A Change???

Someone said this to me awhile ago: here is how things work, in this country we have a hierarchy and it goes like this:

white man (our first choice)

black man (our next best choice)

white woman (a third option)

black woman (a fourth option)

all the other "minorities" (when all else fails???)...

Just makes me wonder if this is really about change or just following our comfort level?

Just wondering...

Comments

Lori said…
This is "Amurica"

It's historically been the pocketbook *comfort* that's voted.

Even though race and gender boundaries are widened; it's still gonna be the pocketbook.
Barbara B. said…
excellent point, mompriest!
I was just thinking that as I watched the early news and saw that Obama took the beltway states. I'm afraid that Hilary doesn't have a chance.
Unknown said…
I hear you, but I think we need to remember that in our own lifetimes (for you and me, anyway!), a black man as a serious candidate for President would have been unthinkable. Would this have been possible in 1968? Absolutely not. We're getting somewhere. It just goes more slowly than we like.
Terri said…
I guess what I'm thinking is that "we" still follow a somewhat predictable path, and in that predictability I lose the enthusiasm and excitment of it...

Also, in my diocese race is a huge issue, AS IT SHOULD BE...but gender issues are swept under the rug AS IF they have been resolved and settled because we have women clergy.... This failure to recognize our bias and pretend it doesn't exist is dangerous. I think we need to acknowledge that there are "isms" across the board...and they are not new.

So, the fact that I am not surprised nor enamored by the rise of Obama, does not mean I won't support him. I thought he would be the candidate all along, given the above theory. I just get discouraged when we are so predictable...


Oh, that and I REALLY wish he had waited 8 years. Yeah.

Oh, and everytime he speaks these days I hear him as "smug" and it's getting on my nerves...but that is just me being a baby about it all...
Barbara B. said…
I totally agree.

(And, I'm glad I'm not the only one who has heard him as "smug" when he talks lately...)
Terri said…
thanks, Barb, it does feel kinda lonely out here...good to know I have some company :-)
Diane M. Roth said…
I haven't heard him lately...

you know, we haven't really gotten anywhere when we think of people in terms of "a white man" or "a black man" or "a white woman". How about them as people? If I vote for Hillary or Obama or Edwards or anyone, I vote for them as a person, not a color or a gender.

When I was on internship, one of my friends got interviewed and didn't get called because, as they said, "They had a woman minister once and it didn't work out." Can you imagine anyone saying this about a man? We had a man once....

No I don't want to say that race or gender don't exist, but the politics of identity diminishes all of us.

Yes, Obama is probably smug. What I worry about is that people are thinking about him not as a president, but as a sort of Messiah, which is unhealthy, and a little scary. I also wish he would have waited.

Popular posts from this blog

The Bleeding-heart: a poem by Mary Oliver

A Funeral Sermon: Healed by Love

Luke: A Mary Oliver Poem