Why would anyone want to reduce suffering for our children and grandchildren?
My life was hard therefore your life must also be hard.
Is that the official creed of the conservatives these days?
Or, to quote Mr T’s father, who was furious when his grandchildren served themselves a reasonable amount of white meat from a 21-lb turkey at Thanksgiving: “When I was a child, I would never have served myself the white meat!”
He then screamed at them, accused their mother (not their father, who is his son) of being a Bad Mother, and stomped into his office to sulk.
The next year, he mentioned – out of nowhere – how he thought white meat was dry and had always preferred the dark meat.
I suffered therefore everyone else must suffer.
A friend – Liz – wrote this and gave me permission to share, so I posted it on facebook.
Younger women have no idea how far back we can slide.
I remember being a military wife with 3 kids. I could not take a college class on base without my husband’s signature (or if he was deployed, the signature of the boss on base).
When I was going through a divorce in 1986, again, 3 kids, 16 years supporting my military spouse, 28 moves since high school, he stopped paying all bills, including the house with a mortgage using a VA loan.
We moved into a rental & I tried to get a consolidated loan to be able to pay off the bills. The bank said “sorry but you have no credit of your own”.
The bills ended up at the credit bureau. I paid off those bills ($14k) within a year and a half, moved into low income housing & went to college.
I met my “forever husband” and we married in 1988. We wanted to buy a home. The bank approved HIS credit & looked at me like I was a loser. Women had no power.
I was married to the first guy 16 years because we moved so much, no one would hire me. I could not support my kids until we moved to [place] & I finally was hired locally & could provide for my kids. So, the moral of the story is: protect women of the future. Vote BLUE!!!
I didn’t think anything about her story was objectionable (other than the social and legal forces making her life hard).
I didn’t think she was whining.
I didn’t think she was lazy, not working hard enough, not taking advantage of what was available.
She was stating facts.
Facts that are backed up with history and with my own experience.
I grew up on military bases, both in the US and overseas. It was almost impossible for wives to get jobs because employers knew they would move. Overseas, these women could not work off base because they were not citizens of the host country. They rarely could work on base because the civilian jobs were reserved either for civil service or for foreign nationals.
Facts like the law didn’t require financial institutions to give credit cards to women in their own names until 1974.
Facts like the law didn’t require financial institutions to make business loans to women – without male co-signers, etc – until 1988.
You know. Reality.
But another facebook friend, Brenda, a woman of about the same age as Liz, took great offense to the story.
Brenda wrote,
People will always find excuses for their lack of success. Working hard makes the accomplishment more rewarding. At 67 I can stay it was not who, but where, that made my success. Knowing where I didn’t want to be is what kept me moving forward.
Brenda also said she never had any problems getting a loan.
Brenda lived in a small town and knew everyone.
Nobody ever said a bank *couldn’t* make a loan to a woman.
It’s just there was no law keeping them from telling a woman “Nah.”
I didn’t wear a seatbelt or a bike helmet when I was a kid so why should anyone now do that?
Teachers could spank children at school so why can’t they do that now?
We never had free lunch or breakfast at school so why should I help feed hungry children now?
Nobody prosecuted husbands for beating (or raping) their wives so why should we do that now?
Men grabbed my ass at work and told me they wouldn’t hire me because I was pregnant so why can’t they do that now?
I got pregnant when I was 15 and had to get married and have the baby so why shouldn’t that happen to girls now?
I suffered. Why can’t everyone else suffer?
Texan in Exile 