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It appears there will be a net loss of women in Congress for the first time in 30 years. This is a huge blow to the many organizations that work so hard to elect and support women in office -- and it’s especially tough considering that women from both parties took a hit during this election cycle in terms of misogyny and sexism in the media. The hits were coming so hard that they prompted the launch of Name It. Change It. was started to help keep track of sexist attacks on female politicians and hold people accountable for those attacks.
Two of the highest-profile attacks were towards candidates from both parties. Krystal Ball, who was running for the U.S. House of Representatives in Virginia’s first district, and Sarah Palin protege Christine O’Donnell, who was running for the U.S. Senate in Delaware. Both women lost by pretty large margins after some of the most talked-about photos of the election cycle surfaced.
Photos of Ball surfaced that had been taken at a Halloween costume party, when she was only 22, with her then husband, that were slightly provocative and gained her campaign national attention. Ball accused her opponent of leaking the pictures.
The attack on conservative Christine O’Donnell was even worse, with photos AND a raunchy story published on Gawker.com who’s author claimed to have spent the night with Christine O’Donnell. The story was an obvious attempt to humiliate O’Donnell, and in turn women everywhere.
Both these stories were actually non-stories, even if every single word of what was written in Gawker about O’Donnell was true. By posing provocatively at a costume party or having a drunken hook up with a guy (where O’Donnell still managed to stick to her principles by NOT sleeping with him) they did nothing wrong. Yet both incidents were used as tools to try and shame both candidates and hurt their campaigns.
Though both women did end up losing their prospective races, neither lost because of those scandalous attempts at degrading them. They lost because it was a tough night for Democrats and a tough night for some Tea Party candidates. Ball and O’Donnell’s losses had little to do with those photos and everything to do with their political ideologies and the ideologies of the districts they were running in.
Tuesday was a huge blow to women in office because most of those women are Democrats, and Tuesday was a big blow to Democrats. Chalk it up to yet one more reason why we need more women in office.
Though sexism and misogyny were in heavy play during this election cycle I don’t think it really had that much of an affect on the results. What the sexist attacks did do was start a new conversation about misogyny. As we enter a new era of politics where Facebook friends can dust off an old dusty picture of you at a New Year's Eve party in high school, scan it and post it on Facebook for the whole world to see in under five minutes, its a conversation we need to continue.
The resources to find and use this kind of sexist material is only gong to grow with the use of social media and online social networks. In the cases of Krystal Ball and Christine O’Donnell the attacks did not make much of a difference. Both women were behind in the polls and were already climbing uphill battles. But next time, it could make a difference. And that is why talking about the attacks and calling out the people behind them and the media that perpetrates them are so vital now, before the next election cycle begins. Women and men need to make it clear that unless the breaking scandalous penthouse story has some direct bearing on a candidate's
