Thanksgiving 2017

Song from church tonight

I've seen many searching for answers far and wide

But I know we're all searching

For answers only you  provide

'Cause you know just what we need

Before we say a word........

I almost cried tonight when I heard these particular lyrics in church tonight.  You see I have so many questions and so few answers.  I have a dear friend who told me that when we die and get to heaven, all the answers will be written on that big whiteboard in the sky.  Not that I feel the need to get to heaven any time soon, but I'd really appreciate access to that whiteboard.  

I am taking a class through  the University of MN on Race, Power, and Education and learning so much.  It almost feels like I had a huge sticky bandage blinding me and it is being slowly peeled off.  You know when you pull that band-aid off slowly it hurts.  I am sitting in discomfort caused by things I now see.  

Today I was looking through my pictures trying to find the one I had planned to use for our Christmas cards.  Of course, I couldn't find it.  But, I came across several photos I took during the summer of 2016 at the Science Museum of MN.  

Yeah, it is a blurry pic and your probably can't read it. Can you see the red letters that state, "Kill the Indian in him and save the man." As part of my class I have been learning about the History of Indigenous People in MN.  My friends, it is ugly, brutal, and oh-so-very-sad.   It breaks my heart.  As we prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving (my most favorite of holidays) I ponder the single story I heard since childhood about Squanto and Samoset and the Pilgrims all being best of friends.  They all broke break together, so the story says. In truth, today the day that we celebrate as Thanksgiving is a National Day of Mourning for Native American People in this country.

Last week I had to turn in a midterm paper for class.  I wrote about my questioning, not of my faith, but of a church and it's people, who historically have talked about this nation as being blessed by God.  Heck, our Pledge of Allegiance even states that The United States is "nation under God."  In my paper, I wrote:

          Prior to beginning my personal and professional learning around equity in education, I read Shane Claiborne’s Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals.  I heard him speak when he came to the Twin Cities.  His words began to inspire me to critically look at my faith, what I had been told versus the actual story of Jesus in the Bible. I need to reread this book soon.  As I flip through it, so much jumps out at me and begs me to dig my mind and my heart into this unsanitized version of Christianity. He posits: “Much of the world now lies in ruins of triumphant and militant Christianity. The imperially baptized religion created a domesticated version of Christianity--a dangerous thing that can inoculate people from ever experiencing true faith. (Everyone is a Christian, but no one knows what a Christian is anymore.)” (240).  At the time I first read this, a disconnect existed between what I thought of as the God of the Church and me. I thought the history of the Church was an academic realm of robed white scholars, with little in common with my more personal experiences. This disconnect left me in a kind of half-attention to the Christian tradition. But Claiborne’s words were like a wake-up call that brought me back to life.  I saw that there could be a place for the way my head and heart interpret scripture, that there were others who think like me.

As I read more, and realize the depth and breadth of racist structures, racist thought, and a militaristic legacy, I continue to turn to my faith, to the God revealed by Christ. The strength of my personal, spiritual experiences, with renewed learning about Christianity's radical origins, both empower me to argue and question how my Christian God could have blessed these United States of America--as popular religion in our nation often claims.   How could God bless--favor, condone, endorse--a country that did not claim all lives as 100% human?  How could God bless a country that raped and pillaged the people whose land it stole.   How could God bless a country that imported human beings and treated them as property? How could God bless a country that built itself upon the lives and land of others?

   Clearly I am still going to church.  I am planning on celebrating Thanksgiving and giving thanks for so many beautiful people and things in my life.  We will roast a bird and serve it with all the trimmings.  But this year I will light a candle in memory and acknowledgement of the historical underbelly of this day.  My family will talk about the other stories that we are not taught that got us to the table, lest we believe there is only a single story.  I hope and I pray that our world can become better than it is, that it can acknowledge past wrongs that have brutal and ugly consequence in the present day.

   As I pray and lift up my many questions to God, I trust that He has the answers before I even say a word.  

Reflection 1

I'm taking a class this fall through the University of MN.

This is my first reflection on Part 1 of Ta-Nehisi's Coates bestseller, Between the World and Me.  I highly recommend this book.  A classmate recommended that I listen to the audiobook, read aloud by the author.  I love listening to memoir read aloud by the author.  So, when class is over and I have opportunity to savor a good listen, I will.

This text was beautifully written and yet brutal to read.  Coates took me under water and held my head there forcing me to look at the bottom of that metaphorical iceberg that we educators like to talk about in our PLC, SIT, IEP and 504 meetings when we attempt to address race and all that we think we know.  After coming out of the water and gulping for air, I feel as though I am beginning to understand just how much I do not know about being a black person in these United States of America.

I read this text as a white woman and as a Latina.  I am both, you see.  However, my lived experience has been mostly in the white world, so my white woman self tends to be the dominant one in this body.  On p. 11 the author describes an interview, where the interviewer showed him a photo of a white police officer hugging it out with a black boy.  Then she asked him about hope.  He felt like he had failed.  Why? I asked myself. We can’t live without hope.  Don’t we want little black boys and girls holding hands with little white boys and girls, and by extension with adults?  Aren’t we striving for positive relationships between police officers and the people they are charged with protecting?  What is wrong with photos that give us warm fuzzies?

I had to go back and reread.  What I found hidden from me in the text (not hidden by the author, hidden by my own constructs and perceptions) were the details.  The photo, this “widely shared” photo depicted a crying black boy being consoled by a white officer.  The subtext of this photo is the story that is continually fed to Americans in our popular culture:  a submissive person of color being cared for by a privileged white person.  I see it now everywhere I look and I missed it here on my first read. This makes me wonder just how often I am missing it.  The story is subversive, but it’s in our faces, which is why we don’t see what it is doing to us white people.  This story is our normal.  It keeps our privilege in place by keeping one group up and the other down, and we white people don’t even see it.  We just feel the warm fuzzies and move on.

Black History month is the perfect example of how we feed this narrative to our students in the educational system.  It is a systemic way to make ourselves feel good, because we, the teachers, are meeting the needs of our black students by sharing their stories.  But, which stories are we sharing?  Why are we only sharing Black stories in February?  For that matter, why are we only sharing Latino stories in September?  When are we sharing the stories of our Indigenous people, Muslim people, Asian people?  Don’t they all make up our population?  But, I digress.  Young Coates noticed that the story being told in schools each February was one where the narrator was not Black. The protagonists, “seemed to love the worst things in life - love the dogs that rent their children apart, the tear gas that clawed at their lungs, the firehoses that tore off their clothes and tumbled them into the streets” (32).  He began to question why Black heroes were nonviolent.  When he writes, “I speak not of the morality of nonviolence, but of the sense that blacks are in especial need  of this morality...The world, the real one, was civilization secured and ruled by savage means. How could the schools valorize men and women whose values society actively scorned? How could they send out out into the streets of Baltimore, knowing all that they were, and then speak of nonviolence?” (32).  This is all playing out right in front of us every day. Trevor Noah recently posed the question, When is it ok for black people to protest?  He gave example after example of lack protest in different scenarios and it was never ok.  While the segment was meant to be funny, it nailed some uncomfortable truths.

There is a segment of our population that is very vocal when they feel their power, their culture is threatened.  Then there are those of us who know better, and yet see the picture of the white police officer hugging a black child and get stuck in feeling the warm fuzzies.  We think we are all going to be ok if we can just hug it out.  This is a lie we tell ourselves because we like feeling good and it is easier to believe the lie than it is to dig into very uncomfortable areas of our shared history and acknowledge that our very culture was founded on extreme violence.  Then we need to name how the consequences of this history play out today.  Naming things is hard.  It makes them real. Reality is not pretty or warm or fuzzy or comfortable.  

Then, there is another image.  The one of the black boy who pulled a gun on young Coates.  The idea that a people might inflict violence on one another is foreign to those who live in comfort and with privilege.  It gives a reason to stay separate because those people live in dangerous parts of town.  That a group of people, … “would break your jaw, stomp your face, and shoot you down to feel that power, to revel in the might of their own bodies (22) is foreign. There was some black on black violence at the SLP High School last year right after the election.  This had nothing to do with the political climate, in the eyes of some, because they (the Black students) were fighting one another.  I heard these comments. My own children had questions about this.  Coates describes the answer perfectly.  After generations of having no power, the need to revel in the might of one’s body has to be fulfilled.

I know that I made several sweeping generalizations here. And yet, they are based on truths that I have witnessed.  I did not enjoy reading this book,  yet I couldn’t put it down.  Coates wrote poetically about things that made me uncomfortable.   I don’t like discomfort. I don’t like discord. I am learning, though, that unless I go underwater to look at all that is underneath the surface, I will not grow as a human being.  I will not have the information nor the tools needed to make my world a good place for everyone.

Remember to Breathe

I went to yoga this morning. It was hard. We held poses longer than I have ever held them before.  I could feel the sweat running off my body and dropping onto my mat.  Just when my quivering muscles didn’t think they could hold anymore, the reminder to breathe would come from the instructor.  She reminded us that our bodies are stronger than our minds.  She reminded us that through our deep breaths we could hold our bodies in challenging poses longer than our minds could believe. She was right.   Yoga, I’m am learning, is not only about what you do on your mat, but what you take from your mat out into the world.

Tonight at church our gospel was from Matthew.

Matthew 13:24-30,36-43

Jesus put before the crowd another parable: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?’ He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The slaves said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he replied, ‘No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’”

Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples approached him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.” He answered, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Let anyone with ears listen!”

During the homily, the priest went on to share how he mowed over his wife’s daisies because he thought they were weeds.  He made the point, that if he had given them time, they would have developed into beautiful flowers for all to enjoy.  He connected his learning to the Gospel.  He said that, through this parable, Jesus instructs the crowd and his disciples to be patient.  They are not to rush into uprooting the weeds because some of those weeds might actually be beautiful flowers.

At this point, I start thinking about the state of our country and of our world, and I can feel my anxiety breathing (really, a lack of breathing) begin.  Panic sets in.  What the heck is this man talking about?!  I feel a sense of urgency to deal with many painful issues that our human brothers and sisters are suffering.  There are issues of immigration, of race and racism and white privilege, and genocide and, and…..so many others that must be confronted and resolved.  I am really having to think about my breathing, of leaning into whatever this man is talking about in an attempt to make sense of it.

Then, somehow, my brain puts itself in the other camp….the camp that says that laws are black and white and must be followed, the camp that fights passionately for the lives of the unborn, the camp that believes that all undocumented people in our country should be deported. These people believe that their opinions (and the reasons behind them) are as just as I believe mine to be.

I then think of  the interview I heard this morning on NPR with David Joy.  http://www.npr.org/2017/07/23/538825520/digging-in-the-trash-how-poor-southerners-are-seen

He talks about his people and how they are viewed in our country.   The host, Lulu García-Navarro brings up one his quotes, “you write in your essay - and I'm quoting here - "I'm tired of an America where all the folks I've ever loved are dismissed as trash, where people are reduced to something subhuman simply because of where they live."  Joy goes onto describe the plight of the poor in Appalachia.  It is a moving interview.  Though, he doesn’t agree with the conclusions of the author, he does bring up  J.D. Vance’s Hillybilly Elegy.  This is the second time this book has come up with this week, which tells me that I need to read it. Joy ends the interview by saying,  “I think that art should illuminate some aspect of the human condition. And so I think that when people want to understand this region and they want to understand an issue, I think you should always turn to the artists. And I think that you should read broadly, and I think that you should read things that make you uncomfortable. And I think you should experience things that are outside of your norm because all of those things challenge us. And they force us to ask hard questions. And the minute you start to ask hard questions, I think you start to understand the world in a more enlightening fashion.”   

And, then the sermon started to make sense.  In order to hear one another, we need to lean into difficult conversations.  As Joy, says we need to move into discomfort and ask hard questions.  Then, and here is the most difficult part, we need to witness the humanity in the person sharing.  We are all human and we all want to be heard.  Many times we need to sit in discomfort and listen to another’s perspective and allow ours to be challenged.  Our lived experience is not the only one out there.  We should not make snap judgements without considering the other’s point of view. So many of us are reacting these days.  Every time I read the comments on pretty much any article, I come away disheartened.  So many of us are entrenched in our points of view that our knee jerk reaction is to attack.  If you attack me and my point of view you can bet that I will not give a rat’s ass about yours.  It goes both ways.  

I am a shades of gray kind of gal.  For me, I think it comes from growing up in two worlds.  This is why I am pro-choice.  This is why I believe in immigration reform.  I hear people’s stories and I understand that there is more than one narrative out there.  Right and wrong are not always black and white.

So, I believe that what today’s gospel was really asking of us was to breathe; to breathe during difficult situations that our minds tell us we cannot handle.  We can handle them.  I have been having these conversations at home.  You might need to disclose that you are in an emotional place when you enter into a difficult discussion.  Your conversation partner might be in his/her head.  Realizing this and talking about where each one is at,  is part of the discomfort, but unless you do this, you will not hear one another.  Might I be sharing from personal experience?!   We might not come to a conclusion that is mutually agreeable.  Yet, having opened our hearts to someone and allowing someone to open his/heart to us might bring us one baby step closer in that direction.  

Is there a lot of crappy stuff going on out there? Hell yes!  Are there weeds that will not turn into flowers?  Sadly, yes.  This is not a kumbaya message where we I think we should all hold hands and invite the world to sing together and share a Coke.  However, I do believe that Jesus was inviting us to stop, breathe deeply, and get to know one another before we judge too quickly.  Without doing this, there is no hope for change.

Change

In the last few years I have been doing a lot or reading and learning about issues of race and racism in our country.  I have worked on my own racial autobiography, which I continue to develop as my learning progresses.  I have been wanting a space to share my thoughts and my learning, as well as the application of these in my fifth grade classroom and my life.  Changing up the blog to write about all of this seemed like the natural thing to do.

I just finished reading the book, Let Justice Roll Down, by John M. Perkins.  I am now working on the book, Do All Lives Matter, by John M. Perkins and Wayne Gordon.  I already knew that issues of race and racism were interconnected with my Christian faith.  However, these books really explain that biblical connection between faith and eradicating racism.

To start this off, I thought I'd share part of my initial racial autobiography.  Here goes:

September 1, 2015

I was born in the Panama Canal Zone in 1971, a beautiful baby, the product of my two parents; a combination of many races and cultures.  My mother, Isabel, is Panamanian.  My dad, Bill, is from the United States. So what does this mean?

I can trace back my racial lineage to Spain by way of my maternal grandmother,  Livina Águila.  Once upon a time there was a contingent of Spanish Catholic missionaries that arrived in Cañazas, in the Province of Veraguas.  One of these missionaries was not so devout and thus the Águila branch of the family was born.  I understand there must have been a large number of Spanish that settled and populated this area because when my grandmother first went to the big city of Panama she was surprised by the racial diversity.  Apparently the population of Cañazas was fair skinned and had light colored eyes.  I have her hazel eyes.  So does my son, Samuel.

My paternal grandfather, Concepción (Concho) Ramos, was a self-described “mestizo” from Penonomé in the Province of Coclé.  He was born in 1896 when Panama was still considered part of Colombia.  He would tell my mom that he was part “Indio” and part “Cholo.”  He had very tight curly hair and dark brown skin.  He only finished elementary school, but was a carpenter and a master builder.  I visited one the churches he built and still have the dresser he made for me when I was born.  If only he had been afforded more educational opportunities, I wonder what he could have done? 

My maternal grandmother’s (Lola Stuewe) family came from German stock.  My paternal grandfather, Herbert Beatty, had British and Scottish blood.  Think Outlander by Diana Gabaldon.  Both my paternal grandparents while of different European cultural backgrounds were white. They struggled financially and sacrificed a lot to put their four children through college when they themselves did not have college educations.  My grandparents helped my dad with his undergrad degree in anthropology.  After finishing a stint in the military, getting married and becoming a father, my dad decided that he had better use the GI Bill for a degree that would be more financially rewarding than this one.  So, he went to law school. 

My mom grew up in Panama City, the “lighter skinned” of two sisters.  This was an issue that affected my Tía Minita throughout her life.  She had other struggles, but my mom’s lighter (not white, mind you) but lighter skin, was always an issue.  Minita was always referred to as the dark one and Isabel was the light one.   

I will digress for a moment to point out here that when I was in elementary school my idea of a beautiful girl was a blond with blue eyes.  I remember being in Texas with my dad’s family and being given the choice of two dolls:  the blond or the brunette.  I chose the blonde, named her Mary and she still lives with my parents.   My daughter is blondish and has blue eyes.  She epitomizes my early ideals of beauty, yet my girl doesn’t see it, which just blows my mind.  Physically, this child is everything I dreamt I could/should be.   She sees faults – but that digs deeper into what our society is doing to all of our girls. 

So, my parents were married in October 3 of 1970.  As I said earlier I was born on February 2, 1971.   I was not a preemie.  Yes, I figured this out at an early age and it was a topic NOT to be discussed at our house.  Though as I got older I did hear the story about Mami throwing her engagement ring down during a fight with her fiance, my dad.  She threw it inside the car and not outside the window. The ring could be recovered!  I am cognizant of the fact that if my parents had not married, my life would be so different.  My mom would probably have stayed in Panama.  Would she have married another American, or married at all?  Would I have learned English?  Where would I have gone to school? Would I have gone to college? Would I still live there now?

I wanted to be white growing up.  I noticed the financial advantages that came with that.  Though my Beatty grandparents struggled financially, as a child I was already able to see the fruit of their sacrifices in their children.  My dad and his siblings were all college educated and my uncles all had good jobs.   My Ramos grandparents lived in a humble home in a humble part of town.  I noticed this.  As a child, I attached this to color. At one point in my childhood  I remember not wanting contact with my abuelito because I thought his darkness was contagious.

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My children consider themselves white.  They are white.  Their dad is white, of Irish German descent.  That they have only recently started appreciating their own ethnic background. This is because we talk about it now.  When I had three kids in diapers my life was about survival, and in order to get through the day I had to let go a little bit of who I am.  It took more than I had in me to speak Spanish to them.   I own the responsibility in this loss, but I am trying to rectify it.  My kids fight me though.  English is easier.

When I worked on my first resume,  I started to really acknowledge and appreciate the stuff that makes me uniquely me.  I landed on this path because of my history.   I have Livina’s eyes and Lola’s nose.  There’s a hint of Concho Ramos curl in my hair.  ”  All of my grandparents were incredibly hard workers.  Had they not been, I would not be here. 

The Day After the March: Some thoughts...

I do not write on here as often as I should.  When I do write, I am committed to writing more frequently, but the reality of my life is that I just don’t have enough time to do all the things I would like to do.  In fact, if I were able to follow through on every one of my ideas, you all would think I am pretty nice.  But alas….

I marched yesterday in St. Paul.  I marched as myself.  I am a bicultural/bilingual woman who looks White.  I am White.  My husband and my children are White.  I am one of the many who benefits from White privilege.  And yet, I am also not White. I am Latinx.  I feel a deep affinity with my Latinx siblings.  I have witnessed how people may treat my mother differently, and my brother and sister because they “look more Latinx” than me.  So ironic because I am the oldest.  I lived in Panama the longest.  Using my Spanish is part of my profession.  But, I am the “white one.”    Whenever I saw a sign in Spanish yesterday, I tried to capture it – many I didn’t.  When Patricia Torres Ray spoke, I was there with her chanting, “¡Sí se puede!”  Being Panamanian is also who I am.  It is in my blood.  I have my Abuelita’s eyes. 

I am a feeling person. In college on our mission to the 1993 Rose Bowl in the SS Honda Civic, my friends, dubbed me Deanna Troi, after the Star Trek empath.   I took a FB quiz recently about which Star Trek character I’d be, and guess what?  I’m still Troi.  I feel things.  Sometimes I feel them too much.  Because I feel things, I want to fix them.   As I grow older and wiser, I’m learning that most times I can’t fix things, but that being present makes them better.

I am a recovered bulimic.  This is tied in to all that feeling.  When the feelings got to be too much, I stuffed them down with food.  Then I purged them all out. I didn’t do this as a teen-age girl.  I did this as a wife and mother.   The day I went in for my evaluation to see if I, in fact, had an eating disorder, the therapist said to me, “Oh honey, it has got to be so hard to be in your head.”  Yes. It was. I thank God that when I was smart enough to get treatment, I had the insurance to pay for it.  How can someone in my shoes have gotten help without insurance?  When I think about someone’s access being taken away, I just want to yell, “Fuck!” Not pretty. But raw and real.  

I am also a Christian.  JC is my guy.  I love Him with all my heart and soul.  Tonight the closing hymn at church was, “We are Called.”  Yes, “We are called to act with justice, we are called to love tenderly, we are called to serve one another; to walk humbly with God!”   This is also who I am.

So, yesterday this beautiful mess that is me, marched. The event was beautiful. It was empowering. It was a giant caring community.  The speakers were inspiring. There were so many people walking together in love and walking for unity. And yet, I as I process the event here and world-wide, I realize that there is still so much work ahead of us, so much work.  The work of bringing those in, who felt they did not belong.

Many of the marchers were there to support Planned Parenthood.  I think PP is great.  It is place where women can go for health care.  I have used PP in my life. They are professional, caring and discreet. I am thankful for this organization.  It is a pro-choice organization.  This means that if a woman’s choice is to terminate a pregnancy, they will support her.

 I am pro-choice.  I have both personal and public reasons for this. This is not a stance I take lightly.  I have struggled with this.  Once I became a mother and felt my children move within me, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was life within me.  

And yet, I know there are women who need to make this decision for themselves.  Given some past circumstances, there have been women who have been desperate enough to take drastic measures that resulted in the horribly negative consequences.  Ending Roe vs. Wade will NOT end abortion.  There are women who for their own reasons need to make this choice. There are medical reasons that a woman might need to consider, that result in her making this choice.  Denial of this choice could end her life.  Who am I to say that I know better than she knows, about what decisions she makes for her own body, and yes, ultimately her own child.  This is her decision to make and not mine.

That said, I humbly respect my friends and family who are pro-life.  I get their stance.  This subject is not an easy one.  Women who are pro-life had just as much right to march as me.  We marched for Human Rights and if one is pro-life, one is pro-human.  So, I was deeply saddened when I read about pro-life and pro-choice women getting into it at different marches.   I feel that groups of individuals who chose to antagonize their opposition and engage in that type of rhetoric, defeat the greater goal of what we, feminists, need to stand for – unity.  Together, we are far more powerful than we are apart.  I believe, we can disagree on that topic and still work together for the benefit of those who have been born into unjust circumstances to make the world a better place for them.  

It saddens me to think that many women chose not to march or did not feel that the march represented them because of this issue.  And, I get that for many women, this is the only issue that matters.  This is their cause.  I know pro-life women have many questions of those of us that are pro-choice.  My question to those that are pro-life is : if you are pro-life, how are your actions making the world better for the humans who are already here – the unwanted babies, the crack babies, the babies born into poverty, mothers who feel they have no choice?  Work with us to make the world better for the women who default to abortion because they have no other choice.  Help us make the world a better place for those children who made it into this big bad world and need our love.  You will feel the impact of your actions making a difference in the numbers of abortions performed.  I have nothing to back me up on that, but my gut. Take it with a grain of salt.  However, eliminating Roe vs. Wade will not eliminate abortion.  

I am not naïve enough to think that there are not women out there who use abortion as birth control.  I cringe at those stories.   I have heard them, too.  But for every story that makes me cringe, there is one where I empathize and think, “thank goodness this woman had a choice.”  Do we stop caring for the sick and the poor because there are those people out there that abuse the systems put into place to care for the sick and the poor?  Yes, I know that is an entirely different can of worms, but the parallels are there.

As an aside, my friend, Heather, posted an article on FB this morning that got me thinking about our feminist Mothers, many of whom did not support abortion.  I think it is important to know this fact. I didn’t know it. Not all feminists were pro-choice.   Before we go off rattling the names of our feminist mothers, assuming they stood with us on all “21^st century ideals” we need to learn about them and what they actually stood for.   

I also know that many women of color chose not to participate yesterday because they did not feel embraced by the cause of white women/white feminism.  I read one account where a Black woman was blocked from getting on the train by a White feminist in her pussyhat. The pink hatted woman was protecting her “baby,” a daughter almost equal to her in size.  I was on a train yesterday and we were packed like sardines.  We let people on until it was impossible to get on. We sang, we chanted, we rallied together.  So when I hear that someone on a different train blocked another sister from getting on, I am so angry. I’d like to give that pink pussyhatted woman a “chancletazo.”

These words are from the woman who blocked:

I have never felt free enough to touch a white woman. I am scared of white women, if I'm being honest. And for good reason. White women's tears get people who look like me killed (or best case fired). Can you imagine calling the cops and telling them you were defending yourself against a white woman? Have you seen what happened in Ft Worth when a white grown man laid his hands on a black child? Having been in the reverse of this situation, the boldest I've ever felt is to just now attempt to move when a white man/woman tries to push onto a crowded metro train. I have never in my black life, in all my burnt sienna years, extended a member of his sepia toned body to block a white person's path. I'm not that trill yet, but I hope to be someday. 

I want to give this woman a hug and cheer her on.  Let’s all get in one another’s path if we see someone using their power over another. 

This woman mentioned the White woman’s tears. I share this academic, but fascinating article on this particular power.  I highly recommend my White friends read it and consider what this means for us as individuals and for Women of Color.  What does it mean for a movement with the following belief statement:  We believe in justice, equality and human rights. We believe we are the true majority and change happens when all voices in our diverse community are heard.  We cannot be a true majority until our sisters of color feel included. We cannot be a true majority until our sisters of color know that they are a part of "we" and "us" due to our actions and not just our words. 

Along these same lines, my friend Melinda posted the following photo on her FB wall. 

                                                                                                                     (that last word is, “forget.”)

So, let’s look at our power and our privilege.  It is difficult to acknowledge, but we have it.  How do we use it? 

We, as intelligent and educated women,  must engage in very important and very difficult conversations with one another.  We must have those conversations with those that disagree with us.  We must learn that these very difficult conversations may not resolve anything right away.  But, but…they are so important.  They are the first step in acknowledging why there is a crack in our movement.  Maybe once we all feel heard by one another, we can begin the process of actually becoming one big united group of women…. women of many different colors and many different beliefs who all feel embraced.  Let us join hands to work together for the greater good of humanity.

We will surely get to our destination if we join hands. 

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Aung San Suu Kyi

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