It is a difficult thing for secular, progressive people like me to get through our thick skulls. I’ve been reading the work lately of historians such as Beth Allison Barr, Kristen Kobes Dumez, and Emily Suzanne Johnson about the relationship between conservative religion, conservative politics, and what people used to call “the woman question.” If we needed any reminding, recent poll numbers remind us that conservative women are often MORE conservative than conservative men about the proper public role of women.
So a little true confession: Way back in the 1980s, I would have agreed with my Senator, Kirsten Gillibrand. She has insisted that there are two sides in politics today: Trump vs. Women. As Senator Gillibrand put it,
I believe that if President Trump wants a war with America’s women, it’s a war he will have and it is one he will lose.
A younger me would have assumed—as Senator Gillibrand is hoping people will assume—that women in general will have a certain political viewpoint. I would have assumed that women should be in favor of abortion rights, equal pay for women, and other feminist basics. I would have agreed that it just makes sense for women voters to be especially outraged by Trump’s violent talk and anti-feminist politics.
It doesn’t take a whole lot of historical study, however, to realize that there is no natural “woman’s” position in religion or politics.
Certainly, as I found in my research into educational conservatism in the twentieth century, conservative women usually played a leading role in pushing for traditional gender roles and anti-feminist politics. In the early part of the century, leaders of the Daughters of the American Revolution articulated a conservative vision for the proper role of women in society. As DAR leader Grace Brosseau put it in 1928,
We need some cheer leaders for America; we need some fearless citizens to sit on the side lines and do a little talking in the interest of this country.
This notion of women fighting for their right to NOT be leaders themselves has always been difficult for me to comprehend, but it is not an anomaly in American history, politics, and religion. Lots of women have insisted on their proper roles “on the side lines” instead of on the field.
Today’s poll numbers show that some women today still feel the same way. Buried in a 2018 PRRI survey about the differences between men and women in politics we find some important numbers. First, most respondents say they have no gender preference in political candidates. All things being equal, 70% of Americans say they’d vote for the most qualified candidate regardless of gender.
Only 11% say they would prefer a male candidate, but among Republican women, that number jumps to 23%. In fact, more Republican women (23%) than men (14%) are willing to admit to preferring a male candidate.
A younger me would have been astounded by this number. Like a lot of my progressive, secular friends, I used to assume that women would “naturally” avoid religious hierarchies that put them below men. I used to think that women voters would “naturally” want more political rights. It’s just not the case.
I Love You but You're Going to Hell 
Patrick Halbrook
/ June 10, 2019Most of my arguments with my wife involve politics. Between the two of us, she is more conservative than me, and also much more likely to approve of what Donald Trump is doing and saying at any given moment…
jonolan
/ June 11, 2019The mistake I believe that you’re making, and the confusion resultant from it, is that you believe that these women believe that they’re taking a lesser position. It doesn’t occur to you that these women prefer male candidate because they don’t think that a women should be forced into the position when and where she feels that she has to jump into that swamp.
The same seem to be true enough in other areas where ” hierarchies that put them below men” exist. My experience shows that these women don’t think that what they do or the positions they’re in are below men, just different from men’s roles.