The narratives surrounding Hillary Clinton’s pneumonia diagnosis and her health this week have been filtered through the routine partisan lenses. Very little has been said about how her insistence on toughing it out until a sick day was unavoidable is not simply the American way, but an American woman’s way of navigating gendered health dynamics in the United States.

People’s capacity to take time away from work when they are sick is stratified by gender, ethnicity, immigration status and class dynamics in the United States. Clinton’s options are simultaneously specific to her and emblematic of larger struggles women across the United States face.

Questions about Hillary Clinton’s health are soaked in gender bias | TheHill

Hmmmm

Women complained of having to elbow their way into important meetings. And when they got in, their voices were sometimes ignored.

So female staffers adopted a meeting strategy they called “amplification”: When a woman made a key point, other women would repeat it, giving credit to its author. This forced the men in the room to recognize the contribution — and denied them the chance to claim the idea as their own.

…In the early days of the Obama administration, the West Wing was a well-documented bastion of testosterone, due largely to the dominating roles of men such as Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, now mayor of Chicago, and then-economic adviser Lawrence H. Summers. At a dinner in November 2009, several senior female aides complained to the president that men enjoyed greater access and often muscled them out of key policy discussions.

…National security adviser Susan E. Rice also has served throughout Obama’s administration. In previous positions, Rice said, she had to push to get into key gatherings. “It’s not pleasant to have to appeal to a man to say, ‘Include me in that meeting,’” she said.

White House women want to be in the room where it happens – The Washington Post

The fact that any of this happened in the last 6 years is a disgusting and unforgivable stain on Obama’s presidency and his legacy.

Hillary Clinton’s public struggle with taking time off shouldn’t be a surprise

Women Are Taught to Work Through Sickness and Pain | TIME

hmmmm

“Thanks to the Obama Administration women will still be able to access the birth control they need to plan their families, and cancer screenings they need to stay healthy.”

…A new rule regarding Title X funding that affects the most basic preventive health care and family planning services for over 4 million low-income Americans, 85 percent of whom earn under $23,500 annually. About a third of those patients are served by Planned Parenthood that receives roughly $70 million annually in Title X grants for contraceptives and cancer and sexually transmitted infection screenings. Of course Title X forbids using even one penny for abortion services for any reason.

The Department of Health and Human Services new rule simply says that states are forbidden from withholding Title X family planning money for any reason whatsoever “other than a provider’s ability to deliver services to program beneficiaries in an effective manner.” The bottom line is that theocratic Republican states can no longer even vote to defund Planned Parenthood just because some of its clinics offer abortion services.

With a Stroke of His Pen President Obama Permanently Protects Planned Parenthood

hmmm

The reason this particular interview with Clinton rings so true to so many women is that even women who never go into political or public life of any kind learn to do a carefully choreographed emotional dance.

…Women know that to receive respect in a professional setting means being articulate and assertive, but not aggressive or angry or b*tchy; warm and inviting, but not fake or emotional; passionate, but not threatening. Essentially you have to demand a seat at the table, while making those around you feel like they pulled that very seat up to the table for you.

This outward emotional modulation matters because it’s something all women must learn to navigate, and then keep up forever. And it feels damn satisfying to hear a presidential candidate articulate what that feels like. 

Hillary Clinton Exposed The Emotional Tightrope Women Constantly Walk | Huffington Post

Sigh…