Browsing Tag

misogyny

Why I March: Looking Ahead to the Women’s March on Washington

December 16, 2016

It’s the morning after the election and I can’t open my eyes and face the truth:  Donald Trump won the electoral college and will be our new president.  So I continue to sleep.  For the next week, I walk around bleary eyed, still not quite believing that, not only did we not elect our first female president, but also we elected a man with a complete lack of respect for women, an admitted serial sexual assaulter.  I feel powerless, and hopeless, and helpless.  I can’t bear to watch Clinton’s concession speech.  It’s too painful. (Just between you and me, I only just watched Clinton’s concession speech today.  And yes, I still became emotional.)

Then, about ten days after the election, something occurs to me:  I simply cannot allow myself to accept President-Elect Trump as the new normal.  I realize I cannot avoid news for the next four years.  I cannot check out and bury myself in a bubble-like cocoon.  Instead, I know that I must do what we women have had to do periodically since the beginning of the United States of America:  acknowledge a setback of monumental proportions, pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and forge ahead for the fight of a lifetime.  In other words, I forced my eyes to open wide, kind of like Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange, and willed them to gaze purposefully into the future.

But now what?  Die-hard Clinton supporters like myself were not only experiencing raw emotions–fear, anxiety, anger, profound sadness–in the days following the political upset to end all upsets, but also the loss of an underpinning.  For we had all known deep down that victory would mean an easier path forward for so many progressive goals.  So, we put our collective energy into electing Hillary.  Now that we had lost that critical battle, what could be done to make the best of a disastrous situation?  Well, it turns out that there have been and will be so many things to be done–even before Trump is sworn in and certainly afterwards.

I personally donated money to an array of newly vulnerable progressive organizations, like Planned Parenthood and the ACLU, Emily’s List and the National Organization of Women, Trevor Project and Human Rights Campaign, the NAACP and the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Anti-Defamation League, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America/Everytown and more.

I subscribed to publications that advance honest-to-goodness journalism and investigative reporting, like the New York Times and the Washington Post.

I signed many petitions:  to stop Steve Bannon, to audit the vote, to protest Trump’s appointments, to investigate Russia’s hacking of our election.

I am boycotting NBC for its decision to air another season of The Celebrity Apprentice, and businesses that sell Trump products.

I wrote to all of the electors, imploring them to vote their conscience, and not for Donald Trump, on December 19th.

I didn’t participate in any of the protests against hatred, but cheered on my friends and those who did.

I continued writing my progressive feminist blog and shared noteworthy action items on my Facebook page.

I joined local organizations that promise to band together to fight against Trump’s threatened policies.

Women’s March: The Nuts & Bolts

Somehow, the one thing that has made me feel the best in the face of a seemingly insurmountable setback, was registering for the Women’s March on Washington and helping organize volunteers for what is shaping up to be a massive undertaking.  After some hiccoughs early on, we now know some basic truths about this prospectively historic march:

  • The march has been endorsed by a wide range of organizations, including 1199 SEIU, American Indian Movement, Amnesty International, Black Girls Rock, Black Women’s Roundtable, Brown Boi Project, Center for Popular Democracy, CHIRLA, Define American, ERA Coalition,Everything Girls Love, Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies, Feminist Majority Foundation, Life Camp Inc., MADFree, MomsRising, Mothers of The Movement, MPower Change, Muslim Women’s Alliance, NAACP New York State Conference, National Center for Lesbian Rights, National Domestic Workers Alliance, National Newspaper Publishers Associations,National Organization for Women (NOW), One Billion Rising, Trayvon Martin Foundation, The Gathering for Justice, The National Coalition of Black Civic Participation, United We Dream.  (Martin Luther King, Jr.’s youngest child, Bernice King, who was only five years old when her father was assassinated, has been supportive as well, according to organizers.)
  • The mission of the March is to advance the cause of justice and equality for all American women, regardless of race, religion, sexual identity, gender expression, socioeconomic status, immigration status, age, or disability.
  • Principles of Kingian non-violence pervade the spirit of the march, which is a peaceful testament to our collective concern for our future, and each other, under the Trump administration.

In the spirit of democracy and honoring the champions of human rights, dignity, and justice who have come before us, we join in diversity to show our presence in numbers too great to ignore. The Women’s March on Washington will send a bold message to our new administration on their first day in office, and to the world that women’s rights are human rights. We stand together, recognizing that defending the most marginalized among us is defending all of us. –Women’s March “Mission & Vision”

#WhyIMarch

#WhyIMarch is an ongoing hashtag on Twitter and I have enjoyed reading the reasons my fellow marchers give for choosing to participate.  At the center of the reason why I am not only marching, but pouring my heart and soul into this march, is that it advances women’s interests as its primary goal and purpose.  It is this march that is dedicated to the cause of justice and equality for all women.  It is this march that I have high hopes will go down in history with some of the greatest political rallies in American history.  It is this march that makes me feel like so many voices will come together and shout loud and clear that while we now know that many Americans were fine with electing a known misogynist to the highest office in the land, the rest of us most certainly are not fine with it.  At all.

So why do I more specifically plan to march on January 21st?  Here are some of the most powerful reasons #WhyIMarch:

  • To honor those female warriors before me–the suffragettes, women’s libbers like my now-deceased aunts, trailblazers like Hillary Clinton–and give voice to their concerns in a new era.
  • To join with likeminded, kindred spirits, and feel the power and sense of community when we merge together for a single purpose.
  • To use my voice to make an impact beyond sitting at my computer keyboard.
  • To forcefully and publicly declare that it is wrong and un-American to be sexist or misogynistic, regardless of one’s station in life, wealth, or fame.
  • To speak on behalf of those who are silenced and marginalized, or are too ill or elderly or poor to travel and attend the march themselves.
  • To acknowledge publicly that we live in a highly paternalistic, inherently sexist, and often misogynistic society, even in 2017.
  • To fight for the rights of my daughter (and her daughters) to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and to not be a second class citizen in the country I hold dear.
  • To make clear that women’s rights are human rights and human rights are women’s rights, once and for all.
  • To fight for the Equal Rights Amendment, which failed to be ratified in the 1970s due to anti-woman sentiment, and continues to fail to be ratified by the necessary number of states.
  • To show my understanding that there is (to quote Hillary Clinton’s concession speech) “still work to do” and passionately assert that we will not rest until we ensure that women have the right to control our own bodies, that with hard work and diligence we can break the glass ceilings of our choosing, that we will not tolerate sexual harassment, bullying, and assault by strangers and acquaintances alike, either in person or online, and that working women deserve the same opportunities and pay as our male counterparts.
  • Because I agree wholeheartedly with Hillary when she said on November 9, 2016, “Never stop believing that fighting for what is right is worth” the effort.  I never will.  And neither should you.  Let’s March, Ladies!

For more information on the Women’s March, including how to register (not required but helpful for planning purposes) or to make a donation, click here.  The Women’s March is what we make it.  Let’s make it an epic turning point for women’s rights in this country.

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Clinton v. Trump: A Referendum on Morality, Civility & “Political Correctness”

August 16, 2016

I don’t think of myself as having an alarmist type of personality.  So please give me a chance to explain exactly why I think that the upcoming presidential election is nothing short of a referendum on morality and civility in the United States. In fact, I think that it isn’t enough for Donald Trump to lose this election. He needs to lose badly.  Like in a landslide badly. Like Walter Mondale badly. I think Donald Trump needs to lose so badly that no one will ever again dare spend the time, and money, and effort to run a presidential campaign predicated on a racist, misogynistic, xenophobic platform. My concern, frankly, is that Donald Trump has—with his dismissive talk about the role of political correctness in a civilized society and his encouragement (incitement?) of violence against his rivals such as Hillary Clinton–uncovered a very ugly underbelly of American society that find in him their grotesque hero.  Now that Pandora’s box has been opened, the only way we can hope to close it up again is with a resounding loss of epic proportions.

It’s not that I didn’t know that this element existed in our society. Of course I knew that there are white supremacists, neo-Nazis, bigots of all ilk living in this country, and that there are people who have shrines in their homes devoted to the Confederate flag and what it represents. It’s just I felt in my almost 50 years of life that in my country–the country to which my own ancestors fled to escape hatred and persecution over 100 years ago–no one in a position of power and authority would ever sanction those views.

We all know the story of Trump’s unlikely climb towards the GOP nomination.  First, we laughed at his candidacy, taking it as seriously as we would if Ryan Seacrest or any other reality TV star suddenly said he was running for POTUS. Then, we recoiled when he doubled down after Megyn Kelly called him out at the GOP debate, asking him to explain sexist, misogynistic language he has used in the past to describe women.   We thought that no one would continue to support him after he said that Mexican immigrants were rapists and criminals or after he mocked a disabled reporter. Of course, we now know all too well, we were wrong. Despite the 16 Republicans running against him, all vastly more qualified than he is for the job, Donald Trump went on to win the GOP nomination handily.   Since then, those in his own party who hoped he would suddenly transform himself into a “new” Donald Trump have been sorely disappointed as he continues to disparage Muslims—even Gold Star families, and weave farcical (and completely false) tales that President Obama and Hillary Clinton “founded” ISIS.  Even as GOP leaders have started to distance themselves from him, with some prominent Republicans going so far as to say they will vote for Clinton, there remains a solid base of Trump support that seems to be indestructible.

You see, I subscribe to the theory that nothing much distinguishes angry and frustrated Trump supporters from the Germans in the 1930s who were searching aimlessly for a scapegoat to blame for their troubles. Like 2016 America, Germany was a highly civilized country and we all know who came to power there and what he went on to do to those that he and his followers decided to scapegoat—the Jews, homosexuals, the disabled. Once we strip away what Trump and his supporters call with no small measure of contempt “political correctness,” but in fact is decency and civility, we are set adrift in a sea that has no boundaries. For if Trump can speak so freely and be so successful in the political arena, and if his supporters–previously closeted bigots–feel free to openly express hatred for their fellow Americans and not face any social or political ramifications, then where does it end?

This is why I am so disappointed when people I know who are pro-Clinton and anti-Trump talk as if Clinton has the election all wrapped up so why bother making an effort.   Yes, yes, I have read the articles about polls in battleground states and dire portraits of Trump’s campaign becoming the proverbial sinking ship, but no matter. First of all, voters can be fickle and Clinton’s support to date has been said to be less than exuberant.  But more to the point, it is not enough for Clinton to win this election. When Clinton’s platform is the most progressive in history and touts equality as an ideal to which we must continue to aspire, and her opponent is steeped in nationalistic jargon of going back to a bygone era when minorities and women had even fewer rights than they do today, then how can Americans view this election as anything but a referendum on equality, core American values and, yes, morality and civility?

All of this is to say:  no one who cares about making America even greater than it is today, by continuing to pursue the ideals that made us great in the first place, can afford to sit out this election (or even to vote for a third party candidate who has no chance of winning in November). If you believe that we, as a nation, are made up of people who are very different, but that we are stronger when we band together than we are when we build walls—physically or metaphorically—to keep out those who are different, then there is no choice.  Vote for Clinton, volunteer for her campaign, contribute to her campaign, and speak out loud and clear against those who try to tell you that a vote for Trump isn’t a vote for racism and divisiveness in this country. Because the only thing standing between an America that continues on the path to a more perfect union, and one that goes backwards in time to the days when it was perfectly acceptable to openly hate others, is all of us.