The noise of someone scoffing spiked his blood pressure. He glanced towards the source of the noise and was momentarily relieved to find it was someone inconsequential — clearly not a voter and probably not even married to one (how old was she, fourteen?) — but it was a fleeting relief. If he'd heard her, others had too. She didn't have to have a say in the actual election to be able to influence the tide of opinion in the room. A scoff from any quarter was an existential threat to his ability to weather this conversation unscathed. Emilia Wright's continued questioning was another existential threat, of course. She was like a dog with a bone on this — why couldn't she drop it? Did she have a particular vendetta against him personally? Had he been rude to her at a ball once and forgotten about it?
Unfortunately Oz had been rude to a great many people and forgotten about it, so this was entirely possible. Oh, that it should come to this — political ambitions dashed on the rocks of an old widow's grudge.
"It's a shortcut, is what it is." He hoped he didn't sound as flustered as he felt by this point. "There are individual women in our society who lack the vote, and who are more qualified to make those decisions than some of the men who have it. But voting privileges aren't adjudicated individually in our current system, and as a class — if one were to list off all the contributing factors, everything that provides one with the right context and experience to make reasonable decisions in this sphere, as a class men likely check off more of those boxes than women do, which is probably where this distinction originally came from."
Unfortunately Oz had been rude to a great many people and forgotten about it, so this was entirely possible. Oh, that it should come to this — political ambitions dashed on the rocks of an old widow's grudge.
"It's a shortcut, is what it is." He hoped he didn't sound as flustered as he felt by this point. "There are individual women in our society who lack the vote, and who are more qualified to make those decisions than some of the men who have it. But voting privileges aren't adjudicated individually in our current system, and as a class — if one were to list off all the contributing factors, everything that provides one with the right context and experience to make reasonable decisions in this sphere, as a class men likely check off more of those boxes than women do, which is probably where this distinction originally came from."
MJ is the light of my life <3