The Times reports this morning that now that Hillary's been safely dispatched, some in the media are wondering if they were too hard on her.  Others are wondering if it had anything to do with her being a woman.  I think these are both valid questions, and I think they deserve more than the pat dismissal from the media they've gotten in this piece.

Here's the graphic The Times ran with its story...


...and it jibes with my own casual observations over the past months (see here, here, and here, for starters).

You'll note that the graph depicts "positive statements... made by reporters and nonpartisan sources," not by partisan commentators, who, like op-ed columnists in the print media, are expected to trash talk.  Even readers of the Times sometimes don't understand the distinction.  I read a lot of comments threads on columnists' blogs excoriating the columnist for expressing an opinion, which is precisely what they're paid to do. 

But even columnists took it to an obsessive extreme that started to seem like the rantings of any ordinary borderliner with a blog.  Maureen Dowd is still sputtering about Clinton.  Her most recent post-Hillary post on Michelle Obama began with the words "Hillary and Bill."  She's clearly going through withdrawal.   

Operatives at MSNBC, home of many of the giddiest Hillary-bashers, dismiss the notion of media misogyny in the Democratic primary with arguments like "she brought it on herself," and "the Clinton campaign saw an opportunity to use it for their advantage. They were trying to rally a certain demographic, and women were behind it.” 

Hmm.  Color me unconvinced.  My take on it is that her being a Clinton gave those in the press inclined to go there license to unleash their misogyny, but that it happened to be unleashed on Clinton didn't make it any less misogynistic, did it?  Their ways of expressing their disdain for her, specifically, were not exactly gender-neutral.  I didn't hear anyone calling Obama a "bitch," even at the lowest point of his popular coverage.  Hostile commentators depended on age-old stereotypes, fears, and prejudices, which had little if anything to do with Clinton's capabilities as a candidate. 

The press in a democracy is not supposed to be delicate, and never has been.  Today's twenty-four hour news and the raucous blogosphere reflect our reality, even as they try to bend and shape it to their ends, better than at any point in time prior to our own.  What you got with the campaign coverage of Clinton was a peek at a dark corner of the collective unconscious, as those who perceived her as personally unlikable were emboldened to attach age-old archetypes to her.