Hillary Clinton recently lashed out at those who have detected a ” feminization” of American society. “What an unfortunate term,” she said. ” After all, don’t fathers worry about how long their wives and babies can stay in the hospital when they need care? Don’t men want to be able to take time off when a family member is gravely ill? Don’t they want to ensure that their elderly parents have health-care coverage in the later stages of life?” In place of “feminization,” Mrs. Clinton suggested “the maturing of politics” or the “humanization of society.”

You can understand her frustration: “Feminization” is a term people throw around without ever being specific about its meaning. But there really is no other word for the multilayered phenomenon that has come to characterize our politics, our marketplace, and our media. Women’s clout is no longer latent, even if the leading apostles of feminism still claim it is. As society is currently constituted, women are the sex primus inter pares, first among equals, in politics, business, and the media. This year especially, from NBC’s coverage of the Summer Olympics to the political conventions, the effort to appeal to American women as a group has been a driving force in the culture.