Conservative women believe complicity will save them. But an emboldened far-right is gunning for their rights - and therefore all women in the USA

US women had no good option in the elections. Neither of the parties offered protection of women's rights.

This.

It's different priorities. Not necessarily a lack of interest in feminism tbh.

I don’t believe a blanket description of Conservative, Right or Centre-Right women as complicit is fair: they are women who have a different set of priorities and a different conceptualisation of the world.

They are not setting out to betray other women, they are working towards what they believe will benefit society.

Do I agree with them on the majority of their policy proposals and ideas? No. But, as a lifelong Lefty I no longer agree with a lot of policy proposals coming from parties on the Left these days.

I’m a lot more keen on discussion and compromise and I feel very discouraged by the increasing political polarisation that’s affecting our various polities.

You do you. I regret that my manners don't meet your standards.

It’s because I do care for family members with dementia that I would never use a disrespectful phrase like that.

@Mielikki You say that as if I've got no experience of caring for elderly family members with dementia. For those of us with that experience, what was unpleasant was the tame media lying to us for years about what we could plainly see.

@SionnachRuadh ‘brain turned to porridge’ is an extremely unpleasant way of referring to an elderly person suffering from cognitive decline/dementia.

@MarieDeGournay You're way more over the detail than I am and it's quite possible my memory has made Hillary's "alt-right" speech less boring than it was.

I'm less inclined to give Biden the benefit of the doubt. Racial demagoguery was his stock in trade before his brain turned to porridge. If he referenced chains, I just don't believe he did it by accident.

I'm not a particular fan of Romney, but he's got that very Mormon combination of being sincerely anti-racist while never seeming comfortable around nonwhite people, and it's my firm belief that Biden played on that consistently.

I remember going to a woman's place meeting about reproductive rights in the same week that it was announced that Roe vs Wade was going to be repealed.
It wasn't the christian right outside filming the women going in, banging on the doors, shouting 'shame on you' and requiring that the women going in needed a police escort. It was trans activists.
Trump and the right are no friend to women and I do agree with pp that there are definitely elements who would remove our voting rights if they could.
But the idea that trans activism is somehow pro-women and pro-choice by contrast is absolutely laughable.
They're both cheeks of same misogynist arse.
I'd be a damned fool if I believed either side was going to support women's rights. They've both demonstrated otherwise.

Because the vast majority of Americans believe in universal suffrage and America is a democracy. Shall we just reconvene here in four years and see who was right?

How do you know?

You know this isn't going to happen.

I followed Hillary Clinton's campaign fairly closely. I remember her making many speeches addressing the economy, poverty, social justice, women and children's rights - issues that she frequently addressed in her long career in public office. She was often criticised for being dull and uncharismatic because her speeches were so boringly about policy and issues.

Since she won the popular vote in the election, maybe the people were more convinced by her dull policy speeches about the economy etc., than Trump's flashy performances.

I'm open to correction, but I don't actually recall her making a speech about Pepe the Frog?? I know it was used as a symbol by the Trump side, and I know that was criticised on HC's campaign website, but I don't recall her ever making 'a speech denouncing Pepe the Frog.'

No more than I remember 'Joe Biden in 2012 telling a black audience that Mitt Romney (!) was going to "put y'all back in chains".
It wasn't a black audience, it was a mixed audience, and he was referring to Republican promises to 'unshackle' financial institutions, and the impact on ordinary people, like his audience:
"Romney wants to, he said in the first 100 days, he's gonna let the big banks again write their own rules. 'Unchain Wall Street!' They're going to put you all back in chains."

He shouldn't have said it like he said it, and he was rightly criticised for his choice of words, but he did not tell a Black audience that Mitt Romney would put Black people back in chains.

There are many real things to hold HC and JB to account for, but Pepe the Frog and Mitt Romney threatening to re-enslave Black people? maybe not.

And if you do (general you) think that Trump won because of trans issues, then maybe it's time to think about why.

@Brefugee I'm not disagreeing with you. The democrats' strategy and campaign was pathetic.

This line of argument from Democrats or left leaning supporters of them only makes sense if you think that the reason Trump won was significantly because of trans issues. Whereas people have been at pains since 5 November to point out that it was irrelevant actually the truth is somewhere in the middle

You cant have it both ways, make up your minds.

Joel Webbon is a Christian with a Biblical worldview. I agree with him on this but it takes having a Biblical worldview to understand why he is saying this and why it is a good thing.

but people were free to vote for the democrats.

Who, and i will admit i didn't pay huge amounts of attention since my assumption was Trump would win, were free to make their campaigning based on access to healthcare, crime and cost of living.

Did they do that to any great effect? probably not from the looks of things

did people vote for Trump for weirdly sectarian reasons? probably yes
did a lot of people who voted for Trump on the single issue of women's sports/bathrooms and/or a fanatical devotion to the republican party (or fanatical aversion to the democrats) suddenly find out over the last few weeks that they have fucked up big time? probably yes

The Democrats didn't pay attention to everyone, in the same way the German SPD didn't. Looking at elections around the world, i think the only reason Labour won the UK election was the fact that the Tories had also stopped listening and people just wanted a change.

They're not even actively campaigning. They're shitposting on fairly obscure message boards.

I'm getting flashbacks to that moment in 2016 when Hillary Clinton, rather than pitch an appealing offer to working class Americans, took time out to make a speech denouncing Pepe the Frog.

So cost of living, access to healthcare, and crime. The first two are clearly not priorities for Trump and while the last is, I doubt his policies will reduce it (given how strongly crime is correlated with poverty).

I'll bite. What have women lost that they weren't already in danger of losing? as i understood it Roe vs Wade was already on very shaky ground with several states watering it down to meaningless words anyway.

What else have women lost? DEI initiatives weren't really promoting women, were they? I can see that individual women (head of the coastgard) are losing jobs but women as a whole? They are possibly losing their access to reproductive healthcare faster than they were before, but that is acceleration not new. They have not lost their right to work, vote, earn money, own property etc etc and from my very cursory glance at the newspapers in relation to the US none of that is on the cards.

They HAVE won, in some instances, the right to sport free of men, and in federal buildings toilets without men. While much of what is going on is an absolute shit-show, for the most part it is affecting men and women of all races, the same. The middle-aged middle-class white men who are always in power are still there. No change. So in respect of things that really affect women's day to day lives - nothing has happened. Yet.

And if it does? They will dig out their pussy hats, their signs and their banners and take to the streets.

The people actively campaigning to take the vote off women sound like fringe lunatics and this bill about passports sounds like badly thought out legislation by stupid politicians rather than a deliberate attempt to stop women voting.

The focus should be on the real problems American women face; these extreme scenarios are just a distraction.