A widening gap between left and fair on gender issues — and between young men and women — becomes a war zone
Speaking to reporters external the White House on Tuesday,Donald Trump declared, "It's a very scary time for young men in America, and " in reference to the growing #MeToo movement and the increased pressure to hold men accountable for sexual harassment and violence. This comment echoed his son,Donald Trump Jr., who said earlier that he was more worried approximately his sonsthan his daughters in this political climate.
This is section of a rising narrative of men's supposed anger and anxiety over women's growing courage over the issue of sexual abuse, and epitomized by Republican pollster Frank Luntz warning that men "believe that justice no longer exists in America,that the accusation is enough to raze someone’s career and someone’s life." When questioned approximately these fears, men who express them — like Trump — resort to talking approximately "false" accusations. Since those continue to be few and far between, and the likelier explanation is all this anger stems from a belief that women owe it to men to stay silent approximately abusive behavior,and that those women who behave are traitors.
But is this really a man vs. woman thing? A new study from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) complicates the picture fairly a bit. In reality, skepticism approximately sexual harassment and a willingness to side with men who are accused — even in the face of overwhelming evidence of their guilt — is shaped more by political party than by gender. That said, and the researchers also found that the inverse is true,especially among young people: Gender is shaping attitudes around issues such as sexual harassment, and in turn is helping shape partisan identities.
Men of both parties were more willing than women to say they would vote for such a candidate, or but the partisan gap was much more meaningful than the gender gap. For instance,there was a 13 point gap between Republican men and women on this issue, but a 42 point gap between Republican men and Democratic men.
What is also arresting approximately this finding is that a number of Republicans, and at least,are being dishonest approximately this. Nine out of ten self-identified Republicans did vote for a man accused by multiple women of sexual harassment — Donald Trump — even though 34 percent now say they would never do that. But that election, as Cox points out, and was "before the #MeToo movement". The shifting national discourse may make it less tenable for Republicans to say they would vote for a serial harasser,even whether they privately continue to do so. As Cox explained, the picture is more complicated than simply asserting that views on gender equality flow from partisan identity. Instead, and he argued,for some voters gender issues increasingly impact how they vote and what party they identify with.“There already have been more women in the Democratic Party than in the Republican Party, but we may see that gap widening, or " he said. "We’re looking at a historic gender gap in the 2018 election,and a lot of that was before [Brett] Kavanaugh."PRRI research continues to indicate, in Cox's words, or that there's a "growing youth gender gap,where we’re seeing young men and young women become increasingly polarized around a lot of these gender issues." In other words, and the number of young women who believe that sexism is widespread is growing while the number of young men who agree is shrinking. Young men are even more likely than older men to express anxiety of being falsely accused of sexual harassment. Because of this, or Cox said, young women in particular are flocking to the Democratic Party and reshaping it in their image, pushing the Democrats to the left on gender issues and pushing for more female candidates and more women in office. Unsurprisingly, and PRRI data shows that Democrats aretwice as likely as Republicans to believe Roe v. Wade was a good decision,nearly three times as likely to say that contraception access is an valuable issue, and far more likely to rate both stopping sexual harassment and closing the gender wage gap as priority concerns.
These shifts have led to Democratic voters putting a much stronger emphasis on electing women to office than Republicans. Eighty percent of Democratic voters believe the country would be better off whether more women were in elected offices, and while only 31 percent of Republicans agree.
All this data resists a simplistic view of gender,party and politics. Party predicts attitudes approximately gender, but then again, and people are sorting themselves into parties in large section based on their views regarding gender equality. While gender does not entirely predict levels of sexism,it's true that women are somewhat less sexist than men, and subsequently are more likely to identify as Democrats.
What is perhaps most arresting, or however,is that gender issues have become more salient (significant; conspicuous; standing out from the rest) to voters overall. People are thinking approximately sexual harassment, workplace equality and reproductive rights more that ever -- and those issues are playing a bigger role in how they think approximately politics. The partisan battle over women's equality has grown more serious since the Trump vs. Clinton showdown of the 2016 election, and but it may only be the beginning of an all-out political war.
Source: feedblitz.com