"Dainty," "Prissy," and "Glamorous": Race, Masculinity, and Othering

by Chana Kai Lee

About a week ago (circa 3/31), Joe Scarborough, host of Morning Joe and panelist on Road to the Whitehouse, referred to Barack Obama as "dainty" and "prissy" as he watched Obama bowl. Scarborough went on and on for a few more segments and continued making comments and laughing. He indicated that he likes his presidents "manly." When former congressman Harold Ford (current Democratic Leadership Council chair) responded by talking about Obama's athleticism on the basketball court, Scarborough continued. Ford looked embarrassed, although he chuckled as well. He did not want to engage Scarborough and, at one point, he noted that was going to be in trouble with his friend [Obama]. Media Matters has tagged Scarborough for this. (I did not see anything over at GLAAD's new media site.) Scarborough has a well-known rep for being a homophobe of the first order--and a racist and a misogynist, [fill in the blank]



The memory of the incident, which I watched live at the time, came back to me as I was reading Virginia Postrel's "The Peril of Obama" this evening. The article is really just some silly musings, except she advises us to beware of Obama's glamour because it may not be good for our country. Postrel is a white woman writer who seems obsessed with all things physical and "mysterious" about Obama. She has been writing about him for a year. Last April she did that New York Post article on Obama: "Mr. Charisma: Obama or Osama." That title should tell you enough. I was surprised to see her byline over at The Atlantic, which is where "The Peril" appeared. Her argument is basically (I kid you not), that Obama is so incredibly glamorous that he could "get the country into trouble if he wins the presidency." She uses a broad definition to describe the good and bad archetypes of glamour ("the vampire, the con man, the femme fatale, the double agent"). Although she admits that Obama has "position papers on specific issues," he is still so much of a mystery that everyone has been projecting onto him everything they/we need him to be. The crazy part is that she seems to blame him for how other people respond to him.

I consider her to be a closeted member of the this-Obama-thing-feels like a cult-because-he-has-no-substance club. Over at her weblog, she praises his book and goes on about his good looks, etc. Today's entry is some drivel about the people who have seen him smoking (and smelled him) and how often he talks about smoking in his Dreams of My Father.

Her observations are creepy, but they made me think that he cannot win for losing when it comes to how he is or chooses to be in his body. He is either not black enough for Debra Dickerson and Stanley Crouch, or for the press he is Rev. Wright's The Spook Who Sat By the Door (see Sam Greenlee's book and the 1973 movie of the same title), or for white male super-pundits his embodiment does not fit a certain masculine idea. These discussions also reminded me of when I first read and discussed Edward Said's Orientalism as an undergrad. I did not know what the hell I was reading, but I did relate immediately to notions of "the Other" and the gaze. The dangerous thing about all of this is how embodiment really equals character and cultural substance to some; never mind what Obama says he is or believes.

An article in the latest New York Review of Books (April 17) really sort of answers the essentializing Martian question (who and what is this guy anyway? what is he made of?). It is "Molehill Politics" by Elizabeth Drew. It is a smart piece, a generous reading of his strengths and challenges, in my opinion. It sort of compares the two campaigns (Clinton v. Obama). Her piece raises an important question for consideration: Shouldn't the way one runs a campaign be some indicator of how one might run a country?