US election 2016: Why women are wearing white to vote
Female voters are turning up to the polls in a sea of white. Photo: Twitter/DrayRuth
When American women head to the polls on Tuesday to vote for their new president, many of them will be dressed head-to-toe in white as part of a powerful social media movement.
The #WearWhiteToVote campaign is an effort to recognise the battle for women’s suffrage in the United States, which culminated in women across the nation winning the right to vote in 1920.
The suffragists adopted white as one of their signature colours, wearing it to protests and rallies as “an emblem of purity” to symbolise “the quality of our purpose”.
In July this year Hillary Clinton gave a nod to her forebears by wearing an all-white Ralph Lauren pantsuit while accepting her nomination at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
The New York Times style writer Vanessa Friedman hailed Ms Clinton’s outfit choice as a powerful statement that demonstrated she understood “the way fashion can be useful in contemporary politics and is willing to leverage that”.
Ms Clinton also donned white at the final presidential debate, after wearing red to the first and blue to the second – the colours of the US flag.
White has been a key colour for Hillary Clinton throughout her campaign. Photo: Getty
Bizarrely, Donald Trump’s wife Melania and daughter Ivanka opted for white while accompanying the Republican candidate to the voting booth in New York.
Calculated choice or fashion accident? Photo: Getty
Suffragette city
Despite its impracticality, white is the colour of choice for women commemorating their right to vote, with supporters of Ms Clinton preferring to wear theirs in pantsuit form.
Women – and some men – are sharing their own all-white looks on social media to celebrate the possibility of the US having its first-ever female president.
Nasty women unite
Some female voters, including singer Katy Perry, are donning t-shirts emblazoned with the words “nasty woman”, one of the insults Mr Trump hurled at Ms Clinton during the final presidential debate.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BMh8lSrB8J0/?tagged=wearwhitetovote
‘All women aren’t white’
The all-white movement has faced some backlash from African-American women who argue the suffragist movement did little to further their cause in the 1920s.
Whilst all women were afforded the right to vote in 1920, many black women continued to be excluded from this right due to financial limitations and discrimination, sometimes from the suffragists themselves.
https://twitter.com/Jouelzy/status/795720396637138944
Black women in the U.S. couldn't vote until 1965—not 1920. All the women aren't white. #WearWhiteToVote https://t.co/dgpHFGs2AA
— Kirsten West Savali (@KWestSavali) November 8, 2016
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