Do I detect gender stereotyping?
By Phil Lawler (bio - articles ) | November 26, 2004 7:51 AM
The ever-reliable liberal bellwether Maureen Dowd of the New York Times is not the first columnist to write about intrusive airport body searches of female passengers. In fact her outrage on this, as on most other issues, is perfectly in tune with this week's fashions.
But listen to this:
Then a beefy female security agent runs her hands all the way around your breasts, in between, underneath - again with guys standing around staring.
What's the word "beefy" doing in that sentence? Would it be more acceptable if a willowy female security agent did the frisking? The reference to a "beefy" woman conjures up thoughts of what Maureen Dowd would, on her better days, call "homophobia."
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Posted by: -
Nov. 27, 2004 7:53 AM ET USA
Bravo, Phil, for standing up for the rights of homosexuals.
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Posted by: -
Nov. 26, 2004 2:25 PM ET USA
As much as I hate to agree with Maureen Dowd, airport searches have become way too intrusive. Things are done in an airport security line that would have a local police department under the supervision of a federal court for decades if they were tried on the street. We have the technology and methodology to make airplanes secure without treating people like prisoners. We need to use it.
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Posted by: extremeCatholic -
Nov. 26, 2004 10:58 AM ET USA
Thanks for the insight. I'll never be able to listen again to Clara Peller who made "Where's the Beef?" a memorable catch-phrase without thinking of Dowd's characterization of the "beefy female security agent".
