Would Sarah Palin have received SO much scrutiny if she were a man?

Question

I dont live in the States but was wondering if this type of scrutiny of candidates is so common and whether or not you think she would have received the same amount of scrutiny if she had been a male.

Answer 1

Yes, but it would have been a different type of scrutiny.

Back in 1972 Joe Biden's 1st wife was killed in a tragic car accident. Both his kids were in the hospital. Everyone felt horrible for him, it is just about the worst thing that can happen to a guy and it gives me shivers just thinking about it.  Thing is, since he is a man,  so nobody suggested he needed to quit the Senate and stay home to raise his kids. Nobody said "Joe, we don't think you have enough time for both the Senate and taking care of your family. You should leave Washington and stay at home."...because he's a guy.  Biden did what any single parent did, he worked AND raised a family. He  commuted, he had help, he made it work, and he's remarried now, and he's spent over thirty years in the Senate and from what I saw his kids are pretty impressive people. (One of them is going to be deployed with the Army Reserve to Iraq if I remember right).  

If Pailn is a Republican, and the media love Obama, so whoever took the job as McCain's VP was going to get attacked. That's part of the game. If Palin were a guy you would have seen some people attack over the experience issue...they would have said "Alaska is too small to matter", etc.  However  NOBODY has EVER said to MALE Governor "Your kids should be your priority, your daughter's pregnant and you son has downs syndrome...why don't you just stay at home like a good little homemaker and just bake cookies?"  

They went after Palin's family like the shark in Jaws....you don't see that happening to male politicians. They went after Palin's because her husband had a DWI 22 years ago...you think they dug up stuff on Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger's wife like that?  They went after Palin because her daughter was pregnant...I thought that was slimy, a lot like when they went after d**k Cheny's daughter for being g*y and a Republican at the same time..but seeing people say that this was evidence she "wouldn't have time" to do her job was stunningly sexist. Andrew Sullivan was even spreading  rumors that little Trigg wasn't even Palin's baby(!) and that he was really poor Bristol's baby (!!) and that this was the SECOND time Bristol had gotten pregnant(!!!).   That is the slimest lie I've ever seen in the media ever.

So Palin would have been attacked if she were a guy, but most of the attacks on her were very very sexist.  I'm not a feminist, but what I saw on TV literally made my jaw drop. There was a lady from the Washington Post who said "well, I'm all in favor of women working, but when you have five kids, and one of them is a speical needs baby and another is pregnant, there comes a tipping point....". I couldn't believe that!!

d**k Morris (he used to be one of Bill Clinton's advisors) really likes Palin (he met her on an Alaska cruise a few years ago). He said that Obama "has spent the last two years keeping a woman from being President, and is now going to spend the next two months keeping a woman from being Vice-President, and he's using women's votes to do it."  I didn't believe him, and I sure didn't believe the charges of sexisim that were floating around from Clinton supporters....until I saw the attacks on Palin.  

Answer 2

the question is would she have even been chosen as VP if she had been a man?

Answer 3

No.  Some yes, but not in the same way. Obviously there would be no question of child neglect if she were a man.  Not to sound like I'm beating a dead feminist horse, but that's a fact.

It's just the way life is, though.  It's unfair but men and women are different and are treated differently.  All you can do is go about your business and not worry about it.  

And of course make sure you're well groomed, closely shaved and that your nose hairs are trimmed.  No sense giving the press any fodder.