While I don't agree with or support Jezebel's usage of the word dykes, I don't think it was particularly out of line for Jezebel, especially considering the average vernacular that they tend to speak over there.

And I notice that you didn't address the theme of Jezebel's response -- that perhaps we ought to be more worried about the actual politics of this election rather than the ol' who-said-what-who-did-what-now? charade that has become the meat and potatoes of American politics.

Here is where I think Jezebel really hit the nail on the head:

We love the irrelevant sexual subplots now, because they remind us of a time we weren't spending $300 million a day on a wrongheaded war being fought by ruthless mercenaries running amok in a culture of impunity.

Actually, the "fucking dykes" thing is a joke. Someone send an enraged hate-mail to Jezebel and called it's bloggers and readership a group of fucking dykes. So we make fun of it and call each other that with warmth.

Moe is still a jerk though.

Wait, I thought I was a pearl-clutching crazypants. Now I'm a dyke? So confused. I must be one of those older lesbians in matching scarves I see shopping for groceries together.

You know I think it's amazing... but I look at the comments from the trolls here... then I look at jezebel... then I wonder once more at the power of Jessica's 'troll-be-gone'.

And now we know where they're being banished to! Mystery solved.

a time we weren't spending $300 million a day on a wrongheaded war being fought by ruthless mercenaries running amok in a culture of impunity.

Ah, the era between Viet Nam and Iraq. Unless you count Granada. Or Panama. Or the Iraq bombings under Clinton. When were we talking about again?

SarahMC, thanks for the clarification. Her post still doesn't make a lot of sense, but at least I know she's not being homophobic as well as a jerk.

Sigh. Infighting, my favorite.

alexmlwallace: Jezebel was out of line, and the fairly cogent points made in the response actually supports that conclusion. See, the response focused on what is wrong with Clinton -- she's too tepid a leader to inspire the world. The original post focused on what's wrong with the women who voted for Clinton -- they're the weak who fell for the weepy. Misogynist humor -- no matter where it comes from -- is NOT funny. And in this case I find the 'it was a joke' response disingenuous since the 'explanation' makes an entirely different point than the 'joke'.

I don't know if I am buying this whole 'joke' explanation -- I mean I really do hear that a lot as the reasoning behind certain anti-woman and anti-queer acts. It is as if to say, "It is just a joke, you have no sense of humour, you don't get it, we do, no more conversation." People then can just laugh off whatever it is they want to say without any intellectual thought.

Something is telling me that Jezebel isn't getting the image that they are presenting of themselves when they match the 'fucking dyke' heading with the tone of Moe's article. Maybe that is what the joke is???

Kind of a moot point, but I thought the rampant use of the phrase "fucking dykes" on Jezebel came from the arrest of Alycia Lane, a TV newscaster who screamed it at the arresting officer.

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Sam, you are right. I am confusing it with another incident.

It's still used in jest to mock the person who initially uttered the phrase.

The whole Clinton coverage everywhere is strange.

I used to really enjoy the original Gawker.com, until that brand of humor got old for me. I haven't read Jezebel, but the site sounds tired. And annoying.

You know what's going on on Jezebel right now? Moe posted a rant, then she posted a follow up that was titled with a snarky in-joke (which all the gawker blogs do, as far as I can tell) that was a more grounded explanation of her political opinions. And Jessica just posted something about her opinion on the matter, and she likes Hillary.

They have having a conversation. And that's why I like Jezebel; mixed in with the gossip and the snakr is political commentary, and it's young women just talking about what they think, in their own voices. And their voices are loud, brash, and in your face. Which I know is exactly how we're all taught NOT to be. And which is exactly why I appreciate it.

Hooray for women disagreeing but still listening to each other! Can we please do that here, too?

I have to call out the bullshit behind the reasoning that the "Dear Fucking Dykes" headine was used in guest to mock the person who originally used the phrase. This doesn't get anybody off the hook. The "fucking dyke" comment was originally used in hate, and now Jezebel is perpetuating that hate through passing it off as something funny.

Jessica, I think you were too quick to call this one as your bad.

Infighting is great for politicians,...... um not so great for the women's movement. Moe was frustrated with politics and resorted to misogyny, because that is how our society works unfortunately. I am NOT justifying it, but perhaps we can try to educate instead of turn against each other.

We cannot afford to make this election an "us v. them issue" (as in older v. younger women, middle-class v. lower-class women, etc.)

The politicians and media would prefer we discuss the tears, rage, emotions - when we really need to be discussing how EACH candidate helps/hinders women with their policies and platforms.

We cannot forget our sisters who are dealing with foreclosures, no healthcare, can't afford quality food or childcare for their children.....misogyny and sexism need to be renounced (and all voters need to be educated about how easy it is to fall in their trap), but we cannot forget the other issues that a lot of women are suffering with.

Sure ColoKris, I agree that we can't forget our sisters and we need to support one another. However, we also need to be able to call one another on our shit, especially when it is misogynistic and homophobic -- because that sort of expression doesn't support women.

We are in agreement, jennao. We do need to call them on it. But I think we need to stand back and not get sucked into the emotional impact of the hateful misogyny (I know this is very hard) and try to educate. Jezebel is not a destructive force against women, they start great conversations and I really think they are intelligent enough over there to listen to other feminists' criticisms.

I am just really paranoid that the campaigns will use us against each other, because that is how you play the political game to win.

We cannot get sucked into the game. We have to try and form our own empowering debate.

You are very right -- it does seem like a whirpool that sucks us down -- it has been very nice reading your comments! have a great day! :)

The fucking dykes thing is indeed a reference to the Alycia Lane story, which became an in-joke over there.

I comment there too (though not as frequently as sarahmc but more frequently than I comment here) as stevie, and I was shocked at today's rant that kicked off everything. I'm not a fan of Hillary (honestly, I found her husband's behavior post-Iowa beyond appalling, and she seemed to endorse it) and yeah, I was disappointed that she won N.H., but I can't fathom buying into the tears argument or flat-out insulting one's readership for thinking independently.

I don't think Moe's a misogynist as other commenters have said and generally, I like the site, as I think it's smart and there's good conversation. But Moe posts before thinking and says just awful things.

Another thing to remember with Jezebel is that it has five writers -- all of whom are very, very different people. So while Moe can bug, the rest are pretty good writers with interesting things to say. I know there's not another site like it, and I'd much rather have Jezebel than Glamocracy.

I am a regular commenter at Jezebel and find commenting addictive (just like here!). I am one of the few people who regularly calls Moe out on her shit.
I can tell within the first paragraph if a post has been written by Moe. She is immature, short-sighted, racist, sexist, and short-tempered. Not to mention a shitty writer. I tolerate it because the commenters over there are all much better than her; I truly enjoy talking about stuff with the fantastic feminists who visit that site. But I, and many others, do not let her (or any other blogger) get away with everything she says.

And I'm glad you do! I don't know that I agree with your assessment of her beliefs, but I do think she's short-tempered and immature, and it shows when she posts about anything that involves confronting larger issues.

I'd love to comment more, but I have a high-pressure, busy job and no privacy in my workstation (and lucky me, my office is near accounting!), so not much commenting for me!

Thank you for pointing this out. I have been reading Jez for a few months, but their coverage of the Clinton campaign has really turned me off. I don't care who their bloggers support, but don't jump on the woman-on-woman hate train!

Jezebel was a guilty pleasure for me, but Moe's posts are frequently disdainful of women. The Hillary rant was a toxic combination of mean and stupid that succeeded in turning me off of Jezebel completely. The last time I peeked in, there was a racist post about Asian women that made my stomach curdle. (I think Racialicious and Feministing responded to it.) Before that, there was an endorsement of the term "gray rape." This latest diatribe revealed yet another dark dimension of ignorance and hate. Thanks, Moe!

This whole gendershit stuff is making my head hurt. The thing that gets me about all the coverage, is that gender is ALL THEY GOT. They cannot attack on anything else, and well, women (and obviously more than a few men) can pretty much figure that
out.

I don't feel bad that maybe a few women maybe instinctively voted for Hillary,(if that even is the case) much like plenty of men instinctively voted for Bush when Kerry was painted a "pussy" by the media. The "masculine" man thing worked for him, so turnabout is fair play.

Let them keep bashing (abusing) Hillary, and more women will turn out because we have all had to put up with that crap and maybe don't want to take it any more. What people like Tweety don't get is that he sounds a lot like the date from hell, the ex-spouse, the shitty boss, the worst guy in our lives.

If Hillary ends up running, I would be damn sure to turn out for her, because this shit is really pissing me off. I imagine some fairly apolitical women would do the same.

"Hooray for women disagreeing but still listening to each other!"

i wish that was actually what was going on.

"Infighting is great for politicians,...... um not so great for the women's movement."

ColoKris, I think it's important to call feminists/those in the women's movement out when they say or do something offensive. If this had never been done, feminism might still be completely submerged in the sentiments of a few decades ago--white, middle class, heterosexual... etc [even more than it is now, I suppose]. Only "infighting" [I prefer to call it "questioning" and "progessing"] changed that, though there is obviously much work to be done. While it is definitely about education to some extent, I don't really think Jezebel genuinely needs to be *educated* on queer issues and inclusiveness. They think the phrase is funny; they're using it as a joke... when it shouldn't be. While I agree that we should address each candidate and what they stand for, etc, and not cut other women down unnecessarily [which I feel Jezebel did here], I think it was totally out of line to use the phrase "fucking dykes." Seriously?! I don't really care if it was a joke, and I don't really care if there's some hidden meaning in it- I think perpetuating that sort of message is divisive. THAT is a form of cutting people down, and it also perpetuates the "us vs. them" problem. Cutting down queer women in jest is really not doing much to "reclaim" the phrase. I doubt it could be successfully reclaimed anyways.

I've been reading Jezebel on a fairly frequent basis lately, but I think that our budding friendship is over. Moe's post totally grossed me out, and is honestly some of the strongest woman-hate I've seen directed against Hillary. Not to mention against the women of New Hampshire and Jezebel's readership. Thank you, Feministing, for your awesome response to Jezebel's disgusting rant, and for providing much more critical coverage of the election.

I've read Jezebel fairly religiously since the beginning, and I'm a fan. It's a nice mix of pop culture, news, and feminism, mostly written intelligently. This is not easy to come by.

As for Dear Fucking Dykes:

Thoughout most of high school, I had several friends who greeted me every morning with a cheerful "Hey hobag!" Sometimes there was boob-grabbing. This is what single-sex education does to people. The greeting had nothing to do with how much any of us were getting -- most, but by no means all of my HS friends are still very virginal virgins -- and it wasn't an insult. No one was offended. Harmless in-joke. There are things you can say to friends that an outsider might be offended by.

The Jezebel community knows what Dear Fucking Dykes means, and while some might have problems, I don't think most of the readers will be offended. Jezebel is generally a lot less PC than Feministing.

And this is not entirely a bad thing. On several occasions, Feministing has declared incredible disgust at things that are supposed to offend me and I have found myself completely indifferent. (Dismembered Barbie jewelery is beautiful. And the Terminator poster is pretty. And the moaning bottle opener is tacky as fuck but I totally want one anyway.)