On my travels to various political websites, there has always been one trait from some Clinton supporters that has always bothered me: That they are voting for her just because she is a woman.
Now, everyone is entitled to vote the way they want to, it is one of the joys of living in a Democracy. I have even heard of people not voting for a candidate just based on the way they look or which sports team they root for.
But one thing that irks me is that they proudly say it.
With no backlash or negative response at all.
As an African-American male that has been watching this election like a hawk, I have always felt I had to have a litany of reasons on why I was voting for Obama. Reasons like his record, his character, or his stance on issues.
This is what I was taught to do. To give my vote to a candidate based on what that particular person stood for. I have voted for Hillary twice in my state of New York. I have even defended her to extremely hostile anti-Clinton Republicans in my time.
But after last night’s Saturday Night Live with Tina Fey bit where she pretty much comes out and urges females to vote for Clinton just because she is a woman, and they are women too. I cannot hold back any longer.
I am voting for Barack Obama because he is an African-American.
Okay, I know, SNL is hardly the beacon in which one should get their news or political views. But it was the last straw.
Before Obama had officially become popular to mainstream Americans, there were actual newspaper articles that discussed whether or not Barack was "black" enough as seen here:
http://www.time.com/...
http://www.latimes.com/...
http://www.crooksandliars.com/...
The point being, searching for "Is Barack Obama black enough" into google yields numerous results from the mainstream media.
They claimed that Obama was not "black enough" simply because he would not advocate controversial racial issues like the Old Civil Rights Guard such as Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and others have done in the past.
"I’m not running for President of Black America." Obama has stated many times, "I am running for the President of the United States of America." One could even argue that Barack has had to downplay his ethnicity to even come so far in the race. How many times have we seen our fellow Democrats using the "No one will vote for him because he’s black!" excuse?
Hillary has embraced her gender in this race to the degree that some of her supporters actively call other women that support Obama "traitors" or "bimbos". Even Ms. Fey last night made a crack about how "women today feel perfectly free to make whatever choice Oprah tells them." I sometimes feel when people say "Barack is young he should wait, it’s not his time." They are almost saying "Let the white woman get the Presidency first, AND THEN the others can have it." Some Clinton supporters also often accuse others of sexism when their candidate gets criticized while offering the famous caveat of "But if I said this about Obama, I’d be called a racist." to shield themselves from being called a racist if they did in fact say something a bit racist to begin with. This usually brings up a discussion on who has had it worse in the United States, females or black Americans (Hint: The answer is Black Women). Basing your vote on who deserves to be in the White House is inherently flawed. Just like Clint Eastwood said in the movie Unforgiven, "Deserve’s got nothing to do with it." Or at least I used to think so.
America, I’m tired of having to hide my choice for a candidate by silly things like issues. So I will say it again:
I am voting for Barack Obama because he is black.
Oh God, that feels so good. I want to say it again. I want to scream it from the rooftops.
I am voting for Barack Obama because he is black, and I do not care who it scares away.