Almost every time I read an article from a liberally coded publication of how gender affects political affiliation, it comes off as both hopelessly out of touch and extremely patronizing.
I feel like this article fundamentally misunderstands the issues it is trying to claim expertise on. There was no discussion of the very real struggles men face today. There was also extremely limited discussion on how young men vs older men view gender in politics, a genuine answer on why conservative claims of masculinity under attack resonate with Gen Z men in particular, or a discussion of how some liberals behave in a sexist way themselves.
The part about “benevolent sexism” was downright insulting. A huge complaint among younger conservative men is “benevolent sexism” towards women in the democratic party. Even a lot of liberals will admit that there’s way too much of the “women are wonderful” effect going around without any real checks on biases.
This is all of course coming from the guardian, which has had some of the most insufferable takes on gender over the past decade. It’s frustrating enough when some op ed shames every single man for the actions of a few, like the guardian did with catcalling. It’s on another level when they then publish another article by the same author where she complains about not being catcalled after 30 somehow blames men for that too.
I personally think Trump will underperform with men. I specifically think he himself doesn’t understand the issues young men have, a small minority of his older base have his tuned out without telling anyone, his surrogates focus on the wrong things, and his turnout machine is gonna end up being trash. However I think that going forward democrats will have to put in real genuine work to win over male voters, and that will require acknowledging some uncomfortable truths that they are unable to do.
As a sidenote, I encourage everyone to read Christine Emba’s op-ed in the Washington Post. It provides a lot better a framework on what’s happening.
If the tests don’t give any insight into the functionality it is testing, they are probably not the best tests.