I’ve been feeling a bit guilty lately about supporting Obama over Hillary in the presidential campaign. In fact, in many ways, i feel like a bit of a traitor.

I mean, I know why I like Obama better (I have this silly thing about voting for someone I can actually believe in, and for me Hillary’s vote for the war was indefensible). I’ve written here before about the thought process which ultimately decided who got my vote.

But I cannot ignore this feeling that I’m somehow letting down the side. Undermining the all-important work and sacrific of generations of feminists before me which *got us* to this pivotal and incredibly symbollic point. And the unvoiced fears of what happens if Hillary doesn’t win – the fear that her loss will be used to corroborate every naysayers argument that ever was.

The country just wasn’t ready for it. Back to the drawing board. Try again in another 50 years.

If Hillary doesn’t win, when will we next have a *real* contender for first woman President of the US? Hillary has become (you should pardon the tongue-in-cheek expression) our “great white hope”.

I heard a podcast the other day which postulated that younger women who are supporting Obama are only doing so because they want so desperately to believe we live in a gender-neutral la-la-land, when nothing could be further from the truth.

Now I’m certainly not naive enough to believe that the political world I live in is genderless. But the inescapable fact remains: I don’t want to vote based on gender identity. As someone else I know put it, “I resent having to stop every time I’m annoyed with [Hillary] to examine my feelings and make certain I’m not buying in to some repressed, societal sexism.”

And more to the point, I don’t want to vote for Hillary because she’s a woman, for the same reason I don’t want people to vote *against* Hillary because she’s a woman. If I truly believe her gender shouldn’t be a factor for those who would vote against a woman for President, then I have to believe it shouldn’t be a factor for me. In other words, if I vote based on gender, I am not only acknowledging that gender bias exists (because of course it does), but also validating it by giving it more merit than other, much more important factors.

That’s not naivete. I simply don’t think you get where you want to go by pointing yourself in the wrong direction.

And I’d like to believe that the ultimate goal of feminism is about women having all choices available to them in equal measure.

I’m grateful for the choice to have a female candidate, and I will continue to fight for the right to ensure that choice continues.

But given the choice? I choose Obama.

wilco – side with the seeds

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