I think this commentary at National Review Online is very perceptive:
But first let me say something a little impertinent. Lukas says the Democrat campaign treated women as sex objects and that is true. But do you know who else treats women as sex objects? Women do. A woman who puts on skin-tight leggings, a push up bra and a cleavage revealing shirt thinks of herself as a sex object. And that is only the extreme example. The woman who dresses in an elegant and sophisticated manner is also flaunting herself as a sex object. That's not all she thinks of herself as but it is part of it.
And, as I I keep repeating here, the more freedoms and rights a nation gives to women, the more they dress as sex objects. Both on the right and the left there are a lot of people who have a hard time dealing with this. They keep trying to convince themselves that women are being pressured into this, and us, that they shouldn't trust their own lyin' eyes but the truth is plain for anyone who walks out the door and looks around.
Again, as I have said here before, women tend to value sexual status at least as much as sex itself but they do like sex and most of them like it a lot. Sex is not a risk free activity for them, and they typically pay a higher emotional price for it than men do. And then there is this central fact:
Lukas says that the notion that Republicans want to restrict access to contraception is "far-fetched". Well, it depends how you understand the language you are hearing. As I said in last night's post, a lot of women hear the words of those who would deny abortion even in case of rape a desire to take away from them the right to have sex and not to have babies. That may seem far fetched but if any woman who takes a close look at Catholic moral teaching regard sex will find language about every sex act being open to conception that will justify her paranoia. An awful lot of women heard that talk and they skipped right past the legal distinctions and they heard an intent. They heard an intent to force them to be open to pregnancies they don't want.
And see this as a right. They understand perfectly that the Catholic church has a right to teach that the use of contraception is wrong but they also think that any woman, ANY woman, working for ANY employer should have the same access to contraception as every other woman. If any employers are to pay for contraception, they reason, then the Catholic hospital should as well.
I'm just describing here. I'm not saying that is the way it should be but it is the way it is and if last night proved anything, it proved that the culture war is over. I don't know what the losers do at this point. There are a lot of them, far too many to expect them to load up their wagons and slink away to exile in the wilderness.
Yet here is something that’s pretty clear, even as the dust settles. Men would have elected Gov. Romney President by a wide margin. Women, who cast about 53 percent of the votes, gave President Obama about a ten-point margin and another four years in the White House.That is written by Carrie Lukas and I will cheerfully admit that Ms. Lukas's name and this comment is the sum total of what I know about her. There is a lot that should be said here.
This should be a wakeup call for everyone on the Right. I count myself among those who assumed — clearly wrongly in hindsight — that the “War on Women” rhetoric wouldn’t work. From my perspective, the Democrats’ campaign for women was flatly insulting, treating women as sex objects (appealing to them to vote with their “lady parts”) and helpless wards of the state (Julia). The charge that Republicans want to restricted access to contraception — that is, beyond returning to the pre-ObamaCare status quo when religious organizations were not forced to pay for others’ contraception — is so far-fetched that it’s almost hard to know how to counter, since just engaging in the discussion grants the question a legitimacy it doesn’t deserve.
But first let me say something a little impertinent. Lukas says the Democrat campaign treated women as sex objects and that is true. But do you know who else treats women as sex objects? Women do. A woman who puts on skin-tight leggings, a push up bra and a cleavage revealing shirt thinks of herself as a sex object. And that is only the extreme example. The woman who dresses in an elegant and sophisticated manner is also flaunting herself as a sex object. That's not all she thinks of herself as but it is part of it.
And, as I I keep repeating here, the more freedoms and rights a nation gives to women, the more they dress as sex objects. Both on the right and the left there are a lot of people who have a hard time dealing with this. They keep trying to convince themselves that women are being pressured into this, and us, that they shouldn't trust their own lyin' eyes but the truth is plain for anyone who walks out the door and looks around.
Again, as I have said here before, women tend to value sexual status at least as much as sex itself but they do like sex and most of them like it a lot. Sex is not a risk free activity for them, and they typically pay a higher emotional price for it than men do. And then there is this central fact:
Women get pregnant.Go make like Bart Simpson and write that 100 times on the blackboard before you go home from school today. Men and women are different from one another and that fact goes a long, long way to explain the differences.
Lukas says that the notion that Republicans want to restrict access to contraception is "far-fetched". Well, it depends how you understand the language you are hearing. As I said in last night's post, a lot of women hear the words of those who would deny abortion even in case of rape a desire to take away from them the right to have sex and not to have babies. That may seem far fetched but if any woman who takes a close look at Catholic moral teaching regard sex will find language about every sex act being open to conception that will justify her paranoia. An awful lot of women heard that talk and they skipped right past the legal distinctions and they heard an intent. They heard an intent to force them to be open to pregnancies they don't want.
And see this as a right. They understand perfectly that the Catholic church has a right to teach that the use of contraception is wrong but they also think that any woman, ANY woman, working for ANY employer should have the same access to contraception as every other woman. If any employers are to pay for contraception, they reason, then the Catholic hospital should as well.
I'm just describing here. I'm not saying that is the way it should be but it is the way it is and if last night proved anything, it proved that the culture war is over. I don't know what the losers do at this point. There are a lot of them, far too many to expect them to load up their wagons and slink away to exile in the wilderness.
I agree with your assessment, rightly or wrongly this is what women heard and based their vote on. I guess it was the feminists who first coined the term "sex object." One has to wonder if it was mainstream feminists or the lesbian fringe. In any case, I'll never forget one of the final episodes of "The Practice" where James Spader (in character) is representing a company accused of sexual harrassment by a female employee. When he gets her on the witness stand he asks her "isn't it true that the only thing worse than being treated as a sex object is NOT being treated as a sex object?" She tearfully agrees. The fact of the matter is that we're sexual beings, men and women alike. A man who is well-groomed, wearing a well cut and fitted suit with a handkercheif in the breast pocket is "advertising" himself just as much as the woman who dresses in an elegant and sophisticated manner. And there's nothing wrong with that. We're all sex objects to a greater or lesser degree to different people at different times. I think what women were objecting to--and this somehow got lost--was being treated only as a sex object. The real issue here--and I think this is what you're alluding to--is that today our sexuality is separate and distinct from reproduction, women demand it and we have the means to accomplish it. Just from the perspective of justice that doesn't seem too far-fetched despite Catholic Church teaching.
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