Caroline Gleich may be new to politics, but she’s not new to sexist comments. Sadly, they’ve followed her from the outdoor recreation world right into her campaign for the U.S. Senate as the Democratic candidate on the Utah ballot.
On her LinkedIn page last week, she shared some of the comments she has received during her campaign. They include ones such as, “When has a woman solved any problem ever?” “Don’t you have to be out of high school to run for U.S. Senate,” “You’re evil and you look like you’re 12,” (she’s in her late 30s), “You should keep those sunglasses on you have crazy woman eyes,” “Why does your nose look like that?” “In a just world, you’d be outcast from society,” and “U should be having babies. You’re young.”
That’s just a smattering of what she shared, and I left out the comments that are explicitly sexual in nature. I’m sure there are many more she has not shared publicly.
Gleich, unfortunately, is not alone. In fact, sexism in politics is so rampant, I cannot think of a single woman in politics that I know who has not been the recipient of such comments. When Becky Lockhart was speaker of the Utah House and I was a freshman legislator (and getting messages where I was learning new four-letter words), she told me she got so many she made a game of it. She looked for messages where people said something new or called her something she had not been called before. Rarely (if ever) did she see something new.