The Man of the Year is a Woman

"For asking more of her country than most politicians would dare, for standing firm against tyranny as well as expedience and for providing steadfast moral leadership in a world where it is in short supply, Angela Merkel is Time's Person of the Year [2015]." 

Nancy Gibbs 

(editor, Time)

Time's Person of the Year was officially the 'Man of the Year' until 1999, and although 'Man' has been interpreted by the judges more broadly than 'person born with penis', and awarded to some groups of men and women, as well as to three individual women, since the 'Man of the Year' award was first allocated in 1927 the vast majority of recipients have indeed been, coincidentally, persons born with a penis. 

The award is not meant to honour good doing but to acknowledge global influence, good or bad - possibly because of the global shortage of good men in the history of the world. In this way Hitler was a recipient of the award. However, Thatcher wasn't. Hitler, it seems, had more influence in his time than Thatcher, the first female head of state in the English-speaking world, had in hers, nothing to do with their different genitals.

In this vein, after Angela Merkel won the award this year for her positive global influence, as summarised above by Time editor, Nancy Gibbs, the runners up were ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who specialises in killing unarmed civilians and persuading other Muslims to blow themselves up, and Donald Trump, who specialises in spreading stupidity, prejudice and greed, and taking the worst elements of capitalism and multiplying them.

So maternal (female) morality, macho Muslim militancy and macho money madness are, according to Time, the three greatest influences of our times, which I think about sums it up. However, I also think that the time has come for the award to stop honouring the maddest and baddest men, of which the world has always produced a great many, in part, I would argue, because of the world's readiness to honour them, and simply honour the person or persons of greatest positive influence. Now that women are beginning to be considered persons there shouldn't be any shortage.