So, somehow I was thinking about Barack Obama and H last night, as I waited to drift off to bed...I think H started me thinking about him, but I'm not sure...this is a bit rambling, and I'm sure to piss someone off, but, oh well...
I looked in on H last night (I think this brought my political thinking to my conscious mind, but I could be wrong), and I was thinking of the pics that we got from a photographer yesterday (we had photos done at a park this weekend.) So, I look in on H as she's sleeping, and, for lack of a better term, with how she was lying, and the light, she *looked Chinese.* I don't know, I just don't look at her and think of her Chinese-ness. It's not far from my thoughts, but I don't know, I don't see it when I look at her, because I see all the things that make her H (and I know, that's a big part of her) before that. I think of the dimple she gets and the nose crunch when she giggles hysterically. I think of her perchant for taking food she's done with, holding it out at arms length over the side of the highchair, and looking me straight in the eye, before she drops it to the hungry kitties below, with a defiant look. I think of the sweet baby "buh" she says when she waves now. But I was struck by her classic Chinese beauty last night. And I realized that this is what people see when they first see her in my pasty pale, Franco-German arms.
I think I thought of this because my mom, in all her good qualities, notices race way too much many times. So, we were going thru the photos, and she would say something like "she looks sooo Chinese here, don't know if you want that or not." I guess because she doesn't have the super-open baby eeyes anymore?!?! I don't know. It's weird, cause she adores...simply lives, for this kid. I guess it's when she's not engaged, for example, a picture, it's really easy for her to forget that there are real people behind the images, that are so much more than what they present in two dimensional space. Anyways, I guess it was on my mind.
And me, being me, started drifting my mind to the looming presidential race, cause, I am by nature, a political beast. I love politics (well, in a hating it kinda way), history, geo-politics etc...and I've had some discussions with people about the First Black Serious Candidate and the First Woman Serious Candidate...
At the time, I said to friends, I didn't get why, because I have boobs, I had to support Clinton...and I didn't get why anyone had to support any certain candidate because you can play "what's the same" with their picture and yours...
Isn't that the point of Civil Rights? Of Equal Rights? That it didn't matter what color, sex, political or religious beliefs you held? The best person for the job? It seems to me, that if I supported Clinton because I was a woman and she was a woman, I'd be doing the exact opposite of what I believe in...I'd be picking her because she is like me, not because of what she stands for...the ambiguous "we" don't like when we don't get chosen because of who "we" are, so why should it be done the other way around?
And if someone (well, a lot of those people in WV and KY said it to be broadcast for the world) said "I'm going to vote for Clinton or McCain cause they are white", all hell would break loose. Really, Clinton was pandering to the blue-collar whites. She uses the "w" word in a lot of her speeches..."hard working white people."
Does that give anyone else shivers that this is acceptable?
No. We cannot live in a world where race/gender/religion whatever is ignored. It's a part of who each and everyone of us is. But it at the same time isn't us. It's a piece. Sometimes big, sometimes small. And that's what makes everyone queasy...lots of people want a black and white (har, har) answer...yes, we either pin everything on it, or we HAVE to pretend it doesn't exist. No inbetween.
Ironically, in cases where race and gender (Affirmative Action and equality stances), they aren't talking about it. This is a case where Barack Obama as a minority male should be speaking as an educated person with a different viewpoint. Clinton should also be, as a female who wants to go where she percieves other females have not been welcome. It shouldn't be their complete campaigns, but these are issues facing our country. And it's like they are not being talked about on purpose...all those talking heads out there on all those 24 hour news networks? They never once thought to ask what Obama thinks of affirmative action? (Maybe they have, I haven't seen it.) Or what Clinton thinks about the disparity of pay to females vs males for the same job? This is when it does matter...to know what these people think. But, the talking heads shun it, cause it's bad to point it out when it matters.
Just like I won't pick out a picture because it makes H look Chinese, or she doesn't look "as Chinese" (what that supposedly means, that's another discussion...). I'll pick a picture that shows the most of H. It'll be in her eyes, and how she carries herself, that look of her soul using her body to show the world who she is. And that's all colored by the body she's in, and the eyes she's using to see the world, but it isn't just those eyes and that skin that is darker than mine.
And I'll pick a presidential candidate that shows me how he will run this country based on who he is, shining thru his eyes, and expressed in his actions. And someday, maybe I'll have to put an "s" on that pronoun, but I don't cry that it's not this year, cause there's so much more that matters than what's between the persons' legs, and what color it is.
How's that for random ramblings?
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