Et tu, Colbert?

This morning, I got an email from Shaker Elke asking if I'd watched The Colbert Report last night:

I was wondering if you saw the clip … where they replaced Sharon Stone's head with Sonia Sotomayor's head in the scene from "Basic Instinct" where she uncrosses her legs in interrogation and flashes her nethers at a row of smoking, middle-aged men who stare as though they've never seen a vagina before.

I'm a big fan of Colbert, but I couldn't believe he did that. It was completely sickening the way they just HAD to sexualize a professional woman whose role as a public figure has nothing to do with sex. I was so despondent after that, I just turned the TV off.

With the mix of trepidation, rising defensiveness, and rueful resignation that has become a familiar feature of my watching videos of various Talk Show Hosts I Used to Like, I headed over to the Colbert Nation website and watched the video.


[Partial transcript of relevant section below.]
Let's be very clear about this: It's not irony. It's not satire. It's not even remotely relevant to the sketch and would not have a place there if Colbert hadn't "pretended to hear Rush right." It's just the demeaning sexualization of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor for fucking laughs.

Two women have sat on that bench in the Court's 200 year history, and I'm not even going to soft-peddle it: This shit is why. The unwillingness or inability or flat refusal to regard women as people rather than some less than subset, defined by what's (assumed to be) between their legs, is why Sonia Sotomayor will be only the third woman in US history to sit on the Supreme Court.

And her nomination will be rife with questions about her stance on women's reproductive rights, and her support for women's autonomy over their own sexuality will be a key point of contention and controversy. Because women's bodies are still considered public property, property of men, to do with what they will. And if Sonia Sotomayor won't publicly make her body available as a sexual plaything to demean her, well, fuck, her head can just be stuck on the body of a woman who will.

I am heartbroken to see Colbert engaging in this rubbish.

And I'm sick to the fucking teeth of it. I bet you are, too. Time to pick up our teaspoons in a big way, Shakers. If anyone's going to listen, it's going to be Stephen Colbert, so let's make this one count.



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Time to make some noise.

Transcript starting at 1:50

Colbert: As always, Senate Minority Leader Rush Limbaugh has led the fight [against Sotomayor's nomination]. Here's what Rush said when he found out Sotomayor said wise, Latina women would reach better conclusions than white males.

Limbaugh [video]: Sotomayor was following her basic instinct; she is racist!

Colbert: Not only a racist, but if I'm pretending to hear Rush right, she was also in Basic Instinct. Word of warning, senators—if your questioning gets too tough, you might see this.

[video clip of Sharon Stone uncrossing her legs, with Sotomayor's head superimposed on Stone's body]


Colbert: I'm just saying! [wild laughter and applause from audience; Colbert tries not to laugh] I'm just saying! A Supreme Court nominee of all people should have briefs. [laughter and groans] You're welcome. You're all welcome.