I’ve never really been the marching type. In high school I let my boyfriend drag me to an anti-war protest, but it felt more like nostalgia for a time when most of us at the rally weren’t even born yet. I’m unapologetically loud and open about my opinion among my friends, but that doesn’t really count as being political, because my friends usually agree with me.
So what was different on January 21st? Why did I wake up on the Tuesday prior and feel a surge of purpose and a need to clear my Saturday schedule so I could go stand in the rain and be counted? Because everything is different now. This election was not a normal election, and I’m not simply disappointed that my candidate didn’t win. I was disappointed in 2000, and again in 2004, but that disappointment didn’t drive me out of my house to stand with 100,000 people in the pouring rain. I was annoyed and disgusted at George W. Bush, but had no problem referring to him as my president. He didn’t have the amount and the type of experience I would have preferred for the leader of our country, but he did have experience governing. And while I disagreed vehemently with the people he chose as advisors, I didn’t question their legitimacy. They were simply on the other side of the party line, and held values and political opinions that were unlike mine.
This election was different. It was not normal. And the people running the White House right now are inexperienced frauds who openly and proudly declare their disdain for women, minorities, education, and basic human decency. They don’t even bother to claim they aren’t spewing lies – they just rename them ‘alternative facts’.
I could go on.
But the reason I’m writing today is because of the picture above. Black women want to know where the hell we’ve been while they’ve been fighting for the lives – not the comfort, not the prosperity, the lives – of black people. So, white women, where have we been? Why haven’t we left our comfortable white houses and stood up for the people most affected by the white supremacists who have suddenly come into a lot more power?
My answer is, I don’t know. I’m shamed by these questions. I can spend all day giving you reasons and excuses, but I wouldn’t feel shame in the first place if I didn’t know that those excuses are really bullshit. That picture wouldn’t make me uncomfortable if I didn’t know and feel the truth of it.
Women are strong – so much stronger than men. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, men wouldn’t feel the need to control us if they didn’t know in their gut that we are stronger than them. Plenty of men recognize this, and recognize their privilege as men – quite a few showed up Saturday with their own pink hats and signs. Women all over the world are starting to wake up to that fact too.
So, white women, where have we been while our black, brown, almond, olive, and rust-colored sisters have been fighting?
I’m embarrassed when I read comments from white people showing their fragility. People who cry out that the woman carrying the sign in the picture above is splintering our cause, or find any way they can to declare that they aren’t racist. We are racist, insomuch as the fight for people of color didn’t force most of us out of our homes and into the streets. Personally, most of my excuses centered around the idea that I didn’t like politics, that I wasn’t a person who marched, that protest rallies and calling your senator every week was for other people. And hey, elected officials weren’t that bad, they’d handle it.
Holy crap on a cracker, I’m embarrassed to admit that. But I’m betting I’m not the only white woman out there who allowed that narrative to guide her actions.
As much as I’d like to, I can’t go back. I can’t find a babysitter for the last Black Lives Matter protest or the last noDAPL protest and show up to be counted, like I did for the Women’s March. But I can find a babysitter for the next one, and the one after that. I can show up with my mouth closed and my eyes and ears open. I can save all the talking for my circle of friends – I can tell them about what I’m doing and where I’m donating, and provide social consent for others to do the same. Because humans are pack animals – we will follow what the herd is doing, for the most part. The herd went out and stood against Donald Trump last weekend, so it stands to reason that the herd can keep showing up.
We can answer the question posed in that sign – not with defensiveness or fragility, but with compassion and a pledge to do better. We’re late to the party, but if we can check ourselves and get over the shame for a second, we can still show up. We cheered and cried when President Obama said, “Yes We Can”. White women, let’s continue with, “Yes We Will”.