Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential bid has a woman problem
Photo by: CNN.com
By Liz Reichart // A&E Editor
“In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman,” said Margaret Thatcher some 30 years ago as Prime Minister of England. Gender as a factor in politics has never been at the forefront of a United States election as it has been in this one. At a time where the United States shouts from every rooftop its principles of gender, it would seem as if gender differences would be entirely irrelevant and reproachable.
It’s certainly hypocritical to say we decidedly need a female president without a thorough discussion of the issues on the table; blind arguments like these negate the core idea of feminism: that both genders should be on equal footing. With important issues concerning women’s health and income inequality spotlighted in the Democratic debates this year, it’s imperative to examine whether the gender of the candidate translates into the most effective solutions for that gender in question.
Enter Hillary Clinton, who is currently the most popular female candidate. Her campaign has been a non-stop feminist rhetoric machine, fervently broadcasting to every eligible voter the fact that she is a woman. When the question of her age arises, Hillary retorts, “I will be the youngest woman president in the history of the United States.” Even though the country seems to overwhelmingly proclaim gender equality, it seems ignorant to say that Clinton’s gender doesn’t matter, just as you can’t examine Barack Obama’s road to the White House without exploring the factor of race. But should gender matter to supporters of presidential candidates? It shouldn’t in theory, but candidates and voters themselves are the ones who bring gender differences to the table of issues to consider. Not only this, but Clinton is content to make the argument that she’s not complicit with the Washington establishment because her gender makes her the ultimate outsider. After the third Democratic debate, she voiced that she “cannot imagine anyone being more of an outsider than the first woman president.”
Historically speaking, women have not held as many high political offices as men, particularly the office on Pennsylvania Avenue. In the House of Representatives, women hold just 84 (19.3 percent) of the 435 seats. In the Senate, the situation is equally as dismal: just 20 of the 100 seats belong to women. There are only six current U.S. governors that are women and only two of these are women of color. But does electing a female candidate change the status quo, or does electing a candidate that may provide more support for women accomplish this task?
Voters are being forced to ask themselves if supporting someone because of their gender is indeed as deplorable as not supporting them because of their gender.
Consider the endorsement of Clinton by Gloria Steinem, the Second-Wave Feminist you read about in textbooks. The now 81-year-old is heralded as a revolutionary icon by both women and men. However, when Steinem endorsed Clinton in early February, she called on female voters to grow up and get with the program. “When you’re young, you’re thinking: ‘where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie,” said Steinem. At the same Clinton rally, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright endorsed Clinton with words that should have made women want to take up arms. “We can tell our story of how we climbed the ladder, and a lot of you younger women think it’s done,” Albright said of the broader fight for women’s equality. “It’s not done. There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other.” The former Secretary of State damned anyone who supports a male candidate because of Clinton’s importance as a gender symbol – not because of the superiority of her policies.
The boys may be with Sen. Bernie Sanders but there’s also a real reason the girls are. In the New Hampshire primary, 82 percent of women under age 30 supported Sanders. Could there be ideological reasons for women not to support Clinton? Consider Sen. Sanders from Vermont, who has often pointed out that of 178 countries worldwide, the United States is one of three that does not provide new mothers with paid leave. He argues for a model where family leave is part of a comprehensive system of social safety nets. Furthermore, if elected president, he would increase funding for Planned Parenthood. He vowed to only nominate Supreme Court justices who uphold Roe v. Wade and plans to expand women’s health programs and access to safe and legal abortions. To end wage discrimination based on gender, Sanders would sign the Paycheck Fairness Act, and increase the minimum wage to $15. Women account for more than half of those who would benefit from the Paycheck Fairness Act and women make up 72 percent of all tipped workers. Hillary too has expressed that she would guarantee up to 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave. Work to close the pay gap and defends women’s health and reproductive rights against attacks.
The endorsement of Steinem and Albright may only highlight a massive generational gap when it comes to this issue. Whereas millennials have grown up in a time of social progression and constant fluctuation, college-educated mothers in their 50’s and 60’s may jump at a chance to get a tangible symbol of their struggle in the White House. “For baby boomer women, in particular, it’s “I fought this whole war, and now we’re running out of time, and if not Hillary, then who would it be?” said Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster who is herself a baby boomer. “They haven’t experienced the kind of barriers that their mothers and grandmothers did — the kind of exclusions from areas of accomplishment,” Mary L. Shanley, a political science professor at Vassar who specializes in gender studies, said of women born after 1980. “Hillary Rodham Clinton is the long distance runner in this race,” said Gail Sheehy, who is the author of 17 books including Clinton’s biography “Hillary’s Choice.” “Young women may yet see the breadth of her vision, which includes much more than income redistribution. She has the battle scars that can make her indomitable in the face of Republican assaults on social progress.”
I’m not going to burn in hell if I don’t support Clinton. Equally, I’m not content to support a candidate that wags a finger at me because I’m not furthering the goals of my collective gender in the way older generations see fit. Shame on Hillary Clinton for accepting endorsements that would humiliate me into supporting a presidential candidate. For a woman who is supposedly about empowering other women, she’s got a long way to go.