In this daily national nightmare none of us asked for (us meaning me of course and you, the readers of this blog), there is something new to enrage me every day–I mean that quite literally. Though I’ve said in previous posts that I don’t want to make this blog solely about Trump, unfortunately he’s just going to come up in a lot of my posts. In this one he’s not directly involved, though the event comes out of something he started, which was the nomination of Jeff Sessions to the position of Attorney General. The event I’m referring to is Elizabeth Warren being silenced on the floor of the Senate.
If you are not already familiar with this incident, here is a quick summary: on Tuesday night, during the last bit of debating over Sessions’ confirmation before the vote (which everyone knew would go through, but they debate anyway), Elizabeth Warren read a letter from Coretta Scott King, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s widow. This letter, which has become somewhat well-known in the course of Sessions’ nomination process, was written by Mrs. King during the 1986 nomination process for Sessions to become a federal judge. This confirmation did not go through, mainly because there were many concerns raised about Sessions’ judgment particularly when it came to issues of fairness around race. So, one would think that if he wasn’t qualified then because of his racist beliefs, he wouldn’t be qualified now, THIRTY YEARS LATER, unless he had shown a significant change in attitude and behavior.
Has he? Take a wild guess.
Fast forward to Tuesday night, when Elizabeth Warren read the King letter and other quotes from that 1986 nomination process, including from Ted Kennedy, who had called Sessions “a disgrace to the Justice Department.” Her Republican colleagues, particularly Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (a man for whom I have a nearly indescribable hatred), didn’t much like hearing what she had to say. Eventually, this happened (please watch, and learn more about the rule in question). McConnell, who is nearly 75 years old and who’s been in the Senate longer than most of us have been alive (another problem to discuss another day…), invoked a Senate rule rarely ever used, just to shut up someone saying some stuff he didn’t like. Never mind that it wasn’t used when Republicans did the same thing, including when Ted Cruz called McConnell a liar (also explained in that article–at that point I don’t even know who I would root for).
(Just a side note: I delayed finishing this post for a few days because as I was searching for the video link to post here, I broke my own rule and read the comments, almost all of which were pure hate towards Warren. It made me feel very demoralized and hopeless, which I think we just have to accept as part of this abusive, awful cycle we are going through right now. I gave myself some time to feel angry and sad but now I’m back at it. I appreciate the support of those who shared their tips on how they deal, including reminding me that we all feel the same way and that we’re in this together.)
McConnell’s argument was that Warren was breaking the ruIes by “impugning” another Senator. I am not sure how stating things another person said or did is “impugning” someone, but in the age of Trump I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.
An incident like this is not something to be ignored, and it is very telling of our current political climate. By this point it’s pretty clear that dealing with Trump himself is hopeless and a useless waste of time. But we can’t let it pervade the entire legislative (and judicial) process, or we are really in trouble.
Though this incident angers me as a relatively liberal person and someone who is interested in politics, it also angers me on another level: as a woman living in America in the year 2017. This is a modern/subtle yet real example of a woman being told, “Know your place.” Never mind that her male colleagues (both Republican and Democrat) were reading the SAME LETTER later. I am CONVINCED that this type of thing would NEVER have happened to a male Senator, certainly not a Republican one. There are only 20 or so women in the Senate right now, which is a high water mark in our history. There are reasons for this, and if you know your American political and social history, you can easily figure them out. The way the men see it, it’s not bad enough that women are ALLOWED to be in the Senate. But speak out in such a public way? Almost treasonous. The comments say it all: Sit down. Shut up. Do as you’re told. Don’t make a scene.
As women, we’ve all experienced this egregious double standard in one way or another, even in our day and age. I am fortunate not to have experienced it as badly as others, but we all have examples. It may have been at work, or school, or even just in daily life, waiting on line at a coffee shop or the way we’re spoken to when we try to place our order. In my own experience, since I’m female, short, and look young for my age, I’ve recognized that people (often older men) tend to assume I’m younger than I am and then try to speak to me in a certain way (i.e. talk down to me). This has led me to try to act tougher in public, particularly when on the subway by myself, to avoid getting into a potentially dangerous situation. This is the kind of stuff most women think about on a daily basis, often not even realizing it. For me, it’s just part of my life. It’s what I was taught by my parents and society in general in order to keep myself safe. It’s not pleasant, but it’s reality.
Many of us also have experiences from our work lives that fall under this category, in which men feel they have the right to tell women what to do, just by virtue of being men. Which is exactly what happened to Elizabeth Warren, and in many instances to other women.
This is just something else to add to the list of terrible things going on in this regime. Thankfully Warren is not stopping her fight, and her voice gets louder and louder. Being shut down by the likes of Old Man McConnell only made her case stronger, which perhaps the Republicans did not foresee (I truly do not know anymore).
I hope cases like this mean we (not just women!) just continue to be louder and louder when we see injustice, which these days is all the time. Sure, things are better for women than they were 50, 100 years ago, but there is still much that is wrong and can be improved. As various civil rights & women’s rights leaders have stated, the struggle for progress and equality is not a straight line, and unfortunately we cannot assume our rights will be honored easily. We must continue to fight for them, no matter how much they try to silence us or sit us down.
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