I'm a fortysomething woman who is not voting for Hillary Clinton. My sixty-something mother isn't voting for Hillary either, and not just because she's a registered Republican. She won't vote for Clinton because my mother's political opinions are largely informed by email hoaxes about non-issues like how [insert name of liberal bogeyman of the day] is trying to remove all the cross-shaped grave markers from Arlington National Cemetery.

I suspect my mother is a far more typical voter than I am. I have actually researched the candidates' positions on issues. I've watched their debate performance. I watch "Meet the Press" almost every week, even when Tim spends the entire hour with some delusional neocon. Yes, I'm a Democrat and fairly socially liberal. But I don't pull the lever based on party or any other meta-criterion, nor do I believe that the next potential President should be subject to any sort of litmus test (especially one involving bodily fluids; ick).

My mother, on the other hand, believes whatever Right-leaning political or social screed hits her Inbox, and happily forwards it to 20 of her friends so that she will have good luck that day. She is college educated and is good at her job, which requires specialized skills. She reads her local paper daily and watches the news every night. But my mother is a stupid woman - my definition being that she has access to information and chooses to either ignore or reject it out of hand because considering or accepting it may require her to think critically about real issues.

All these women who are burning up their keyboards with "analysis" of whether mother-love means accepting or rejecting the radical feminism that made Clinton's candidacy possible, blah, blah, blah are no better than my mother. It is clear from this article that their choices are informed far more by their feelings, which are driven by the equivalent of email hoaxes ginned up by the media and the micro-blogosphere they inhabit, than by reality. They would rather crawl up their own butts for days looking for "meaning" than spend five minutes actually thinking about the candidates' qualifications and positions, and whether their respective presidencies would benefit more people than they hurt.

Sending my mother to the web site debunking the cemetery hoax does not change her mind about the premise - she says, "Well, that's the kind of thing that [the liberal bogeyman] does, even if it's not at this cemetery, and people should know about it!" My mother, like so many stupid people who vote, needs the bogeyman to tell her which lever to pull. Citizenship is too hard to do otherwise. It sounds like the subjects of this article need their bogeywoman - whether she is the pre- or post-feminist - to tell them the same thing. Too bad being a feminist doesn't make citizenship any easier.

You make some very good points here, and point out the short-sighted nature present on many parts of the political spectrum. But you really oughtn't trash your Mom like that.

One day, your mother is going to die. In all likelihood, you will still be alive and able-minded, and you really won't like thinking back to the time you repeatedly called her stupid on a public message board. At least, that's my take.

Have a great weekend.

Actually, loving someone, truly loving them, means recognizing their short comings (stupid, crazy, a slob, etc.) and just loving the heck out of them anyway.

But to be fair, your mother isn't any stupider than anyone else. Let's be real. Like most american's she's just mentally lazy. To discuss and or think about real issues with an objective eye and a logical mind is an extremely rare skill.

It's much easier to make knee jerk decisions based on divisive rhetoric or e-mail hoaxes or party lines than to do the mental work to try and figure out what any politician means by anything they say. Your mother and mine are close in age, and I find my mother has given up on thinking that politicians mean anything.

Actually, loving someone, truly loving them, means recognizing their short comings (stupid, crazy, a slob, etc.) and just loving the heck out of them anyway.

I think this sums up Liberal philospohy pretty well. This is why the whole, Conservative, "they hate uhmurica!!!! Caint they see that uhmurica is the greatest, smartest, bestest, country the world or any world has ever or will ever know?!?!" argument is so stupid.

I do love my mother. Having just watched my stepfather die of lung cancer, I am well aware of the filial angst that occurs while watching a parent die. My mother is a smart, canny woman in many ways, but in this, she's stupid (by the definition I posted). I am also stupid in many ways - talk of accounting makes my mind slam shut faster than you can say, "Don't forget Mother's Day!" I call 'em like I see 'em, and stand by my initial post. My mother would be proud of my stance, if not my words.

And that may be true feminism..after all. To be proud of our mother's, our sisters, and our daughters. To be proud of them despite their faults or opinions that may be contrary to our own. To respect them and their strengths and tolerate their opinions however stupid we find them.

That is the way women love, and respect each other. Perhaps with a slightly sharp edge, but if I'm a little sharp with someone it means I think that they are tough enough to take it. It means that I feel a trust with them and in them to also accept me for who I am, stupidity, opinions and all.

Judging each other on our own terms is feminism, because we're no longer judging each other by some yardstick imposed by a male society, but rather by one, however flawed, that we have chosen.