It gets tossed around a lot, but I never had a clue as to what it means with respect to a person. (A jewel or a document can be authentic, but how is a person "authentic"
?
I'm beginning to think it just means "male." Or rather, males who say anything that comes off the top of their heads. Or angry males. Firebrands. I'm beginning to think being female pretty much automatically excludes a person from being considered among the class to which people attach the vague term "authentic." It's a convenient way to deny personhood to women candidates, it would seem. Women are "inauthentic" because it is not their authentic role to pursue leadership positions. Real fundamentalist crap.
People say Clinton isn't "authentic." But when I look at old speeches or old footage, going back to her college days, I see pretty much the same person: not a firebrand, but just smart, wonkish, hard-working person. That's who she is and who she's always been. Isn't that "authentic"? It certainly can't mean changing or evolving on positions, because take, say, Elizabeth Warren, who subscribed to Republican positions and voted for Republicans for the first 46 years of her life. Yet no one says, now that she's a Democrat, that she's inauthentic (well, they did say she wasn't an authentic Indian, so I guess that even is a moniker that got thrown at her in an attempt to disqualify her from office).
I don't buy this "authenticity" ploy as a measure of anything. I know some authentic assholes. Is that something to crow about?
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