The Forgotten Value of Em*tion, Politics’ Favorite Derogatory Word

I’ve always been told I cry too much and laugh too loud. Common belief is that my mood oscillates unpredictably: I swing between glorious highs and crashing lows. Like half the world's population, I wear this ‘prone to be emotional’ like a neon yellow ‘Hi! My Name is:’ sticker on my chest. I will wear that label in job interviews, on first dates, and when I (inevitably) run for president. Every emotion other women and I experience is immediately attached to the assumption of ‘too’: when men can be rightfully sad or angry, we are always devastated or furious. Men are smart, logical, and grounded. Women have mood swings that revolve around our time of the month. Emotions make us undependable. We're bad students, bad coworkers, bad girlfriends, and maybe, most detrimentally, bad politicians. After all, women, and our hysterics, are simply unfit for any role of political significance.

 In politics, ‘too em*tional’ is derogatory.  The ‘too emotional’ label making headlines is a female politician’s watergate. It was slapped in a headline when Kamala Harris dared to raise an eyebrow at Trump during the presidential debate, when Alexandria Ortazio Cortez displayed any passion, and when Hillary Clinton teared up on stage. Even left leaning outlets were quick to attach the assumption of ‘too’ to female emotion; even ABC news produced ‘Can Clinton’s Emotions Get the Best of Her?’ and countless news outlets described her voice as “shrill” during her campaign. 

Here’s a quick history on em*tions. Just 50 years ago, half of all Americans believed that women were too emotional to hold government office. President Nixon cited being ‘erratic’ and ‘emotional’ as the reason he believed women should never be given the chance to earn the presidency. 1 in 8 Americans continue to doubt a woman’s emotional ability to handle politics. In the context of the miniscule victory margins, 1 in 8 votes is significant - even career defining. So yes, while the drop from one-half of Americans to one-eight of Americans believing women are ‘too em*tional’ is a draconian victory for feminism, I’m still (rightfully) devastated and furious that we’ve never had a female president. Even though more Americans in general believe that women are suited to be president, claims that we are too emotional severely undermine a female politician's credibility. An experimental study by Psychology of Women Quarterly revealed that when a woman is told to calm down, observers believe her arguments are less legitimate. Interestingly, male legitimacy doesn’t decrease when told to calm down. 

These findings are saddening but not entirely shocking. After all, opponents exploit our bias against women’s emotions to call out female politicians every day. A Forbes Article notes how the label ‘too em*tional’ is a political strategy. A favorite criticism of Alexandria-Ortazo Cortez is her ‘alligator tears.’ Trump called Kamala Harris ‘totally unhinged’. Right-leaning outlets routinely pointed to Kamala’s facial expressions during the presidential debate as evidence that she is too reactive. Because most Americans continue to believe that emotion makes women unfit for the presidency, these political tactics to undermine female politicians are extremely effective. It’s easy for media companies to rely on these same tactics to undermine their female oppositions. For centuries, women have been considered the ‘emotional’ gender. It’s easy to rely on the same uncreative, tried-and-true insults for women and save valuable energy and brainpower to report on the much more complicated men. 

This assumption that women are ‘too-emotional’ is so ubiquitous that I couldn’t help but doubt myself. Was everyone right? Are women really more emotional than men? 

The short answer is no. An fMRI study by Stanford University shows that men and women have an equal capability to regulate emotion. The differences come in how that emotion is regulated and presented. Women regulate emotion with areas of the brain associated with positive responses and conscious decision making, making regulating emotion more effortful. Men, on the other hand, showed less brain activity in their amygdala, the region of the brain partially responsible for emotion regulation, implying that emotional regulation is slightly faster with a smaller emphasis on positive responses. These differences are slight: neither gender is ‘too emotional’ or ‘not emotional enough’. Instead, we’re just likely to do different things with the same emotion. Women are more likely to use emotion as a tool to thoughtfully respond whereas men are likely to continue to have efficient brain activity. We are not ‘too’ anything, our moods don’t oscillate unpredictably, and our hysterics don’t make us unfit for any role of significance. Shockingly, a woman's time of the month wouldn’t make her too hysterical to be president. 

Women are so often ridiculed for experiencing the same amount of emotion as men because emotion is demanding. Passionate speeches, provoking policy, or, god forbid, raising an eyebrow in a presidential debate require energy to respond to. In the same way that women are conditioned to take up less physical space and be quieter, we’re also conditioned to take up less emotional space. 

So, that neon yellow label is both untrue and sexist: women are not too emotional. In fact, we’re so inundated with ‘too em*tional’ to pull down women’s polling numbers that we forget the value of emotion in politics. Even though those neurological differences in the way that men and women deal with emotion don’t lead to one gender being more emotional than the other, women are able to use emotion positively to rally for social change. 

In recent years, we’ve had signs that our dictionary for derogatory terms may be incorrect. This Cambridge University study researched the Covid-19 pandemic to reveal that female leaders were more effective at pulling their country out of crisis. Not because women are more emotional, but because increased activity in positively responding parts of the brain during an emotional reaction cause women to be more confident in using emotion to advocate for a cause. Presidents and political leaders that turn the tide on social issues are most likely to be described as ‘emotional’. Take FDR’s ‘fireside chats’ and emotional speeches about the New Deal. To a certain extent, women would be even more capable of using emotion comfortably. Harris even used her first name to feel more personable. The Guardian points out how importantly, this same down-to-earth, ‘Momala’ rhetoric rallied many Americans towards Ukraine aid easing up on border policy. Emotion should be a political pro, not a dirty slur that locks women out of the Oval Office. 

I’m not looking forward to wearing a neon yellow ‘too emotional’ warning sign as I try to make my mark in professional and political spaces. I’m only moderately comforted by the fact that women aren’t actually ‘too-anything’. Mostly, I’m worried because that takes the ‘too emotional’ problem out of our hands and into the hands of the media. Public perception will only change when a women’s opposition stops using ‘too-emotional’ to undermine her argument. When I (inevitably) run for president, I’d hope that my opposition listens to me more deeply than the ‘shrill’ of my voice or ‘alligator’ tears on my face. Hysterics aside, I hope to be heard. Now that we know that em*tional isn’t actually a dirty word, I only ask this: try to find more creative insults for female politicians, please. That female politician didn’t just cry too hard or laugh too loud—your media outlet is just boring.