In a particularly heated rant about President Trump, Don Lemon decided to take a swing (and a miss) at first lady Melania Trump.
“What is it about President Obama that really gets under your skin?” Lemon posed. “Is it because he’s smarter than you? Better educated? Made it on his own and didn’t need Daddy’s help? Wife is more accomplished? Better looking?”
This isn’t just sophomoric and incorrect. It’s sexist to its core. It pits against each other two women who, to all appearances, have gotten along just fine, against one another, and on the basis of physical appearances, and for the sole purpose of jabbing at a man.
This checks all the boxes. It is the most sexist and misogynistic means possible of objectifying women: coldly using an unsolicited comparison of their appearances in a matter that has nothing to do with them.
Consider the absolutely justified outrage this would stoke across the commentariat if a conservative anchor said that Barack Obama hated George W. Bush because he was jealous that Laura Bush was more attractive and accomplished than Michelle Obama. That wouldn’t just be an absurd proposition, it would obviously be a grossly sexist one, just as Lemon’s comparison was.
There’s no denying that Obama and Trump are both exceptionally beautiful women, and yes, Obama has two Ivy League degrees earned from a time when the odds were stacked against black women in academia. But Trump also speaks five languages and became a successful supermodel in her own right. It’s not only offensive to try and pit their appearances and accomplishments against each other. It’s also plainly dumb.
You can loathe the president all you want. That’s no excuse to employ a cruel sexist trope against not one but two of our country’s great first ladies.
