By: Shelley McKinley
In response to fear while walking through a dark forest Dorothy, the Tin Man, and the Scarecrow, said ‘Lions and tigers and bears… oh my!’ in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz. Today, many Americans feel like they are in a dark political forest and are calling for President Biden to step down out of fear of his memory loss, fear of his death while in office making Kamala Harris president, and /or the possibility of Donald Trump winning the presidential election. Some democrats and independents alike, are asking President Biden to withdraw from the presidential race. In essence, the public outcry is ‘Ageism and sexism and racism…oh my!’
As baby boomers are getting older in this increasingly technological society, ageism is still an accepted prejudice in the USA. Age bias, rooted in stereotypes, has called into question President Biden’s cognitive abilities with the assumption that they will inevitably worsen with age throughout his second term if elected. His recent public performances have only provided sound bites that will be used against him. The fact still remains that Biden has a proven successful political track record, and has a team of advisors, spokespeople, and experts for domestic and foreign issues, so President Biden’s age should be a non-factor.
In a 2024 American Psychological Associa-tion (APA) interview, Joann Montepare, PhD, director of the Rose Mary B. Fuss Center for Research on Aging and Intergenerational Studies at Lasell University in Newton, Massachusetts, stated, “Ageism is this odd ‘-ism’ in that it’s still socially acceptable in many ways. Aging is a very diverse process, and there are great differences between individuals.” Others fear that are fueling the call for President Biden to withdraw are sexism and racism. If the President cannot serve his full term, Vice President Kamala Harris would assume the role of president. “In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall be-come President,” Section 1 of the 25th Amendment reads. Th is last happened in 1974, when Vice President Gerald Ford replaced President Richard Nixon.
Vice President Harris, who identifies as Indian-American, attended Howard University and is an active member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. She uses those experiences to link herself to the African American community. If she were to ascend to the presidency, Harris would become the first woman and first Indian-American to hold the office. Therefore, VP Harris stands at the intersection of sexism and racism. Niki Haley, another Indian-American woman, recently lost the republican presidential primary to Trump, and is being ostracized by her party for taking him on. This is another example of sexism and racism, showing that party affiliation does not matter when it comes to minority women holding the highest office in the USA.
As we approach the 2024 Democratic National Convention where delegates of the United States Democratic Party will select the party’s nominees for president and vice president, democrats and independents are asking for an-other candidate so that they can avoid admitting their personal prejudices related to gender and race. With a presumably younger white man running against Trump, they can pretend that their personal prejudices toward women and minority populations do not exist.
