"Wearing a trim dark suit and a deep purple tie, Mr. Obama stands in an airy, cream-walled room and strolls slowly toward the camera, speaking directly into the lens.-- September 20, 2008"

How's life in the future, Jason?

Well, it's disappointing to see you buy into 90% of what that article is saying and just quibble with 10%.

How are ANY of these words evidence of sexism? This is always just assumed, never explained.

Every other time I see any kind of "advocate" or "activist" referred to in the newspaper, they're always "strident." It has nothing to do with gender.

"trim dark suit"? By this logic, this is evidence of a subtle media attempt to portray Obama as an oversexed African American, on the prowl for white women (i.e., looking for some trim). Surely there are enough legitimate examples of sexism that the NYT doesn't have to enter nutty territory.

They also seem to have trouble distinguishing between gender specific and gender biased. hell, the word "she" would never be used to describe a male candidate. That doesn't mean it's evidence of sexism.

I've always thought that the first half of the word pantsuit is unnecessary. A suit with pants is typical, across gender lines in general as well as for Hillary in particular. The more economical usage would be to use more specific language only for a skirt suit.

I'm on the other side of this fence -- to my eye, "pantsuit" is the word Hoyt references that seems most clearly sexist. A "suit" is an outfit consisting of pants, jacket, and sometimes a vest made of matching material. A "pantsuit" is a suit, but only when worn by a woman. Why the extra syllable? Because a woman is assumed to be wearing a skirt, and so her wearing of pants is therefore notable? That is the only conceivable justification for using the word "pantsuit" instead of "suit" to describe a suit that's being worn by a woman. And that justification is sexist though and through. It defines a gender-specific, limiting norm for women in order to label any normal woman as an uppity, mannish transgressor.

Rhubarbs: There's no need to refer to a man's style of suit, because men ALWAYS wear pants. There's more variety in women's clothing -- not just with suit style but also colors, etc. Thus, a writer who wants to be vividly descriptive will end up making more distinctions about women's clothing than men. That's not "sexist through and through." The real culprit is fashion itself, not the writers.

yeah c'mon rhub. Are you going to wage war on the word blouse next? I mean, a blouse is just a shirt right? And high heels are just shoes too, right? as John says above, look at how many more women's clothing stores there are then mens. Is that sexism too?

Unfortunately, "suit" for women means skirt suit, it's the default for us, so until that changes, pantsuit is what we've got for what H wears. The cheesy bit to me is the fact that it's one word, like swimsuit. Yuck.

Also: I don't think "Nixon in a Pantsuit" is sexist. It's saying she's Nixon, and don't be fooled by the happy colors and softer lines.

Damn right, blackton. If Hillary is wearing a lemon yellow suit, she's wearing a lemon yellow suit. No need to drag her pants into it. And if Hillary wants to wear non-bifurcated garments on her bottom, then by all means it's sexist to call it anything other than a kilt. "Blouse" is fine, if and only if you use it to mean "puffy shirt, of the sort worn by pirates or men in kilts at Ren Faires," rather than the more common, sexist definition "a shirt, when worn by a woman." (Is it clear yet that I'm mocking my own position here? Is it clear now?)

Seriously, though, I just don't see any justification for using the word "pantsuit" to describe a garment that, if worn by a man, would simply be called a "suit." When the Riddler wears a line-green suit, or when a character in a blaxploitation flick wears a purple suit or a bright yellow suit, we don't call that a "pantsuit" because brightly colored suits for men are uncommon. A suit is a suit, unless there's an uppity woman who needs to be put in her place. Then we whip out the word "pantsuit" and make implicit claims of gender deviancy.

(Also, I've noticed that pretty much any outfit worn by a woman politician that does not include a skirt can be called a "pantsuit." But if it's black pants and a yellow jacket, that's not any kind of "suit," pants- or otherwise. It's slacks and a blazer. Until the day comes when Tiger Woods, upon donning the green blazer as champion of the Masters tournament, is said to be wearing a "pantsuit," then calling slacks and a blazer a "pantsuit" when a woman wears them is just laziness of the mind.)

Rhubarbs: What do you want to call the suit that has a skirt on the bottom? This is not about color, it's about the fact that women [unlike men] wear suits of two different sorts. When I hear "she wore a suit to the interview" I think of the skirt kind. Now that you, like Pol Pot before you, are remaking the world, tell me what you want the skirt kind to be, since "suit" is what you want the kind with the pants to be.

I've wondered from time to time whether Hillary might have not done better confronting that "toughness" issue if she'd worn a skirt suit occasionally.  It seems to me to be a kind of ludicrous assumption that a female politician can only broadcast decisiveness and other command qualities if she's wearing pants.  Women leaders of an earlier era as different as Golda Meir and Margaret Thatcher, both of whom led their countries to war, only dressed in traditional female style.

Admittedly, it might have generated more of the "wow, she has cleavage!" style response from Fox News and other media with a mental age of 14, but it might have given her self-presentation some nuance.

Also, it's not just the language of the male oppressor.  I have a clear memory of HRC bringing up the "pantsuit" meme back in 2000 when she won the Senate seat.  Her victory speech included the phrase "and six months and six dark blue pantsuits later" or similar.

Rhub, um the reason is because the fashion industry wants it so. I worked years and years ago for a distributor of clothing, you need those words to communicate effectively. Shirt just won't do when you are moving a hundred thousand units. A box of blouses went in the area reserved for the womens clothing for consignment later, mens shirts to another area, labelling boxes shirts would be ridiculous. Besides, I disagree with the notion that their should be a gender neutral language police around.

ironyroad, I believe she wears the pantsuit because her legs are not her best feature. Men don't have to worry about how their legs look. And that is also why they don't have to wear high heels, which slims the ankle and lengthens the leg. And makes a person completely unsuitable for running [see all movies ever, most recently Iron Man]. Therein lies the real sexism.