Hillary Clinton’s “super volunteers” are watching you.
The pro-Clinton group HRC Super Volunteers circulated an e-mail to roughly 150 editors in newsrooms across the country this week that warned reporters against spreading “any form of sexist news coverage of any woman who chooses to break through glass ceilings,” according to the Washington Examiner.
New York Times reporter Amy Chozick appears to have been the recipient of said e-mail — or a similar warning from the group — and she tweeted about the rather threatening message Wednesday.
A group called HRC Super Volunteers just warned me “We will be watching, reading, listening and protesting coded sexism…” (1/2)
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick) March 25, 2015
According to Chozick, the group specifically cautioned against the use of “sexist” words and phrases, including: polarizing, calculating, disingenuous, insincere, ambitious, inevitable, entitled, over confident, secretive, will do anything to win, represents the past, and out of touch.
2/2 Sexist words, they say, include “polarizing, calculating, disingenuous, insincere, ambitious, inevitable, entitled, over confident…”
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick) March 25, 2015
Also sexist, according to HRC Super Volunteers: “Secretive” and “will do anything to win, represents the past, out of touch…”
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick) March 25, 2015
“You are on notice that we will be watching, reading, listening and protesting coded sexism…” the email reads.
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick) March 25, 2015
One of the group’s founding members, John West, spoke to the Washington Examiner Thursday and insisted that HRC Super Volunteers is “not at all attached” to Hillary Clinton’s nascent presidential campaign.
“All we are is a Facebook group of Democrats,” explained West of the group, which was founded after Hillary lost the Democratic nomination to Obama. “We met in 2007 and stayed connected afterwards.”
He said the community of Hillary supporters was formed by individuals who were “bullied” for saying positive things about Clinton on social media.
“We want to let [reporters] know that we the readers were very sensitive to sexist innuendoes and language in 2007 and we want the media to exercise some restraint in terms of how they report specific individuals, but women in general,” said West.
The e-mail sent by the group to reporters, which was entitled “Your Obsessive and Loathsome Coverage,” specifically named examples of sexist news reports about Clinton, including ones from the Washington Post and the New Yorker.
“We continue to experience vile and hateful responses anytime we speak out against sexist reporting, sexist comments, or post positive facts about Hillary Clinton and her record,” it read. “[W]e will not tolerate any form of sexist news coverage of any woman who chooses to break through glass ceilings; whether as a CEO or running for President of these United States.”
