On feminism and elitism---what is sticking in my craw...

[Skidmore]

It has taken me some time to get to the point where I could sit down and write about why I am so angry with Hillary and some of the people who support her. I want to address the rhetoric of her campaign. The propensity to sling labels around indiscriminately and to make assumptions about those who support Obama. I hope this doesn't get too long but I want to address the idea that anyone who supports Obama cannot be a feminist or is elitist.

I want to address both of these topics by way of telling you about myself. I grew up in a rural community right smack in the middle of America. Our family was dirt poor. My parents grew up during the Depression, born to families of little means. My father was one of 14 children and my mother one of four. I am one of eight. Of my four grandparents, only one had graduated high school. The rest had made it through grammar school or had no formal education at all. One of my grandfathers signed his name with an "X" when he conducted business. My father made it through eighth grade when he quit to work and help support his siblings. My mother graduated from high school. My father went off to the Great War after lying about his age to enlist and returned home after being wounded. He and my mother were married shortly after he returned. His life was hellacious as was ours. He was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia when I was a small child and he could be extremely abusive when he decompensated. He was in and out of mental health institutions throughout my childhood and seemed only to be well enough to help create another child. He couldn't hold down jobs for long. And before you get judgement about my parents, I will point out that we were all born before the birth control pill was invented and there were no mental health support services for the families of those with CMI. You toughed it out.

We lived outside of town in an old house that had been renovated following a fire. We owned no car and many a day I walked barefooted into the town located a mile and a half away to buy a loaf of bread, a couple of pounds of hamburger. I hated the times when I needed to bring home milk. It was heavy and the road seemed interminably long. We wore hand-me-downs and went barefooted all summer because we could only afford new shoes once a year at the beginning of the school year. We received surplus commodities and food stamps when those came out. We worked odd jobs to pick up bits of change here and there when we were kids--mowing lawns, babysitting, raking, etc.

In the middle of this, my mother taught us that the only chance we had to better ourselves was to become educated. She pushed both her sons and her daughters to achieve academic excellence and told us that no matter how far we went, we could not leave each other behind. She told us that we could be whatever we wanted to be if we only put our minds and energies to our goals. Better yet, she taught by example. No matter how bad things got, she continued to work away at completing a bookkeeping certification program, studying late into the night. She made us all learn to take care of ourselves in all aspects of our lives. I can swing a hammer as well as my brothers can cook and sew. She read to us and took us to the library. We would bring home stacks of books and would pour over them for hours. I used to read with a flashlight under the covers after I was supposed to be sleeping. Mom would drill us on math, spelling, and made us practice grammar. Sometimes I still see diagrammed sentences when I close my eyes.

I went on to marry and have children with a Middle Eastern man, who is now deceased. In my late thirties, I married a man of West Indian descent. I love my mother's spirit of generosity and her acceptance of others. She welcomed into our family my husbands, and sisters-in-law of Phillipino and Mexican heritage. She took to her heart stray young'uns from the community and we have an extended family of brothers and sisters of the heart. She taught us tolerance and respect for others, no matter what their means. That "there for the grace of God go I" and that your lot could always be worse that it is at the present time.

We all have been successful in varying degrees and by our standards. The greatest accomplishment of my life is my education. I have three college degrees, which I worked hard to get. All but two of my brothers have college degrees. We are proud of those achievements because they were made against great odds. My status has never been higher than lower middle class and will never be. I felt I had arrived finally. I was a member of the working class, complete with the training that society demands of me to be productive.

My point in sharing my story is to explain why these labels of "elitist" and accusations of being anti-feminism that have been tossed around are deeply offensive to me. By working hard and educating myself, I have become "elitist" by some definitions of the term I've seen on this board. By refusing to leave my brothers or spouses or my son behind as we attempt to move foreward as a nation, I am not a feminist. I would like to think that my fellow Democrats can acknowledge that striving to acquire knowledge and use it does not make one "elitist." That want all to rise does not make you anti-feminist. I was taught better than that. I know in my heart that I am right about this. Either we all rise together or we all will fail together. I am very offended that I have been hearing Democrats adopt this language and apply it to other Dems. It is wrong.

When I consider Obama's story, I find some striking parallels to my own life. The stigmas are different, but the heart and will of the mother is the same. The teaching of the value of education and striving to do the best you can is the same. The lessons of caring for others and helping others is the same. Lessons of tolerance and acceptance for all is the same. The belief that there is a fundamental goodness in humans and that we should aspire to our better selves is there as well. All the derision and ridicule does not take away from the integrity of that vision or its sincerity.

I needed to give voice to my discontent. It has been bothering me because I know that Obama's story and my story are repeated in our land. Many of us have overcome much to get where we are and have done it through hard work and with integrity. Most of us are "working class," no matter what the color of the collar. Most of us believe in equality and justice and fairness. Let's practice it and drop the divisive labels.