The Hot New Thing In The Democratic Party: White Men

Your questions are good ones, but perhaps inappropriate for the subject, considering MOST jobs--especially those requiring special education or training for a career--were totally closed to women until recently. Why would any woman waste the time, effort & money, training for a job that would be closed to her because of her gender when she finished that training?

 

Yes, meritocracy is more important than gender in that decision. So, while I am thirsty to support a qualified woman for President, I will ultimately support the candidate I feel is most qualified for that crucial office. I am very impressed with the personal qualities & general philosophy of Marianna Williamson, but have concerns over her lack of political experience. I admire the personal commitment & high energy Elizabeth Warren delivers in her efforts to open more economic opportunity for the middle class, but I sometimes feel her focus is too narrow & her determination to "fight" her opponents for those rights rather than convince them of the benefits of supporting her views, bothers me. I'm VERY impressed with the interviews I've seen of Kamala Harris, who until recently, I felt was the most "balanced" candidate, and the most positive one for working across the aisle--which I recognize is essential for getting anything done. K. Harris is still my favorite female candidate, and I'd be happy to vote for her as President if she gets the nomination. But I've recently been watching & listening to the increasing number of interviews of Pete Buttigieg, and finding myself totally in agreement with everything he says. I now regard him as the strongest Democratic candidate running, and my new first choice for my vote in the primaries. I remain open to changing my mind as the primary season continues.

 

OK. do you have another measure to suggest?

 

As someone who has experienced the divorce court challenges you mention, I sympathize with your view, but I never allowed the hostility I experienced from my X-wife to become generalized over all women around me. There are jerks & creeps of both genders around us all the time. We have to be smart enough to avoid becoming personally subject to their abusive behaviors. That responsibility is on us, not them. I tried learning positive lessons from my pain, and succeeded. I feel I'm a better person for it.

 

Please see my recent post #127 in this thread.

 

The fact that this gender wage-gap theory is supported only by a misleading statistic that supports no such thing tells us that there really isn't any, or very little, gender discrimination to measure.

 

Just because a conclusion was based on one misleading measure doesn't preclude the possibility that the conclusion is still accurate.

 

If there was any real evidence of discrimination against women in the workplace the feminists would be using it instead of a bogus statistic.

 

You are still voting against your interests, and you needed to qualify, which tells me how shallow your initial reasoning was, which is most likely your real reasoning that you simply changed when called out on it...

 

Those who look only for faults or the negatives in anything & everything around them, will ALWAYS succeed in doing so. Are you one of those people?

 

That's not really accurate. Men are far more capable at being leaders simply by the fact that men are far more competitive by nature. Women are more cooperative and thereby fail to lead, because leadership requires making decisions. Female leaders are notable in great part because they are so rare. Queen Elizabeth I, Cleopatra, Empress Wu Zetian, and Margaret Thatcher (who I would have been proud to vote for) all stand out from history as great leaders in large part because great female leaders don't come along very often. We have equal opportunity for women in leadership in this country, and those women with leadership ability rise to great heights without any special favors. The idea that we need a woman president is nonsense. The idea that men can't represent women's interests is nonsense. The idea that men's and women's interests are different is nonsense.

And no, it's not just conservative women who are unhappy with the current situation.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2006/03/why-feminist-wives-are-unhappy.html

 

1. I agree that men are more competitive & women more cooperative. But great leadership is finding ways to get divergent people to work together COOPERATIVELY. Great leadership is NOT finding ways to make war & kill more people. Competitiveness creates a few winners and a lot of losers. Cooperativeness creates more winners & few losers. Women's cooperative slant makes them preferable to men as leaders.
2. I agree with your point here--SADLY.
3. If that were true, why have we had 45 male Presidents & zero female Presidents during our history? Is that YOUR idea of equal opportunity?
4. I never said we need a woman President. I said I'd prefer one over another male, provided she was equally qualified, because I DO support having REAL equal opportunity for both genders.
5. Men have been representing women's interests here since 1607, and we're still having this discussion. Why? If men have been so successful, why is this still an issue?
6. I totally disagree with your comment here. The things men & women value in their daily lives are often quite different. So are the things that motivate them to vote. We've really not had the chance to see leadership from a woman's point of view yet, but I guarantee, it'll be different--unless the woman has to behave like a man to get that position in the first place. Then it'll simply be more of the same, but more awkward.

 

Actually, that sounds pretty sexist. Wouldn't it make more sense to look at what policies and plans a candidate has rather than what sex, creed or color they are?

 

I've responded to this very question from other forum posters several times. But, briefly, again--the female candidate MUST be completely qualified, but given equal qualifications, because we've had 45 Presidents in our 230+ year history as a nation, and zero female Presidents, it's long past due to elect a female. If a male candidate is clearly superior as a potential leader, then I'll support him, but I'm hoping for a female who'll stand out this time.

 

What do you mean by REAL equal opportunity? If you don't think we have that now what would it look like if we did? What changes do you want to see that would create what you consider to be REAL equal opportunity?

 

To see why this isn't so, watch the male v. female version of Survivor. (New Zealand version, season 2) It's most instructive. Cross-dressing lesbian feminist Camille Paglia said if it were up to women to get things done, we'd still be living in caves.

Up until 1920, no, there was no equal opportunity, since women couldn't vote. Since 1920, yes, there's been equal opportunity, and we still haven't had a female president. That's 27 presidents. Three of them reached office on the death of the previous president and one reached office on the resignation of the previous president, but the other 23 were all elected. To understand why numbers are not necessarily representative of reality, Ruth Bader Ginsburg was asked during her confirmation hearing if a case came up in which someone had employed 90 people and not one of them was black, was that prima facie evidence of racism, and she said it was. Then the gotcha... it was her. She had employed 90 different interns as judge and not one of them had been black. Did that prove RBG was racist? No. Did she recant? Sadly, no.

Why does a woman need to get elected to prove there's equal opportunity? Hillary lost, but she was her party's candidate. Isn't that proof sufficient that women have the equal opportunity to be president?

It isn't except in the minds of liberals. Ann Coulter doesn't even think women should vote.

That is indeed how women have to behave in order to be successful. To compete with men, women have to behave like men, and most women don't want to. Jordan Peterson pointed this out in one of his videos, that most women, even the most successful, high-powered women, aren't willing to invest so much of their lives into being successful versus having a personal life.

 

1. I don't watch "reality tv". It's too unreal. But your comment here regarding feminist Camille Paglia demonstrates the non-reality most women deal with trying to open opportunities for themselves in a male dominated world. The feel they have to act like--or pretend to be--males, to get the acceptance they seek. I think that's all wrong--for everyone. It deprives us from benefiting from the substantial advantages women inherently bring to the table as themselves.
2. Having the right to vote doesn't automatically infer an equal right to run for any particular office--especially President. I think your conclusion here is premature.
3. I think Hillary proved America has accepted the idea of giving women the opportunity to run for President. But it will take a woman in the Oval Office to PROVE gender equality is a fact for the Presidency.
4. America was the first country to come up with the ideal of "all men being equal," in spite of having slavery for the first 90 or so years of its existence. America has been rather slow to expand that ideal from men only to include men of color, women, and now members of the gay community. In my view, since we're all human, we're all eligible to enjoy those human rights. I applaud any & all advances toward that goal. Ann Coulter & I agree on practically nothing.
5. I agree it is senseless & a mistake to have women behave like men just to gain access to opportunities. We need to change that by accepting the benefits of the feminine perspective more in our lives, & allowing women to be women in whatever career path they choose for themselves. Our whole society will gain by doing this. While I welcome a woman candidate for President, I don't want a woman pretending to be a man, & I won't vote for such a woman.

 

You're essentially living in a fantasy world, then. Men are not going to change and women still have to compete with men to get what men get. I disagree with your assessment, by the way. We don't need a Jewish president to prove that Jews have equal rights in America, we don't need an Asian president to prove that Asians have equal rights in America, and we don't need a female president to prove that females have equal rights in America.

 

You are welcome to disagree with me. But until those minorities actually inhabit the Oval Office, there will always be a question of whether they do have equal access.