I was browsing around on an unrelated subject and happened to notice something about the nicknames of famous women who have led big countries:
- Golda Meir: Iron Lady
- Indira Gandhi: Iron Lady
- Margaret Thatcher: Iron Lady
- Benazir Bhutto: Iron Lady
- Angela Merkel: Iron Chancellor
Is the United States ready for a woman president? Maybe we first need an Iron ______.
Kamala Harris, with her prosecutorial experience and affect, might have been our "Iron Lady." Instead, we got a rusted out rust bucket the color of rust. Technically "iron". At least in part.
Harris doesn’t strike me as being as iron-rich as those five.
MMMM?? Israel qualifies as big with 10 million population?
To give you a better sense of scale: - **Israel** is slightly smaller than the state of **New Jersey** (which is about 8,723 square miles).
Arguably, when Gold Meir led Israel it was punching above its weight class.
it's big in the sense that anything that happens in that little country has repercussions around the world.
Isn't it just likely that somebody used the term for one of these people (Meir maybe) and then lazy writers just got into the habit of using "Iron Lady" for every female leader?
The original Iron Chancellor was Bismarck, who was male.
According to wikipedia:
"In 1976, Thatcher gave her "Britain Awake" foreign policy speech which lambasted the Soviet Union, saying it was "bent on world dominance".[114] The Soviet Army journal Red Star reported her stance in a piece headlined "Iron Lady Raises Fears",[115] alluding to her remarks on the Iron Curtain.[114] The Sunday Times covered the Red Star article the next day,[116] and Thatcher embraced the epithet a week later; in a speech to Finchley Conservatives she likened it to the Duke of Wellington's nickname "Iron Duke".[113] The "Iron" metaphor followed her throughout ever since,[117] and would become a generic sobriquet for other strong-willed female politicians.[118]"
I thought women hated ironing.
Maybe we could go for The Ironic Lady.
I liked the series of anadromous fish names in Scottish PM's : Salmond, then Sturgeon. The next one should have been Trout, but alas, no, nor a lass.
uh, two of them were assassinated. not sure we want another iron lady to be killed.
Remember why?
I respect Merkel, but have issues with the others - & not just Gandhi's Operation Blue Star. She was cruel, as well as a fool.
Merkel isn't even the most famous person with an iron nickname to be Chancellor in Germany!
Meets the woman criteria, though.
Hillary Clinton was pretty much an “Iron Lady”, or at least it seemed to me.
Maiden, obviously. Maybe we first need an Iron Maiden.
Gretchen whitmer
Big Gretch!
It isn't likely that the US doesn't have the talented pool of iron women that Israel, India, the UK, Pakistan and Germany have. But we have to get over whatever is holding us back first.
Judging by the election results of 2016 and 2024, "iron" is not enough. What we need is a "Steel" Lady.
Pingback: கடுமையான பெண்கள் – இது இப்போ