"We have a tight community with a private language, and Althouse ... doesn't get that."

So says a commenter, over at Kos, who thinks he's explaining that I was unfair to the commenters over at Eschaton. Hello? They were attacking me. You're right that I'm not a member of the community, and I don't know their "private language," but since I could see you were talking about me, I thought I'd read some of what you were saying. I got about 100 comments into a series of 800+ comments and most of what I read looked like rank sexism. And no one stood up to say anything about it. All this in a post reacting to my complaint that Democrats don't seem to care about feminism. You folks looked awful. Your defense is, we're all insiders who share a private language?

You're talking on the web, in front of the whole world. You purport to be liberals, the people who usually tend to claim they are the ones who will protect the interests of women. But you present an ugly, degraded face to the world. Then you say, oh, this isn't my real face. This is a funny mask I wear and you just don't get it. Brilliant politics, folks.

Back in the late 80s and early 90s, feminists within liberal groups would give you hell if you talked about women like that. Saying you're joking, ironic, or speaking a private language would only earn you the next slam. That kind of feminism died in the Clinton Era.