Do you think Vance's view on childless women will win him votes on the right?

It is the quintessential, clichéed, insult about women, childless and with cats. Throw “unmarried” in there and you have the perfect, 1950s, trifecta of worthlessness. The childless ones are often high powered professionals and the controllers of corporations, with access to bunches of capital and influence.
Vance needs to get his head out of his ass and enter the twenty-first century.

Interesting, because Harris became the mom of 2 stepchildren 3 years before he said it. Pete and his husband adopted infant twins a month before Vance made his statement. It’s also pretty hypocritical because he himself said:

“During an interview with Megyn Kelly in 2017, he noted that she was the greatest influence on his life, saying she “just got me.” His 2016 memoir Hillbilly Elegy, which was later adapted into a film starring Glenn Close, was greatly influenced by his Mamaw and his family’s upbringing in Middletown, Ohio.”

https://tinyurl.com/5ynnv9kb

It won’t lose him many if any as most Christian Conservatives would agree, even if they never verbalize it.
Trust me, I’m a childfree married and take care of 5 cats. A very rare type in my red state. :)

That was a stupid statement of Vance to make. Even though it was 4 years ago. There are any number of childless women who would indeed like to have children but have been unable to. Add that to the fact that the Republican party has come out against in vitro fertilization because of the unused eggs at various clinics.

So for Vance to have said something like that is an insult to childless women who would like to have kids but but are unable to.

The bottom line is that that was a stupid and insensitive thing to have said 4 years ago and remains so today.

Is there a link where he said childless women don’t have a say in the nation?

@seawulf575 “Stake,” not “say.” The quote is:

“You look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC, the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children. And how does it make any sense we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?”

[Source]

What he said:

Comments JD Vance made in 2021 questioning Vice President Kamala Harris’ leadership because she did not have biological children have resurfaced, testing the young conservative senator in his early days campaigning as part of the Republicans’ presidential ticket.

During Vance’s bid for the Senate in Ohio, he said in a Fox News interview that “we are effectively run in this country via the Democrats,” and referred to them as “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.” He said that included Harris, U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat.

“How does it make any sense that we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?” asked Vance, who is now Donald Trump’s running mate. Harris became stepmother to two teenagers when she married entertainment lawyer Douglas Emhoff in 2014. And Buttigieg announced he and his husband adopted infant twins in September 2021, more than a month before Vance made those comments.

So @seawulf575 is asking the wrong (and irrelevant) question. It must be one he invented.

What Vance did do is, as you can see, say that childless women have no stake in America. Which is even worse.

@JeSuisRickSpringfield Thank you for the link.

I’d say he isn’t necessarily wrong. What he is saying is that people that don’t have the children, don’t have a worry about what their children are going to have to face, are making decisions based on the moment and they aren’t good decisions. At least that’s what I get out of it. He does call basically all Democrats in Congress and the corporate oligarchs that support them “childless cat ladies that are miserable in their own lives and they want to make the rest of America miserable too.” That might be insulting to cat ladies everywhere. I think more highly of cat ladies than most politicians.

Now, let’s compare what was actually said with what the left is saying he said. He didn’t address ALL Childless Women. They had nothing to do with his statement. They aren’t making decisions for the country and the world. So once again, the left seems to be trying to make something a Republican said out to be something it was not.

@seawulf575 It might be what he meant to say, but it is not what he actually said. Saying that someone without children has no stake in the country is a claim about the present. People living here now have a stake in what’s happening regardless of whether or not they have children. And he most certainly did implicate all childless people. To say that a politician lacks a stake in the country because they do not have children is to say that not having children entails not having a stake in the country. And even if he meant to limit this accusation to the realm of politics and policy, one does not need to be a politician to participate in making decisions for the country. Voting and other forms of civic engagement also count.

Furthermore, I think he is wrong. I do have a child, but I cared about the future before he was born. I have nephews and nieces. I have students who I care about very much. And even if none of those things were true, I care about humans in general. I did not need to have children of my own to have a stake in the future, and I think it is a bad look for Vance to say otherwise. It implies that he would not care about the future were it not for the existence of his own children, which reminds me of those religious people who say that they would go around raping and murdering people if they didn’t believe in God (as if the only reason to be good is to avoid punishment or some other harm to their personal interests).

@JeSuisRickSpringfield Except he didn’t say it was all people without children. That is the point. He specifically was talking about people in the government (Democrats and corporate oligarchs, men and women) making decisions about everyone. That is where the lie starts. He was very specific and the left has now said he said it about all childless women. That is the lie, how the left took something, rewrote it, and spread it as truth. That is how many on these pages deal with me so I see it first hand.

I don’t really agree with it either, though having children does make you think a lot more about their future. A single person with no children can and do think of the future so from that aspect he is wrong. But his point wasn’t even really about childless people. Miserable people is the point he was making. Miserable people that have put career ahead of family their entire lives and how they hate middle America who puts family as a top priority. People that have chased power and status for so long, they missed out on enjoying a family of their own. So they work feverishly against the idea of family.

Here is the ENTIRE interview which puts it more in perspective:

https://www.foxnews.com/video/6265796735001

As always, a snippet was taken and was run with to paint a picture. That is what the media does so often. When you see the entire interview you see it is not quite the story painted by the leftist media.

What a typical ass minded statement he made. Vance just alienated every step-parent.
Bearing a child and being a parent are two different thing JD!

The problem with insulting childless people is that not every childless person is childless by choice, and now he drove a knife into those people.

And I have to ask if this is any different than Kamala Harris saying 18–24 year olds are just stupid? Both sound horrible until you put them into context. But when the media takes stuff out of context, it becomes a lie.

@seawulf575 I’m not taking Vance’s comment personally myself. He was obviously upset with Dem leadership (not regular citizens) but it does demean women, which never tends to be a wise choice for politicians. Js

@seawulf575 The link you sent was about a bigger conversation about young adults who are being sent to light confinements because they committed, assume a small crime and instead of sending them right away to the big house, they are given a chance for activism, so they can be returned to society. And it’s a fact that the human brain part that makes decisions isn’t fully developed. Stupid is a poor choice but I don’t think foolish would fair better.

However, it is not the same as saying that only genetics makes you care about the planet. And plenty of socio-paths have children. Narcassist have children, And I would argue that every single CEO who has family and dumps poisons into our soil or dumps tons of trash into the ocean, don’t care about the future.

^^ ...and many CEOs have sociopathic tendancies, they just use them more productively. “Productively” being a matter of opinion.

@Pandora Exactly the point. If you take the one statement out of context, she did say it. It is offensive to a whole generation. Until you read the entire thing. Same thing with this with Vance. Context can clarify meaning and change the narrative being pushed.

Sounds like Vance was just spreading the “Good” Book’s teachings.

Is being a white Christian male, who follows his religious teachings against some law?

@MrGrimm888 No one ever said it was against the law. But honestly if he wants to be a preacher, be a preacher. If a person wants to rule a nation, maybe don’t give off the Handmaiden tale vibes. So that is what prompted me to ask this question. And by the way, so many tragedies have happened throughout history because of religion and innocent people victimized in the name of the Good Book. I believe the bible can be good, but often the people who preach it use it as a weapon of hate. Just because someone preaches something doesn’t automatically make them good.
Rain drops are good until they cause a flood. Fire is good to cook food with till it burns your house. Sun shine is good till it causes cancer or dries your crops.
So beware the raindrop, the fire and the sun and I will continue to beware of hypocrites who use religion to smash those less powerful.

^I was being facetious. But I couldn’t agree with you more.

The thing is, Vance is effectively of a product of the extremely-online, increasingly unhinged “new right” (the outgrowth of the alt-right). The “new right” very much exists online, but it’s divergent from traditional MAGA politics. For example, there was that young DeSantis staffer who got fired for making a campaign video that had explicit Nazi imagery in it; that’s the kind of thing these “new right” guys think is funny and cool, but it freaks out the mainstream right. Talking about “childless women” is right from this same playbook, but it isn’t the kind of thing Trump himself would’ve said in 2016 or 2020. Plenty of conservatives come from blended families, plenty of childless people like Trump. So yeah, I guess that’s my way of saying I think Vance will appeal to a class of terminally online Brooklynite gay Nazis. Not sure how much that plays with the working class voters in the Rust Belt who will ultimately decide the election.

@Demosthenes I tend to agree with you. The middle is not offended because it was about Democrat lawmakers specifically.

^The insult, was meant for ALL, even if he was just speaking about the dems.
He was talking about a “type of person,” he has a category for in his mind.
A notion I find, tremendously offensive. But. The sentiment is really a MASSIVE example of the right’s hypocrisy.
He (Republicans) can’t be anti-environment, anti-healthcare, anti-education, anti-diversity, anti-civil rights, conservative AND say HE cares about the future!
I agree with @canidmajor , in that a lot of women didn’t have children, became they were pursuing fruitful careers.
I don’t have the stats in front of me, but last I heard women are making up a much higher percentage of our higher paid workforce, and men (of all ages) are declining in many areas.

I (long story) don’t think I have any children. I am a guy. I love, and am very involved in my nephew’s and my brother’s lives.

I care TREMENDOUSLY more about the shape of this planet, than ANY GOP, or Republican does. The right, is more concerned about cheaper gas, and products, than destroying Earth. This illustrates greed, selfishness, and clearly NO care for the future.

Vance is NOT, the “working/common guy.” That’s a disguise he wears, poorly.

I’m addition. (I love this part.)
Vance likened Trump, to Hitler.
So. Is he cool, with working under Hitler? Or, is he not a man, who has permanent morals?

Vance keeps doubling down on this theme (just google it, there are some recent statements trying to clarify it) and he really seems to believe that anyone without a personal, biological, interest really has no stake in the future of the US. He mirrors how his party represents itself.

The rest of us (and although I have a child, the conservatives I know hate how my family happened) care about people in general, humanity as a grouping, and feel compassion and empthy for humankind. We work to try to make things better for everybody, not just our biological line. We support groups and work toward lifting communities out of poverty, protecting the more vulnerable, promoting equity and equality.

So to the “he isn’t necessarily wrong” people, yes, yes he is wrong.

Why does Vance not acknowledge that mayor Pete has 2 children? Because they are adopted?

^^ and that Kamala has 2 children. Is it because they’re stepchildren? They’ve been with her, I believe, for 10 years.

@chyna Maybe because they’re gay.

He is hooked on the biological offspring thing. Which is frankly, IMO, just a little icky.
And, apparently, only if they have been achieved by coitus.

Vance is a creep.

Apparently, in his mind, women’s major purpose is breeding.

@seawulf575 Sorry for the late reply. I’ve been traveling and couldn’t get the video to load, but I didn’t want to respond without watching it.

“Except he didn’t say it was all people without children.”

Yes, he did. He says that not having children means that one has less of a stake in the country, and he then uses that claim to raise concerns about putting childless politicians in power. So while the ultimate concern may be childless politicians, that concern is based on a claim about childless people. And it is that general comment about childless people that is getting him in trouble.

If someone said “Republicans are ______, so we shouldn’t put Republicans in power,” would you say that statement was only about people in government? Of course not. And if you did, you would be wrong. It’s a statement about Republicans that is used to make an argument for not electing them or otherwise putting them in positions of power. If someone made this comment, you would be well within your rights to characterize that person as having made a claim about all Republicans (even if it is nested in an argument for not electing Republicans).

“I don’t really agree with it either, though having children does make you think a lot more about their future.”

About their specific future? Sure. When my wife and I first discussed having children, we started thinking about our child’s possible future. But him being born certainly made it all the more real. That’s not unique to one’s own children, though. Thoughts about my hypothetical future students are different than thoughts about the very real students in front of me. They don’t need to be my own for me to think a lot about their future (especially since I specialize in working with kids who are below grade level).

“Miserable people is the point he was making. Miserable people that have put career ahead of family their entire lives and how they hate middle America who puts family as a top priority. People that have chased power and status for so long, they missed out on enjoying a family of their own. So they work feverishly against the idea of family.”

First, I don’t think this is true. The original speech that prompted the interview doesn’t talk about miserable people. It talks about parenthood and empowering parents against the “childless left” (which he characterizes as anti-family and anti-child). And in his recent clarifications, he also doesn’t talk about miserable people. He mainly focuses on the “cat ladies” part (which isn’t the actual issue, so classic deflection there) and again characterizes his opponents as anti-family and anti-child. And when his wife decided to clarify his comments once again, she claimed he was talking about how “it can be really hard to be a parent in this country, and sometimes our policies are designed in a way that make it even harder.” So while there have been several attempts to reframe and restate what Vance “really meant,” none of these clarifications have brought up the “miserable people” line of argument.

Second, it might be even worse if you were correct because it would be such a repulsively ignorant caricature of his opponents. Republicans and Democrats have different ideas about the best ways to do things, and the politicians who represent them seek to magnify and exploit those differences. But not every opponent is an enemy. Democrats and Democratic politicians are not hunched over in the dark, rubbing their hands and plotting to destroy the idea of family, just as Republicans and Republican politicians are not hunched over in the dark, rubbing their hands and plotting to destroy the environment. This idea that people who are different from us are “working feverishly” against all we hold dear is both pernicious and false, and it gets in the way of real conversations about what should be done. It also obscures the fact that there are many topics on which Americans across the country are in agreement.

^^ Excellent rebuttal.

^Yes. Very well crafted, and consistently on point.
Best of all. No personal attacks.
Bueno!