SALON

Thursday, Oct 23, 2008 4:00 PM UTC

Putting out for Barack

A new poster claims, "Girls say yes to boys who say Obama."

By

Topics: Broadsheet, Love and Sex,

Putting out for Barack

Bust Blog

It’s a theme as old as ancient Greek theater: Women give or withhold sex in order to achieve some sort of political end. The latest version comes from a quartet of young women who have created a poster that reads, “Girls say yes to men who say Obama.” In smaller print, at the bottom of the photo, the women tell us, “Sarah Palin is not a women’s choice. Vote November 4th.” Their version updates a classic ’60s antiwar image of Joan Baez and her sisters, emblazoned with the slogan, “Girls say yes to boys who say n0.”

The ladies at Bust are all for the poster, and I certainly have no qualm about its pro-Obama and anti-Palin sentiments. But I have to admit that somewhere between its boring, overdone sexual politics and its hipster aesthetics, it makes me cringe a little bit. And it turns out I’m not alone. I asked a few Broadsheeters whether they found the poster adorably retro chic or obnoxiously retrograde. Here’s what they had to say:

Rebecca Traister: Makes me want to put a fist through a wall, put a hammer through my skull and move to France. During the primary, a variation on this was one of the (less overt) vibes cited to me by some college women I spoke to who were considering voting for Hillary: that there was a derisive attitude from boys that anyone who would consider voting for her must be an unsexy feminazi, but supporting Obama made you sexy to the guys. I know it’s different when McCain is the competitor, and I realize the suggestion here is about boys voting to impress the women, but still, the idea of any kind of political action being taken to impress the opposite sex — or that guys would only vote a certain way if a woman promised sex at the end (that’s also totally the only way you get them to pay for dinner, incidentally) — sort of makes me want to drown myself.

Kate Harding: It really bugs me. Both the concept of a vote-for-sex transaction and the “obnoxiously retrograde” notion that women are merely gatekeepers for our own vaginas, not human beings with actual sex drives. We just say no as a matter of course until men do something wholly unrelated to sex (buy dinner, vote for Obama), which makes us decide they’re worthy of coming inside us. We certainly don’t want sex for its own sake! And that’s without getting into the heterosexism. Where’s my “Straight girls say yes to, and sometimes even initiate sex with, boys they find attractive for any number of reasons” T-shirt?

Also, if they had to do it anyway, “Girls say ‘Yes, we can’ to boys who vote Obama” would have been funnier.

Sarah Hepola: It doesn’t bother me as much, but it’s kind of gross. Are the women in this photo going to say yes to every boy who says Obama? Because if so, they are going to be very, very tired. And sore!

Considering this poster was made, according to Bust, by “a couple cheeky ladies in Brooklyn” — where I (and Rebecca and Judy!) proudly live — I would suggest it should be tweaked to read, “Girls say yes to boys who say Obama and also wear skinny jeans and have scruffy hair and buy me Stella Artois while I crochet an adorable bong cozy.”

Also, I’m really irritated by the tag line “Sarah Palin is not a woman’s choice.” Look, I despise her policies, too, but I don’t pretend to tell other women what they can and cannot do.

******

So what do you think? Adorably retro chic or obnoxiously retrograde?

Judy Berman is a writer and editor in Brooklyn. She is a regular contributor to Salon's Broadsheet. More Judy Berman.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 52 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
FBI reportedly joins Bachmann campaign finance probe
224 points225 points | 13 comments
vote
Jon Karl makes things worse: He regrets “inaccurate” Benghazi email but says his story based on it “still entirely stands.” Really. ABC News?
193 points194 points | 29 comments
vote
Paul Krugman’s right: Austerity kills. "In an economy where we’re all in the same boat, one person’s spending is another person’s income. So when the government cuts spending, it reduces people’s income, leading to less business, more unemployment, and a vicious spiral of slowing down the economy."
201 points202 points | 140 comments
vote
“Jodorowsky’s Dune”: The sci-fi classic that never was.
78 points79 points | 16 comments
vote
Doug Henwood: Capitalism Thrives on Class Exploitation
40 points41 points | 8 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations