2008 Election
Goodbye, Hillary. Hello, New Feminism.
I can barely sleep tonight with all the anticipation for tomorrow morning’s concession speech. I don’t want to be too giddy because if the roles were reversed I’d be bitter and angry and hoping that the HRC peeps would be empathetic and sensitive to our side’s objectives. But I might (just might!) be halfway through a bottle of Savignon Blanc doing a little dance in my living room right now.
Amid her ardent supporters’ chants of “Denver! Denver!” and the whimsical goodbye commentaries of the pundits and surrogates who backed her as the primaries ended this week, Hillary Clinton’s refusal to concede the election and her borderline delusional instance on the relevance of her outdated, divisive brand of female empowerment was never so poignant.
It was sad to watch Hillary tarnish her great legacy as a leading Democrat in Tuesday’s speech by failing to acknowledge Obama’s victory; but the greater tragedy of her failed presidential bid is that she didn’t take the opportunity to acknowledge and embrace the arrival of a new feminism.
Women no longer live in an unrealistic competition-to-have-it-all model. For decades we’ve seen exhausted women sacrifice their sanity, health and self-esteem in a misguided quest to prove that there is some sort of unisex life experience where parenting and professional responsibilities take long walks on the beach and snuggle in bed. Hillary is a victim of this illusion herself, as those who accuse her of employing a coattails strategy that manipulated her husband’s success love to point out. In reality, she may have been the first stay-at-home mom to have her “experience” supporting her daughter and husband as First Lady legitimized and later touted as the central resume talking point of her campaign. But far more people frame her ascent to power through the former lense, making it about punishing Bill for his infidelity or her insatiable hunger for power.
This perception was avoidable had she dropped that rough-edged, beat the men at their “all-boys club of presidential politics” chip on her shoulder and taken a more transparent approach. Instead of remaining zip-lipped about Monica et al and acting as if we voters owed her this glorious and inevitable comeback, she could have earnestly reached out to the women who applauded her refusal to bake cookies during the 90s. Back then her formidable intelligence and strength impressed and buoyed all of us; now it fails to resonate.
Women now acknowledge that we are not the same creatures as men. Not only do we cry when high-stakes elections get tough, as my client, Dr. Louann Brizendine, wrote in her book, “The Female Brain,” the hormones and genes in our brains have biologically wired us to be more emotionally sensitive and in-tune with the feelings of others than are men. This capacity for responding to nuances is one of our greatest leadership and management tools, and Hillary seemed to hold it at arms length like a pair of smelly socks.
Perhaps it wouldn’t have taken so long to select our Democratic nominee if she’d never shed those tears in New Hampshire. If you flash back to that January day, when the usually stoic senator let down her I-Can-Be-Commander-in-Chief exterior in a Feminine Moment: It was then that the nation embraced her and revived her candidacy.
Race stepped into the spotlight when Barack Obama eloquently responded to Rev. Jeremiah Wright, but the corresponding conversation about gender only gained traction with her recent criticisms of media misogyny, coming 15 minutes late and sounding lame given the similar discriminatory context her opponent overcame. The subject was broached briefly after a November debate in Philadelphia, when the Hillary camp accused her male competitors of ‘piling on.’ The take-it-like-a-man backlash that followed proved that underscoring gender dynamics was not going to be an effective strategy, and we never saw a similar degree of scrutiny applied again. Maybe the lesson she should have taken from Obama’s playbook was that challenges of this nature must be met head-on because sweeping something obvious under the rug still means the floor is dirty.
Many of us still find ourselves faced with Hillary’s dilemma. We younger gals may take our birth control pills religiously in hopes that one of these sly guys at the bar on Saturday night won’t prevent us from actually using our degrees and decorating that corner office with our names on it, but we typically marry men who are three to four years older and more established in their careers, meaning we are the ones to pack up our desks when it’s time to move for a critical promotion. Then once we have babies, our female brains change forever into aggressively protective “C-suiteMommy Brains,” rewired by the hormones of pregnancy and giving birth. The main focus of our lives during the child-rearing years cannot be expected to be exclusively on professional achievements. That may come later in our careers, but not during the same years as child-rearing, as it does for men. The new feminism no longer requires that you deny your biological reality. We can still dream big, but choices, societal expectations, career paths and personal goal setting must be grounded in these evolutionary parameters.
What we saw in this election is what all women see: When you choose to delay the pursuit of your career, you’re gambling and you’d better be prepared to lose.
Despite that harsh reality, the good news is that Hillary didn’t lose because she is a woman. She lost because she was beat by an inspiring, once-in-a-lifetime leader who also faced considerable adversity. While misogyny did at times surface, the election should be largely viewed as a victory for the principle of American equality. For the small segment of the population that was uncomfortable with having a woman or black man serve as head of state, there were also a majority of Democrats who made a concerted effort to vote on experience and merit. Those who did showed bold leadership and sent an important message to those who embrace intolerance. For this, we should be proud that our nation has evolved and applaud both our candidates as we begin to reunite the Democratic party. We should also take this opportunity to learn from the missed opportunities of a complicated and bold woman, and begin a new conversation about the female experience. One that embraces the concepts of balance, partnership and possibility.
Discussion
6 comments for “Goodbye, Hillary. Hello, New Feminism.”
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[...] to break through glass ceilings. This comment was particularly incisive because it touches on the New Feminism that has prevailed in Obama’s victory and explains why some of us young women are not doing [...]
[...] to break through glass ceilings. This comment was particularly incisive because it touches on the New Feminism that has prevailed in Obama’s victory and explains why some of us young women are not doing [...]
I am a part of the younger generation and completely disagree with you and your views. The Female Brain was widely discredited by scientists, notably the prestigious journal Nature. So don’t write sweeping generalizations about women and how we feel. If these are your beliefs, have at it. But science and many other women do not agree.
Thank you for this article… I don’t agree with many of the things you said…this statement in particular:
“What we saw in this election is what all women see: When you choose to delay the pursuit of your career, you’re gambling and you’d better be prepared to lose.”
Hillary Clinton has never delayed her career and has always been someone searching for her feminist identity…. She has risen to the top of her political career this year… and I see no delay in her choice of timing… She chose to run as a man and not as a feminist woman and I blame her campaign staff more than the candidate… When she finally found her own voice, when it was obvious that she could not win on electoral votes, the “real” Hillary emerged… I don’t know if she told her staffers to frack off and she was going to do it her way… but if she had done this at the beginning of her campaign, it would be Hillary that I would be supporting…. a case of too much too late.
this blog is unfortunate. it very much mimics a line of thinking taken by women like katie roiphe and the iwf, cloaking anti-feminist beliefs underneath the label, *new feminism.* sadly, i think that your loose attention to sketchy facts renders you unqualified to reinvent the brand. a strong case can be made that hillary lost on her positions, missteps on the trail and campaign mismanagement. along these lines, there are many reasons why a woman would vote for barack–even a feminist. maybe they didn’t like her war vote or perceived loopholes in her healthcare plan. but please do the women who dedicate their lives to promoting gender equality a favor and rethink your position as a *feminist* talking head. your thoughts on women’s *evolutionary* confinements are incredibly backward and your goofy confessions don’t come off as smart. actually, they embarrass. (let’s hope you know how to deal with the *sly guys at the bar* before they get around to facing off with your preferred method of birth control!) nothing that you say here with regards to how women can or should be perceived is *new.*
If “new feminism” means not having to sacrifice yourself for the good of others and not having to suffer to live up to other people’s expectations, then I’m all for it.