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The weird thing about “what if Hillary never married Bill” thought experiments is that there are plenty of women of Hillary’s age, background, and general demeanor and none of them came within spitting distance of being president of the USA.
I think anyone who tells you that Hillary would have been bigger, more successful, had she not been held back by Bill is ignoring the fact that, without a man’s career to propel her into the public eye, she might never have been a contender in the first place.
I want to be very clear here that this is *not a criticism of Hillary or her skill set*. This is a recognition that throughout the second half of the twentieth century, many women needed the help of male family members to establish political careers *BECAUSE OF SEXISM*.
This also isn’t just a USA problem: it’s not uncommon for women who become the first female leader of their nation to achieve that role in part because they were someone’s daughter or wife.
This is focused on Asia but it bolsters that last point: it’s easier to break the glass ceiling when you have male relatives to pull you up on the other side. https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/a-daughter-a-sister-a-wife-asias-female-leaders/
Wild how much people want to ignore that pointing out that no woman has been president of the USA, and that the one who got closest was a former First Lady, is not saying that no women have achieved anything ever.
It’s also mostly men who seem deeply offended by this tweet? Kind of hilarious, but I guess you all prefer to pretend sexism doesn’t exist and that HRC did herself more harm than good by marrying Bill.
If Hillary hadn’t married Bill, I suspect she would have been able to remain far more uncompromised morally. I don’t think that morally uncompromised woman would have been in line to be elected president. Hell I don’t even know if she would have been a senator. Sexism sucks!
Also FWIW: this isn’t really “oh voters won’t support a woman who doesn’t have a famous male relative.” It’s that it’s vastly easier to get access to the fundraising and organizing infrastructure of a major party if a man deeply embedded in the system is rooting for you.
Further reading: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/11/clinton-woman-leader-world/506945/
There’s another piece from 2016 that more explicitly makes the case about having a politically well connected male relative being a pathway to success for female leaders, but I can’t find it unfortunately.
There’s another piece from 2016 that more explicitly makes the case about having a politically well connected male relative being a pathway to success for female leaders, but I can’t find it unfortunately.
