I am a daughter, a woman and a mother

[Coexist]

and the freedoms I have been given by giants like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Margaret Sanger, Betty Friedan are immense.

However, the assertion that the pinnacle of the woman’s movement will be the election of Hillary Clinton as the President of the United States, and that is what I should fill my heart with, is wrong. A history making event - yes, but I want the woman I feel is right, not just a woman is right.

- Giving me the vote is giving me the option to vote or not vote – my right and my choice. My decision to make.

- Giving me reproductive choice is giving me the option become a parent (again) or not – my right and my choice. My decision to make.

- Giving me the choice enter politics or not is giving me the option to run if I choose – my right and my choice. My decision to make.

- Giving me the choice to enter the workforce in a managerial capacity or not is giving me the option to work hard and be rewarded if I choose – my right and my choice. My decision to make.

Choosing to not vote, choosing to have a baby, choosing not to run for office, choosing to stay home with my children – these are valid choices that women make.

Having the realistic choice to become a CEO does not mean that is what I have to shoot for – having that as a viable option is the freedom I want for myself and my daughter.

I am happy to have the choice to vote for a woman or a man. I will not vote for a candidate based upon shared sexual characteristics. That is not what women have fought for, have lost fortunes for, and have lost lives for.

Having the right to choose your path is freedom. I am free to choose, and I choose Barack Obama.

[K Gardner]

1. My fellow Obamaites are ON FIRE today ! Another excellent post :-) You say what

many, many of us who are women and mothers and professionals feel about this. Thank you :hi:

[Coexist]

3. thank you very much for your kind words!

:hi:

[Unbowed]

2. Well said.

It also bugs me to hear people talk like this is the only chance a woman has to be President of the United States in the foreseeable future. How could anyone possibly know or even say that?

It would be really nice if we were to get to a point where gender and race were not considered in the choosing of a candidate.

[formernaderite]

28. obviously hillary has a hitlist

and will be knocking off any other female contenders in the foreseeable future...lol
The reasoning behind needing to vote for hillary by some of these otherwise impressive women...is astounding.

[Unbowed]

49. LOL!

Yeah, it is astounding. With our country in the mess that it's in, you'd think that the welfare of our country would be a bit higher on the priority list than the gender of the next President.

[MoJoWorkin]

4. This mother and grandmother of all females agrees totally with you.

[fight4my3sons]

5. nicely said

:applause:

[Hepburn]

6. Yes!!!

Excellent post! I "came of age" in the 1960s...when a married woman in California legally could not own real property in her own name. I, too, want the RIGHT woman, not just a woman. IMO, Hillary Clinton is NOT the right woman.

Maybe the older females like me understand this expression: "She is one of them and not one of us." IMO, Hillary is one of them.

[VolcanoJen]

7. Lovely!! We are fired up and ready to go today!

Another great Obama post!

[Johnny__Motown]

8. Well, if you were a daughter and a mother but not a woman I would have been worried

Still, thank you for the post. It is nice to see a post about not voting simply based on gender. If I had posted this I would have been called sexist.

[Triana]

9. Very well-written post. I'm undecided but get sick of the notion that..

...we - as women - ought to vote for Clinton because she's a woman - or that if we DO support her and have decided we'll vote for her - then it's just because she's a woman. Besides the rampant and disgusting sexist remarks made about Clinton both here on DU and in the media, this is another thing that bothers me in this election.

The third is the utter worship at Obama's feet. I like him, he'd make a good President. But the worship thing is a concern to me and it is unrealistic. He has faults, his policies, background and record are certainly not without fault. Neither is Clinton's.

I have compared her policies, record, and where she stands on the ISSUES to Obama's and THOSE THINGS are what are important to me, not what gender she is or color he is.

I supported Edwards first, because I thought he was simply the best choice for the job. It had nothing to do with his gender or race. He's out, I'm undecided. I may be undecided right up until the GE - but I get sick of people TELLING me that I 'hate" Clinton or that I "hate" Obama or that I would vote (or should vote) for her because she's female or him because he's God or perfect or a rock-star or has "charisma" or whatever. (I could care less about charisma).

There IS a choice here - two very good choices IMO - that's what makes it tough to choose! But I don't want someone - anyone - TELLING ME who I oughtta choose and why - or if I make a decision - WHY I chose that person. THAT is for ME to say, not anyone else. THAT is what choice and freedom is about.

I GET TO SAY who and WHY I choose - not someone else. And I value that right and always have - and I get really rankled when anyone tries to define it for me - or take it away from me as woman - and as a voter. GRRR!

[ExtraGriz]

14. Nicely said Triana

:-)

[Olney Blue]

31. great post

[Maddy McCall]

10. You must have the misconception that you should vote for a woman because you're a woman.

No one thinks that. Or at least I don't.

But, as a mother, woman, daughter, it should bother you that so many sexist insults are hurled at Hillary because of her gender.

[rosesaylavee]

43. The sexist insults bother me. I particularly dislike the attacks on Chelsea.

And the racist insults hurled at Obama sicken me. As just recently deciding on who to vote for in my primary last week, I find the two factions to be unneccesarily polarizing the troops here. I don't understand it frankly. We have this great opportunity to discuss the programs of both candidates and perhaps band together to get them both to agree to some of the great ideas of candidates who have dropped out... but we spend too much of our time slinging mud, doing the work of the rethuglicans.

Not so much a rant at you but I just had to vent a bit I guess. I don't expect a cumbya session by any means. But just an assumption that we are all here to support the democratic ideal would be a good basis to start communication.

[Avalux]

11. Woo Hoo! Your words ring true to me and I applaud you.

I have a choice as well and I choose to pick the candidate I believe is best to lead this country. I choose Barack Obama.

I want more than anything to elect a woman president but Hillary is not the right woman.

[Skidmore]

12. This mother and grandmother of daughters agrees heartily with you.

The candidate needs to be right for the times.

[Auntie Bush]

13. May I ask who said it wasn't your choice to choose a woman/Hillary or a

black/Obama? Why are you making up some ridiculous argument and then going about defending your own argument?

By the way...reminding or persuading women to vote for a woman is in no way denying you of your chance to vote anyway way you want. What's that got to do with giving you and your daughter freedom?

Be my guest...vote for Obama...but I will vote for the only possible female president in my lifetime and that's a right I have because this is a free country and I have the right to vote for whomever I want because I care about setting an example for my daughter. So there.......Think about it?

[jenmito]

17. Ask the women who called Oprah a "traitor" for not voting for a woman. There are other examples,

too, of course. Did you vote for or did you support Carol Mosely-Braun?

[Auntie Bush]

23. Oprah can't help but be a traitor by your scenario.

If she votes for Obama she is a traitor to woman and if she votes for Hillary she is a traitor to her race. Maybe the woman who called Oprah a traitor is stupid. Does that deprive you in any way of your freedom to vote? This is just a plain ridiculous post.

[jenmito]

26. It's not MY scenario. And it's not just one woman. It was all over the news that MANY women

were angry with her for "betraying Hillary" for campaigning for Obama instead of a woman. Wake up. And DID you support Carol Moseley-Braun?

[NastyRiffraff]

15. I, too, am a daughter, woman and mother

I, too, am delighted with the fact that I can choose, in this context any candidate, for any reason.

I choose to support Hillary. There are those who say that the only reason I support her is because she's a woman. Is that a factor in my decision? Of course it is. Is it the only, or even the main, reason I support her. No, not even close.

I know many Blacks who do not support Obama, for many reasons. Some do, and they support him for reasons other than race.

I, too, have freedom, just as you do. And that is precious, and hard-fought. We stand on the foundation of many great women who fought for our natural rights. It wasn't that long ago, that although we had the right to vote, that women were expected to vote with their husbands.

I'd like this meme about if you're a woman, and vote for Hillary, that's your only issue, to go away. That's the opposite of freedom, and demeans ALL women, not just those of us who are voting for a candidate who happens to be a woman. (And yes, we're loving it.)

[Maddy McCall]

18. Excellent post.

Really deserves an OP on its own, so more people can read it.

:thumbsup:

[NastyRiffraff]

24. Thanks! Did the OP, with minor changes to make sense as a standalone

Used up one of my three OPs, too! (JK...I rarely start a thread, so that's a non-issue for me.)

[Maddy McCall]

25. Good!

:hug:

[sickinohio]

47. To a republican they still

expect their wife to vote with them, as do the evangelicals. Their attitude is that the man rules the household, therefore, their wife must be the good little woman and do as they say. The problem is, the wife obliges. You can see that by just watching Xanax Laura (I don't think she has ever had a mind of her own), and by watching Mitt's wife standing behind him while they were on the campaign trail looking like she is in some kind of zombie-like state, as does Huckabee's wife. Those are just a couple examples that I can think of. Pretty sad, actually.

[ProgressiveMuslim]

16. I think for many, neither race nor gender play much of a role in deciding -- that's progress! nt

[Yavin4]

19. It Aint The Gender...It's The Policies

To prove this, which candidate do you think would be much better for women in general, Howard Dean or Condi Rice?

[Captain Hilts]

20. I'm a member of the Falopian Forest and I'm voting for her for foreign policy reasons.

It's neat she's female, but that's only a part of it.

Don't dislike Obama, in fact, I'd vote for Michelle before Hillary and Barack.

[paperbag_ princess]

21. Of course you have the right to vote as you see fit

If you don't think Hillary is qualified to be a good president or won't be a good president then you should not vote for her ...ever.

Do you really think though that the rights that you now have came because people before you had your attitude...that it was not neccessary to support and promote women? Do you really think that for generations women did not intentionally back other women?(and of course good men backed women)

You only feel that you have the luxury to vote for anyone you want because others before you did not have that luxury....they pushed and broke down doors

If you feel that we have gone far enough in society then that is that....but I disagree...I am not going to stop pushing until women represent approximately 50% of power positions in this nation.

I owe that to those who came before me and those women who will follow...

[desertflamingo]

46. EXCELLENT POST!!

thank you. couldn't have said it better myself.

[davsand]

22. Amazing how stupid we are all supposed to be, isn't it?

We are either supposed to vote based on our genitals or our pigmentation levels...

How far have we really come as a society that this kind of stuff even comes up?

I'm an Obama supporter and have been since his Senate Primary race. All it took for me was hearing him speak at a local Dem dinner and then talking with him for a while. I was ready to march to the gates of hell for him then and I still am.

He delivered up health care for ALL kids in Illinois at a time when the Illinois legislature was dominated by the GOP. He also began a reform of our criminal justice laws and managed to put a stop to police beating the confessions out of people in this state (which WAS going in.) Obama has a unique ability to make conservatives see "progressive" ideas as the sensible and right thing to do.

We need that dearly at a national level.


Laura

[Laurab]

34. I really wish this was an OP .

I don't think I've seen another post anywhere near as good or as personal as this one, telling people things that Obama has actually done. If I could recommend it, I would. I get so tired of the "empty suit" and all the other stupid things people say about him.

The rest of the post is excellent as well - please consider posting it as an OP - it's the kind of thing we need more of, IMO.

[rosesaylavee]

45. I agree that this would be a great OP... please consider.

I think it would be great to have a positive post about what Obama has done.

[davsand]

51. Thank you to you both. I did post it as an OP.

It has pretty much vanished into the purgatory of GDP:


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4628964&mesg_id=4628964

Again, thank you to you both for being nice.


Laura

[rosesaylavee]

52. Not so vanished...

It's made it to the Greatest Page. Thanks for posting it.

[KaryninMiami]

27. Lovely - well stated and thank you! K&R

(and "hearted")

[Coexist]

30. thank you!

[ShortnFiery]

29. Outstanding! Thank-you for such a well written commentary.

:thumbsup: :hi:

[TheDoorbellRang]

32. Absolutely!

I feel pretty confident in saying that there's not a Hillary supporter on DU that is voting for her just because she's a woman, nor an Obama supporter voting for him just because he's ethnically mixed. Even tho we may disagree in our personal choice for a candidate, by God we've all got cogent reasons why we support one or the other. The media demeans all of us with these broad (pun intended) generalizations. I am not a woman voting for a woman or an African American, I am a voter voting for the candidate I feel to be best qualified.

Reading this reminded me of a political discussion I remember overhearing in my youth. Remember Warren Harding, he of the Teapot Dome scandal? Some of my older relatives were discussing it, and one said that of course he was elected shortly after women got the vote, and all the women had voted for him because he was so good-looking -- underlying message was that women were just too frivolous to vote. So here we are almost 100 years later, and again we have the assumption by the media that women don't think deeply about their choice of candidate. It's beyond irritating.

[Coexist]

36. what a great analogy.

Ann Coulter still thinks we shouldn't have the vote!

[housewolf]

33. You said it!

The women's movement is about CHOICE, not about sisterhood. It's about each person being able to make the choices that she/he this is right for them and for the country, not based on gender or race or any other sort of grouping.

Thanks for a great post! I'm with you.

[cooolandrew]

35. Your supprt for Barack is warmly welcome, with a strong woman at his side like Michelle, he wouldn't

even think of leaving any women's issues neglected.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

37. So Basically, You're Giving A Righteous Rant To An Argument That Doesn't Truly Exist?

Why do people just make up positions as if they are prevalent in reality, and then go off and rant about them as if they had actually been real?

This whole "vote for Hillary because she's a woman" is such NOT a real issue in this race, except by people who want to pretend it is so that they can have something to rally against.

[Coexist]

38. oh, it exists

feminists have been railed against for supporting Obama, Oprah was called a traitor, and the OP was my response to another OP that suggested that parents of daughters should consider supporting Hillary because of their daughters.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article3216586.ece

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/02/08/chris_matthews/index_np.html


Teddy Kennedy is a traitor for not supporting a woman

http://www.nownys.org/pr_2008/pr_012808.html

I started responding to the OP, but felt a bit of a rant in me, so I chose to use one of my precious three OPs to get it off my chest.

Thanks for the concern, though.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

41. No, It Doesn't Really Exist.

Sure, you could cherry pick a few examples of fringe people who have said it, but exceptions don't make the rule. 99% of this campaign has had NOTHING to do with that, so to go off on a righteous rant to get your accolades, as if the issue had consumed a significantly greater percentage of the debate than it has, is just a bit silly, even if in response to another thread. It really should've probably been responded to in the thread itself, but no biggie really. But when it comes down to it, your OP is a bit overdramatic of a response to the real significance of the issue, since it responds to the issue as if it had been a prevalent one or one that has permeated the campaign throughout. But it really hasn't and it really isn't. It's been an issue of exception, spoken by only a relative few. Like I said though; no real biggie. I just always get a kick out of it a bit. (making mountains out of molehills)

[TheDoorbellRang]

42. I think we saw the problem with letting memes like this go unaddressed

with the swiftboaters vs. Kerry. I think all the garbage memes start out in the fringe element -- testing the waters of believability -- and if a certain element of the populace falls for it then there's a full frontal attack. I've already gotten a lot of "aren't you supporting Hillary? But you're a woman!" from some of my acquaintances who should know better.

[Evergreen Emerald]

39. what a shame you are looking at the issues so superficially

And what a shame you are so easily swayed with pretty words and a nice looking empty suit.

Women still have so far to go.

[Coexist]

40. what a shame you assume so much about me

without knowing me at all.

[RBInMaine]

44. Awesome Post. THANKS!! GO OBAMA !!

[VotesForWomen]

48. guess african americans didn't get the meme, cuz they are voting overwhelmingly for O.

what's up with that? are they just voting for the black candidate? would it be wrong if they were, assuming that he was a qualified candidate? are you against affirmative action? just saying, because it seems to me that a lot of women are very anxious to let people know that they're *not* voting for hillary, as if they want to reassure people that they're not feminists. it's not surprising; susan b. anthony et.al. faced the same kind of resistance from women, as did every women's rights advocate who came after them.

[Barack_America]

50. I love hearing from my fellow FREE WOMEN!

Excellent post.