Thursday, February 25, 2016

Feminism and Politics

Today I was on Cosmo snapchat sorry, surprising, I know, and I was reading through some of the 2016 election confessions. One of them was a woman claiming that she stood with Gloria Steinem on  Steinem's claims that most woman Bernie supporters are just supporting Bernie to impress their friends who are men. Obviously, as someone who is voting for Bernie Sanders, I was really upset. Hillary supporters are constantly have to deal with critics claiming the only reason they're voting for Hillary is because Hillary is a woman and they are too.
The big issue is that why are we constantly trying to invalidate what women think and their political opinion. Steinem, being a huge feminist activist, I think crossed a line here. Feminism is about validating other women's opinions whether they are what you agree with or not. You are not only a feminist if you vote for Hillary, you are a feminist if you support women and gender equality. I think that regardless of who you're voting for, it's important that we show women that the fact that their political voices are being heard is what's significant here.

1 comment:

  1. I think that this is a very interesting point and I have heard a lot of individuals talking about it as well. I have heard by many people, famous and not that just because they are female, doesn't mean they have to vote for Hilary. I think that you should vote for who you think would do the best job, however, I do believe that "relate-ability" also plays a big role in elections. I feel that for many people, they elect someone that they feel connected to or that they understand and for some I believe that decision is based on gender. I have heard Hilary say though that "you should not vote for me because I am female, you should vote for me because I can do the job". I think it will be interesting to keep an eye on this topic, particularly as we get closer to the election.

    ReplyDelete