Comment from Steve Holden
Time July 15, 2009 at 9:42 am

It would have been just as applicable to the men who love the sound of their own voices. Not all humor about women is sexist. Women are just as valid a target for satire as men.

Comment from Broadway Carl
Time July 15, 2009 at 9:43 am

I don’t consider this cartoon racist. I’m not familiar with Gillibrand, but judging by her introduction of Judge Sotomayor, I would think that this cartoon is meant for a politician’s rambling rather than because she’s a female. Would we be offended if it were Mark Sanford?

Perhaps a Sarah Palin subject with the gaggers being the GOP? Does that make it sexist or suggests that Palin is a babbler?

Comment from Katie Bauer
Time July 15, 2009 at 9:46 am

It was merely portraying that she was talking for far too long; I don’t believe there’s any underlying meaning to it.

Comment from Michael Hart
Time July 15, 2009 at 10:21 am

When Reagan was elected in 1984, I did a portrait of him wearing a Steve Martin trademark arrow through the head, and I replace the arrow with a huge floppy dildo. Was it \"sexist\" to call him a dickhead?
I don’t think so. Neither do I think Bramhall\’s floppy sock penis \"touches on anything\" for feminists \"to be concerned about for centuries.\" Oh wait… If they still find phallic images disrespectful… maybe it\’s because they already <i>eschew</i> them…

Comment from Ken
Time July 15, 2009 at 10:22 am

Heavens no. It’s a cartoon about her talking too much NOW needs to relax a bit. Heck I’m still looking for the phallic symbols they saw in the cartoon. What a bunch of blowhards with too much time on their hands. Had it been Jeff Sessions, they would have laughed.

~K

Comment from Ted
Time July 15, 2009 at 10:39 am

She is a noise woman that needs to shut-up and listen. Better yet, make her listen to herself for a day….she will be begging to be waterboard!

Comment from Heman Womanhater
Time July 15, 2009 at 11:08 am

I like that it’s really only men commenting on this. THAT’S HOW IT SHOULD BE!

Comment from Vicky
Time July 15, 2009 at 11:22 am

Herman Womanhater - I’m a woman commenting and like Ken I think N.O.W. needs to chill. If they hadn’t made a fuss, I never would have seen it for anything other than yet another politician who loves the sound of his/her voice. People tend to look for conflict where there isn’t any. Furthermore - I must have been out the day the memo came around saying we could get thru life without ever being offended. People just need to get over themselves.

Comment from Justin
Time July 15, 2009 at 11:26 am

The joke isn’t gender-based. If you can replace the woman in the panel for a man and the punchline remains the same, it’s not sexist.

Comment from UWS
Time July 15, 2009 at 11:35 am

Anyone bothered that the men each had 10 minutes to speak and Senator Gillibrand was interrupted after 6?

Comment from Jill Zimon
Time July 15, 2009 at 11:46 am

The cartoon is sexist, period. Show me the portrait of Bill Clinton going on too long at the DNC convention, or anyone else for that matter, and having “Gags” pushed toward his face. If you can show me that, I’ll back down. However, not all manners of showing certain sentiments with illustrations work the same on men as they do on women - to wit, the commenter who mentioned the “dickhead” arrow on Reagan’s head. We don’t call women “dickhead” for the most part, so that would not work on a woman.

Would the socks, corks and gags have worked as well with a man having his mouth shown wide open as Sen. Gillibrand’s is shown?

No. Why not? Because the stereotype is of a “loud-mouthed women” and bolsters the notion that women talk more than men, can’t stop talking, etc.

Again, show me some portraits in political and editorial cartoons that show loudmouthed men in elected office - and there are many who drone on (Mark Sanford - anyone do a corks, socks and gags one of him after his four hour chat with the AP?), and then I might back down.

Otherwise - yes, it’s sexist, no matter what rationalizations in fantasyland you come up with.

Comment from Nora13
Time July 15, 2009 at 12:24 pm

The cartoon deserves a place in the Sexists’ Hall of Fame.

For more than 200 years, the 11,648 men who have served in the US Congress have held the floor. Senator Gillibrand, one of only 255 women who have served in our country’s history, might have assumed she would have the same ten minutes her colleagues were given to speak. Senator Leahy interrupted her, rudely and arrogantly asserting his “privilege”. So you ridicule her?!!?

Senator Gillibrand is New York’s senator. She was speaking as a well-informed advocate for another New York woman in an historic moment for New York and the country. You’d think that a New York paper would stick up for them both. But, unfortunately, your cartoon reveals another historic truth: women in politics - from the suffragists to our 21st century leaders - are routinely stereotyped in ways meant to demean them and deny them power.
Your cartoon is one of the worst examples.

Comment from Dr Liz
Time July 15, 2009 at 12:35 pm

Had Gillibrand been a white male with seniority the News wouldn’t have even noticed. Had she been African American they would have written a front page story and an editorial about the horrible racist event. Get a grip on your masculinity, guys. The days when women were supposed to be seen and not heard are long over.

Comment from fran20
Time July 15, 2009 at 1:28 pm

You fail to consider context. Women have seen this same message repeated over and over again–sit down and shut up, or “that’s enough deary.” If these cartoons appeared depicting the many windbag male Senators in a similar light, your defense and excuses would be believable. There was so much of this last year, it was undeniable, and I watched countless “news” anchors, pundits and commentators (men & women) express dismay over what was egregious sexism: “Do you see sexism? I don’t see sexism!” As if that meant it didn’t exist. Meanwhile, women all over the country could feel it in their gut–knowing the tell-tale messages. If he did recognize it, he wouldn’t have penned the cartoon (or defended it) in the first place.

BTW: Many other people spoke for 10 minutes, and Gillibrand was one of Judge Sotomayor’s earliest advocates, encouraging Obama to nominate her. If anyone had the right to a full introduction, it was Gillibrand. The only reason this was noticed was because of Leahy’s extremely condescending attitude when he interrupted her. Another (not) big surprise.

Comment from Martha F.
Time July 15, 2009 at 3:49 pm

The content isn\’t really sexist, but the socks put it over the top.

Comment from Warren
Time July 15, 2009 at 3:57 pm

You know, I’ve seen cartoons showing VP Biden with tape across his mouth. They weren’t sexist — just reflections on his unfortunate tendency to forget engaging his brain before letting his mouth run.

However, sexism can be in the eye of the beholder. I think it’s probably valid for some to see sexism in this cartoon, but I think Bramhall’s claim that he didn’t intend to send a sexist message is equally weighty.

Saying otherwise — suggesting he meant for it to be sexist — is effectively calling him a liar, which is not conducive to more-or-less polite discussion. Similarly, suggesting that those who see sexism here are somehow wrong is equally unfair to their perceptions.

Personally, I don’t see deliberate sexist intent. But then, I’m neither a woman nor the creator of the work.

Comment from urban bohemian
Time July 15, 2009 at 3:58 pm

Now that I know what the cartoon refers to, no. But initially it looks a little more oppressive/borderline violent (as violent as a political cartoon gets, anyway) than amusing. I haven’t been following the hearings or news about them, so this was completely without context to me. And once something’s taken out of context, all bets are off.

Comment from Jen
Time July 15, 2009 at 4:48 pm

Not only is this cartoon wrought with double standards as Jill has outlined, but it is in bad taste, misogynistic and out of line. You would NEVER wave a vagina in front of a male Senator\’s mouth - so WHY is this cartoon even prodding the concept of \"shutting up\" Sen. Gillibrand with a penis? This is unbelievable - and YES, it is sexist.

Oh and for those who seem to not know what that word means, here is a very basic definition:

http://mw1.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sexist

sex·ism
1: prejudice or discrimination based on sex ; especially : discrimination against women
2: behavior, conditions, or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex

Comment from Melissa
Time July 15, 2009 at 8:08 pm

This cartoon is not only demeaning and not sensitive, it is derogatory. I know men would be very offended if we told them to shut-up and sit down. It shows that some of society think they are better than others. If you offend one race, religion, gender, sex, etc., you are demeaning and derogatory. We need to let others know this type of “humor” will not be tolerated by bogging such as this and writing letters to the editors demanding to not print these types of cartoons. The newspaper should go further in writing an apology!!!

Comment from Loretta Rietsema
Time July 15, 2009 at 8:32 pm

I’ve been folding socks all of my life and they NEVER look like flaccid penis’ - give me a break and go suck your own sock.

Comment from david in iowa
Time July 15, 2009 at 11:07 pm

YES it is sexist. Would the same cartoon be drawn of a male senator., Answer NO. Men in general talk a good game of “supporting women”, and agreeing to some support on a few issues. But when a woman stands up and challanges “the men” all hell breaks loose. We saw it with Hillary Clinton, it continued with S Palin and continues again with Judge Sotamayor.

Cheers to Sen Gillibrand!!!!!!!!!!!

And a big Boo Hiss B Bramhall

Comment from Nancy Hoppe
Time July 16, 2009 at 1:47 am

Ugly, not funny. I won\’t comment on whether it is sexist, it is just plain dumb. The cartoonist is fairly adept at drawing but his subject matter is a non starter. i would be inclined to ignore this kind of foolishness.

Comment from Bluegrass
Time July 16, 2009 at 3:16 am

Oh good lord. Clearly people have no sense of framing with regards to cartoons; being a cartoonist, I see this same sham of racism/sexism/whatever-ism shoved down the throat(pun intended) of us political illustrators all the time.

Perhaps before we all go blowing up about this being intentionally sexist or misogynistic we should consider what the thought process would be in creating such a cartoon.

There are essentially two options, either he:

(a) Was told/read about/ saw on TV that a politician was told to please stay on topic, and thus had the idea to use classic symbols of “mute” to represent this - the hook, “putting a sock in it” and “putting a cork in it” are all common references,

or

(b) He intentionally and maliciously planned to make a cartoon with the image above, knowingly attacking the women’s rights movement and trying to break it down by subversively chastising women for speaking their minds.

It isn’t even a contest - as in all such cases, the one where a cartoonist thinks something is kind of clever and throws it together, only to later be blindsided by people digging far too deeply into his doodle is the correct answer.

And if we’re being fair in our outrage over gender issues, where are all these people who claim to want an end to “gender stereotypes” when we get mindless macho-drivel like the AXE commercials or the ads for Milwaukee’s Best Lite beer? Color me however you like, I’m baffled that something so vague and ambiguous as this puzzle inside a riddle wrapped in an enigma, cleverly hidden in “editorial cartoon form” takes precedent over the blatantly sexist nature of such advertising.

Comment from Jessica
Time July 16, 2009 at 8:51 am

Before you claim this isn\’t sexism–think back: when was the last time you heard \"put a sock in it\" said to a man? Oh, right, some forms of our wonderful free speech we reserve for women only.

This cartoon reinforces negative stereotypes of women. If you can\’t recognize that, it\’s probably because you\’re a male and have never had your sex ridiculed on a regular basis for talking too much.

Comment from jeanne spivey
Time July 16, 2009 at 9:52 am

Gillibrand spoke for a mere seventy seconds - SEVENTY SECONDS!- longer than her allotted time — which was five minutes shorter than everybody else’s and two minutes shorter than she’d been asked to prepare for — and every tushy in America is carrying on as if she were in love with the sound of her own voice and had — as one talking fundament put it — “diarrhea of the mouth.” Either the Daily New is indeed sexist — or else just plain stupid. Perhaps both.

Comment from thedrymock
Time July 16, 2009 at 11:17 am

People keep saying that it’s not sexist because the cartoonist didn’t “intentionally and maliciously plan” to be offensive to women (that’s Bluegrass’s phrase, but others are saying the same thing). The thing is, people can be unintentionally and unconsciously sexist. The negative effects for women don’t disappear if the sexism was unintentional. Does anybody really think that every single person who has ever paid a woman less than a man, hired a man over a woman, voted for a man over a woman, was always consciously thinking “Ugh, I don’t like women”? It doesn’t matter what the artist’s intentions were, this cartoon is STILL sexist.

Also, @Bluegrass: “And if we’re being fair in our outrage over gender issues, where are all these people who claim to want an end to “gender stereotypes” when we get mindless macho-drivel like the AXE commercials or the ads for Milwaukee’s Best Lite beer?”

Those people are all over the feminist blogs, which will ALL tell you that those commercials are offensive to both men AND women. Shakespeare’s Sister has an excellent series on advertising, which I’m pretty sure has covered at least one Axe commercial and made exactly that point.

Comment from Bluegrass
Time July 16, 2009 at 12:49 pm

Good points all, thedrymock - I did not know of the blog you mentioned, but then I was also fishing a bit, hoping to get some feedback because it seems like there’s no outcry to such ads as long as men are okay with it.

Erm, yes I am a male, but I think in this case I think the phrase “put a sock in it” is entirely innocuous - I have heard, and do hear all the time people being told to put a sock in it, to and from both genders. It’s sort of old slang now, so you wouldn’t hear it as often, but then again how often does somebody call something “boss” if they like it?

Sure they can be unintentionally sexist, but if that\’s the case then everything is unintentionally offensive if you wear the right set of tinted-glasses. I find it to be completely worthless to go around looking for hidden agendas and messages or digging too far into the thought process of an artist like this has done.

I actually have done cartoons similar to this myself, but it was a male being muted by another male. I have nothing against men as I am one, but I wouldn’t hesitate to do the same with a female in the same situation. What ticks me off here is that it seems it’s more the actual event, that a male politician attempted to shush a female politician in typical good ole’ boy fashion, but it’s now being misdirected at a cartoonist that I am almost certain is completely blindsided by the outrage.

I’d compare it to this cartoon( http://blog.cagle.com/daryl/20.....y-cartoon/ ) where the cartoonist thought it would be clever to compare a chimpanzee that tore a woman’s face off to the stimulus bill, only to see people scream racism and hate speech - admittedly it was a Republican paper with a history of wingnut opinions publishing the drawing, but I’d categorize it in the same way - the cartoonist thought it would be clever to say that the stimulus bill is going to rip our figurative faces off. Instead, he got his ass handed to him.

At the end of the day, this country seems to be heading towards monogamy, yet I can’t help but think that it’s progress trying to stall out every time we decide to dig up some old euphemism or derogatory slang and try to erase it from our vernacular. This upcoming generation of cartoonists(and those who aren\’t left handed) don’t seem to hold the same biases about minorities or women, so why reintroduce the ideas and coinages of a generation who does?

Comment from Sundown
Time July 16, 2009 at 10:34 pm

There sexism in this issue, but it\\\’s all coming from NOW\\\’s Pappas, not from cartoonist Bramhall. Pappas doesn\\\’t think women can compete with men in the political arena.

She wants women to have political power, but once they have it she wants them to be treated as delicate, fragile flowers, not as politicians.

Politics is a tough game, and politicians are have to put up with a lot of scorn, contempt and mockery. Given how long women were relegated to this room of the house, Pappas ought to be able to understand a cardinal rule of politics:

If you can\\\’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Comment from Seen it before
Time July 27, 2009 at 6:41 pm

To Jessica:
As a matter of fact, one of the funniest moments in the movie “Coming To America” (an essentially all black movie starring Eddie Murphy and Arsenio Hall both in multiple parts, and many other well-known black actors) is when the Queen ( the beautiful Madge Sinclair) tells the King (the incredible James Earl Jones), “Oh, put a sock in it, Jaffe!”.
I guess that makes the comment racist AND sexist.
Just because you are compelled to find sexism in everything doesn’t mean it’s there.