Dem
47
GOP
53
A new American University poll shows that many voters, male and female, want more women in politics... just not as president. They think women get more done than men. Sounds like a recipe for more women to run for governor. Governors are expected to get stuff done. Senators just bloviate. Presidents, however, need to be tough and voters don't think women are tough. Pity the Democrats can't bring back Maggie Thatcher and run her. She was tough as nails. Oh wait, she was not a natural-born citizen. Also, she was a Tory.
Nearly 20% of the voters said they knew someone who would not vote for a woman for president, independent of the quality of the woman. Pollsters know that when they ask a question like "Would you ever vote for a woman for president?" everyone says "yes" because they perceive "no" to be an unacceptable answer. This is why pollsters sometimes rephrase it as "Do you know someone who would never vote for a woman for president?" It gives the respondent cover. Of course, it also dilutes the answer, because in some cases the respondent would but knows someone else who would not, and in some cases it is the respondent who is the refusenik. Still, a lot of voters are not ready for a woman president.
The breakdown is a bit surprising. It is not only old men who are anti-woman. A quarter of women under 50 and one-fifth of men under 50 would not vote for a qualified woman for president. This new data point says something about why Kamala Harris lost and it wasn't just because the campaign was so short and possibly not because she is Black (although the pollster didn't ask if the person would refuse to vote for any Black candidate).
Why are so many voters anti-woman? Well, one-third of all voters listen to "bro culture" podcasts. If we assume that relatively few women listen to them, then probably half of all young men listen to Joe Rogan or some other bro. Of those who do, four in five believe the podcasts affected the election, although that is just a guess, of course. Still, the decline of the mainstream media and rise of the bro podcasts could well be a factor in making men averse to voting for a woman for president. (V)