Papa Don’t Miss the Vote

Allison — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 16:15:22 +0000

I spent a few minutes at WAM chatting with one of the presenters about fathers and feminism. We were talking about the importance of men in the women’s movement generally, and how fathering daughters seems to bring even unlikely men around on women’s issues.

Then I came home and found this study on voting patterns in the US Senate from the March 2008 American Economic Review:

…parenting an additional female child increases a representative’s propensity to vote liberally on women’s issues, particularly reproductive rights.

It’s nice when numbers come along to back up your intuition. But I’m curious about the mechanism. Do fathers with daughters gain more respect for women’s autonomy? Or is it more calculating than that? (Everyone wants their children to get ahead.) Is there a difference?

Hat tip to Marginal Revolution and The Monkey Cage.

Economic Woman » men and feminism

Papa Don’t Miss the Vote