Hysterical men illustrate the profound imbalance in gender dynamics
Thursday presented us with a tale of two Senate hearings, and what a harrowing tale it was: A parable that laid bare the ways in which gender cleaves our conception of acceptable behavior. Watching Hon. Brett Kavanaugh scream for long hours, many women will have fumed over the double standard. If a woman fell into a full-scale meltdown in front of Congress, if she shrieked and spit the way multiple men did yesterday, we would not be having even a hypothetical conversation about her confirmation. She would be done for.
Women in politics have classically been bound by an emotive paradox: If, like Hillary Clinton, a woman raises her voice on the national stage, she often finds herself dismissed—typically, by men—as shrill. If, like Hillary Clinton, she attempts to adopt a more measured and...
