A Day For All Women

As I write, we are awaiting the first appearance of VP Biden and Senator Kamala Harris as the Democratic Presidential Ticket duo. Every woman in America should be encouraged by this new development.

Some of you will enthusiastically embrace the Biden/Harris ticket. Some of you will not based on differences about the issues. Some of you are still in limbo. But that is not the point. I never have politicized from this platform, and I will not start now.

There is much more to reflect on today. This is a momentous day for all women who are tired of being ignored and marginalized. Women make up 51% of the population in America, and they deserve recognition based on that alone. Women have shown up in record numbers at the polls in recent elections, and, yet, there are so relatively few of them on ballots across the nation — and even fewer who are elected.

Women have proven themselves to be very effective leaders in business and on boards of directors when given the chance, and their acumen and competence in those arenas is impressive. They are natural leaders, natural negotiators, naturally empathetic and naturally conversant in all manners of effective communication. They are everything that leadership requires EXCEPT access. Too many women with great leadership potential are overlooked for petty and indefensible reasons that simply are related to the fact that they have extra X chromosomes.

As women lawyers, we should be offended by that. We understand the challenges we face as women lawyers, all of which are the foundation of the Best Friends at the Bar project. Too many of us have experienced gender discrimination, sexual harassment and inequality in the workplace that should have been ancient history long before we entered the workforce.

So, we ALL have something to be energized about today. Yes, there have been other women who came close to breaking the highest glass ceiling in politics, but none of them have represented the competence in so many settings and on so many levels, including local, state and national elected office, and none of them have represented both gender and broad cultural diversity that the selection of Kamala Harris represents in her addition to a presidential ticket.

Some of those prior candidacies have happened in my lifetime, and I admit that I was disappointed in them for one reason or another. But I strongly believe that we do not have an obligation to support women just because they are women, and I have engaged in many heated discussions over time defending my belief. I believe we support our fellow women because they are competent, because we admire them, and because we feel confident that they will represent us well in advancing the futures of all women.

No matter your political preferences, I hope you will join me in celebrating the advancement of women at this historic moment. Herald it, celebrate it, and use it however you can to move the agenda of all women forward.

That is what it means to be a woman.

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