This, in a nutshell, has been a dominant strain of thought regarding the role of women in politics, dating back pretty much forever. Accordingly, government has always been the dominion of men. And to a large extent, it still is, despite the tremendous advancements made by women over the past couple centuries. Look no further than American government for proof. In America, women have only had national suffrage since 1920. The vast majority of seats in the House and Senate are occupied by men - women make up just over 16% of Congress, as opposed to over half of the general population. We have never had a female president.
The question, of course, is why. I mean, really. I suppose the situation in Congress is as much the problem of incumbency as it is residual chauvanism. Members of congress just don't get defeated, whether male or female. That's why we get senators who are over 100 years old, or members of the house on their 30th term. In this system, change happens slowly, if at all.
That doesn't account for the presidency, of course, as presidents have term limits. We've had 42 presidents (not double-counting Cleveland, who was #22 and 24), and none have been women. We haven't even had a woman as a major party nominee yet. The closest was Geraldine Ferraro, Walter Mondale's running mate in 1984 for the Democratic Party. We have more and more women running in primaries, but to date, no female nominees.
Of course, this year we almost had Hillary Clinton. You'll hear the phrase "groundbreaking" liberally applied to her campain, and it was - she was a major-party frontrunner for over 10 months, and barely missed out on the nomination. As we all know, she was defeated by the equally groundbreaking campaign of Barack Obama, the first African American to be a major party's nominee for president. We've all heard how these two candidates have energized women and African Americans, respectively. And I guess that's only natural. If I was a woman or an African American, and I was a student of history and current affairs who understood the centuries of political oppression, and was frustrated by the continuing lack of proportional numbers of women or African Americans in power, I would probably also be very excited about these two candidates. (In fact, despite the fact that I'm a white male, I was very excited about both. Admittedly, I supported Obama over Hillary, and I generally think that she's a bad person. But I think both would be excellent as president, and if things had gone the other way, I would have voted for Hillary in a heartbeat.)
But then, that also brings up the problem of "symbolic" or "descriptive" representation. Basically, it's a question of whether the gender or race of a candidate actually matters. On the one hand, taking the view that we're all created equal, it shouldn't matter. A man should be able to represent women just as well as he represents men, and vice versa. Whites should be able to represent blacks just as well as they represent whites, and vice versa. With this ideal in mind, the race and gender of a candidate should make no difference to voters.
This is why I've always been pissed off when someone asks the question, "Hypothetically, would you ever vote for a woman as president?" The question only gauges whether or not I'm a sexist. All I know about this hypothetical candidate is that she's a woman. I know nothing of her positions on the issues. I know nothing of her character. Ultimately, I know nothing about her. All I can tell you is that the fact that this candidate possesses a vagina doesn't disqualify her from office in my book. Same with race, same sexuality, same with any other superficial characteristic you can come up with.
Of course, not all voters think this way. Some voters harbor gender or racial biases. They care about these superficial characteristics. A lot. Some truly believe that a woman will better represent women, or that an African American will better represent African Americans. And they may not be wrong, because politics often doesn't follow the ideal I mentioned. That's just the reality of the situation. And, in my opinion, it means that people who vote based primarly on race or gender are not foolish simply because they base their votes on these supposedly superficial characteristics.
But then there are others who I won't hesitate to judge as being foolish. Take, for example, this woman. An ardent Hillary supporter, Billie Bromer says that she is highly unlikely to vote for Obama in November now that Hillary has been defeated in the race for the Democratic nominee, despite the fact that Bromer is a Democrat. Bromer's not alone - a substantial portion of Hillary's supporters are considering either not voting, or possibly voting for Republican nominee John McCain. Now, I won't outright call these people stupid. If McCain's positions on the issues are more in line with yours than Obama's are, fine. But the voters - particularly women - who won't vote for Obama because their beloved female candidate got defeated are idiots. Just listen to this statement by Bromer, as part of her explanation of why she won't vote for Obama:
"We are homeless now and we are desperately seeking a home. We feel we have been ''abused'' by the Obama campaign and by the Democratic party.
Why would we go back to our abusers, especially when they continue to minimize our thoughts and feelings? The feminist in some of us certainly trumps any party loyalty we may have had and actually trumps any views we may have on Roe v. Wade or Iraq."
The last line is what really makes me angry. This woman is essentially voting squarely based on the vagina. The "feminist" in her trumps all other issues? Then she probably shouldn't be allowed to vote. Hillary Clinton stood for a whole lot more than simple possession of a vagina. I guarantee you she wasn't running to put a woman in the White House - she was running to push her issues, such as...for instance...Roe v. Wade, or Iraq.
Sure, why not vote for McCain? Except that his positions are pretty much diametrically opposed to those of Hillary. Sure, why not stay home on election day, let your non-vote be a boycott for your candidate getting defeated? Except that by not voting, you're not engaging in the political process. By not voting, you're making it a little more likely that the candidate who opposes your candidate's positions on every issue will get elected.
It seems to me that this woman is betraying the very principals her candidate stood for. It seems like her stance is completely irrational. It seems like she's acting out of spite and emotion rather than reason and logic. It seems like she's doing a complete disservice to herself, her candidate, and her gender.
Then again, I'm just a man. What do I know?
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