Michelle Obama: Ain’t She a Woman?
by Guest Contributor Tami, originally published on What Tami Said
Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama (born January 17, 1964) is an American lawyer and the wife of Illinois senator Barack Obama, who is a candidate for the 2008 Democratic Party nomination for U.S. President. She was born and grew up on the South Side of Chicago and then educated at Princeton University and Harvard Law School. After completing her formal education, she returned to Chicago and went to work for the law firm Sidley Austin, on the staff of the Mayor of Chicago Richard M. Daley, and for the University of Chicago and the University of Chicago Hospitals. She is the sister of Craig Robinson, men’s basketball coach at Oregon State University. Read more…
I admire Michelle Obama. By all reliable accounts, she is smart, accomplished and an equal partner in her marriage to a high-profile, powerful man. Obama is not overshadowed by her husband. He complements her, and she him. In many ways, she reminds me of another First-Spouse-to-be that I once admired: Hillary Clinton. And just like Clinton back in 1992, Michelle Obama is being demonized for not being a cipher that stands quietly by her man, enraptured by his power and prowess.
Kathy G. at The G Spot blog nailed it when she wrote about a recent Michelle Obama hit piece written by Christopher Hitchens for Slate:
The Hitchens piece, contemptible piece o’ shite though it is, a surefire sign that, now that it’s clear Hillary’s presidential campaign is all but over, the right is proceeding apace with its attempt to Hillary-ize Michelle Obama. We have, of course, all heard about how “unpatriotic” she is. Maureen Dowd has already cattily attacked her for not being sufficiently deferential to her husband. And now we’re being treated to Hitchens’ exegesis of how her college term papers prove she’s really Stokely Carmichael in drag. Delightful! But hey . . . radical, unfeminine, unpatriotic — remind you of any other right-wing caricatures of a certain prominent Democratic woman with a famous husband? Read more…
I was barely out of college at the dawn of the Clinton years, but I still knew what the deal was when conservatives, and even some Democrats, poked at Clinton for using her maiden name or for “not staying home and baking cookies.” For all our talk of progress, America likes our First Ladies (Can we find a less antiquated term?) decidedly NOT like Michelle Obama or Hillary Clinton or Theresa Heinz Kerry or Dr. Judy Dean or their foremother Eleanor Roosevelt. These women are too multi-dimensional, too fully formed, too autonomous.
Every feminist, womanist or unlabeled supporter of equal rights knew why, when Hillary Clinton entered the Democratic presidential primary as a frontrunner, there were still those with an irrational dislike for her…why some men and women unabashedly called her a bitch and cable TV talking heads like Chris Matthews gleefully attacked her for her “shrillness” and pantsuits. We all knew what that was about. And throughout the primary season, feminist Web sites, columnists and female supporters have derided the sexism aimed at Hillary Clinton. While I am no fan of Hillary Clinton, while I think that some of her supporters’ cries of sexism have been completely spurious, and while I vehemently disagree with the notion that Hillary Clinton lost the nomination because of sexism, I CANNOT deny the ingrained sexism that has been a part of this campaign cycle. Women are right to be vocal about the ways our gender has been denigrated. But I wonder, where is the feminist support for Michelle Obama? I mean, ain’t she a woman?
The mainstream feminist blogosphere has been largely silent on an issue that is spreading through the black blogosphere like wildfire. This image…
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