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Royal would win. were it not for the +65. | 83 comments (83 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 2)
It should come as no surprise that women are more conservative in some ways. Women play a strong role in propagating gender roles through primary socialisation of children.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 12:05:34 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 3)
Yes, but why are women more conservative than men?  That they play a strong role in propagating gender roles is simply evidence -- not an explanation -- for this.

However, it does suggest one possibility:  If socialisation of children happens through the mother more than through the father, then both boys and girls are taught gender roles by what their mother tells them.  However, in addition to that, girls have on a day to day basis an up-close example/role model of how to be "women", while boys learn how to be "men" mainly through what their mother tells them, and not as much as daughters by what they pick up from the example of their father, who in this scenario would be presumably less present than the mother.  In other words, the close up example of the mother reinforces and fleshes out the female gender role taught by the mother to daughters; but this reinforcement/fleshing out of the male gender roles is much weaker in sons whose father is less involved in their socialisation than the mother.

Truth unfolds in time through a communal process.

by marco on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 12:34:24 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 3)
The thing is that older women are probably very conservative. For one thing, feminism came too late for them - to put it roughly, they still get nothing of its frills. I would also recognize that socialization outside family increased much in modern times, at the expense of "education" within family.

Other (falsifiable) possibility is that conservative women might live longer.

But the particular 75-25 distribution is not explainable by conservatvism of elder women alone.

by das monde on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 01:55:43 AM EST
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Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 1)
It would require a near unanimity among the women, assuming the men break nearly 50:50 as the 50-64-year-olds do.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 04:27:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 2)
Not quite, as there are significantly more older women than older men, considering the life expectancies.

I'm sure you can find the exact numbers over at INED or at INSEE.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 04:49:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 0)
OK
By sex and age: recent data
65 and over: Total 10,111,093; Male: 4,165,027; Female: 5,910,955
Some  possibilities:
  • Men - 60:40 for Royal; Women - 0:100 for Sarkozy
  • Men - 50:50; Women - 7:93 for Sarkozy
  • Men - 25:75 for Sarkozy; Women - 25:75 for Sarkozy
  • Men - 0:100 for Sarkozy; Women - 43:57 for Sarkozy
Note it is impossible for the women to break 50:50 and still have a 25:75 overall split.

If 14:1 is not "near unanimity", I don't know what is.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 05:25:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 1)
I'm sorry, how exactly did we decide that this was all women's fault?  Since we have no data regarding the gender breakdown of the over-65 vote?

What percentage of France's 65+ population is female?

by the stormy present (stormypresent aaaaaaat gmail etc) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:00:27 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 1)
65 and over: Total 10,111,093; Male: 4,165,027; Female: 5,910,955

What percentage of France's 65+ population is female?

That would be 58.5% female and 41.5% male.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:06:29 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 2)
Sorry, I could have done that math myself, but I for some reason didn't see that you'd included the numbers.

I think we would have to eliminate the possibility that women or men voted 100% for anybody.  That doesn't happen.  You've said it's nigh-impossible for women to have split 50-50.  It seems likely that one of two things happened:  (a) a large majority of women and men voted for Sarkozy, in roughly equal proportions, or (b) a majority of both women and men voted for Sarkozy, but a larger majority of women did.

We have no evidence (that I know of) that (a) is not true, but everyone here seems to be assuming that (b) is the case.  It would not surprise me if (b) was in fact true, but I just wanted to note that we do not have the data to support that, and if it's true, we don't know how wide the gap between senior men and senior women was.  Without that data, all this speculaton about older women being overwhelmingly more conservative and listening to their priests more is not terribly constructive.

Really, all we know is that a significant majority of older people voted for Sarkozy.

by the stormy present (stormypresent aaaaaaat gmail etc) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:21:55 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 0)
This is not voted but would vote (according to a poll).

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:25:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 1)
You are correct, sorry, I'm clearly a little distracted today.  But the points stand.  We don't have a gender breakdown of intent to vote, do we?

Which I think is rather strange.

by the stormy present (stormypresent aaaaaaat gmail etc) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:29:06 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 0)
We do, but not of gender and age.

Overall, men break 47:53 for Sarkozy, and women 48:52.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:31:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 0)
So what is likely is that men and women of the same age vote similarly in the SR/NS duel - but since there are more older women than older men, women end up voting more for NS.

Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
by linca (antonin POINT lucas AROBASE gmail.com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 11:56:09 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 0)
That is inconsistent since overall women favour Royal (albeit by 1% only). If women voted in the same proportion as their age group, as they are overrepres nted in the grouo that iverwhelmingly votes for Sarkozy, one would expect women to vote more in favour of Sarkozy in the aggregate.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 04:14:33 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 0)
I'm sorry, how exactly did we decide that this was all women's fault?

About here, I think.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Apr 30th, 2007 at 10:13:07 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (none / 1)
I think he makes a good point about the differences in generation, too, though.  The norms are, I suspect, radically different in the eyes of older women, French or not, compared with younger women, and I think that holds relative to older/younger men, if that makes any sense.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.
by Drew J Jones (pedobear@pennstatefootball.com) on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 12:43:56 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 2)
I often mention the case of Spanish women majoritarily opposing women's suffrage in the 1930's when the Second Spanish Republic gave them the vote, and going on to vote for the right-wing at the next election.

There are two reasons for this: one the acceptance by women of the social gender norms that it was not for women to take part in decisions in the public sphere; and the other a stronger propensity by women to follow what the Cathilic priests said in their weekly holilies.

Some of the same might be at play here. Including what someone mentioned of not letting a younger woman (Segolene is 53) become the "alpha female" in the matriarchy.

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 02:24:02 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Royal would win. were it not for the +65. (4.00 / 3)
Probably true.  There's a certain segment of the female population that lashes out against any and all signs of feminist principles taking root, but that's not limited to only the older generations, at least not in the states.  The Catholic Church also, obviously, hasn't traditionally played as strong a role in the states as in Spain.  The views you're talking about are similar to those you'll find among conservative Baptists in the Deep South here.

It's more associated with political conservatism and the propping up of the fantasy of "Old America" -- family sitting around dinner table, Johnny Carson, Mommy watching kids while Daddy goes to work, and all that other horseshit that conveniently ignores what a hole Old America was compared with modern-day America.

(Elements of it were better, of course, but I'll take Civil Rights and the Internet over the Machine Governments and the Dust Bowl any day, quite honestly.)

It's not unlike the fantasy of The Family FarmerTM that the press loves to play with.

It's, to a degree, action based upon a longing for something that never really existed.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.

by Drew J Jones (pedobear@pennstatefootball.com) on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 03:38:26 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Typos (none / 0)
Catholic
homilies

Bush is a symptom, not the disease.
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 03:48:37 PM EST
[ Parent ]
"In some ways" (4.00 / 3)
maybe, but older women in the U.S. aren't as consistently conservative as their male counterparts. They're not, for example, the primary audience for right-wing radio. That would be men over 65.

Still, these are devastating figures, whether they're overwhelmingly female or not. It's expecially frightening that Europeans live, like, forever!

 

by Matt in NYC on Sun Apr 29th, 2007 at 01:39:08 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Royal would win. were it not for the +65. | 83 comments (83 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
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