Elizabeth Nolan Brown at Reason was on the call so you (and I) didn’t have to be, not that we were invited.

“Karens for Kamala?” actress Connie Britton joked.

Britton was one of two celebrities, several politicians, and, reportedly, more than 100,000 others on a Zoom call advertised as a way for white women to “show up for Kamala Harris.”

Good white women showed up for this call.

Also, pop star Pink was there. And Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D–N.Y.) told a story about her and Britton having to drink toad venom after eating bad seafood.

There were other calls as well, though not for white women.

The virtual gathering was organized by gun control activist and Moms Demand Action founder Shannon Watts, who modeled the meeting after recent calls set up by and for black women and black men who want Harris for president.

David Hogg, the child gun activist, is trying to set up a white men for Kamala call as well, though it’s unclear whether anyone will show. But I digress. Back to the white women for Kamala call, Nolan provides the cringe.

“I am here tonight, embracing myself in your incredible, profound white women midst, because we’ve got a fucking job to do, y’all,” said Britton, who has starred in shows like Nashville, American Horror Story, and The White Lotus. She went on to suggest that because Vice President Kamala Harris is a woman, she will “listen. And lead with empathy, integrity, and the power of the truth.” When President Joe Biden stepped down as the Democratic Party’s 2024 presidential nominee and endorsed Harris to take his place, “the world blew up. Did you feel it?” asked Britton. “It was seismic. Cosmic, even. And since then—have you seen it? Have you seen Kamala glisten in the brilliance and shine of her true power and leadership? And what does that feel like? Feels like self-love.”

“Women, when we are capable of opening up to our own voices and gifts, can access a love of self that is reflective…and can shine outward to unknown depths,” Britton continued. “Which brings me back to us. Beautiful, beautiful white women. Here we are gathered together.”

To be fair, Kamala Harris wasn’t the instigator of these calls. Then again, Harris didn’t do anything to suggest she had any problem with the identity essentialism of segregating by race or sex either. What eludes these unduly passionate supporters is that this played into the worst fears of woke racist and sexist stereotyping that fuels fears that Harris isn’t running to be the president of the United States, but the woke president of the marginalized.

And, oh boy, was the politics-as-self-care style of activism on display.

Much of the call was permeated with a sort of social-media therapy speak, as if winning the election for Harris is just a matter of enough white women self-actualizing.

The challenge was that black women were the backbone of the Democratic Party, and white women were free-riding on their effort and suffering.

“This tonight…is a gathering of people with white privilege, discussing what we are going to do, what we are going to use our privilege for,” said poet and activist Andrea Gibson, who noted that she is “actively hunting out” the parts of herself that are “misguided.”

“Thank you, I feel like we all just went to collective therapy,” Minnella responded after Gibson’s talk.

But what about Harris’ positions on the issues? Well, who would know, since she had little to say about such things before the calls, and frankly, only three things mattered: Harris’ race, gender and the indisputable fact that she wasn’t Trump.

Many of the speeches on last night’s call went light on things Harris has done or that she stands for, instead emphasizing her womanhood or the simple fact that she’s not Trump and/or a Republican. That’s a good way to rally people who already support your party and candidate, but not a good way to convince people who may be considering a third-party vote, not voting at all, or a vote for Trump.

This has been a staple of pro-Harris advocacy since Biden dropped out. Writer Kat Rosenfield called it “fandom politics”—an advocacy “fueled by rhetoric that is participatory fun for people already in the fandom, but categorically not persuasive to people outside it.”

If the notion of fandom politics sounds familiar, it’s little different than the MAGA nutjobs who are willing to spend hours in the hot sun to listen to the incoherent gibberish spewing from their orange god, Trump. But as thrilling as it may be for sycophants to bask in the warm glow of feigning political activism within their echo chamber, Nolan points out that the people who need convincing are not likely to be persuaded by these segregated group therapy sessions. If anything, this is exactly what people fear from Harris.

There’s nothing wrong with organizing folks who share certain affinities in order to discuss and act on political goals. But convening a group as broad as white women based solely on the basis that they are white women feels like losing the plot. It assumes white women by and large are more similar than they are different, just by virtue of being white and women. It is collectivist to its core. It laughs in the face of individuality.

On last night’s call, there was little room for the idea that some white women might vote Republican because they are Republican. They might favor Republicans for reasons having nothing to do with being women—that they might like, say, their regulatory stances or tax policies—or that they might even agree with ultra-conservative views on issues like abortion and what can be taught in schools.

Efforts to shame people based on race and gender into supporting Harris not based on the merit of her policy stances but on her identity strikes at the core of Harris’ vulnerabilities. Up until Biden withdrew, there was little support for Harris, who had aspired to mediocrity as vice president, tried desperately to shed her history as vicious and ambitious prosecutor before her metamorphosis into pseudo-woke senator, and now tries to laugh her way into likability as the anointed presidential candidate of the Democrats.

All of this aside, Harris still has one inarguable virtue that may well carry her into office.

She may not win an election because of her race and gender, but if that’s what her supporters pound, she could well lose one if that overcomes the foremost argument for voting for Harris.