Though a poll released this week shows white females favor the Republican Party now that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is on the campaign, women at ASU said they are looking more closely at the issues.
The Washington Post-ABC News poll released Tuesday gives McCain an 11-percentage-point advantage with 53 percent of white females in support of the McCain-Palin ticket, compared to an August poll that gave Sen. Barack Obama an 8-point lead.
Many political analysts attribute this shift to the addition of a woman to the Republican ticket, which could lure Hillary Clinton’s supporters away from the Democratic Party.
But one ASU student disagreed with the pundits’ opinions.
“It is insulting to think that women would vote for a candidate just because she is a woman,” political science senior Marign McCarthy said.
“I am supporting McCain-Palin because I believe in their principles, not because Sarah Palin is a woman,” McCarthy said. “I think people should be rewarded for hard work, and I’m against the Democratic, Robin Hood, take from the rich and give to the poor agenda.”
Aerospace engineering freshman Jessica Villa agreed gender is not the deciding factor in whom they will support for president.
“Gender is not an issue now Hillary is out of the race,” Villa said.
Political science senior Casey Seidman, who is a member of the ASU Young Democrats, said he sees the nomination of Palin as nothing more than a ploy to steal disenchanted Clinton supporters. But he said he believes the Democratic Party is more united than ever behind Obama.
“At the end of the day, [Palin] is nothing more than an empty suit. She brings nothing to the table. Her only political experience ever was being the mayor of some small town in Alaska,” Seidman said in an e-mail.
Mary Margaret Fonow, director of ASU’s Women and Gender studies program, agreed it is presumptuous to think women would vote for a candidate based on gender alone.
“I think the women who will vote for Sarah Palin are women who believe in her values,” Fonow said.
“Any time a woman is selected and is elected, it is progress for the increase in the representation [of women] in the field, but I don’t think women just automatically vote for candidates based on gender,” Fonow said.
As an advocate for gender equality, Fonow said the addition of Palin to the Republican ticket is a quagmire for feminists. While Palin is a woman, she does not embody much of the feminist agenda in terms of her social beliefs.
“It isn’t good for feminism to have a female candidate if she is not going to be for the issues that feminists have been advocating for like choice, universal health care, equal pay,” Fonow said.
Reach the reporter at james.a.king@asu.edu.
