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. This is directed at all of the men resistant to voting a woman into the Oval Office – something spotlighted in a recent New York Times article.

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 – just as Clinton 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. 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 – has a disturbingly high number of people who hold misogynistic views 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; 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 United Kingdom, 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, just as there are scores of reasons to vote against her male opponent.

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 the male portion of the electorate. 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 the leader of the free world, I have only two words for you: WAKE UP!

It has been thousands of years since Neanderthals roamed the Earth. Every Y-chromosome-holding voter reading this has surely had a mother or a mother figure who has guided you at some point; 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 influenced 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, thanks to the overturning of Roe v. Wade by a Supreme Court stocked with three Trump appointees. You have already indicated you can support a man who has been convicted of sexual assault – yes, that victim could have been your wife, sister or daughter if they were unlucky enough to find themselves in Trump’s crosshairs in the past. 

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?

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 slave owners, philanderers, warmongers and corrupt officeholders, have had their turn.

On Nov. 5, be a man – vote for the woman.