Boobgate: Meghan McCain, slutbaiting and the reality of being a woman online

I should probably just mention up front that I have boobs. Two of them. I’m not going to post a photo or anything, but I just wanted to get that out of the way, that there might be some conflict of interest here. I also post things on the internet. Not boob things, generally, but blog posts and tweets and covered-boob photos, online, for everyone to see.

These two facts alone made this week’s Meghan McCain tempest-in-a-DD-cup hit pretty close to home, and served as the final straw that compelled me to finally launch my hotly anticipated (by literally tens of people) new blog, in which I write a weekly column that is syndicated absolutely nowhere.

But anyway, on to Meghan McCain’s boobs.

For the uninitiated, on Wednesday night, Meghan McCain posted a photo on Twitter that was composed of probably 5 percent book cover, 5 percent face and 90 percent BIG GIANT BOOBS. Every person, gay, straight, male, female, thought exactly one thing when they first looked at the photo: Whoa hey BOOBS!

The media storm that’s ensued has mostly revolved around who said what about the photo, the boobs and the woman attached to them. Some, like noted troglodyte bottom-feeder Robert Stacy McCain of the American Spectator, reacted predictably, while others, like ABC News’ Jake Tapper, rushed to both defend Miss Meghan’s honor and profess their shock that people would—gasp!—say such things online.

To me, the latter group is much more troublesome. RS McCain has made a career of being a dickless shit, and at this point nobody has any business being surprised by it. But the Tapper crowd, who are collectively aghast that someone would make a crude sexual remark about a young woman on the internet, point to a more pervasive, and insidious, problem in the male-dominated media and elsewhere.

The sad fact is that any woman with a sizable online following who posts any photo of herself is going to receive degrading and abusive responses, and anyone who is surprised by it is astonishingly disconnected from the reality of how women are treated, in public and in private, online and off, every single day.

It’s worth noting, too, that the most of the slurs directed at McCain involve some variation on calling her a slut. Two points here: First, having large breasts in no way makes you a slut. Let’s be clear about that. Posting softcore porn of yourself on Twitter? You’re getting warmer. Also: How telling that all of the White Knights riding to McCain’s rescue treat the accusation that she has and enjoys non-monogamous sex to be the ultimate slur against a woman. Who’s slutshaming now?

Fact is, slutbaiting/slutshaming has always been an effective way of putting ambitious women back in their place. Just this week, journalistic beacon Townhall.com, panties in a twist because Stacey Ferguson might end up with a minority stake in an NFL franchise while conservative demigod Rush Limbaugh might not, derided the entertainer as a “trashy pop tramp” in a story that couldn’t have had less to do with either party’s relative sexual promiscuity. It’s easy: Don’t like a woman? Call her a whore and knock her down a few pegs. It’s all very Mad Men.

I hope, though, that like the slut/stud double standard, this paradigm is at least starting to change. I can’t speak for anyone but myself, but if you want to get under my skin, call me a moron, a bad writer, a Republican, any number of things. But a slut? Meh. That’s your hangup, not mine.

I suspect Meghan McCain feels the same way. Love, hate, defend or deride her, she’s a savvy marketer who doesn’t want your protection and doesn’t need your pity. Using nothing more than a Twitter account and a pushup bra, she’s outed both the puritans and the perverts and now she’s laughing all the way to the bank.