Women in Leadership- The Political Arena

Maybe I am sexist, but I thought having a female PM might bring some more human sensitivity into political debates.  Even putting aside the whole Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus pop psychology, there is some truth to women being more nurturing and men being more aggressive isn't there.  My girlfriend was telling me that in situations of stress the 'Fight or Flight' is generally true of male's response but that women have a 'Tend and Befriend' response.  (And Google seems to bring up plenty of papers to support this)

So maybe I am extrapolating a bit too far, but imagine 'Tend and Befriend' in politics.  Tend and befriend asylum seekers.  Tend and befriend in Israel/Palestine.  Tend and befriend in Afghanistan, Iraq, and countless more places of conflict...

Anyway, all this is to say that I have been damn disappointed in our new PM, who seems to be setting out to prove she has the 'balls' to protect our borders, deal with 'illegals', win the war in Afghanistan etc.  But is this an indictment of her.  Or is it an indictment of us - the Australian electorate - that the only women we elect, and the only way we want them to act, is like the testosterone-charged male politicians that fill the halls of parliament with their power-seeking and aggression.

This is a bit of a tangent however I still think that it's relevant to women being in leadership roles.

I was reading the paper today and it was announced that scientists have reported a big stride towards a vaginal gel that can thwart HIV, potentially protecting millions of women from the AIDS pandemic.  They described a prototype cream tested in South Africa that curbed the risk of infection by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) by 39 per cent overall, but by 54 per cent among those women who used it most consistently.

Why I think this is relevant is it's about women standing up and taking responsability for preventing the transmission of HIV.  As said by Michel Sidibe, executive director of the UN agency UNAIDS, “we are giving hope to women. For the first time we have seen results for a woman-initiated and -controlled HIV prevention option.”

While not quite in politically related, I still think that this is a definite step forward for women taking a leadership role in their sexual health. 

Full article can be found at

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/vaginal-gel-a-new-hope-in-fight-against-aids-pandemic-say-scientists/story-e6frg6so-1225894566687

I was really excited when I heard we had a new female PM... for the first couple of hours. I'd been really pleased about the growing representation of women in politics (especially in the Labour Party and Greens Party, although my impression was that the Libs lagged behind.)

However, I was really disappointed about the way the Gillard took over- as I felt that Prime Minister Rudd didn't really deserve to be turfed in that manner. I would have rather seen a female PM voted in by the people of Australia at the next election. I suppose we'll probably see it anyway come August 21.

Also, I felt that Gillard had been 'persuaded' by big lobby groups- especially the mining industry to jump in and 'fix' their problems with the mining tax. And that this didn't really represent what the people of Australia wanted.

Anyway, what I mean to say is: does it really matter what the gender of our PM is- when the voices of the people are not heard?