So, this was going to be posted in the last thread but I'll just post it here because similar conversations are already popping up.
It's really amazing that in the face of an old man probably saying something that was sexist enough to miff Warren to the point of telling staffers basically directly after it happened, we have folks bringing out arguments like;
1) Outright denying the validity of the event, even after saying "I'll wait for her to say it happened (and she did say it happened)
2) Saying "it was a misunderstanding" of the two parties.
3) Saying it's a smear (well yea it's politics but that doesn't mean it didn't happen)
4) Finding any excuse to try and give cover for the rather blunt statement Warren described to make his words (which he said he didn't say) not sexist in nature.
5) Question "the timing" (why say it happened now???)
Now, obviously this is politics and this isn't an assault, this is... well, sexism or diet sexism. However you want to put it.
But, it's actually really amazing how quick people are to fall back on the most common tropes of questioning a women's recollection of an event where she felt her sex is under radar when the accused is a powerful man who is "in the middle of important things", so to speak. People who label themselves as progressives so fucking quick to snap into the most used up and ground up talking points to discredit events because of favoritism.
Considering Warren found it hurtful or annoying enough to note it to other aids when the dinner happened it's pretty unlikely it's some "fake news" as a lot of posters seem to want to be labeling this as. Like, the fact she talked about this after it happened (you know kinda like how the serious shit goes down) gives credence that this wasn't just some misunderstood conversation and Sanders probably said this in a way that was hurtful to her.
Other people have talked about the obvious parallels, talking about how quick people are to dive into the usual discrediting of stuff against women isn't "coopting" MeToo, it's making comment of the fact that this shit happens a lot and with various topics/subjects and people really are quick to fall into such similar talking points when threatened.
Food for thought, if Warren leaked this about Biden nobody would be up in arms about "the timing". Nobody would give a shit if it was someone else.
Is there conversation about the sexist aspects of the American electorate and the shitty fact that women politicians in many places are dealing with a barrier to voters based around the simple fact of engraved sexism? Yea, of course. Outright spewing "women can't win" is just that, spewing the same sexist propaganda shit heads have been repeating for years. You're not being some insightful commentator on the state of politics, you're just spewing sexist defeatism because that's all you heard growing up from the same sexist people who go "I mean I wouldn't mind if a women won but there is just no way that women..."
*that women being any women who runs for POTUS at any given point in time
This can be a lot of things happening at once as well
a) Warren is slipping in the polls and either authorized this story to be leaked or a staffer had loose lips and leaked it
b) The story is true and the event pissed Warren off when it happened to where she told people it happened right after the dinner
c) Whoever leaked it intended to hurt Sanders, just like anytime you talk about damning events that... make someone not look good after they say something that hurts you.
Like so many things, the easiest outcome would be to just... say it happened and that Sanders kinda said a shitty thing, at least shitty enough to make Warren annoyed to talk about it with her closest aids. But instead of like, admitting that someone in a private dinner conversation (who is an old white dude) could have dabbled in casual sexism, everyone is grabbing a sword and saying that it's impossible?
Is Sanders a "bad person", I mean I don't even like him but I don't honestly think "less" of him in terms of being some secret misogynist, which I don't think he is. If anything this just reinforces how engraved sexism is in politics, especially in terms of the Executive Branch. I think from a general "look around" of the situation the overall conversation is strikingly parallel to other topics regarding private events between people of the opposing sex.
