Australia’s Largest Christian News Site

Young women, including Christians, are increasingly leaning left, but embracing biblical femininity and principled living can counter cultural pressures and restore God-given purpose.

Last Tuesday’s election results in the United States of America — particularly in New York, New Jersey, and Virginia — revealed an overwhelming inclination toward Democratic candidates. Word on the street is that young women are to blame.

The exit polls speak for themselves: 81% of young female voters, ages 18 to 29, supported Abigail Spanberger, Virginia’s Democratic nominee for governor. In New Jersey, 81% voted for the newly elected Democratic governor, Mikie Sherrill.

New York City’s newly elected mayor, the Democratic socialist Muslim Zohran Mamdani, was backed by 84% of Gen Z female voters. The Daily Caller emphasised “that these numbers include young women of all races”.

In addition, there’s another trend being highlighted in this leftist shift among young women, which is in direct contrast to the right-leaning shift among young men. Some studies from the last couple of years showed a range of 25 to 50-point gaps between women being “more liberal than their male contemporaries” — studies that took place in the US, Germany, the UK, and South Korea. Even in these most recent elections, using Mamdani again as an example, “the only demographic to vote against him” were white men.

And while the political dialogue has long been focused on what ails men — “porn, video games, unmade beds, laziness, loneliness, alienation, radicalisation,” as the Caller pointed out — there’s a growing interest in wanting to bring women to the forefront. Why are they increasingly shifting left — and socialist? How might this impact the future of America? Definitive answers appear to be lacking, but there’s been a fair share of speculation.

Christians Included

“Study after study has found that young women have become significantly more left-leaning, with the political differences between young men and women more than doubling in recent years,” wrote Founder’s Ministries’ David Mitzenmacher. “It might be tempting to dismiss this as a problem confined to secular culture.” However, “tragically, the evidence shows that a similar ideological shift is occurring among young women who profess to be Christians.”

As Mitzenmacher explained, “The divide appears across issues: young Christian women are consistently more supportive of abortion, same-sex marriage, and broader LGBTQ+ acceptance than their male peers. The data tells a sobering but straightforward story: the youngest generation of Christian women is being radicalised.” Mitzenmacher believes the reason is primarily theological, and he summarised it through five words: “Femininity corrupted by the fall.”

He elaborated, “God designed women with wonderful strengths: compassion, nurture, relational sensitivity, and a heightened instinct to protect the vulnerable” — “good gifts” that Mitzenmacher said were “corrupted by the fall”. He then argued:

“Bad actors of both genders have discovered that the natural strengths of women can be co-opted and hijacked for nefarious purposes. Simply observe the political double-speak that has become so commonplace: abortion is reframed as healthcare, homosexuality is relabelled as love, and transgenderism is celebrated as authenticity.

In each case, God’s law is set aside in the name of what feels compassionate. The moral calculus becomes not whether something is right, but whether someone might feel hurt if it is named as sin.”

Control and Acceptance

Lydia Prudent, an ambassador for Young Women for America who researched Polarisation and Extremism in the United States, spoke with The Washington Stand. As a young woman, Prudent was able to help sift through the various layers of why women are growing increasingly liberal. To start, she addressed the issue of what is often labelled “bodily autonomy”.

These days, she said, “it’s being praised so much that women should just be able to go do whatever we want and not have to face the consequences.” Women want to be able to have control over their actions, she argued, and in many ways, this has not been good — especially when paired with a woman’s natural inclination toward empathy.

“Women are naturally very empathetic,” Prudent said. “We naturally want to help people and make sure that people are in the right place. That’s why mothers are so important, because we’re so nurturing.” Yet, this is “a big part of why we tend to skew more Democratic” — a party that claims to be for the people, always seeking “comfort.”

But in this process, Prudent noted, many lose sight of “the difference between good and nice. We’re looking to be nice instead of being good.” As she continued, “Nice is just telling people what they want to hear … hoping for comfort and likability with that person.” Being good, she stated, is “telling the truth in a caring way and being principled in that.”

She highlighted the tension: “We tend to want to let people be comfortable and not challenge their ideas.” And yet, this thinking often leads to compromise. Suddenly, Prudent explained, people say, “It’s okay to go out and marry someone of the same sex” or that “we should allow men to be in women’s sports … [and] allow kids to transition.” It’s “a slippery slope”.

Prudent once cared deeply about what others thought of her. “I had gotten saved young,” she said. “I considered myself a Christian. I lived a Christian life, but I wasn’t [really] living a Christian life, you know?” As she explained, there’s so much external pressure to conform, and it’s so easy to get “ostracised”.

By being “very concerned” about her image, Prudent herself used to hold liberal beliefs — even to the extent of once claiming to be “non-binary” in order to fit in; to be accepted. “We long to be accepted,” she observed. “All people do. But I think that’s also a really big thing for women, especially. We want to be accepted.”

Rediscovering the Dignity of Femininity

So, with Prudent now a Christian in word and deed, boldly holding conservative and biblical values, what caused the shift? As she put it, “I started getting discipled and decided to actually pour into my faith. The Lord really changed my mind in a beautiful way.” Now, after her own struggles with liberal ideas, Prudent diagnosed the problem: Women are chasing freedom, but “a misguided version of it.”

She pointed to the first temptation seen in Genesis, namely, the serpent telling Adam and Eve they can be like God, which implies total freedom. “That’s ultimately … where Eve wanted to be,” Prudent noted.

“That’s where Adam wanted to be when he took the original fruit and ate it. It’s always been a chase for freedom. That’s how the enemy likes to try to deceive us, because we’re always looking for what’s better,” and ways to not “have to rely on anything.”

To the world, Prudent argued, freedom means, “It’s all about me.” Indeed, she added, we live in “a me-focused culture.” But often, this “so-called freedom [is] really just putting you more in shackles.” Not to mention, a secular understanding of freedom isn’t “really freedom.”

What do women need right now? Prudent thinks, “They need an understanding of what femininity is. Not only in the biblical sense, but what it actually is: Clothing yourselves in dignity.”

When the world tells women how they need to behave, what they need to think, and who they need to be, Prudent encouraged us to say instead: “You’re great as you are” and as God created you to be. “Also,” she continued, women need “an understanding that they are created with a specific way of thinking. We all are. While some women have dreams of doing things outside the home,” ultimately, “we’re nurturers at heart.”

“Your femininity is a gift from God,” Prudent emphasised to young women. “Don’t let the world drive who you are and what you believe. God made you to be bold and called you into true and beautiful femininity. When you wake up in the morning, know Whose you are and know who He created you to be — and then walk in that direction.”

___

Republished with thanks to The Washington Stand. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.