rise rīz/ verb
- Move from a lower position to a higher one; come or go up.
- reach a higher position in society or one’s profession.
- succeed in not being limited or constrained by (a restrictive environment or situation).
“The only way to move forward,” says Alex Ocasio-Cortez, in a recent stump speech in Michigan, campaigning for her democratic Congressional run, “We have to change for the better or for the worse because status quo is not an option anymore.”
VOTE!!
NOVEMBER 6
Sorry to shout, dear reader (that’s how I perceive exclamation points), but the time for etiquette—much like the climate change tipping point—has passed, while America is distracted: shopping at WalMart, eating Chipotle, and binge-watching Netflix. If democracy ever existed in America, the current corporation-as-a-person Administration has twisted it into a tribal zero-sum game. And you can’t play the game when you are sidelined on the bench.
I realize that this is an international magazine and this is a very nationalist discussion, but the domestic stakes couldn’t be higher right now. And, let’s face it: the reality show cluster**** of the current Administration is fodder for international parody anyway.
This is the “Rise of Women” issue, which is ironic.
A record-breaking 256 women have qualified for the United States’ ballot in November—197 Democrats and 59 Republicans. 234 women are running for the House and 59 for the Senate (CNN).
And yet a collar-flipping, Rolling Rock swilling, conspiracy-theorist partisan perjurer and emotional basket case will get to vote on what kind of health care rights every woman in America is entitled. (Help us, R.B.G., you are our only hope). What a painful travesty for the voting majority, a stark reminder of that sickening feeling at 12 midnight PST in November 2016. How many alleged sex offenders is too many to sit on the highest court in the land, to interpret our most sacred laws, Dr. Anita Hill? At least two who believe that elected office means not having to answer to those laws. And, of course, the (alleged) Assaulter-in-Chief. If a few of those nominated, qualified women were already seated, maybe the “Get off my lawn!” Republican Senate Judiciary Committee would not have had to use a female prosecutor as a human shield to protect them from the logic and intellect of Dr. Christine Blasey-Ford. The hearings were not just a slap in the face to equality and justice, but a de-stabilization of our most sacred ideals as a country.
Despite the Women’s Marches, the protests, the pussy hats, #MeToo, Times Up!, the high-profile assault trials, major companies paying multi-million-dollar sexual harassment settlements, and all the women demanding equal consideration under the law the past two years, the weekend of the “Honorable” Kavanaugh hearings was both an echo of the last Presidential elections and a reminder that the seven female Senators that charged the Senate steps in 1991 also failed to stop the confirmation of the similarly-accused, “Honorable” Clarence Thomas. To be clear, nearly a century after the Equal Rights Amendment was proposed (1923), 46 years after it was passed by the Senate (1972), the ERA has yet to be ratified and women throughout the nation—50.8% of the populace—are experiencing taxation-without-representation, the very reason the slave-owning, old-boy United States revolted against England in the first place. That’s right—a quarter-century after the American public famously dubbed 1992 “The Year of the Woman” because of the record number of women running for office, the Oscars featured a tribute to the rise of women, and there were multi-million-dollar sexual harassment settlements–the status quo has not shifted one iota. In fact, I could have been describing last year instead of 1992. Even though women’s voices are rising and questioning, the answer from the powers-that-be is still, “We just don’t care.”
If we want equality for America, the time has come for an essential paradigm shift in the government. The biggest thing we can do to change the government is get women elected. Feminism has a fourth wave, a cyber presence, that envelopes gender and social equality. Women have got to stop staying silent amidst the imposition of oppression and authoritarianism, because the culture of oppression affects more of the American population than just women. In fact, it affects the nation’s majority. Civilization won’t make any significant progress until women can take the stage in their own right and exert their influence over ethics and the cultural understanding of what’s right and what’s wrong. Redressing the grievances will re-set the government priorities.
The fact that our elected officials are meant to be our representatives, our proxies, the employees of the American people, and they are indifferent to not voting our voices means they have to go. Corporations have their own representation—ALEC, the lobbyists, the paid. But we don’t need to pay. We just need to get out en masse and vote. There is no electoral college in the Midterms to thwart your voice. Your vote is worth just as much as David Koch’s. Elect someone who will speak for the youth, the women, the voiceless, the future. If they won’t negotiate with us in the streets, move the venue to the House and Senate floors, to the courthouses and the benches and the White House. Sisyphus is a magazine of philosophy and culture. If we lose free speech, what is left of the Republic?
Sure, the advertisements are out there more than ever before. Why is it important that you vote if it seems like the American majority isn’t being heard anyway?
“Let this last week and all that we have experienced in terms of our frustration and our anger and our sadness—let’s use this week to give us all that extra energy that we know we have—that the bottom line is that they may have the power right now, but we need to take it back.” Senator Kamala Harris.
Senator Harris is feeling what a lot of people are feeling right now. But real leadership isn’t about winning and losing or who has (or is losing) the “power.” Great leaders build cohesive teams with diverse viewpoints to create structures that stand stronger together than alone.
In this issue, there are memoirs about empowerment; essays of frustration and injustice; enlightenment about the laws; poetry celebrating the resourcefulness, strength and resilience of the female spirit.
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