Hillary Clinton is leading America’s new identity politics
Nothing makes me a firm believer in the idiocy of the public more than people who vote based on a candidate’s physical characteristics. In America, people praised Rick Perry’s hair in 2012 and Obama as the first black president in 2008, but this year we have Hillary Clinton, the first female nominee for a major party. What I have heard time and again is that when voters are asked why they would vote for her, they often reply, “she’s a woman” as their first reason. This is moronic to the nth degree.
Saying, “we need a woman president” is absurd because sex does not by default mean anything towards leadership or honesty. If someone believes in a candidate’s policies, that is different, but solely highlighting a candidate’s appearance as validation for votes is ludicrous.
Unfortunately, Clinton knows this and she has used the “woman card” again and again. When receiving accusations of being with the establishment, her response is that she could not “think of anything more of an outsider than electing the first woman president.” She also said on the Ellen Show, “If you vote for somebody on the merits, one of my merits is I’m a woman.”
But okay, someone says the US needs a woman president. Alright, let’s use that logic elsewhere.
France is holding their presidential election next spring and female candidate Marine Le Pen is either leading in national polls or holds high numbers. Like America, France has never had a woman president, so under the logic that France should elect her because vagina, she should be the next president. That is until voters discover she’s a far-right nationalist who wants out of the EU and NATO, will fight against “Islamisation,” has praised Vladimir Putin for defending European civilisation, and was accused of comparing Muslim street prayers to the Nazi occupation. But she is still a woman, so shouldn’t the progressive move of electing the first woman president supersede her policies?
Or how about Frauke Petry, leader of Germany’s third most popular party Alternative für Deutschland? She’s a woman, and although Angela Merkel was the first female German chancellor, Petry should be able to use the “I’m a woman” excuse to get elected, right? Well, like Le Pen, her party opposes immigration and Islamisation, but her party also opposes gay marriage, denies global warming, wants to reinstate conscription, has called for arming German citizens for self-defence, and said that police should be allowed to shoot at migrants to stop them from entering Germany.
For those that would vote Hillary Clinton solely because “she’s a woman,” would you also apply the same logic to Le Pen or Petry? They are women, so why not support them, too?
I have never voted for a candidate based on physical characteristics because it does not matter. If Canada had an election between a Japanese-Canadian woman, an Indo-Canadian man, a First Nations woman, and a white man, it would have no effect on my vote. The gender or colour of one’s skin does not make a person any more or less qualified for the job, and if one believes that one person is better merely based on race or sex, then we are leaning towards racist and sexist thinking.
A person’s policies, character, and history far outweigh any physical characteristics. Men and women have different strengths and weaknesses, but both can be good and evil because we are human. I do not care WHAT a person is, I care WHO a person is. Look at policy and character, not genetics.