The Republicans are on their way home…now the fun begins. In just a few months, we will know who will lead the country for the next four years. My question to Sarah Palin is this. Who is going to lead your children? I get it when you say you have a supportive husband who is always there for you. I get it when you complain that men aren’t subjected to the same kind of questioning as women when it comes to family values. Been there…done that… got the t-shirt. But Sarah… GET REAL. No one will ever be able to take your place as a mother. I’m telling you this not because of what I have heard. I’m telling you this because this is what I know. More than 17 years ago, I was elected the national president of the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ)….the first woman in our organization to accomplish that. The biggest heartstring pulling at me was how it would affect my two year old son. That consideration almost forced me not to run.
But NABJ has always been like a family to me and my family rallied around me and offered me all the support and encouragement I needed. Even after I was elected, I realized that there was a cost involved. Many times I would have to load the entire family into the car to drive to meetings around the country instead of flying, just so we could be together. Several women in the organization became surrogate moms when I had presidential duties to perform. I will never forget the time when NABJ VP Sheila Stainback stood in the back of the ballroom, covering the ears of my young son with her hands, when I had to challenge and eventually put out vile rapper Bushwick Bill from a session on hip-hop music when he used derogatory language directed towards the women in the audience. I remember the time we were panicking when my son unintentionally locked himself in the master bedroom of the presidential suite during a convention and we couldn’t awaken him for hours to unlock the door. For some reason, the hotel staff didn’t have a key to the room as we banged and banged on the door as tears swelled in my eyes. Eventually, he woke up and walked out, with a look that said, “why are you all so worried about me?”
Now here you are, Sarah, not only dealing with a child with special needs, but also with a daughter who has done something that we have been imploring all of our young girls NOT to do and that is have sex and get pregnant, especially before entering the holy bond of matrimony. Your children need you more than ever before. And with respect to all the fathers of the world, they will never be a MOMMY to your children. While I am not questioning your dedication to our country, your family comes FIRST. They always will. That reality has forced many of us to make some difficult choices about our lives and our careers.
Many women have stepped out of the workplace because of that choice. Others have taken jobs that don’t force them to travel so much. I thank God that when my children were born, I had a position as an executive producer of a morning news program that allowed me to be home almost always in the afternoon. My children have never been latchkey children. I’ve been to almost every baseball and football game and every wrestling match. I’ve served team meals, taken snacks to the boys, washed uniforms and then stayed up late with them to make sure they did their homework. That’s what’s being a mother is all about.
Now Sarah you are the poster girl for “hockey moms” and other working mothers. But I really wonder whether you know what that really means. Do you really know the sacrifices you are asking your family to make? Do you really expect your family to escape the glare, criticism and praise of the media?
And while we are talking about what’s off limits and what’s not when it comes to the media scrutiny of the candidates’ families, I must respectfully disagree with my brother Barack Obama and others who are telling the media to “back off.” Sorry kiddos, that’s not going to happen. Since when do politicians tell journalists how to do our job? They may not like what the media say and do, but it’s reality. Get over it. Smart politicians listen to their media advisors and develop a strategy on how to deal with this reality, not condemn it. Everyone’s family is fair game when you run for office. That’s the price of public office. That’s why many people decide not to go into that arena because they know the toll it will take on their family and friends. You may not think it is right or fair, but this is the real world and that’s how we roll.
So Sarah, Barack, John and all of the other pundits lashing out at the media need to get a wake up call. You’ve made your choice and now you have to deal with the consequences…the good, the bad and the ugly. As my beloved late mother used to say, “you’ve made your bed, now lay in it.”
Friday,September 5, 2008 at 8:44 am |
Sidmel,
I’m feeling you all the way. My son practically grew up in newsrooms around the country because, as a single parent, my childcare arrangements didn’t always work and my hours didn’t always accommodate motherhood, but I made a bunch of choices that I never would have if I hadn’t been a mom. That’s just how it goes.
Palin and the GOP are trying to have it both ways, too. They want to hold up Palin’s family as the symbol of what many “average” Americans have to wrestle with — children with special needs, a teenager having and paying the challenging consequences — but they don’t want anyone to ask questions or make comments about the family.
Sorry, but if you throw your kids under the bus, you can’t turn around and say “hands off.” It didn’t work with Dick Cheney, when he tried to show he wasn’t in lockstep with George Bush by ntoing he and the president disagreed on whether there should be an anti-gay marriage amendment. Cheney said he had a different position on the issue because it hit close to home – his daughter was a lesbian. But when others mentioned that, candidates, the media, the Republicans then tried to create a backdraft against the Dems and reporters by saying a family was sacred and hands off.
As Bill Cosby would say, “C’mon, people!”
Politicians, like most celebrities, want media attention when they want it and they want it turned off when they don’t want to bother. But, as you say, Sid, that’s not how we roll.
As my late father used to say: “The same thing that makes you laugh, makes you cry.”
Friday,September 5, 2008 at 9:43 am |
Sid,
This should be a discussion point, I agree. I am not so sure that I agree with the outcome. This election has certainly raised my feminist quotient. As a black woman, I never believed that the feminist movement included me. Perhaps I was wrong. Maybe I just never joined, and made the movement reflective of my needs and point of view. As black women, I think this is an excellent time for us to reflect on what black feminism is, and ought to be.
When I see Sarah Palin, I see a woman who acknowledges that she stands on the shoulders of the women who went before her. Not that she shares their politics, but she knows that their accomplishments created the way for her. I think that is really important. The movement wasn’t supposed to make us clones, but to empower us each to be the best woman that we could be.
I don’t share Sarah Palin’s politics, but I do want any woman to be able to enter the political arena and bring the talents that she has. I also don’t agree that fathers can’t be loving caretakers and primary caretaker parents. I have seen many many examples of that. And as black women, many of us made the choice of believing we raise our children without fathers. How tragic has that been for our community? The point should be that the Palin children have two loving parents. Not that their mother is their primary caretaker. As women, we owe it to ourselves to stop the forcing of that false choice.
As to Bristol Palin, we have all been a 17 year woman/child. We all know that we did things that our parents told us, indeed forbade us to do. Most of us were lucky enough not to get caught. Bristol Palin was not so lucky. It is not necessarily a reflection of the parenting in the Palin home. We don’t know this child, and how we got to where she is, and frankly it is none of our business.
Barack has two daughters and he is trying to protect their future privacy. He is right. Children should be off limits. None of the Palin, McCain, Biden or Obama children chose for their parents to be in the places that they are. They do deserve to have the best and most normal childhood that they can have. The press needs to give them space. The adult children are fair game. But the minors should be left alone in my view. I think that the Bush twins are a prime example. They were doing some pretty stupid stuff as 18 year olds. But the press backed off, let them grow up, and they now seem to be past that phase.
Perhaps Sarah Palin believes like you did that she has the family/support structure that allows her to commit to something that she believes is very important, and that she can balance that out with the needs of her children. We owe it to each other as women to trust the judgments that we make as being the best for our families. We owe it each other to trust that the person making the judgment has more information than any outsider looking in. And if she is wrong, God help her, that there will be women who will step in to help her get it right.
I may not be right, but I always have something to say.
Ce
Friday,September 5, 2008 at 10:04 am |
I’m happy to see that my entry has prompted comments from two of the most brilliant women I know!