Kamala Harris has treaded her path in the political landscape for the better part of the last two decades, teetering under the weight of perceived potentials. On the night she grasped for the Democratic presidential nomination, a single national convention speaker highlighted she is merely the second woman to do so, being just the third female to be present on a national ticket. Unsurprisingly, this solitary voice was none other than Hillary Clinton; the first woman pitted for presidency who secured the popular vote in 2016, an advantage that has failed to guarantee Electoral College victory in recent decades, producing two of the mere three American presidents elected despite minority votes.
Clinton, underlining her then-unique position as a woman on a presidential ticket, described ‘breaking this last glass ceiling,’ optimistically wishing for Harris to shatter it completely. However, Clinton’s perspective diverges from Harris, perhaps due to their nearly 17-year age gap. This in itself is reminiscent of younger women today who cannot fathom periods when married or engaged women faced job rejections legally on the potential grounds of becoming pregnant. Perhaps conveniently forgot, this form of sanctioned discrimination was only criminalized in the 1980s via rulings that enforced an earlier Civil Rights Act to outlaw it.
In the contemporary world, women assert power across countless fields including law, medicine, and the clergy. Presently, females make up more than 56 percent of law school attendees. Similarly, they accounted for 54.6 percent of medical school enrolment in 2023, seizing the majority in 2020. The populace has growing accustomed to dealing with skilled females in both these professional paths.
Reflecting the same trend, numerous American churchgoers have become accustomed to women orchestrating sermons from manifold pulpits. Every Anglican denomination, along many Lutheran and Presbyterian churches, ordains women priests, as do both Reform and Conservative Jewish denominations, which uplift women to rabbinate positions.
However, this newfound acceptance of female clergy has not eradicated hurdles. Contrastingly, fields like law and medicine, lower acceptance barriers for women, wherein less than 100 years ago, they filled a meager 5 percent of student seats. The Roman Catholic church remains a considerable hurdle to women aspiring to pastoral roles, with Mormons, Southern Baptists, Southern Methodists, select Pentecostal churches, Muslims, and Orthodox Jews also creating ironclad barriers for women clergy.
Despite this, the trend indicates an uptick in women attaining more authoritative positions in the future. As an illustration: Caltech, one of America’s premier academic institutions, recently welcomed its first majority female freshman class. This development has made the concept of female leaders more palatable to both men and women.
Perhaps this shifting public sentiment is one of the reasons why Harris’s gender did not arouse significant attention during the month-long period of cementing her role as the Democratic nominee. Simultaneously, her gender remained out of focus in several convention speeches, including her own acceptance discourse, which neared the hour mark.
Of course, Harris, straddling dangerous divides, had to portray strength without being overly aggressive, courage without appearing strident, and radiate physical attractiveness while avoiding vanity, and showcasing empathy without the guise of submissiveness. But navigating this complex labyrinth has long been her modus operandi.
In her previous roles as San Francisco’s district attorney, California’s attorney general and as vice president, Harris propelled through the glass ceiling, managing quite adroitly not to ruffle feathers among many self-assured men. This talent was in full display over the past summer as she sifted through potential vice presidential nominees.
Prominent figures such as Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, and the eventual nominee, Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, did not balk at accepting her authority. Despite their manly demeanor, they bore no apprehension towards serving under a woman asserting a claim on what could potentially be the most powerful political position globally.
Post his selection, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz demonstrated nothing but comfort, seemingly untroubled by surrendering the spotlight and the majority of public attention to Harris during bus tours and at the convention. So, any anticipation of her displaying fear or timidity towards Trump during their initial debate (or any subsequent ones) is likely a miscalculation of Harris’s character.
She may just emerge as the perfect candidate for these times, but if that happens, it will not be due to her own merits alone. It will be built on the courageous strides of countless women before her, who bulldozed through societal barriers to claim their rightful spots in positions of power and authority.
Kamala Harris: Riding the Coattails of Better Women Leaders appeared first on Real News Now.
About Author
