Identity politics undermines a person’s achievements and perpetuates the lie that immutable characteristics are the most important thing about a person. Nowhere is this more obvious than in coverage of female politicians in recent elections. 

Headlines celebrated Kamala Harris as the first woman elected Vice President of the United States and how she has accepted her place in history. We were supposed to be excited as ‘Jacinda Ardern appoints first Maori woman as foreign affairs minister’ and Queensland’s ‘history-making’ poll was to be celebrated because “two women [were] going head-to-head.”  

The emphasise on their sex — something they did not choose, have no control over, and is irrelevant to...