Lena Welch ‘20
Teen Romance Editor
Thursday afternoon, the Feminist Legal Forum (FLF), Law Democrats, American Constitution Society, Virginia Law Women, and If/When/How invited UVA Professor Jennifer Lawless to explore the role of gender in the current election cycle. FLF Presidents Eliza Schultz ’21 and Jolena Zabel ’21 moderated the conversation with Professor Lawless.
“There's so much going on in this election cycle, and so much is at stake, so we wanted to create a space for people to unpack its gender dynamics,” Schultz said. “We wanted to hear a smart person answer questions about how the #MeToo movement is affecting this race, what sacrifices come with pursuing the vote of disaffected white men (and whether those sacrifices are worth it), and how sexism and other forms of bigotry are affecting the media we consume about the election.”
Professor Lawless, who is an expert on gender and politics with six books to her name, including Women on the Run: Gender, Media, and Political Campaigns in a Polarized Era, described the challenge of a political scientist during national campaigns.
“The reason that all of these questions are so hard to analyze at the presidential level and are way easier at the congressional level is because at the congressional level every election cycle you have about 450 races where you can sort of see what patterns are,” Professor Lawless said. “At the presidential level, everything could potentially be seen as sexism or racism or explained away.”
Over the course of the conversation, Professor Lawless made distinctions between when data and patterns support gender as a factor compared to when sexist comments or actions take place without any real effects on a campaign.
“Whether sexism is ultimately consequential or determinative of votes is a lot harder to measure. At least in terms of outcomes, it doesn’t look like it is. But it could be that women have to endure comments like this [Chris Matthews’s treatment of Senator Elizabeth Warren] more frequently than male candidates on the campaign trail.”
However, when it comes to showing anger or electability, the gender of the candidates does not make much difference in reality. According to Professor Lawless, the most important factor when it comes to a candidate demonstrating anger is authenticity. As long as a candidate does not cross a line or seem fake in his or her outrage, voters are unlikely to punish a candidate more based on gender. And when it comes to electability, Professor Lawless does not care much for the conversation or the word.
"Well, the first thing I would note is that a woman did beat Donald Trump. So in 2016, Hillary Clinton received more votes than Donald Trump did. Now, this is not to say that we should throw out the electoral college and it's terrible, but there are these general reactions that, 'Well, there's no way a woman could get elected; voters aren't ready to vote for a woman.' The empirical evidence is just not true."
For virtually every question, Professor Lawless cited empirical data in her response, challenging perceptions of those in the room as well as those held by many American voters.
“She's funny, she's sharp, and she knows her stuff,” Schultz said of Professor Lawless. “She talked less about her own opinions and more about the data that explain the phenomena we're witnessing.”
Schultz, Zabel, and Professor Lawless all noted that gender as a whole seems to be less of the focus of the 2020 campaign compared to 2016. Professor Lawless suggested that the need for novelty is what drives the conversation. Hillary Clinton’s cracking of the glass ceiling by earning the Democratic nomination made history. She also incorporated gender much more into her rhetoric and campaign. Nevertheless, Americans still have a tendency to focus on the failures of female candidates.
“There are a bunch of male candidates that never made it on to the debate stage, never garnered any real attention, and we didn't really talk about their lack of success,” Professor Lawless said. “But because women are still relatively an anomaly when it comes to presidential politics, when a woman emerges as a candidate, we sort of fixate on her and her electoral fortune.”
With Senator Amy Klobuchar ending her campaign four days after this conversation, the Democratic field has only one woman left, but Professor Lawless stated that this winnowing process does not seem to be gendered. She did, however, lament the lack of racial diversity of the remaining candidates.
“For a stage that started out as the most diverse stage we’ve ever seen, to wind up looking, race-wise, the way it looks right now, suggests that probably something’s going on. However, the one complicating factor is Joe Biden’s track record and ability to resonate with the African-American community in a way that most candidates cannot.”
By the time this article is published, Super Tuesday will be over, and we may have an even better idea of who the Democratic nominee will be, but these conversations will continue to be important.
“We wanted people to be able to ask questions and engage with each other,” Schultz said. “I spend a lot of time on Twitter and it isn't the safest, happiest place to engage in political discussions, so we wanted to create that space for people.”
The FLF Presidents also said, “We hope people organize for the candidates who share their vision for a more equal future while holding those same candidates to account and calling them out where necessary and not just in issues relating to sexism. We have some power in pushing candidates to be as inclusive and anti-racist as possible, and we should use it.”
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lw8vd@virginia.edu