Over at FoxNews, they have a commentary ranting about how awful it is that women like Obama more than Romney. The article starts off with just simple statistics. Women in general give Obama a moderate lead of about 9%. And it's worst amongst educated women where Obama holds a lead of nearly 60%. Ouch.
Obviously the writer thinks this is a huge problem and admits that the GOP has a "very big problem when it comes to female voters." And then she proceeds to miss the point entirely.
Instead of inquiring at all about why this might be, she lays the blame not at the feet of the GOP, but at the feet of women themselves; they're too stupid to figure out why they should vote Republican.
The argument is that Obama protects their
And that's where the commentary on women leaves off. It doesn't stop to consider that they might actually need that protection because as much as feminism might be about being independent, it's rather hard to do anything independently when you've had your rights to control your own body and financial independence stripped.
It doesn't stop to realize that domestic abuse against women is exceptionally high which is why we need the Violence Against Women act.... which Republicans are trying to repeal.
It doesn't stop to consider that women are raped an order of magnitude more than men and that we need to recognize the extent of ways in which this occurs.... which has Republicans trying to redefine rape to exclude many forms.
It doesn't stop to realize that women are disproportionately paid less than men for the same jobs which is why we need the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.... which Republicans are trying to repeal.
It doesn't stop to realize that women have legitimate medical conditions which birth control is the most effective method of treatment which is why we need the Affordable Care Act.... which Republicans are so busy trying to repeal, they can't seem to get anything else done.
But according to this author, it's not the GOP that gives women legitimate reasons to distrust them. It's Obama.
Why? All of their arguments rest on the idea that Obama hurts women business owners. We'll pretend that's true for a moment, but note that the article doesn't say "hurts women business owners more than men". The author tries to make a gender issue out of something that's not in an effort to distract from issues that actually are rooted in gender. Which might just be why those darn educated women flee the GOP.
It's pathetic and childish of the author to try something like this. But then again, that's about all the right wing can manage: Missing the point and misdirection.
2 comments:
I'm a female business owner and the reasons women support Obama are things that make it possible for me to have my business. It would be much more difficult for me to run a business if I wasn't allowed control over my own body (I don't want to be a parent plus I have medical reasons for BC so I'm not incapacitated 3-5 days out of a month anymore), it would be difficult to impossible to run my business if I was a victim of domestic violence or sexual assault.
It wasn't that long ago that women couldn't get a loan or credit on her own, husbands were automatically given their wife's paycheck (sometimes even made out in his name not hers), couldn't buy or rent a home without a male cosigner, education for women was considered pointless and a woman in college was assumed to be working on her MRS not a degree to further a career. The attitudes of some Republicans seems to be that they would be happy to go back to that time and that is incredibly scary to me.
So....when all these barefoot and pregnant women without jobs, voices or rights are left by their useless, right-winged GOP husbands, I wonder who is gonna support these women and children out on the streets? Or are the good 'ol boys just gonna sit around and watch them rot?
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