Rush Limbaugh is upset that the White House is hosting a summit on working families because he believes that such a summit gives the "false impression that women are still mistreated and stomped on." He knows that women are no longer "mistreated and stomped on" because he watches a show called "Suits" on the USA Network and there are two female characters on that show who boss men around. Case closed, guys. Everyone go home. (And start watching "Suits," I guess.)
Limbaugh also said that he knows "Mad Men"-era sexism in the workplace is dead because "there are too many women CEOs" for such sexism to persist.
He is wrong. Which is not surprising! This month, the Fortune 500 CEO list "made history" because -- wait for it -- there were 24 women on the list. Twenty-four women represented on a list of 500 CEOs. That is 4.8 percent of the list. Women make up half of the population. But that is enough for Rush Limbaugh to conclude that the patriarchy has been defeated or whatever.
And then he used a show called "Suits" as another example to support his very wrong point about the death of sexism. Limbaugh said that he watches the show and there are two tough female characters on it. He then reasoned that this means sexism is over. He also speculated that mostly women writers write the show called "Suits." He is wrong! Which is not surprising! There are three female writers on the writing staff of 11 on the show called "Suits." This is pretty much the case industry-wide. Only 30.5 percent of television writing jobs are held by women.
I don't expect someone as vile as Rush Limbaugh to acknowledge the insidious and persistent nature of sexism in our culture, but to not even be remotely interested in numbers around his claims feels kind of different. This guy is a jerk and a misogynist and a homophobe and a racist. We all know this. But he is also a mush head who is entirely divorced from reality. And yet he is paid a lot of money to share his angry and bigoted mush brain ideas with frightened people who listen to him and believe him. This is why it is kind of important to write about Rush Limbaugh sometimes, even though it would be nice to pretend that he doesn't matter.
h/t Media Matters
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