Obama: Saves World, Gets People to Fucking Chill

So: done and... well, almost-but-not-quite-but-nearly-as-good-as-done. Yay! Good job! Keep it up! And so on and so forth!

Now. Why, pray tell, did Obama sign the executive order lifting the global gag rule today, rather than yesterday, a date that would have had far more weight and resonance, and which was also the date he initially planned the signing? Well, the Wall Street Journal has a theory that will piss you off: he did this precisely to deny it that weight and resonance, and to make all our Abortioning Day parties a little less awesome. This is consistent with his (weirdly pander-y and undermining and gross) statements about abortion being so sensitive and divisive and sad and bad and undesirable, and the fact that he has always been a little nebulous and unwilling to fully, openly commit to a progressive stance on issues related to gender and sexuality. It is also consistent with his history of "[supporting] liberal policies he believes in while trying to defuse emotional political debates."

Which, to be honest, does make me cynical and cranky. Barack Obama respects my rights! Barack Obama respects the people who seek to deny me my rights! Which is inconsistent with respecting my rights! So what in heck does he believe? I DON'T KNOW! I automatically distrust people-pleasers, since I figure that you cannot smile at every single one of the people you meet each day without faking it at least some of the time: in the absence of concrete proof as to where your loyalties lie, I will be forced to assume they don't lie with me, because that's a lot safer than misplacing my trust. Give me honest assholes over insincere charmers any day of the week, say I. So, though Obama is most certainly a charmer, I insist (and will continue to insist) on good, solid, action-based proof of his sincerity.

Yet rescinding the global gag rule is... exactly that. It is awesome. It is great. It will save lives and do a substantial amount to ensure the autonomy, freedom, health, and economic security of women. It is a praiseworthy, feminist act. Regardless of these facts, however, crazy people who hate women don't seem to be losing 100% their shit! Witness this quote, from anti-abortion advocate Reverend Joel Hunter!

"I really do appreciate their sensitivity to this day and this issue," he said. "To do it [the policy change] on a day that pro-life people see as a day of grief, and a day of a really hurtful decision, would be, I think, very insensitive. And that's not who I think President Obama is or would mean to be."

President Barack Obama, surrounded by the souls of his unborn victims. Oh, no, wait, those are bling graphics.

I know, right? We won! He lost! Yet he is expressing... respect? Gratitude? Gracious acceptance? Never in my life have I heard these things from anti-choice people in response to a pro-choice victory. This seems to mean that, whatever Obama is doing, it is working - and that, to be honest, is blowing my mind.

Progressives are Obama's base. Our commitment to him has been crucial to his success. We helped him to rise above a well-established Democratic frontrunner, then supported him during a dirty campaign from his Republican opponents, and eventually helped to make him the leader of our country. We owe it to him and to ourselves to keep him (and every one of our representatives) accountable. When he screws up, we are obliged, as citizens who believe in our government enough to care about it, to criticize his actions openly and seriously. Yet these moves of his, slick and occasionally infuriating as they are, are nothing to fuck with. The man knows what he's doing. Within two days of taking office, he's made that abundantly clear.

So, yeah, Barack. Listen to those folks. Listen to them all you like. Listen to them for as long as it takes. Just don't, you know, listen to them. That's gross.

LINKING TIME Is Up In Your Baby-Maker

It is Blog for Choice day, hurrah! So all the Internet ladies get to write posts today about their shmushmortion hopes and dreams. This year's topic: What is your top pro-choice hope for President Obama and/or the new Congress?

My post is right here, duh. It is mostly about how I hope Obama will actually be (non-reluctantly, unapologetically) pro-choice. I dream small and/or big; honestly, when it comes to this topic, I can't even tell the difference any more.

Shark-Fu at Angry Black Bitch writes about if Roe were magic. It is not, sadly, and therefore does not fix everything, as she makes clear.

Cara at Feministe blows your mind with a post linking abortion rights to rape to "sexual rights" (my two favorite words, denoting my one favorite concept) in general. (Also, if you go alllll the way down to the bottom of this post, you will see that Obama has already granted one of my wishes! I take it back, you guys, he is totally going to drive us all to Chuck E. Cheese and give us an unlimited number of tokens with which to play skee-ball. He is the best.)

Melissa McEwan at Shakesville supports choice because she trusts women. Melissa McEwan is adorably optimistical and full of faith in the world, and makes me feel crusty and bitter on a more or less regular basis. I love that about her.

Ann Bartow at Feminist Law Professors uses her platform to broadcast Nancy Northrup's serious, well-thought-out, and totally plausible suggestions for promoting the cause of choice. This is why Ann Bartow is totally brilliant and people who quote her out of context in order to level unfounded accusations of P.U.M.A.-ism at her (ahem) need to actually, you know, read her blog.

Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon wonders what the overlap might be between anti-choice advocates and old white dudes who hate the ladies. (SPOILER: It is huge.)

Finally, Amanda Hess of The Sexist has spent the entire day covering the enormous anti-choice protest in Washington. So, to sum up: we are representing ourselves and making our presence felt and educating people as to our beliefs, using TECHNOLOGY and WORDS while INDOORS. They are wandering around D.C. freezing their asses off and screaming about how abortion is "Vietnam for women" or something. We have now conclusively proven which side is smarter. You know, in case you wondered.

Oh, and here's Barack almost wearing a t-shirt and/or running for President of Your Heart:

If I insist that he give all future press conferences whilst wearing this exact shirt no matter how smelly it gets or how many times the White House Puppy throws up on it, does that make me a single-issue voter? Or does it make me A CITIZEN WHO GETS INVOLVED?

To Choose Our Better History.

"We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness." - OFFICIALLY NOW PRESIDENT of the ENTIRE UNITED STATES Barack H. Obama, in the twenty-nine seconds of his speech I was actually able to view while the Internet freaked out from everyone logging on to it at once and I contented myself with viewing the high-water pants of change.

Yes. Let's do that. That sounds like a plan.

Dear Mr. President Barack H. "Stands for 'Hope!'" Obama,

What's happening to us?

You and I have been involved for about a year. I'd eyed you from afar at the DNC in '04, and hoped that something might happen. Then there was that crazy, intense period last spring, when we were definitely doing something, but neither of us knew exactly what - I mean, should I commit to you, or keep my options open for the first female president? Was what I was thinking, and I know you felt that - but, by June, we seemed to have it all figured out. I was committed, and not just in some bullshit "you'll do for now" way, which (I hate to admit) is how I've been with most other candidates. I could see a real future with you. 

That's why these past months have been so rough. I mean, I guess what I'm saying is that my mental picture of your campaign was like this:


Whereas the actual pictures of your campaign have been like this:


Now, Jon Favreau may have many great qualities as a speechwriter, chief among which seems to be an ability to utilize the progressive rhetoric specific to his generation (it is mine as well, so I recognize it!) which Bush's disastrous presidency made popular even among people with no real commitment to social justice issues, while skillfully blending said rhetoric with some lyrical passages and some crowd-pleasing ambiguities, managing to convey a take on social issues and that particular subset thereof which we call "identity politics" which far outstrips that presented by any other President in terms of its intelligence, depth, and nuance, while cleverly distracting the reader or listener from the fact that nothing has been promised or even said outright. I know you like that. However, I always thought that you were more than just talk. Together, you and Jon convinced me that you knew what you were talking about - that you got it. If this photo is any indication, then Jon, at least, does not.

I get the feeling that I don't really know your gender politics any more, Mr. President. Maybe I never did. However, it says something that you kept Jon around, knowing - as you must have known - about these, shall we say, tendencies of his. What it says is not good.

That's not the end of it, either. The Larry Summers thing really hurt. I mean, it was such a betrayal. I tried to convince myself that you didn't know about his "girls are dumb" thing, but it didn't work. I mean, my mom knew about that, and she's hardly the type to spend 50% of her day surveying the feminist blogosphere like I do. You're clearly smart - my smartest President ever, I think - which means that, when you do things like this, I can't really convince myself that you "just don't know any better." You always know better. The question is whether you care.

Rick Warren, Mr. President? RICK WARREN?! Be honest: how little respect do you actually have for me? The worst, most humiliating part of it all is that I blame myself. I finally go ahead and trust a President - something I've never really done - and the next thing I know my friends are coming at me with news like this. Then you have the gall to defend yourself by saying that you "[disagree] with Pastor Warren on issues that affect the LGBT community." Um, great, me too, but what about issues that affect my community? You know: the one comprised of women? Women, whom your new BFF Rick believes should be in submission to their husbands (they will all have husbands in Rick's ideal world - even the Ls! - just as the Gs will have wives and the Bs and Ts will not exist), and to whom he would like to deny access to safe and legal abortion? Or does that not merit a mention - is that just one of those "other issues" you disagree on even though you don't apparently disagree so much that you can refrain from giving this man a crucial role in your inauguration (and your tacit approval thereby) because it's "bringing together all sides of the faith discussion in search of common ground?"

Mr. President, I'm tempted to say that you have found your common ground with Rick Warren, and it consists of being utterly dismissive and clueless re: women's issues, which at this moment both of you seem to be.

You know about my last Democratic Presidency, of course. Everyone knows about that shitshow. It was long, and intense, and although Bill and I had some good times - I'll always be grateful for the deficit - for the most part it was just scandal, scandal, scandal, all the way through. I had to overlook Paula Jones. I had to overlook Gennifer Flowers. It was fucking impossible to overlook Monica Lewinsky, although (sick to say) I tried. I was the very picture of an abused, codependent feminist voter. "I mean, I guess if you looked at these things from an outsider's perspective," I would say, "it might seem like my President is a misogynist with severe impulse control issues who exploits his institutional power in order to seduce or sexually coerce young women, engaging in sexist, demeaning, belittling cigar-in-the-pussy behavior verging on sexual assault, which I would find utterly revolting and unacceptable from any other man on the face of the planet. But you don't know him like I do. He really tries. And he's better than some of the other guys out there." Looking back at myself, all I can say is: YIKES.

I do not intend ever to get back into that place, Barack. I certainly don't intend to go there with you. As far as our Presidency goes, there will be a zero-overlooking policy.

So, Mr. President, here's the sand. I want you to watch me very carefully while I draw this here line in it. I'm going to be generous and say that you haven't crossed it yet, but you are close, very, very close, so close that the outermost grains of it are brushing against your shoe. You need to back away from this line, this line you have not quite crossed, at a speed so great it could break the sound barrier, if my support for you is to continue. Do something to show me you care. Lifting the Global Gag Rule would be a good start. I know this comes across as "needy" and "demanding" and all those other things us chicks are always being warned against - it creates a division in your party! people will be reluctant to ally themselves with you! blah! blah! blah! - but frankly, I'm a little tired of being ignored.

You do not want to cross that line, Mr. President. Hell, as they say, hath no fury like a voter base scorned. You think you had a tough time with Hillary? Just you wait.


Love,

A Lady Voter

UPDATE: Again! "Accidentally unoriginal posts" are the new "terrible sex puns" of this blog. Next week it will be "jokes that were old four years ago" and all the posts will be about Zach Braff. In summary, I guess what I am saying is: do not hire me, or consider me a person worthy of your respect. Also, read this. It's good. I guess she broke up with him before I did, but: don't all of your exes sooner or later sound the same? 

Feast Ye Now Upon Your Condemnation. Served With a Hearty Red!

The Catholic Church has always had its problems: with the Ladies, the Gays, the People Who Use Birth Control, and the People Who Get Married More Than Once. (Hi, Mom!) They also have problems with the Left-Handed, by the way. Maybe this is not as much of a thing, but I recall being seven years old and hearing that Mary sat at "the left hand of God" because she was a woman and because it was the "unclean hand," and I was DEEPLY OFFENDED, living as I do at the intersection of these two equally important forms of prejudice. I cornered the priest after Mass and let him have it!

Short answer: yes, I have always been a sanctimonious twat.

Anyway! The Catholic Church has added a new group to its shit list: the People Who Voted for Obama. Actually, it might just be this one guy:

"Our nation has chosen for its chief executive the most radical pro-abortion politician ever to serve in the United States Senate or to run for president," [Rev. Jay Scott] Newman wrote, referring to Obama by his full name, including his middle name of Hussein.

"Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life alternative exists constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil, and those Catholics who do so place themselves outside of the full communion of Christ's Church and under the judgment of divine law. Persons in this condition should not receive Holy Communion until and unless they are reconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance, lest they eat and drink their own condemnation."

So, you totally can't have communion now unless you do your penance, although this is slightly complicated by the fact that (a) no-one knows who you voted for unless you tell them, and (b) the priest can't tell if you did penance or not unless you tell him, as evidenced by the many times I did not say a "Hail Mary" for calling my little brother a poopface and thus damned myself to Eternal Hellfire. To be fair, though, he was being a poopface. I think God agrees with me on that.

In fact, I've checked with God, and he would also like you to know that Obama is not even remotely a pro-abortion radical. Obama doesn't even believe that psychological distress counts a health-related reason to abort. I, however, am a pro-abortion radical, and drove many people mad throughout election season with bitter, non-productive comments about the choice positions of both major Democratic contenders. "Why won't Hillary say she's okay with abortion? Why won't Obama say he's okay with abortion? Why does no one like abortion as much as I do? Why am I not having an abortion right now? You know who would be a better Vice-Presidential candidate than Joe Biden? An abortion! Obama/Abortion '08! GOD, I JUST LOVE ABORTION SO MUCH."

Short answer: yes, I am still a sanctimonious twat. Now, however, I'm a sanctimonious twat who won't stop talking about abortion! Also, I don't go to church any more.

You know, given the fact that Obama's election drove this dude into an epileptic rage fit, I can't wait to see how he reacts when he learns who the Secretary of State is going to be. (Ohpleaseohpleaseohplease.)

[Via this via that.]

What It Looks Like

So, yes, I burst into tears last night, but now I want to tell you why.

A few days ago I wrote this:

Most people do not belong to the (incredibly small) demographic of white, straight, middle-class men at which most "mainstream" media is targeted; most of us will, at least once per day, be smacked in the face with a message that tells us we are unimportant or inferior, and most of us learn to shrug those messages off.

I was thinking about the election when I wrote that. I was thinking about the election, and I was thinking about the most basic and most urgent task that I engage in every single day: looking at that white/straight/middle class/male narrative of America - the atmosphere through which I move, every day, absorbing its countless messages that only those people truly belong in this country or this world, that only they matter, that only they can ever be imagined when we say the word "American" or even "person" - and understanding that for what it is, and talking back to it. I don't do this because I want to; I do it because I have to, in order to believe that I belong in this world.

There were two men who shaped the course of my education: Sekou Sundiata and Gary Lemons. Sundiata taught me to write. He insisted that I learn the necessary discipline and technique, while acknowledging that writing was - or should be - only one facet of a greater engagement with the world. He told me that your message is your instrument: it doesn't matter how beautiful that instrument is if you can't play it. Lemons shaped the nature of my political engagement. On the day I met him he stood in front of the classroom and told us about his childhood: his father's violence, his mother's pain, and how he learned to internalize racism, which told him he was worth nothing, and sexism, which told him that black women were worth even less. He spoke of political engagement as a life-saving action, a recovery, which allowed him to overcome the ugliest aspects of his own socialization and work to heal the same wounds in others. I do not engage with this theory because it is intellectually interesting, he said, I do it because without it I would be insane or dead.

I knew that it was true. It was true for him, and it was true for me. I was falling apart that year. I was living with the memory of my father's violence, and my mother's pain. I was coping with the ways that I had swallowed the misogyny embodied in that family dynamic whole, and had treated myself - or allowed others to treat me - as a piece of meat or a garbage dump because of my gender. I was coping with my departure from the very white, very racist community I had grown up in, and was uncovering unconscious prejudices and attitudes of entitlement in myself to which I had never consciously admitted - and I had never had to admit them, because within that very white, very racist community, they were simply normal.

You want to talk about hope: I will tell you about Gary Lemons and Sekou Sundiata. I do this theory because without it I would be insane or dead; your message is your instrument, so learn to play it. These men were never easy on me, or on any of their students. They called me out, over and over again, for sloppiness in my work, for errors in my arguments, and for exhibiting a privileged, entitled white middle-class feminism which reified the system I claimed to be working against. I owe them more than I can express.

Lemons, who had been openly critical of the school's student diversity and faculty hiring policies, was fired a year after I met him; he had served at the college for more than a decade. Sekou Sundiata died last year.

So, yes, directly after Obama's victory speech, I excused myself from the room, and I went out onto the sidewalk, and I cried, harder than I have cried in years. It was not about the Democrats winning, or about me getting what I wanted, which was a Democratic win. It was about the fact that people have given their lives to this work, and many have suffered for it, and many have died, and some may have believed, as they died, that it was worthless. Many have developed, as I have, an ugly cynicism - we push for things that we don't honestly believe can be achieved, so that, when we lose, we don't mourn. We just say, what more would you expect from this country? I want you to believe me that, when I cried last night, I was grieving. I was also feeling that cynicism lift from me. I was realizing that it had been so, so, so heavy.

The narrative is wrong. It has always been wrong. "People" and "Americans" and "America" do not look like forty-three white married men of means. They look like this:












Yes, evil still exists. No, electing Barack Obama did not magically solve racism or end the dominance of the master narrative. Yes, we have a lot of work to do. You know, last night, this kid showed up to the party:

He is still going to grow up in a world where his success and his comfort are prized more than those of others, because of his gender and his race. He will still see that people who look like him occupy the most respected and powerful positions far more often than people who do not. He will still be taught in schools where the intellectual and artistic accomplishments of people who look like him are considered "canonical" or "foundational" or simply "great" works, with no identity-based qualifier, whereas the contributions of people who do not are typically described as "great works by women" or "great works by African-Americans" or what have you, rhetorically and conceptually separated from pure (white, male, straight) "greatness." He will still be encouraged to consider his successes as entirely his own, without taking into account the privileges and support networks that people who look like him necessarily inherit, which have made his success not only possible but likely. He will still live in a world where it is unlikely for him to gain the critical apparatus necessary to understand his own privilege, or the empathy necessary to join others in dismantling the institutions and assumptions which make it possible. He is still, most likely, going to make things harder for the rest of us, without entirely knowing what he is doing, or why.

I know this. I know this because I am a white, straight, college-educated, middle-class professional, and I am constantly extended privileges that I do not deserve, and I am constantly encouraged to simply embrace those privileges as my birthright. It is easy, safe and comfortable for privileged people like me - and lots of people are privileged, like me - to affirm and reinforce the structures of oppression; it is painful, dangerous, and difficult for us to resist them. But I believe that, in order for last night's victory to happen, millions of people had to vote against their own privilege. They had to defy that master narrative for long enough to cast their votes. I hope that we are able to continue this; I hope that we continue to reach past the politics of pure self-interest. I hope that boy is going to be able to carry this moment with him, and to serve its spirit. He is going to need good teachers.

Vote Yes on Michelle Obama

Happy Voting Day! How was your experience? No matter how good it was, it can't compare to the experience that these folks had: 

That is because they have the Most Amazing Marriage of All Time. 

I will be honest with you: I've liked Barack Obama since 2004. After his speech at the DNC that year, I, like many people, believed that he had the capacity to be a major figure in American politics - maybe even President. He had good politics, a clear vision, and a capacity for energizing people that I thought would be extremely valuable. I did not love Barack Obama, however, until I found out that he was married to Michelle. 

I know, I know: for most of this country's history, the most prominent political position available to women has been that of Lady Who Is Married to the Dude In Charge, and that is lame. Still, I think you can tell a lot about a person's character by who that person chooses to partner with and how they relate to each other, and it would be foolish to pretend otherwise. You can definitely tell a lot about a man's relationship to feminism by watching how he relates to the women around him. John McCain called his wife a cunt; John McCain put air quotes around "women's health." These two incidents are not unrelated. As a feminist, I respected Barack Obama more, and was happier to support him, after learning about his relationship with Michelle, and with their daughters. 

Because Michelle Obama scares people. She's opinionated. She's accomplished. She's politically engaged. She's funny - and not in a broad, crowd-pleasing way, but in a deadpan, sarcastic way that can be cutting. She is most likely smarter than you. She's also a black woman, and she exists within a cultural context where all of these qualities are feared, demonized and suppressed in women (we're called "bitches") and black people (they're called "bitter" or "angry") and especially in black women (for God's sake, the Angela Davis thing). To fall in love with a woman like Michelle Obama, you have to fall in love, not only with these qualities, but with the sheer strength it must take for her to own them and wear them on her sleeve when every day, everywhere, everyone around her is pressuring her to shut up. You have to be one hell of a man to do that, or to earn that woman's love and respect. You have to be her equal. 

Which is a tough job, because look at how awesome this woman is: 

Of the Iowa State Fair's corn dogs and candied apples, obligingly gushed over by hopeful First Ladies every four years: "Stuff on a stick." Here's Obama, talking to me in her motorcade halfway between Sheboygan, Wisconsin and Green Bay about Obama Girl, the young woman who professed her crush on Obama's husband all over the internet: "That was a little weird, because, you know... I just assumed, you know, there's no way anybody's gonna hear about that. And one day Sasha comes home, and she's like, 'Daddy has a girlfriend. It's you, Mommy.' And it's, like, 'Oh, shhhhhhhhh -- yeah.'" Curse word averted, barely.

Traditionally, candidates' wives - including this year's alternate model, the hollow-eyed corpse of Betty Draper - speak of their husbands in reverential platitudes, rhapsodizing about their roles as perfectly submissive helpmeets to the Great Men and painting their relationships in sugary pastel tones that would ring false even if they hadn't been repeated a million times in other elections. Here is how Michelle Obama describes her position on her husband's campaign: 

Obama has been open about the value of her ability to speak to black audiences in cadences that reflect their experience, but she makes clear her distaste for the notion that she is a niche tool, wielded by her husband's campaign to woo black voters solely on the basis of their shared racial identity... "I mean, I've been to every early state," she told me... "I was 'deployed' to Iowa," she said, making air quotes with her fingers. "I was 'deployed' to New Hampshire."

So, Michelle Obama: invested in the campaign, committed to involving communities of color in the electoral process (her thesis, "Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community," was about being assimilated into an overwhelmingly white establishment through education while being aware that, within that environment, she was treated as "black first and a student second" due to continuing institutional racism - BECAUSE SHE'S BRILLIANT) and not about to let herself be described as a passive tool of her husband's agenda or a person who can be exploited by the Democratic party on the basis of her race. 

So much for the helpmeet theory! How about their relationship? Surely she's deferential to the mighty Barack Obama: 

"We would have this running debate throughout our relationship about whether marriage was necessary," Obama told me. "It was sort of a bone of contention, because I was, like, 'Look, buddy, I'm not one of these types who'll just hang out forever.' You know, that's just not who I am. He was, like" - she broke into a wishy-washy voice - "'Marriage, it doesn't mean anything, it's really how you feel.' And I was like, 'Yeah, right.'"

So, let's pause for a moment. You are in a relationship with a really great guy, who you really like, and you end up having one of those Commitment Discussions, in which he takes the inevitable "but it doesn't meeeean anything, it's just a piece of paaaaaper" route, pursued by dudes all over the world since approximately forever. You know damn well it means something, because if it didn't, he wouldn't be freaking out about it. Still, you really, really like this guy - you wouldn't be having this discussion if you didn't - and breaking up with him would hurt like hell, but then again, so would staying in a relationship where the other person always has one foot out the door. Then AGAIN, his argument is insanely well-framed and persuasive, because he is BARACK FREAKING OBAMA FOR GOD'S SAKE, and can you even imagine having a Relationship Discussion with Barack Obama? By the end of it, you'd be sobbing with joy and chanting, "yes! I! Can! Take! Out! The garbage! You! Are! Tired!" So you look this man in the eye, and you say, with resounding conviction, "whatever, dude - get on the train before it leaves the station." 

How awesome is that? Please rate your answers on a scale from "one" to "Michelle Obama." 

Anyway, we all know how that turned out: 

And: 

And: 

AUGHHH GOD THE BEAUTY IT BURNS MY EYESSSSSS. 

So, long story short, he's probably going to be President. He deserves it. He deserves her, too. Which is saying something.