Do you ever just sit there completely unable to think of any kind of title for a post?
So, I'm getting ready for the 19th Annual GLAAD Media Awards in San Francisco, which I'll be covering this evening for AfterElton.com/AfterEllen.com. KT is coming along to take pictures even though neither Lucy Lawless nor Renee O'Connor will be there (which, by the way, is COMPLETELY WRONG).
But as I was blow drying my hair (wasn't that a brilliant segue?), I realized I'd been ranting to myself about something.
I've tried hard not to give in to the Hillary-hate, for a few reasons. One, a couple (literally) of people I care about support her candidacy. I don't know why they do; we've made the decision not to discuss it, although when we did, I don't think any of us knew how long this thing would drag on. Two, I happen to believe with Yoda that hating hurts me more than the target of my hate, and I'm against hurting myself. Three, I'm sick to death of negative politics so I prefer not to engage in them.
The thing I was ranting about was prompted by a very nice, civil expression of opinion on the part of a black man that since Hillary Clinton is not, in his view, very feminist, certainly policy-wise no more supportive of women's rights than Obama or Edwards, white feminists must be supporting her because she's a woman.
And it was also prompted by the statements I've read (even though I try to avoid places where such things are said) that black people are only voting for Obama because he's black.
Well, newsflash for everyone: Both things are a load of crap. If all it took was being black to get the black vote, Alan Keyes would have gotten the black vote. And if all it took for women to support a candidate is that she be female, Elizabeth Dole would have gotten the women's vote.
Actually, if both those things were in fact true, Shirley Chisolm would have been our President a long time ago, which would have been fine with me. But I digress.
I'm white, so I won't speak to why black people support Obama. And although I'm a 49 year old white lesbian and a feminist, I can't speak to why older white feminists might support Clinton, because I don't understand it and thus, can't explain it. My issues with her were, from the beginning, that she represents the type of corporate "Republican-lite" version of liberalism that I feel has choked the life out of the progressive movement in this country for decades now -- which is exactly why I never voted for Bill Clinton, either.
Edwards and Obama, like Howard Dean, on the other hand, despite having that Y chromosome, represented a more populist political approach that more accurately reflects my lifelong values. And it is that approach that I feel will actually address the racial, gender, and class imbalances that are killing America, rather than just try to nudge the pendulum leftward for a little while.
Of course, the middle and working classes always do better under Democratic presidents, and the rich can take care of themselves, so I would of course rather see a Democrat, even a DLC Democrat, in the White House than a Republican. But when I do that math, it has nothing to do with gender or race. The first woman, the first black person -- those are SYMBOLS. They are meaningful and important, but in and of themselves, they aren't enough to earn my vote, nor, I believe, the vote of any thoughtful person.
So I suspect, although I don't know, that the number of white older feminists who are voting for Clinton just because she's a woman is as small as the number of black people who are voting for Obama just because he's black. Not zero, certainly, but absolutely not the driving force behind that choice.
Okay, must go pick out my shoes for tonight.




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