Opinion: Men of America, get over yourselves

I’m a 62-year-old cisgender male (just learned the meaning of that from my kids a few years ago). I came of age in the late 20th-century metrosexual era in New York City (still not exactly sure what that term means). I’ve always been comfortable with my masculinity (another vague, confusing term), but unlike many men my age (or younger), I probably have as many close female friends as I do male ones.

Enough about me. What I’d really like to explore here is the state of gender relations in America on the cusp of an epochal presidential election in less than two weeks. A recent piece in The New York Times, titled “Why gender may be the defining issue in this election,” got my mind racing as I read it at the breakfast table.

It made me realize that the 2024 election is not a rerun of 2020, but actually 2016, when the electoral college outcome illustrated that many Americans – including 46% of women – preferred an untested, misogynistic, insult-spewing, narcissistic candidate to a woman who had vast experience in political leadership and on the world stage.

Vice President Kamala Harris is very similar to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in ideology, experience, competence and worldview. She’s had four years to learn the presidency up close, like Hillary did for eight years in the White House in the late 1990s. She has proven her intelligence and competence in various elected roles her whole professional life, and if she were a man, she’d be lauded by everyone for her impressive résumé rather than viciously criticized for some of her liberal policies or political mentors.

America – even in 2024 – is still a third-world country in its backward view of women and their abilities to lead. Only 10% of Fortune 500 companies are led by women, and only 24% of governors in America are women. The U.S. Senate is only one-quarter female, and the House of Representatives is only marginally better with women making up 28% of members of Congress.

Contrast these sad statistics with this international honor roll of female leadership: in the UK, Margaret Thatcher was elected prime minister in 1979 (45 years ago!); in Israel, Golda Meir was elected prime minister in 1969 (55 years ago!); in India, Indira Gandhi was elected to lead her country in 1966 (58 years ago!); and in Africa, the first female head of state, Liberia’s Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, was elected in 2006, almost two decades ago.

I am not advocating that we elect Harris merely because she is a woman. There are a myriad of other reasons to vote for her, and there are an almost infinite number of reasons to vote against her male opponent.

But think of this: for all those who believe the world is in terrible shape, what is the gender of the leaders of Russia, Iran, North Korea? What about Israel and Ukraine? And how many terrorist organizations have had female leaders?

How many fossil fuel and climate-polluting companies are led by women? If you had the letters NONE on your Bingo card you can advance to the next round.

Because former President Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance have former professional wrestlers ripping their shirts off at their testosterone-fueled rallies, I can only guess that they’re leaning into dominating the male vote. And not to be too reductive and demeaning, but if you’re a young or old man voting for Trump because this appeals to you or because you’re afraid that a woman is too emotional or weak to be leader of the free world, I have only two words for you: WAKE UP!

It’s 2024 and thousands of years since Neanderthals ruled the earth. Every one of you men surely had a mother who guided you for at least 18 or more years; many of you have married at least one woman who has sustained and taken care of you in your adulthood; a large percentage of you have sisters who probably had strong influences on your life; and a large subset of you are fathers of daughters whose future is at stake on Nov. 5.

Your support of Donald Trump in the past has already denied many of your daughters of their bodily autonomy with the overturning of Roe v. Wade; you have already indicated you can support a man who has been convicted of sexual assault – and that could’ve been your wife, sister or daughter if they had gotten in Trump’s crosshairs the past five decades. 

Can you really look your mother, wife, sister, aunt or daughter in the eye and say that Donald Trump will make their future better than Kamala Harris would?

I think part of the definition of masculinity is being the kind of human who doesn’t judge people based on gender. It means being secure in who you are, what you believe in and who you are willing to support to safeguard your family and community.

For me, the proud father of three daughters in their 20s, it also means enthusiastically casting my vote for Harris next month. Forty-six men, including slaveholders, philanderers, warmongers and corrupt officeholders, have had their turn.

Now, it’s time for a woman to clean up our mess. 

The future of America is at least half female. Time to embrace it.