Seventy Thoughts on Turning Seventy

Holding on to my subjectivity

A long time ago, when I was beginning my graduate studies in the 1990's, I read this line by a woman scholar in "An Alchemy of Genres: Cross-Genre Writing by American Feminist Poet-Critics."

"I am always afraid of losing my subjectivity," she wrote.

What??? I asked myself. She wants to hold on to her subjectivity? Isn't she supposed to LOSE that? Isn't she supposed to seek objectivity in an academic context?

That was the beginning of my own awakening to the ways in which many so called disciplines of knowledge train women to work against our own interests. By excluding our subjective experiences from knowledge making, and claiming a male perspective as objective reality, so many fields of study were crippled by their adherence to this belief.

This understanding of the importance of the knower to knowledge making lead me to the discipline of practitioner research where actual knowledge could be developed through systematic and intention inquiry into the meaning and significance of one's own work. And it also informed my approach to teaching, inviting students' perspectives and lived experiences into the classroom when we were studying history and literature.

And it taught me to stand in my own subjectivity and reject others' definitions of who and what i am.

I am tried of hearing that the educated elites and their disdain for working class people is what cost the Democrats the election.
That narrative was created by MAGA and repeated in every trump ad and rally. HE was the one who pit groups against one another for his cause -- re-electing himself. He was the one who characterized the "woke" agenda and told his followers that feminized, educated people were their enemy - the journalists and medical professionals and scientists and teachers... We were the enemy within. And he would be their retribution.

trump may not have originated the race, class and gender wars that characterized this election, but he masterfully used those ideas to make them a reality. And not only did it work, but it gaslighted enough people for so many Democrats to be blaming ourselves for an elitism that was perpetuated by the trump agenda and used against us. In his topsy turvy world, he told his followers that only HE could be trusted to look out for their interests and that Dems didn't care about them, only he did.

Meanwhile, Harris is still being accused of not having any real agenda to address the economy and the cost of living, even though she was very specific about plans and policies to reduce the cost of raising children, buying a home, starting a small business, caring for elders in the home, cap the price of medications, strengthen the ACA and go after companies who continue to price gouge consumers while making record profits for themselves. I still cannot believe that pundits and wanna be pundit keep saying -- she had no plans!!

I don't claim to understand all that went into the so called red wave. But I do know that anyone repeating how the Democratic party only cares about educated elites has bought the narrative that the former Great American Party has been crafting, honing and delivering wherever they can for the past decade or more.

I don't know how Kamala Harris could have presented her agenda any better than she did. I do not believe that the election was rigged, as I've seen some of my friends suggest.

But I do believe that the narrative of out of touch, self serving educated elites pushing a "woke agenda' on real red blooded American men is part of the plan. Included in that rhetoric was a war on women and men who support us. Just look at how they characterized "tampon Tim." Using feminine qualities to insult a man is part of a collective attack on women and all the ways we are less than men.

Harris' rallies were attended by tens of thousands of people in many different parts of the country. They were not all educated elites. Most damaging is the belief that ordinary Americans were somehow enemies of the state if we showed any knowledge of history with compassion and support for vulnerable and marginalized people.

trump won the war of rhetoric. masterfully it would seem, with a whole lot of help from educated elites on his side who supported him and crafted his campaign.

Look at Biden's actual record. Look at student loan forgiveness which helped young families establish themselves. Child tax credit which lifted so many families out of poverty. The cap on insulin costs for seniors. Look at the CHIPS act and the Infrastructure Bill. Look at his support of unions. And on and on.

It is still a great mystery to me why these accomplishments and clear support of working people and the middle class did not register with the public. It was as if there were some unseen forces propelling a counter narrative to the fore.

Part of it has to do with the changes in the way we get information. Reliable sources with close ties to the community are gone making us ripe for mischief, foreign interference and disinformation. So many local newspapers have collapsed. Their on line stories exist behind a pay wall. Many local news stations are owned by Sinclair which has a political agenda for how news is reported. Cable news networks have owners and advertisers. The soon to be oligarchs are taking over the means of communication. Bezos and the Washington Post. Elon Musk with the cesspool X formerly known as twitter. All of them gave trump his platform -- in a vicious cycle of accommodation. Well the public seems to want this, so let's give them more of it, which increases their audience and profits... and this is how lies become truth and false labels stick.

Now that trump is back in power, he will have an even bigger platform to spread his self serving fabrications about those who oppose him. And more toadies towing the trump line and spewing more disinformation about the "enemies within."

Don't fall for it. Don't let others who disdain you control your identity. Speak freely and often and contest those lies with every breath.

I may be "educated" but I have been part of the working class, a member of a union and a hard working Democrat my whole life. My ideals and values aren't "woke" in the pejorative way that word has been misappropriated.

But I am open to learning the lessons of history and evolving my views as my knowledge has deepened and my empathy for the plight of others who have had to fight for their basic rights as well as my responsibility for their well being has increased exponentially. This is the "elitism" that my education and commitment to life long learning has wrought in me.

Here is what I know from examining and re-examining my subjective lived experience as a woman, a mother and an educator:

First, do no harm.
Do unto others are you would have them do until you.
We are all connected and our fates intertwined.
America has not lived up to its full promise for all and will not do so without a fight and constant vigilance.

The clearer we can be about who we are and what we believe, the more effective our resistance will be to what is about to happen.