Four years later, feminists split by Michelle Obama’s ‘work’ as first lady – The Washington Post
Man, I started to like the point of view portrayed here for a bit but they lost me.
The question isn’t would Michelle have more power as CEO or as First Lady.
I’m with the Feminists at the start. Sucks big time to see a successful woman sacrifice her career for her man’s. She shouldn’t have to. It pissed me off to see a Bad Ass Chick put down her briefcase and start doing puff-piece-material work with children in gardens. Nothing against the cause, it just seems a little Bad Ass Chick Lite is all. It’s not beneath her to be interested in the these causes at all. They are good causes. It’s great she’s an involved mom, but the fact that Mom-in-Chief seems to be all that is portrayed of such a talented intelligent woman is beyond disturbing. It’s eery. Downright Stepford.
Once you scratch the surface factional elements show up in any special interest group. Or should I say fractional? If allowed to, these divisons cleave apart momentum and progress like trickles of water carve apart rocks over time. Any group committed to the advancement of their cause should be careful of who they rule out as allies. The author frames the tension thusly,
“By necessity and by choice, a majority of black women have been working outside the home at least since the census began keeping track of their labor in 1972. There has never been a national effort to keep black women at home, caring sweetly for their children.”
It is true that many black women have not had the opportunity to stay home, it is also true that being not having options outside being a Stepford homemaker a bad thing. Peanut Gallery says that division could easily be exploited to promote division very easily. Beware the Man girls!
How Obama is portrayed, “refocuses the conversation around black womanhood and black motherhood away from the welfare queen and into the middle class,” one of the woman quoted says. That’s a good thing and a valid goal.
In my humble opinion, I think there is a larger issue at play than Mrs. Obama’s race in how she is portrayed to the public though. The lovely First Lady of the United State of America in 2013, Michelle Obama, is portrayed as existing somewhere between a Lady Bird Johnson who discovered other uses for plants than beautifying highways and a J. Crew wearing, Target shopping version of Jackie Onassis.
I understand the potential politcal gain here in presenting such an image. I support anything that help Obama be more effective and preotecting the family as much as possible. It just eery.
As a country, as a culture, as a society, this is the mother we envision for our nation? A latter-day Donna Reed? We want the 50’s back? Little girls should aspire to be a non-threatening but impeccably styled stay-at-home Mom? Not where I thought we’d be by now.
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