUK!
Now if it was an article about Christina Ricci’s bountiful endowment, or Thora Burch, or any pretty young thing… well, it STILL wouldn’t belong in the Post.
that’s what Hustler’s for.. I mean outside of exposing people like david vitter.
As an even “older lady” than Hillary, me an my “tits” take exception to your remarks, although I find them hilarious (your remarks,not my tits). Seriously, some of us old broads have some pretty good looking tits even now. . .its genetics don’t you know.
ROFLMAO
Feel free to post photos. 😉
Now your really are making me ROFLOL!
Now in my drinking days, it just might have been a possible. Heh! LOL
yeah, I know some older women with great racks, I must admit. So i deliberately entered Fred Thompson, so I’d be an equal-opportunity ageist, sexist, whateverthehellelseist offender.
Here’s my communications with Robin ;
Dear Shirley,
Thanks for sharing your opinion.
Robin
Shirley White sent the following message:
You call yourself a journalist???? When you start talking about what nice
butts the males have and comment on their abs, then possibly this might be
the least small bit appropriate. Really. If this is the best you can do,
then I’m a journalist and I want to start pursuing my Pulitzer.
Disgraceful!
Ick, Brendan, couldn’t you think of a less offensive way to get your point across? I think you’ve just offended women in general, women over 50 in particular, “young things”, Christina Ricci, Thora Birch and me.
Point is….Hillary Clinton is a professional and a politician, and her breasts have no place in the news unless they mic up and start speaking for themselves.
“Ick, Brendan, couldn’t you think of a less offensive way to get your point across?”
No, but I could think of quite a few MORE offensive ways.
I coulda sent a picture of David Vitter oiled up and wearing his diaper and asking Givhan to do an article about HIS cleavage. Or, I coulda sent a picture of me, butt-ass naked and doing windmills. And if you’ve seen me in person, you know that’s not especially attractive.
No offense, but I’m a pretty offensive guy. Nowhere near as offensive as that idiotic article in the Post but pretty offensive.
I can attest to that.
hey no comments from the peanut gallery!
That’s not a bad idea….maybe I’ll send her a picture of my cleavage….on my ass, that is.
And join us next week for an in depth inquiry into Barack Obama’s butt.
Meanwhile in other news of intimate body parts:
Linky thing
My cup runneth over.
My email:
What a bunch of crap! As if nothing of import is going on in the Senate, let alone our country, you chose to write about an middle-aged woman’s breasts. In all fairness, we should be seeing a similar article on Cheney’s bulge next week, and I ain’t talking his forehead.
Shame on you for wasting your and our time with this drivel. Talk about fiddling while Rome burns…
Thanks for sharing your opinion.
Robin
Robin Givhan, fashion editor
The Washington Post
251 W. 57th Street, 12th Floor
NY, NY 10019
212-445-4900 (p)
212-445-4853 (fax)
202-258-0622 (mobile)
givhanr@washpost.com
Obviously, she has gotten quite a bit of email already, and her replies are becoming necessarily more terse. Would that her “reporting” be as terse…
I got the same response to:
It’s appalling that dreck about Clinton’s cleavage passes for news in what used to be a house of journalists. In reporting on the space between the breasts of a U.S. Senator and leading Presidential candidate you have demeaned your profession, your gender, your government, and your readers.
.
BERLIN (Reuters) – A German bus driver threatened to throw a 20-year-old sales clerk off his bus in the southern town of Lindau because he said she was too sexy, a newspaper reported.
Bild.de OnLineA bit surprising though, for the Germans have their Munich Oktoberfest.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."The cleavage registered after only a quick glance. No scrunch-faced scrutiny was necessary. There wasn’t an unseemly amount of cleavage showing, but there it was. Undeniable.
The neckline sat low on her chest and had a subtle V-shape.
robin, robin.
I don’t get what her problem is. Robin Givhan seems to appear in a number of cleavage shots. What’s the big deal with Hillary?
too funny.
And in her pink dress – never mind the cleavage – her slip is showing!!! She has no business being a fashion writer, none at all. And obviously, she was not educated by nuns, or she would never be seen with her slip showing, let alone have her picture taken that way for God and all the world to see her petticoat.
“Tits” is misogynistic. Get a clue.
Oh alright. I’ll use “bodacious tatas” from now on. That or the more politcally correct “bouncing bazoombahs”.
I’m not talking about being politically correct. I am talking about what offends me as a woman. Maybe you can picture yourself applying this clever humor to the N word and see how far it gets you as a progressive.
no, but i certainly use a host of ridiculous and/or non politically correct words to refer to my package (hey I just used one).
is the word “tits” is inherently offensive or does it depends on context?
I would say offensiveness has its place, and one of those places is in the service of ridicule, which is EXACTLY what the piece does. it ridicules Robin Givhan and the Washington Post for writing a stupid shallow article about a Democratic front runners breasts: it describes her gutter journalism with like words to do the job.
So that’s where I’m coming from.
do you use peckerwood or tallywacker?
How about Walter? Do you call it Walter?
I’ve always found “schlong” to be hilarious. “trouser snake” is also choice.
sometimes i look at my fellow humans and try to imagtine how an alien would perceive the weird tentacled pads we have at the end of our four apendages.
Well then don’t bother replying to any of my comments. Why should you?
It’s meant to point out the crassness of the article, not as an endorsement of using the word ‘tits’. But I don’t think the word is necessarily degrading. Happy to hear other opinions.
I get why you used it – but I agree that the word is degrading. It’s all a matter of context: a stripper has tits (because she wants them to be tits), a senator has breasts.
I can see that. Obviously the headline is supposed to evoke disgust comparable to the argument itself.
Nice to see you again! 🙂
Nice to see you, too, SN. I kind of demoted myself by default to lurker status for awhile. I had to regroup around the idea that I was not in a safe place while posting on this forum. But I’m okay now.
I’m glad you’re back. There was a scary little time there, wasn’t there? Cafe sure has been quiet….some would say boring. Not me of course, just some would say that. 🙂
Yes, scary, but now I understand the need to stir up controversy to stimulate site participation. However, this strategy is a two-edged sword, unfortunately, and IMHO has cut the wrong way for this site once too since often so many great voices seem to have taken a powder.
I do miss the Good Ole FB Cafe days, but understand that things can’t stay the same forever.
And (I know you wouldn’t say that, but…) from the Lurker’s Eye View the FBC is not the only place that has been boring.
Still, I learned a lot for better or worse and so am grateful.
We need to all hang together or we will surely all hang separately. I think Benjamin Franklind said that.
Thank you for this and so here’s another opinion. I’m a woman and I say “tits” is (at best) vulgar slang.
Fine to use this denigrating terminology in context within your article, but in a title and appended to “Hillary” (BTW I’m not a big Hillary fan), it could be perceived by some as misogynistic. However, that’s just my perception, and I don’t pretend to speak for other women.
Oh, and, proud to be a feminist!
What’s the male equivalent? Would it be ‘balls’?
I dunno. It surely qualifies as vulgar slang but it isn’t always used as a way of denigrating women. Many women embrace the term.
However, in this context, it is meant to offend. But it’s not meant to offend women, it’s meant to offend sensibilities. We shouldn’t be talking about Hillary’s tits because it is inappropriate.
I get your point.
I don’t know that many women who embrace “tits”….same for the C-word (I still can’t say that even to myself)…I’ve heard the argument about claiming the language being empowering, but I don’t buy it.
well, what would anna in philly say?
She seems to be an exception to more than one rule.
I’d like that in a bumper sticker: WWAIPS?
OK what’s wrong with the C-word. Cowabonga, Cowabonga, Cowabonga! There I said it three times. ;~P
Chattanooga Choo Choo.
If Hillary’s tits are on today, can George’s ass be far behind? (Like tomorrow,hehehehe).
This is the response I got back when I emailed Robin:
I will be out of the office starting 07/21/2007 and will not return until
08/06/2007.
I will not be checking e-mail. If your message is urgent, call Cory
Ohlendorf at 202-334-7555.