What's sexism got to do with it

Lately it's been very en vogue to see Hillary Clinton's failings as a sign that sexism is dooming her candidacy. Certain local bloggers have in fact asserted that it is proof positive that racism is less powerful in our culture than sexism. But I found it terribly sexist when the Clinton campaign was assuming that she would win in large part because female voters would be unable to overcome their estrogen and would reflexively vote for Clinton--even if they're Republicans, Mark Penn said! As though we don't vote on issues, don't make decisions carefully and independently, and would immediately fall in line like the homogenous Chick Borg everyone presumes us to be. But a funny thing happened on the way to the female-fueled nomination...

This article from today's Boston Globe sums it up perfectly: many of us women voters just don't like Hillary Clinton. It's not sexism, it's not a weakness of female voters, it's human nature. We want to like our president, even if likeability is not the best measure of whether someone will be able to lead effectively. I know, I know, people liked George W. Bush too and look where that got us. I know. But as someone who has spent the last 7 years wanting to punch our president in the face every time I see him on television, I cannot overestimate the importance of having our next one be someone who I can actually stand to listen to for an hour at a time if something important is happening. When I see Hillary Clinton during the debates and she says something ugly or does her strange fake cackle, I see red. I want to turn off the television lest I commit violence. I do not like her, and no amount of softening or crying or appearances on Saturday Night Live are going to change that.

As the author notes, having a problem with someone's likeability is not an inherently sexist proposition:

Questioning a woman's tone and delivery evokes charges of sexism, of biased preoccupations with niceness - as if no one ever complained about the Bob Dole snarl or the Dick Cheney sneer. How many times do we have to hear that when women get forceful, they are called shrill and angry, while bellicose males are lauded as strong and presidential? We get it. No one has questioned Senator Clinton's toughness, or her readiness to be commander in chief.

Many male candidates have been rejected because they were not likeable. Richard Nixon lost once because he was perceived as less likeable, then won in his second attempt...and turned out to be a collossal asshole. Al Gore's loss in 2000 could be blamed almost entirely on the public's negative reaction to him during the debates and the public perception that he was self-aggrandizing. Mitt Romeny's loss this year was probably in large part because people found him unauthentic and snide. Pointing out the likeability deficit as a problem for a candidate is not sexist. Disliking a particular candidate because of their personal tone and style is a natural human reaction and has nothing to do with sexism.

Frankly, asserting that every rejection of her as a candidate has sexist undertones is further exacerbating the problem. It reinforces the old canard used by throwback opponents of feminism that women are always embracing victimhood for personal gain. If you cry wolf by finding sexism in every defeat, without showing that it's actually at work, you weaken the cause of those who have to fight real sexism every day. Hillary Clinton is losing because she is running a bad campaign and because she is a candidate with an unfortunately tumultuous past relationship with the American public. It's not because anyone has questioned whether she could run an army or manage a national crisis because she's a girl. But if she doesn't stop asserting that every disadvantage she finds herself in during this campaign is rooted in sexism, she's going to continue to lose women voters at a fast clip. We don't, in my experience anyway, tend to react well to whiners.