Last Sunday, Steve called his folks in Cleveland for their weekly chat. They chatted about work, the house projects, the kids. They also talked about who they were going to vote for in the primary. My father-in-law was planning on voting for Obama; my mother-in-law had chosen Hillary. My mother-in-law is part of Hillary’s core demographic — late middle aged, white women.
In today’s Times, Maureen Dowd refers to Hillary voters, like my mother in law, as shoulder-pad feminists — women who came of age in the era of shoulder pads and still see sexism everywhere. They are ticked off about injustices in their own lives. They relate to Hillary who jokes about her wrinkles. Their hatred of Obama is intensifying as the guy takes the spotlight again. Dowd says that younger women think the old bats are crazy.
I have had my issues with shoulder-pad feminists in the past, but I don’t want to get into our differences today. I want to point out our commonalities.
Yeah, there is sexism out there. It takes a slightly different form than old school sexism, but it’s a huge problem that hasn’t gone away.
While the gender differences aren’t as stark in political science as in the sciences, they are still pretty bad. Our big annual convention is dominated by men. The leading journals prefer quantitative research over qualitative research. And no surprise, men do the quantitative work. The numbers of women with PhDs have increased dramatically over the years, yet the departments at universities are fraternities. Women get the degrees, but not the jobs. Many schools don’t offer family leave time or child-care centers on campus.
Most women don’t experience these forms of soft sexism until later in life. We’re sailing through school work, out pacing men in the classroom. It’s when the hard realities of family and work hit that women get the short end of the stick.
Women are mad. And they are carrying that grudge into the voting booth. Dan Drezner found this great item in Salon that shows where Hillary’s support is coming from.
In January, I discussed women voters and Hillary for Pajamas Media.
Hillary is getting much sympathy from pundits and bloggers
about the image problem that women leaders face. Most women have had
that “shrill and strident” label smacked on their forehead at one point
or another.They also know what it feels like when the young, handsome,
Harvard-educated golden boys like Barack Obama take home all the
prizes.
Recently, Megan McArdle wrote,
But it’s far from clear to me that in this race, the benefits of being
married to Bill are outweighing the drawbacks of being punished for
things that would pass unnoticed in a man. And it’s pretty damn
frustrating to think that you may lose a job you want because you’ve
got twice the "normal" number of X chromosomes.
Taking a grudge to an empty voting booth may be passive aggressive, but that’s sometimes how we work.
I’m not sure that a vote for Hillary is really a vote for women. After all, she was given the early nod from Democratic party leaders, an old boys’ network. However, this primary season, which has been remarkable for so many reasons, has also shown a light on a low levels of anger in women. That isn’t going to go away after the Democratic convention.
Apt. 11d 
The big reason I’m a Feminist for Obama ™ is not that I dislike Clinton, or think she’d be a bad President. Rather, I want to give the big, fat finger to the DLC, James Carville, Terry McAuliffe, Mark Rand and all of their ilk. If Senator Clinton won the Democratic nomination, you betcha I’d vote for her. Truth to tell, while he was in the race I was for Edwards, and I’d still be for Edwards if I could.
As for MoDo…well, it’s MoDo. Good ol’ Moron Dowd. Who thinks Donald Trump is great boyfriend material. That old bat is definitely crazy.
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“boys”?
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yeah, that was dumb. I was rushing to finish before Project Runway. Let me take that out.
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What’s been surprising to me is that I’m 42 and perceive myself as eternally 15 (give me a tv show focussed on smart and sassy teenagers any day–Buffy, Veronica, the OC, Gossip Girl), I am really relating to the “older” feminists. My 63 year old mom is in an almost constant rage over the sexist treatment of Clinton. However, so is my 32 year old high school dropout SAHM sister and my 34 year old accountant sister and my 39 year old preschool teacher sister. Meanwhile, my father, who loves both Bill and Hillary (when he called me to tell me he was having a triple bypass, he started off by saying excitedly “I’m having a heart bypass just like Bill Clinton!”), is leaning toward Obama. It’s really interesting. Much as I try to eliminate what I consider to be irrational prejudices from my thinking, I find I relate to Hillary Clinton, and that’s affecting me.
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Note: the tidbit you linked off of Dan Drezner’s site is at Slate, not Salon. (I loved it!)
I have to admit, it’s gotten my blood boiling to hear pundits saying that Hillary should “do the right thing” and drop out. When the race continues to be this close, who’s to say that one or the other is the clear winner? But more than that, I hear “she’s a woman and she should do what women always do, step back and defer to a man.” And when they go on to say that “she’s hurting the party” by staying in the race? I struggle to control my tongue.
I’m not a fervent fan of Hillary. I was behind John Edwards and regretted it when he dropped out. But I’ll be damned if I watch a woman politician get eased out the door by the clucking tongues of media figures and gender politics. We have a primary system for a reason. It’s not over ’til it’s over in Denver, anyway.
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I really don’t get how a vote for Clinton is a vote for women. Women with powerful husbands or fathers weren’t shut out of the corridors of power before feminism took hold. Of course, I’m not a woman.
I have pretty much the same gut reaction to Sen. Clinton as I did to Bill Clinton (mild annoyance and less mild distrust). That said, if I had to pick between Clinton and Obama, I’d pick Clinton in a second. She is the DLC’s candidate and history suggests that they at least know you can only raise taxes so high.
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i’m 40 and in that regard fall through the cracks between the boomers and the genY, as have done my entire life. and this is one of those things – i’m supporting obama but i 100% completely get where the so-called “shoulder-pad feminists” have come from.
i’m in a good place professionally, after having made a shift in my field about 15 years ago from an area that i technically enjoyed more but was more dominated by the “good-old-boys” mentality. as such, i sometimes wonder if i haven’t gotten a little soft – i do know what it is like to have the “shrill and strident” label, but it’s been so many years ago that the pain & anger has dulled with time.
i think partly because i am fortunate enough to feel so empowered professionally now that it’s easier for me to support obama. like wendy, i also think of myself as being perpetually 15 (or 25) and so therefore am assuming that i WILL see a woman elected president in my lifetime. i get why women in their 60’s might feel this is their last chance.
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MH, if having a spouse or parent who can vote counts as “access to power”, then I’m assuming you won’t mind if we take your vote and let your mom speak for you? That should suit you just fine.
To me, feminism is something that younger women really don’t need. You’re not really denied much in this country as a woman any more — until you reach a point where you might be supervising a man, or you have children. Then it all goes pear-shaped. So I’m not surprised that the younger set is not drawn by the gender stuff.
That said, it’s been a long time since I saw so much sexism up so close and personal. A lot of people I’ve known for a very long time, and thought everything was cool with, have said a lot of horribly, horribly sexist things about Senator Clinton. You may not agree with her policies, but it should be handled respectfully. Expecting the woman to defer when she’s told — that’s not respect.
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Ah, Jen, having a husband or father or son or brother who can vote (no need to be gender neutral here, it was always the men) is surely better than having no one who loves you able to cast a vote in your interest, No? Even in societies that are extremely sexist, it’s wrong to imagine that fathers don’t love their daughters, or sons their mothers. Of course being loved by people with power doesn’t replace having power yourself, but it’s better than nothing.
That’s why though I certainly feel that Hillary faces significant sexism, and that she has carried a significant burden, and that she is fighting battles that help me and my daughter, my heart of hearts is with Obama. I find it largely foolish to suggest that the negatives of being married to the former president outweigh the positives of it, especially in Hillary’s case.
If Hillary wins the nomination, fairly, I’ll do everything I can to put her in the White House, and feel joy at the result (assuming, of course, that we’re successful). But, it won’t make my heart sing, like seeing the biracial, first-generation immigrant, Hawaiian raised,half-African, but All-American, scholarship kid, Harvard lawyer there.
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I think Clinton would be a fine president, though I worry about (1) the dynastic thing (2) whether she can beat McCain and (3) whether she would attempt even a small portion of the change that the country seems to be ready for.
But as I do the math, it looks like she would have to win 60 percent of the delegates in every contest from here on out to get to the convention tied with Obama. Is that likely?
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Obama doesn’t make my heart sing, but neither does Clinton. I have no single, overwhelming beef with her and her record; in some ways, and with the gone-but-not-forgotten Edwards out of the race, she might even match up best with weird social conservatives/economic liberals like myself. But the dynastic thing is, in my mind, in fact a very large issue, a corruption of the meaning of democracy that we’ve already gone too far towards, and thus something that we should try very hard not to add to.
I’ve already recommended this to everyone I can think of, but again, if you’re interested in thinking through the options facing both Democratic candidates right now, give this a read.
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I don’t like your link at all Russell, for the very least because it puts words in candidates mouths. When has Hillary ever suggested a re-vote in FL & MI?
[from Russell’s link, and not from real life: “Clinton: You want to re-vote and find out?”]
Well, Obama is the one who makes my heart sing :-), so clearly, I’m biased (I haven’t fainted at any of his rallies, though, from the pure glory of it). But, I hope that his answer to that hypothetical question would be yes. My heart will sing a bit off key if it’s not :-).
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Jen,
I’m not saying that it was a good thing that women used to be able to secure power only through their families. Just that Sen. Clinton’s candidacy seem to be to be closer to the old pattern (i.e. marrying well) than to anything that is especially feminist. (Of course, plenty of men did rise by marrying well, but it wasn’t the only way for men.)
As for letting my mother vote for me, she never tells me who she votes for, so I don’t know if that would help Hillary or not.
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My apologies to MH — I misunderstood yours and BJ’s comments to be more along the lines of actually questioning the legitimacy of women holding power at all. I guess it shows how touchy I’m getting about all the rhetoric I’m hearing.
I remember with some fondness way back before the Iowa caucuses that I had great clarity on this. I disliked Senator Clinton because she had backed the war, just that simple. But I have become caught up in the identity politics of the whole thing. I am having trouble not losing my temper at the treatment Senator Clinton’s gotten. After all, if I don’t defend her, who will? And I very much dislike the “it’s the woman’s role to cave in so we can stop all this conflict” vibe I get from so many conversations about her. It’s not helping matters at all.
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You know, although I was vehemently against the war and still am, I can’t really hold it against Clinton for backing it or not fighting it. Sure, she could have shown courage, and that would have been cool, but it would have been used against her to portray her as not capable of being C-in-C, not to mention the fact that she represents NY and would have come under fire for not avenging her constituents. Come on, we all know that, right?
I remember thinking when that happened that it was a political decision, and it must have been hard to do. Anti-war votes/voices were really really rare back then. Everyone was in a post-9/11 haze of irrationality.
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Thanks guys, for all the good comments. I just revised this post for Pajamas Media.
I’m a Obama-bot, but I do sympathize with the bad treatment that Hillary has gotten. It has hit some sore points in my own life. It’s interesting how this primary has become a proxy for our own sensitivities. Gives a whole new meaning to issue politics.
I did like that American Scene post, Russell. Quite a bit. Hillary (or her staff) are asking for a re-vote Florida.
For shoulder-pad feminisms at its most annoying, check out Linda Hirshman on this topic. With a bonus, fun Pollitt response — http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/03/AR2008030302838.html
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Politt is fun — I hated the Steinem article, but Politt’s “Bitches for the Daughter of Satan” is going to be on one of my t-shirts if she does pull through, somehow, on the nomination.
I think it’s wrong to read the requests for her to step down as asking the “woman to step aside.” It’s asking the person who has fewer votes, and fewer delegates to step aside. I was surprised after the Potamac primaries to note that the delegate numbers have *never* been in Hillary’s favor. Obama simply couldn’t have survived that math.
Did I say it here? I can’t remember. But, my math tells me that she can win the pledged delegates if she wins 56% of the remaining delegates (including a legitimate vote in Florida & Michigan). She needs 60% of the remaining delegates without Florida & Michigan.
But, I still assert that Hillary is not officially asking for a vote in FL. She should, though — adding more unpledged delegates to the count can only help, not hurt her.
Funny, while I was writing this, I got an email from the Obama camp reviewing the delegate math and asking for $25. Why not? I decided. :-).
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Wendy: you bring up the one excuse I have for Hillary about the war vote. I’m much less willing to excuse her on general grounds (not many people were against it because there were courageous people who stood up against the war — notably Kennedy). But, I do think that the people of New York were operating differently than the rest of us. Hillary’s as yet fresh relationship with her New York constituency might have required her to behave differently than the Senator from Massachusetts.
But, I have no similar excuses for the pandering vote on flag burning, and a general belief that she plays a low road game in elections, the latest being the successful attack against a smart and capable woman who used the wrong words.
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I don’t get the level of emotional involvement that I see in many supporters of either Clinton or (especially) Obama. I’m very happily voting for McCain, but he doesn’t make my heart sing and neither did any one else in the Republican primary. When I see the people swooning for Obama like he’s a rock star, it just strikes me as strange (though not as strange as when I see somebody swoon for an actual rock star). Part of it may be that I don’t use TV for news. (Excepting breaking news, I find trying to get actual information from TV is like trying to eat a healthy meal at Wendy’s. Sure, it can be done, but it really isn’t what it is there for.)
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I personally, am swooning more for the idea of Obama than the man, specifically. I do admire the man — I like his background of community organizing, and Harvard, and even Chicago, a city I know well. I like that he had courage to oppose the war during his 2004 run. I like the organization they’ve built.
But what makes my heart sing is the idea of him, in the White House. I’m an immigrant, but an American through and through. I and a colleague (from a white southern family) once amused our Italian and Belgian colleagues by singing “We the people” (Anyone else of the right generation to remember learning the Preamble from cartoon characters?). Time magazine quotes a foreign official saying “An Obama victory would fulfill everything the rest of the world has been told America could be, but hasn’t quite been.” Remember “Any kid can be the president” from the “Great American Melting Pot.”?
America, the idea, is a beacon to the rest of the world, of opportunity, and equality, and freedom, where anything is possible. A dream of what’s possible. Those students erected a Statue of the Liberty in Tian-Min, because it represents an ideal.
And, when eighty-year old white people in Wyoming are willing to buy in to this, when they prove that the color of one’s skin, the funniness of one’s name, or the religion of one’s fathers isn’t a bar to their vote, they make me hopeful that this land of opportunity is real and not a myth, or worse, a lie.
No, I don’t feel this level of emotion for Hillary, though I don’t hate her except when she seems to stoop to her worst instincts. My own personal story plays into my passion, so I can’t tell you what drives the passion of my seventeen year old neighbor who certainly doesn’t share that story. But, I think he’s tapping into that belief in a lot of people, even those without a personal story.
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But bj, it sounds like what you’re saying is not that “any kid can become president” but “any boy can become president.” I don’t want to get into sexism vs racism and identity politics, but I have to say that I find it really hard to understand why *Obama* could inspire such history-making thrills and Clinton can’t. (They both do, for me.)
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Anyone else of the right generation to remember learning the Preamble from cartoon characters?
I sing little snippets of Schoolhouse Rock to my American Government students all the time, particularly the bit from one of the Revolution ones: “That’s called taxation without representation (and that’s not fair!).” Most of they stare at me blankly, but I usually get at least few nods and smiles from my twentysomething students all the same.
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The thing is the rest of the world has already proved that girls can grow up to be president, especially if she’s the wife or daughter of a powerful man (Bhutto, Ghandi, Isabel Peron), or even if she isn’t (Tymoshenko, Thatcher, Merkel). I would like to see a woman president of the USA, and if Hillary was running against someone else, who I did not prefer, in every way, it might give me satisfaction.
But, I prefer Obama for practical reasons, and feel passionate about him for impractical ones. The woman thing doesn’t speak to the universals of America like Obama’s candadicy does, because we’re not a beacon of hope for the world on gender equality.
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PS: I don’t deny anyone the right to feel passionate and hopeful about Hillary. I’m just explaining why I feel that way about Obama.
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Hey Russell, maybe you can tell your students that 500,000 DC residents still don’t have real representation? Or would that be too much cognitive dissonance?
(In high school American History, one bonus test question was to write out the Preamble. Everyone hummed; we told the teacher why afterward.)
I would go to Wendy’s for a healthy meal.
Maybe Hilary isn’t inspiring transcendent feelings because she is running as the candidate of “experience” rather than the candidate of transformation. Or maybe a bunch of other reasons; people’s mileage obviously varies.
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Doug, good choice. I made caramelized tofu and brussels sprouts last night, served over brown rice.
Btw, I can’t tell if it’s the time change that has me nearly comatose, or having gotten up in the middle of the night because my son was having an asthma attack. I can usually handle a sleep interruption much better than this.
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Yeah, Wendy great post and comments at LGM. Sorry, I missed that fun fight. No fun fights without me. New rule.
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Post, comments, LGM, fight. Link?
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At my blog, Doug. Thanks, Laura. I’m actually feeling kind of validated by this post. I haven’t read the Tina Brown article yet though (is it really fair that I have to attend THREE inservices this week, presenting at one of them? Really?).
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Check out Wendy’s blog for more discussion of Obama and sexism and her in the comment section at LGM. Yeah, it all happened a few weeks ago, but it’s still good.
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Thanks for the reference!
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Or am I missing it (I’m in Germany after all) and HRC is running on transformation?
For a while, I was seeing a fair number of references to old ladies at her rallies, saying things like, “When I was born, women couldn’t vote; now I’ll live to see a woman president.” Those are great stories, and they’re a solid counterpart to Obama’s stories. But I’m not seeing much of it, in all of her work to out-McCain McCain or to play gotcha with Samantha Power. Am I missing that, too?
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Ah, bj, something has been bugging me ever since you posted your replies in this thread, and for some reason I woke up with realizing why.
The world has already proven that black men can be president, too. Now, my first response was that Hey, of course in Africa black men have been leaders of their countries. But then I thought of numerous comebacks you might make so I was quiet.
But this morning I remembered that Nelson Mandela was president of South Africa post-apartheid. So in response to your assertion that “The thing is the rest of the world has already proved that girls can grow up to be president,” and the accompanying implication that the world has *not* proved that a black man can, particularly in a country that has seen horrible racism and racial violence, I’d point out that South Africa has already made the kind of history you seem to be looking for.
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