I did not vote for Hillary, and for a while I resented the fact that she said or implied that “Women voted for Trump because their husbands told them to.”
Let me make it clear that MY HUSBAND AND MY FATHER (who both supported Trump) DID NOT TELL ME I HAD TO VOTE FOR HIM.
But let me also share 2 mini-flashbacks....
- At one time, my hometown had a critical and controversial school year where I cast a vote for a particular pack of school board members along with an actual list I had been given of other very specific people that were highly recommended by family and friends to be the most conservative candidates. I was teetering on the edge with who to vote for on some of the candidates and was still not sure what I should do even when pulling in the lot to park. Just before I voted, I saw a neighbor and church friend who was on the side of voting specifically for this particular group of people. When I was in the booth, I cast the vote for what everyone else in my circles had been saying. I have never felt more sick to my stomach while voting. I couldn’t shake the feeling even leaving the parking lot. And that surprised me. I still see it in my memory—the day, the placement of the sun, the location of the voting center, where I parked, etc.... That day. Interestingly enough, that was a yucky and embarrassing school board season.
- When I was dating...there was a moment in time where I specifically quit dating someone BECAUSE they were politically an Independent (among other reasons that made us less compatible, but that one was a BIG factor to me). I knew that the man I was going to ultimately marry needed to be from my religion and also in the same political party (Conservative Republican). Perhaps that was my “higher self” telling me where I needed to find him. But overall, it was expected for me to marry within the religion and that was also what I wanted for myself—I think I just absorbed the political part as also being implied even if it wasn’t said expressly. I felt all of “that stuff”—theologies and ideologies—were so important for family unity. I did find a husband who fit the profile I was seeking and who fortunately has a SLOUGH of MANY other traits and qualities that are perfect for our compatibility. I really hit the jackpot and Mitch is truly a trophy husband and I feel that we make a great team. But imagine my surprise when one of my sisters seriously dated a politically Independent man from our church—I had even heard his parents had different political parties from each other. I was very surprised and perhaps even a little confused that that was even possible, and it was difficult for me to wrap my mind around that scenario.
Next, you know there’s a lot of name calling in politics. I don’t agree with it. But sometimes I stay quiet because I don’t want to be called names (and especially not by the people I respect and care about).
There are a lot of stereotypes, too. Often the stereotypes go so extremely far.
For example, I am NOT an advocate FOR abortion (except for maybe extreme early cases). But when another woman’s march was going on, I was in a time and season where I could see some gender inequities in my own life. At a group gathering I made a comment about how maybe I could see why some women were marching. That’s when someone I respected picked up a baby near me and said heatedly, “If someone held a knife to this baby, I would put my life in front of the baby to stop them.” I responded with “I would, too.” But the expression was clear—because I could see ANY humanity in the women who were marching, that made ME a “baby killer” since some of the people marching could have potentially wanted to pass legislation to allow or forever keep late stage, 3rd trimester abortions, which is one of the most heinous of all things our society does to children. So the idea that I could see in ANY of those women the need to speak up for themselves (whether their personal reasons for marching had anything to do with abortion or not) made me seem “just as bad as a baby killer”.
Sort of interesting, right?
Recently I was asked a question about women’s rights, and the way it was asked hit a nerve to me, because the response I gave was, “No—in my experience I was not considered to be a member of my faith in good standing if I had any ties to feminism.”
Now, let’s review the claim or question of whether or not some women are told by the men in their lives how they SHOULD vote.
:)
Sometimes no one has to even say the words explicitly for you to absorb that kind of message.
It’s quite unfortunate, actually.
THE FIRST ELECTION WHERE
I VOTED ENTIRELY ON MY OWN:
Let’s fast forward to the 2018 Red for Ed situation, where Arizona teachers (of all political backgrounds) finally united after a decade of educational injustices that had never been fixed after the Recession. The same day I attended the rally for education at the state capitol, I was also invited to represent a local non-profit organization at a meeting that night where the AZ Superintendent of Education would be present. How amazing it was to be able to speak with the Superintendent of Public Instruction and ALSO to do that on such a historical day in our state’s history. I personally appreciated some of the changes she made in the state education program during her time in office, especially in regards to Common Core. She was outspoken against the Red for Ed march although I supported the cause.
In agreement or disagreement with Diane Douglas, it was completely a pleasure to meet her.
Also at the meeting was Kelli Ward. A man who was with her spoke first about how he had to go to the capitol incognito wearing a red shirt so that he could even “get in” and once he was parked and in, he ripped off his red shirt (I had been there that same day, walking all up and down the capitol—no streets were blocked off and no one was standing anywhere to “let someone in”). Then he spoke about how there was Communist literature all over the place (I had been there for hours and hours with my children and different groups of bipartisan friends—not once did I see anyone passing out literature, let alone Communist literature). Then Kelli spoke. She said that “a music teacher has no place in politics”. I just listened. Also there was a reference to how the illegal immigrants were sucking our state education system and funding dry, to which I spoke up that entire schools had been closed down after SB-1070, and that I had been to border towns even recently. I said that IF those teeny tiny groups of potentially remaining “illegal kids” at the sparsely populated border towns had an impact on the state budget, it was hard to see where they were impacting it, and that far bigger funding issues were in other places that needed to be addressed.
After she spoke, some women at the meeting pulled me over after and asked if I was okay. I said I was fine. Before the meeting they told me they were against Red for Ed because they are very sensitive to manipulation and didn’t want to be controlled by the Liberal side. I said I understood their concerns but also that manipulation happens from the Conservative angles of politics, too. After the meeting, those same women and others told me they were worried about me because of Kelli’s slam towards me saying that “a music teacher has no place in politics.” (Earlier in the meeting I had been invited to share who I was and why I was there. I had included that I was a Music Educator and that while I was representing a non-profit that night that I had attended the Red for Ed March with my 6 kids to advocate for the pervasive educational needs I saw daily in the classroom). In this conversation I realized that I had given Kelli the benefit of the doubt during her speech and that many other people expressed that they couldn’t believe she would say that to me and in front of the entire group, no less. But I knew one of the national faces of Red For Ed happened to also be a Music teacher and that had been shared in the meeting also. So whether her statement was directed AT me during the meeting or in general to music teachers, or to the more famous music teacher involved with the movement, I wasn’t going to let that kind of ignorance and rudeness get to me. In all of music history, and all across the world, musicians have affected and influenced politics—by their lyrics, by their networking, by their messages, by their outreach, by their humanity, and by their reality. So I didn’t need to feel bad about myself if Kelli had never paid attention in any of her music classes.
Anyhow, that election cycle, my respected and close circle of family and friends was adamantly against Martha McSally and were pushing hard to vote for Kelli Ward.
But I had listened to an entire speech of Kelli’s. I had spoken to her personally. And honestly with setting all of her rudeness towards me aside, I still didn’t agree with her stance on tiny little populations of kids in sparsely populated border towns affecting Az state education as the primary and most pertinent problem to our educational funding, especially in a post SB-1070 world (I regret that particular bill ever passed. The damage of that bill may never be undone.) I also didn’t agree with it appreciate the lies told about the overall portrayal of the nature of the Red for Ed state capitol experience I had seen first hand. Maybe there were some extremist people there that I never saw among the thousands and thousands, but the sensationalist way he shared it misrepresented the entire event.
Teachers are used to being different than each other and still working towards solutions and collaborating with anyone, but that day, all of the education world found in a disheartening and eye opening way that politicians play a very different and barbaric game that is foreign to the humanity we teach in the classroom.
At the polls that year, when it was time to vote, I said ‘no thank you’ to any list offered to me. I made all of my own choices. I voted for Martha McSally instead of Kelli Ward and was proud that an empowered Republican woman I could respect ended up winning the spot for that position. I also happened to vote mostly Republican, but for the first time in my life I did vote across the aisle for 2 positions. Not all of the people I voted for made it in office, but I will never forget the feeling I had walking out of a polling location as an empowered woman claiming my own equality—I was in my mid thirties when for the first time I made all of my very own decisions for voting using MY OWN VOICE.
I actually didn’t talk about this, except for with one or two very close friends, and I had never intended to bring it up now.
But it was voting day again for a Primary election.
I used my own voice again, and I was grateful that just a couple years ago I found it.
Now I’ve been studying for my Master’s degree and have been delving into some pretty serious content about humanitarianism. I am saddened that there was a time I had ever thought that there was no more need to advocate for a woman’s equality in my country or anywhere else in the world. Saddened because I know now HOW that happens. But even so, there are places all over the world where women are being horrifically abused for just being women. How could I not see that then? Did I not want to see? Was I too blinded to see?
If we can never become aware of the injustices that still exist (even systemically) in America and address them without being afraid to use our very own voices, then how can we ever imagine to empathize with anyone else who has gone thru a story of abuse and oppression? If we run from our own realities, how can we look any other woman from any other part of the world in the eye and tell her she can get through her own journey? How can we tell her she can find her inner strength if we can never find our own?
When you’re a woman and say you have equality because you can vote, but then you accept pay at a job where men routinely always start out higher then women and where they are paid twice as much because they are men, are you equally valued?
When you’re a woman who says you have equality because you vote and then you vote for the list that was circulated by your people, are you truly using your own voice?
When you’re a woman who says you’re equal due to voting rights, and then you sit on a business board as the token diversity representative with high credentials and achievements but still never have your comments respected, implemented, or valued, then are you actually valued as equal?
Anyway, there are so many examples. If you are a woman reading this, you may not need my examples. You likely have plenty of your own.
Let’s just say I am so proud to be a woman. I am happy to find and use my own voice. I am so proud of my strengths as a wife, mother, aunt, and daughter. I have a very maternal nature just like I have always had and I still take pride in my gender role. I am still living my religion and I also have respect for the need in this world for feminism.
What really feels amazing is when I am able to speak up and express myself with autonomy (in or out of the polls).
Even if what I vote for is different than my husband or dad or mom or sibling or cousin or friend or anyone, I am learning how to be me and accept myself no matter what someone else thinks or tells me what I should be.
I am also learning to listen to my inner voice even when another person “doesn’t tell me” what I should be.
August 4th, 2020
April 2018
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