Feminist Organization: Bring Me the Head of MSNBC

I quit watching MSNBC when Chris Mathews made his comments about Hillary, so I am not surprised about the comments about Chelsea. It is a biased and sexist network.
I remember a few years ago the way they treated Ashleigh Banfield; their own reporter.

Bobbie
Ohio

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*****Thank you....your comments reflect reflect what I'm thinking. I too have a PhD and am in my 40's and I support Senator Clinton....so does my husband, BTW. I quit watching MSNBC some time ago when it became clear they'd stopped being "fair and balanced". Funny how Keith O. is always castigating Fox News and now his network is a worse offender. I was reading another blog the other day and someone was making the point that Fox was actually being somewhat "reasonable" in their campaign coverage. It struck me as amusing, then again that's the way all the networks should be. I don't think Clinton should debate on any more NBC-sponsored debates, unless they issue a statement and agree to start playing by the rules of journalism...and just REPORT THE NEWS.

To whoever said that only uneducated latinas and latinos support Hillary:

I am latina with Ph.D., and I am proud to support Hillary Clinton.

" You type like you have not ever commited any sin most be great to be able to judge others and have no stones in your pockets"

Isn't that an interesting thing to say considering all these voices of shrill outrage over a largely harmless comment from David Shuster?

I used to like to watch Hardball with Chris Matthews. I hardly ever missed it. But when Hillary Clinton started running for the Democratic nominee, he lost all objectivity. He talked about his wife Kathryn or Kathleen (his Queen as he puts it)a long time ago and implied that she and her friends certainly wouldn't support Hillary because they were educated and intelligent and upper class. So, not only is Chris Matthews sexist, but apparently his wife doesn't get it either. Neither Chris or David Shuster get it. I don't watch MSNBC anymore. It's kind of sad because they do have other unbiased reporters who are very good.

Education or intelligence does not indicate common sense. Hillary Clinton is a dishonest, calculating individual. She reminds me of the anti-christ character in the novel series "Left Behind". People will follow her to their own damnation. I hope her supporters at least have somewhat of a morality about them, for she has none at all.

To whoever said that only uneducated women (and men) support Hillary:

I graduated from Berkeley with high marks. I have two graduate degrees from Harvard. I am about 15 years younger than Obama, and I believe I have more valuable and relevant experience than Obama does to be president (but certainly not enough). Do you wonder why I am then supporting Hillary?

My boyfriend graduated from Berkeley with high marks, and has graduate degrees from Columbia and Oxford. He has a doctorate from Oxford. He wants someone with proven experience. Who do you suppose he is supporting? Hillary.

Sorry to disappoint you, but some people care about having a candidate who has granularity and understands how to work in national politics.

Talking constantly about MLK, JFK, RFK, and Lincoln in his stump speeches for a year has been effective for Obama. People think it is inspiring. But I want someone who will talk specifics and know what they are talking about.

I don't blame Obama for saying in one of the debates that he will consult with the "President of Canada" when he is president. I just want someone who is at this point in their career know without having to think about it that Canada has a prime minister.

Poor all around especially Shuster and MSNBC... but they are not the only reporters/commentators and networks to have brought the standard down to where it is now... and we can expect lower to the point where many people stop viewing because there ceases to be any material that applies to elections, issues and candidate choices.

America is a 5 minute infomercial culture and not much more. Poorly educated, not caring except about selfish needs, materialistic and not much good of any kind.

One gets the impression that the stars of MSNBC, Chris Matthews and David Shuster, among others, harber a deep resentment of Hillary. Maybe she threatens their manhood. Maybe they are just macho jerks. Or, maybe they just hate the Clintons, who have made no secret of their justifiable antipathy toward the cable news-tainment personalities.

The comment was sexist and reprehensible. We have to send a message that these kind of comments should not be tolerated any more than racist comments should be. I am glad that MSNBC suspended him.

I am an educated, married, mother of three who owns her own business. Although I love to listen to Obama speak; he is inspirational, I am more inspired by Hillary and her plan of action to get our country back on track. I have never contributed to a campaign in my life but I did to hers. Not because I felt like her 5 million was an investment in her own campaign but because I realized that "It was going to take a village" to get her elected. Being a college graduate 20 some years ago and applying for a job with a big name corporation I was told that I could start as an executive secretary. Appalled that I had just spent over $40,000 on my private college education which I achieved through academic scholarships and working as many as three jobs at a time I was enraged. David Shuster's comment was a reminder to me of how our society has still so far to go in our regard for woman and people. Disprespectful and disgraceful comments to anyone for any reason are unaaceptable, period. It is not about growing thicker skin. It is about common decency. Stick to the facts. That is why I watch the news. I have boycotted MSNBC as this is not the first instance of disprepect I have seen. There has been an overall bias towards Obama during this whole campaign. I am voting for Hillary on her merits and her merits alone. I look forward to seeing Obama gain experience and continue to contribute to the political experience in America.

An unfortunate choice of words. He apologized. Get over it. But, nope. The Clintons will USE it to rile Women! NOW is over the top. As usual, of late.

Show me the unity Clinton brings to the Country, I do not see it.

Feminists and the Clinton campaign are enjoying every moment of Shuster's mistake to freely advertise their political agenda. Who cares about what he said? Worse things are being said about other people, and her mother should step off the race, like Romney (who really loves his country), and allow America to move forward. She is blocking the way to transformation!

'Pimping out" has multiple meanings, not just the sexist version, however preeminent it has been in the past and the future.

And it's not insignificantly used in the alternative non-sexist form. See the song nominated for last year’s academy awards, the MTV show, etc.: The point: the label is used--sometimes--in the widespread culture in non-sexist terms. Keith Olberman--also MSNBC--referred to Gen David Petraeus as being "pimped out" by George W. Would any of those here claiming that "pimping out" is just a sexist phrase please explain to me the sexist nature of Olbernam's comment?

I think it was inappropriate of Shuster. Is he sexist because he used the label in this way once? What if he's used the term a number of times before but only referring to men? Or mostly to men? Or evenly to men and women? Or only to women? What other sorts of comments has he made? Does anyone know enough about his history to put this ONE comment in context? Do ANY of you want to be judged based on ONE comment that you've made somewhere, sometime?

Those claiming that it's exclusively a sexist label aren't living in the real world. It might be used overwhelmingly for women--i.e. it is sexist--but the use of it once by Shuster does not a pattern by him make.

I think Chris Matthew's comments were absolutely sexist, repulsive and dead-wrong: There's no doubt that Hillary is talented and qualified enough to have reached the levels she has in politics. To attribute it to her status as the spouse of a male politician is ludicrous.

What bothers me more than Shuster's comment-- a non-deliberate, non-thinking slip of the tongue, even if sexist, is that Emily's List --among others--is deliberately and consciously exploiting the situation for political gain. They're not speaking up on behalf of Chelsea; they're speaking up on behalf of Hillary's political campaign. They're a political organization that exists to promote female politicians (only; sexist?), that's their angle here and if you read their statement that's clear. The talk is the treatment of Hillary, not really Chelsea. Others are exploiting the situation, too. The Right (Fox) is having a field day with it in order to bash MSNBC, the hypocritical "liberal media," to slam political correctness, etc. Others, too.

The exploitation of the situation to benefit Hillary is apparent in just about every other comment here. The focus isn’t on Chelsea for those decrying the comment, or for women in general, it’s tied into the interests of getting Hillary elected. A slam of Chelsea has nothing to do with the merits of getting Hillary elected. The sexist comments from men here are appalling and an exploitation of Chelsea to find a soapbox to use to slam women and/or Hillary. It’s not a campaign issue.

It’s not Barrack Obama who said this; it’s not Obama who’s out to hurt Chelsea or to hurt Hillary using such low-class disrespectful language. Yet the upshot is that Hillary will benefit from the controversy thanks to the shilling by herself and groups like Emily’s list to turn it into a campaign issue. Hence, Hillary is exploiting the situation, too, for her political gain. Wouldn’t it be simple for Hillary to make her objection known in public and private, and move on with her campaign? Rather, there’s talk about boycotting a debate stemming from the comment of an on-camera nimrod that surely MSNBC of anyone concerned wish he hadn’t said?

Keep’s it and the picture of Hillary as a victim of sexism in the news. (When the reality is that Chelsea is the victim, not Hillary, though you wouldn’t know it from the dialogue.) Just what’s needed for a campaign on the downward slope.

Does anyone doubt that Hillary’s campaign jumped into “strategy mode” about how to best spin the situation to Hillary’s benefit? Politics is so bad these days that I imagine any campaign doing something similar, e.g. McCain. Obama, etc.

I don't see a whole lot of concern for Chelsea in all of this and the exploitation of the situation for other purposes re-victimizes Chelsea just as much as the slip of the tongue of one TV talking head. I don't think MSNBC really wants it's people like Shuster going around saying stupid and potentially harmful things like this.

But Get Real: “Pimping Out” is NOT ONLY used in a sexist context even it was used by Shuster as such*. Asserting otherwise distorts.

See: Keith Olberman on Gen. Petraeus.

It was the time delay between the insult and the apology that will hurt David Shuster and MSNBC, in the exact same way and for the exact same reasons similar delays have damaged other media reputations. The delay (and initial refusal to even acknowledge the mistake) clearly implied that Shuster (like Chris Matthews several weeks earlier) didn't quite "get it" until MSNBC brass explained it to him. If media personalities want to avoid escalating mistakes like this they should take an immersion program in public relations crisis management -- the advice they should follow is pretty straightforward: a proper apology, according to http://www.perfectapology.com, should always include the following:

1. a detailed account of the situation
2. acknowledgement of the hurt or damage done
3. taking responsibility for the situation
4. recognition of your role in the event
5. a statement of regret
6. asking for forgiveness
7. a promise that it won't happen again
8. a form of restitution whenever possible

Obviously perfect apologies work best when delivered to recipients who are prepared to forgive. But when the aggrieved community sees an opportunity to push the hurt a little further then no apology is likely to be good enough. And that is precisely where we are today -- we're in the midst of a political charged election environment where the primary imperative is not to be reasonable but to search for ways to generate support for your side. When media personalities like MSNBC's David Shuster or Chris Mathews (or MSNBC's Don Imus, or Golf Channel's Kelly Tilghman, etc.) screw up by insulting Chelsea or Hillary (or the Rutgers University women's basketball team, or Tiger Woods, etc.) even perfect apologies may not work, for perfectly rational political reasons.

The real error in these cases was not the initial mistake but the fact that the best, most sincere and meticulously worded apology was the last one to be issued by those who screwed up. What is so fascinating (and perplexing) about the rising number of failed public apologies over the last few years is that so few public figures (surrounded by public relations advisers) really know how to do it well, or quickly enough.

Peter

I am a female who manages to educate myself to get my master's degree. I am for Hillary, so please stop saying that Hillary's supporter are the low class and uneducated female. There you go again belittle female, just borrowed your words. I am glad that this sexist, double standard jornalist crosses the line because they showed what they are made off, that even they call themselves professional and maybe graduated from a pretigious school never learned anything.
They are living in the dark ages thinking that female should not be at the highest office possible. I guess that's how they treat thier spouses, mother's, sister's, aunt's and grandmother's who without this females they will never be in the face of this earth.
And for those females who thinks that this comment is acceptable and innocent, well you have accepted the the male in your life has "pimp" you.
I think this is important issue if you are seriously wanted to elevate females role in our life and in our country.

The phony "women's" movement has no standing to say anything about this, having discredited themselves by saying NOTHING about Hillary's boy using his power to procure sexual favors from subordinates.

"Irregardless of whether the comment was sexist or not, it follows a pattern of everyone on MSNBC bashing Hillary. You can actually hear the venom in their voices when they talk about her.They gush over Obama so much you feel like you are watching one long commercial. It's kind of scary yet familiar. Remember when everyone gushed over Bush and were attacked if they dare disagree with him? Thats what these Obama supporters are like. Looked what happened to the country when we let these fanatical type of people elect a president. Hillarys supporters seem much more grounded and follow their heads, not emotions. That is why I have decided to vote for her. We have seen were the extremists have taken us. "

- I agree completely. Team Hillary all the way.

Thank you Emily's List!!
Sexism is acceptable but racism is not? What a joke!

Chelsea is a smart woman, and a proud supporter of her mother.

"Hey Joe, I am an educated woman and I support Hillary Clinton. I have a doctorate. And I read books. Now what? "

Maybe we re-examine what it takes to earn a doctorate?...