This is one of the single questions that confounds many of us that have been involved in the women’s movement. While we are working within the business realm and the community to move the topic of equality, there are women that are hell bent on returning life to the 1940’s and 50’s. We cannot understand why they have a desire to hold women back or why, as conservatives, they see themselves and other women as second class citizens. Almost everyone knows women like this, they vote Republican down the line, a party that continues to do everything that they can to demonstrate their anti-women ideologies.

I have fought for women’s rights via demonstrating on the street and in the boardrooms. In the past, I assumed that women that vote Republican were simply those that were accustomed to living life as a doormat or worse, they suffered from Stockholm Syndrome. Since these women are diversely opposite of everything that I have devoted my life to, I spent little time associating with them. However, the 2016 Presidential election changed all of this as there is a large swath of mostly white women that came forward to support Trump, even though he had a platform based on hate, racism, bigotry and sexism. This brought the topic forward to a startling moment and created a situation where I finally had to examine the question.

I know a few women that consistently vote conservative, and of course, politics is never part of our conversation. Some are from wealthier families, having attended college that was paid for by their parents, while others are from middle class families. This combination of demographics is important as we cannot point to a single income base that might explain why women would support a party that does everything to push them down in society. It goes without saying that some of these women make their political affiliations based on family history while others vote based on what their husbands choose. For those of us that are independent thinkers, the latter goes against the grain of our core beliefs. Not only would I never give up my personal agenda simply because of my husband’s political stand, but if his was that drastically different from mine, it would be a deal breaker in our relationship.

You need only Google the subject of voting for Trump causes breakups and divorces to see an array of articles. There are also other articles that are indicating that for those that are dating, a conservative vote for a known hater and sexist is the cause for not continuing any relationship. This cascades beyond just romantic situations and extends into friendships and family as well. I cover this in my article: Lost Friends and Family Due to Trump: This isn’t Political….It’s Personal

So why, in this age, do women vote for a party that refuses to offer any sense of equality and instead makes every attempt to control their income, bodies and health?

Image Source: Reason

One Answer Seems to Be: Religion

A Slate article addressed this question head on when they included some interesting data:

“A new poll from Public Policy Polling is making headlines this week because it reveals that 57 percent of Republican primary voters want to make Christianity the national religion, even though doing so would require removing the First Amendment from the Constitution. Even more interestingly, the data shows a stark gender divide among Republicans polled on this question: 66 percent of Republican women versus 49 percent of Republican men would like to see America become more theocratic.

Overall, the data suggests that there may be an intriguing gender divide when it comes to the motivations of Republican voters, with results showing men to be more motivated by economic reasons and women drawn to conservative politics for more religious and social reasons. Other interesting gender gaps: Men are nearly twice as likely as women to identify themselves as “Tea Party”; 73 percent of Republican men refuse to accept that climate change is real, compared with 57 percent of Republican women; and Republican men are actually more likely than Republican women to accept evolutionary theory, with 43 percent of men versus 30 percent of women expressing a belief in evolution. Since climate change denialism is more tied up in anti-environmentalist sentiment and evolution denialism is primarily about religion, this divide makes perfect sense.”

It appears that women are more likely to align themselves with religious extremism, specifically those that profess that they are “Christians”, and this belief system refuses to adopt such topics as science, education and even equality as part of a social norm. They cling to old-school concepts of the family unit with the male as head of the household, with the role of women as obedient and subservient. They take their Bible verbatim and run the gamut from what we might refer to as rational Christians all the way to the extremist evangelicals.

These are often women that have little knowledge of the truth in history as to how our forefathers founded the country and seem to think that the United States is a “Christian nation”, even though the founders refused to include that doctrine and emphasized separation of Church and state.

One of the most shocking of these revelations was during the Alabama Senate race when white evangelical women came forward in support of Roy Moore, a known pedophile and sexual offender. Their willingness to vote for such a horrible candidate exists in their belief that he was better than the Democratic candidate, whose platform included a pro-choice agenda. What this says about these women is that they believed sexual assault on children was “ok with them” as compared to someone that supported a woman’s right to choose.

Image Source: Pinterest

Republicans Line Up in Support — No Matter What

Another aspect of conservatism, specifically in the Republican Party, is that while Democrats will call out their representatives to make them accountable and even refuse to vote for those that have negative histories, Republicans will vote down the line, no matter how bad their candidate is. Women who vote Republican tend to view the overall actions of the party in a different light, seeing the bigger picture and ignoring the fact that their own Party demeans their gender.

In a Washington Post article they say:

“Kelly Dittmar, a political-science professor and scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University’s Eagleton Institute of Politics, said the recent criticism of white women voters is ‘embedded with the biases of more progressive women.’

‘Some of those expressing concern and confusion about why women identify with the Republican Party are really asking why these women don’t seem to identify with other women who view Republican policies as problematic for women.’”

The article continues with:

Women, just like men, tend to vote based on their party affiliation and ideology, and Dittmar said it’s wrong to assume these women don’t know what they’re doing. For some women, free markets, smaller government and curbing abortion ‘is pro-women. They see that as particularly helpful to women and families, so it doesn’t seem to stand in contrast to voting for somebody from that party.’

[ While Democrats call for resignations, conservative women stand by colleagues accused of sexual misconduct ]

Another very important portion of the article:

“Jane Junn, a professor of political science and gender studies at the University of Southern California, said political scientists also should take a more intersectional approach to their study of women voters. She said that the Democratic Party is winning the gender gap because of the disproportionate support from women of color, particularly black women.

In a paper published earlier this year, she made the argument that white women’s political behavior could be shaped more by their race than their gender.

‘The Republican Party is the party of white people,” Junn said in an interview, noting that the Democratic Party’s base has become more and more diverse. It’s not unreasonable to think that just like men, white women in the South and Rust Belt states also would conclude, ‘Wait a minute, this isn’t my party anymore.’”

Just as anything in politics, the subject of why women vote for a political situation that continues to undermine their own very existence is a bit more complicated than one might think. It appears that analysts indicate that it has a lot to do with the fact that the Republican Party is a group of “white people” combined with the supposed “Christian” belief system that they have created. I refer to these people as “pseudo-Christians”, as they cherry pick what they want from their Bible to validate what they want to believe.

When it comes to talking to some of these women you might be shocked at their responses to daily life. In some cases they think that women in the workplace is taking a job that a man should hold to support their families. Others think that it’s ok for a woman to work until they have children and then they should stay at home. Still others support a rather bizarre belief system where they value male children in the family and not the female children. I admit, speaking with these women is like being thrown back to the 17th century! Their ideas of “wifely duties” transcends anything that is the real world today.

Image Source: InHeadline

Are Republican Women Finally Waking Up?

The 2017 Women’s March represented millions of people in the U.S. and around the globe that are standing up against Trump and the horrid Republican representation in our country. It was indicated that 1 in every 100 Americans participated in the protest and for every individual that was physically there, others that couldn’t make it were there in spirit of support.

These people, both women and men, represent the more liberal views, but it seems that there are some Republican women that are indicating that they also have had enough of their party. In a Newsweek article they cover this topic:

“College-educated women are increasingly abandoning the “damaged” Republican Party as part of a backlash against President Donald Trump and the party’s backing of an alleged child molester for Senate — and the shift could mean big trouble for Republican candidates in the midterms.

Democrats in Congress currently boast a 20-point lead over Republicans with women and an even larger 32-point lead among college-educated women, according to a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll conducted December 13–15 [2017].”

The article also includes:

“The sexual misconduct allegations against Trump, of course, didn’t matter much in the 2016 election. Trump still managed to win with 53 percent of white women’s vote. But with the #MeToo movement in full swing across the country — and now in Capitol Hill — the tides could be turning against the GOP, allowing Democrats to seize control of Congress.

‘Republicans have to be on the defensive rather than the offensive,’ Tara Setmayer, a former GOP communications director, told Newsweek earlier this month. ‘They cast aside the indecency of Trump to secure the borders, fix health care, [but] they don’t have those accomplishments…You throw all of that on top of a damaged brand, and it’s going to be tough for Republicans.’”

I have to say that for those women that I know of that voted for Trump and the Republican agenda, both educated and non-educated, their support has not waivered. Of course, these are also women that watch propaganda sources such as Fox/Breitbart and they filter what they hear and see with an extremist lens.

Our only hope is that the up and coming generations of women and girls, represented in the protests and demonstrations alongside those of older generations that demonstrated and stood up in the past, will be the powerhouse that overtakes the antiquated thought processes of the GOP, their attitude towards women and the women that seem to illogically support them. We have seen an incredible light of hope with the Nov. 2017 Blue Wave that elected more women, transgendered, and people of color and other religions than ever before.

The 2018 midterms are close at hand and for those women that want to live in a male-dominated, religiously controlled world, they will have to brace themselves for a Blue Tsunami.