A Plague of Pearl Clutching: How clutch the pearls became a lady blogosphere cliché.

[ellisonz]

Is it time to retire the phrase clutch the pearls?
Photograph by Inga Ivanova.

By Torie Bosch|Posted Friday, Jan. 20, 2012, at 11:26 AM ET

Unless you’re former First Lady Barbara Bush, pearls may not be in style. But accusing people of clutching them is.

The phrase pearl clutching, which means being shocked by something once-salacious that should now be seen as commonplace, like sex, is ubiquitous on blog posts, especially in media geared towards women. For instance, a recent post on Jezebel called Girl Land author Caitlin Flanagan a “professional pearl clutcher.” Less than two hours later, another Jezebel writer called a sexy Calvin Klein ad “sure to inspire pearl-clutch-y local news stories across the nation.” The feminist website Feministe used the phrase in a blog post about privilege and oppression; another feminist website, Tiger Beatdown, used it to deride a Wall Street Journal writer who was panicking about the subject matter of YA novels. But the phrase isn’t just used in the lady blogosophere: A Washington Post columnist wrote dismissively last week about the “pearl-clutching that hippies’ parents did in the 1960s.” Basically, a writer who discusses pearl-clutching is saying, “I’m too blasé and worldly to be shocked by this.”

“Clutch the pearls” first appeared on In Living Color in the show’s 1990 debut season in an April 15 “Men on Films” sketch. After Blaine Edwards (played by Damon Wayans) waxes about how “daring” producers were to cast a male actor as the “female” lead in Dangerous Liaisons, his sidekick Antoine Merriweather tells him that Glenn Close is actually a woman, prompting Blaine to gasp, “Clutch the pearls!” The sarcastic phrase and its many permutations existed prior to In Living Color, of course; for instance, “she clutches her pearls” appeared in a 1987 article in an Australian newspaper about ladies who lunch. But it was the “Men on …” sketches that brought the phrase into widespread, albeit sometimes too literal, use in the early ‘90s, appearing, for example, in a couple of Billboard album reviews as well as a Newsday piece about—who else?—Barbara Bush’s jewelry in 1993.

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The loss of novelty isn’t the only problem with the phrase. While the mental image is amusing, the use of the phrase has degenerated into accusatory shorthand, particularly in blog comments. People—particularly women—lob the charge at one another to accuse them of not being liberal, or feminist, or open-minded enough; not infrequently, it prompts tedious semantic debates about whether something is “pearl clutching” or a legitimate concern. And to that I say, mollusks.

More: http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2012/01/pearl_clutching_how_the_phrase_became_a_feminist_blog_clich_.html

I for one, as a heterosexual male, find this turn of phrase, which has been the subject of much recent debate, to be distasteful in its misogynistic overtone as diminishing the concerns of women and others about social issues. I think it's a term society is better off without. What do you think? Is this loaded language that should be unacceptable for use? Have your impressions changed at all after reading this article? Why do you think it is becoming popular?

I couldn't find any prior linking to this article and am going to roll with the presumption that it has not been posted before.