Wednesday, September 05, 2012

Tens Of Thousands Of Feminists Call On CNN To Fire Sexist Contributor


By Annie-Rose Strasser/Think Progress:
This afternoon, in just over one hour, 23,000 people signed a petition asking CNN to fire contributor Erick Erickson.
His offense? He referred to the Democrats’ packed list of female speakers at their convention in Charlotte, North Carolina as “the Vagina Monologues”:

After a flurry of furious tweets, Erickson — who once said he “kind of like[d] the idea” that women are barred from a golf club so that he wasn’t “hanging out at some women’s event” — half-heartedly expressed regret for his comment, saying “My apologies to those offended by my tweet. Wasn’t my intention.”
But UltraViolet, a women’s advocacy group, launched the petition calling on CNN to “Take him off the air right away” for his sexist line. “Seriously?” the petition reads, “He hears powerful, eloquent women talking about crucial issues and that’s his reaction?”
Among the “Vagina Monologues” that Erickson was referring to were speeches by Sec. of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius; Congressional candidate and double-amputee Iraq veteran Tammy Duckworth; and the First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama.
UPDATE
The petition is quickly gaining steam. UltraViolet representative Molly Haigh reports that, as of 4:30 pm on Wednesday, it has 32,000 signatures.

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