The morning after last week’s presidential debate, one of my professors spent class stressing the importance of voting. She then told us about her mother, who is turning 102 this year.
When her mother was born, women didn’t have the right to vote. They didn’t until she turned six years old. Voting is a privilege that she does not take for granted and a responsibility that she does not take lightly. My professor said she has never missed an election.
Women’s suffrage was granted nationally in 1920, less than one hundred years ago. I repeat: women gained the right to vote less than 100 years ago. There are women alive today who were not able to vote at every point in their lives. Even more daunting, legal barriers designed to keep African-Americans from voting did exactly that, and most African-American women, as well as other minority groups, were unable to exercise their right to vote until much later than 1920. Not until the 1968 election did African-American voters cast their ballot with apparent ease: as a result of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, African-American voter turnout in the South, where racially biased voting restrictions were most oppressive, was just 44 percent in 1964 and 72 percent in the rest of the country. Basically, women of all races were not able to vote freely until less than 50 years ago.
As a direct result of gaining the right to vote only within the past century, there is a distinct lack of female and minority representation in the United States government. Women currently hold just over 19 percent of the seats in Congress, while only 17 percent of Congress is made up of minorities of either sex. Only four females, three of whom were white, have ever served as Supreme Court justices. And, in case you haven’t noticed, America has never seen a female president of any ethnicity.
This is the precise reason that I cannot agree with the sentiment that voting for Hillary because she’s a woman is not a good enough reason. People claim that being a female alone does not qualify one to be president, that a female candidate should not automatically win the votes of female constituents, that a candidate’s sex does not matter and should not affect an election’s outcome.
It would be wonderful if this were the case, if sex truly did not matter. Unfortunately, sex seems to matter a great deal, considering we’ve only ever had male presidents.
In what capacity do women have equal rights if they lack equal representation? Why is it acceptable that each of the 43 presidents who have led this diverse nation has been a man? Why is it acceptable that all but one of them have been white? Why have all of them possessed Christian roots? The backgrounds of the American people represent a wide spectrum; the backgrounds of their leaders, however, do not.
As a woman, Hillary Clinton would be more sensitive to issues concerning women. Is it wrong for a woman to vote with her own interest in mind? Is voting in one’s own interest not the premise of political participation? During the course of her campaign, she has expressed interest in closing the wage gap among women and minorities, providing paid family and medical leave, supporting Planned Parenthood and ensuring the right to an abortion. These are topics of importance for a great many female voters.
I’m not saying that Hillary Clinton is my ideal candidate. If this election cycle has taught me anything, it’s that I’m not sure such a thing as an ideal political candidate actually exists. But I will reiterate that, as a woman, she is prone to be more aware of and sensitive to issues that concern women than her opponent, as demonstrated clearly in the first presidential debate.
During the debate, Donald Trump stated that Clinton is unfit to be president because “she doesn’t have the looks; she doesn’t have the stamina.” Something tells me that if Trump were running against another man, then looks would have little to do with determining who is more qualified for the presidency.
On stage, Clinton pointed out that Trump referred to former Miss Universe Alicia Machado as “Miss Housekeeping” because of her Latina background. Based on his blatant sexism during the debate and throughout the course of his campaign, any intersectional feminist, or self-respecting woman, for that matter, ought to think twice before voting for Trump over Clinton.
Instead of voting to make America great again (Again? When? Less than one hundred years ago, when women couldn’t even vote?), I plan on voting to make America greater than it ever was by diversifying the nation’s leaders and electing the first female president. I’m voting for a woman … because she’s a woman.