Having a Voice
My book ALIVE AND WELL IN PRAGUE NEW YORK came out this past June- normally I'm still pretty excited about that but right now all I can think about is this election! Here are my two cents on the priviledge of having a government we can take part of and the thrill of having a candidate as cool as Obama:
It was the day that I was put under house arrest that I suddenly had an epiphany about our system of government. I’d been living in China for two years teaching English, and I’d just changed from teaching at a local university to teaching at an intensive English language institute. It was my second year living in China, I was conversational in the language, had made good friends, I knew where to get an incredible massage for only a dollar US and I loved my students. All was good until the night when armed police knocked on my door, politely confiscated my passport and visa and told me not to leave the house until they returned next day to escort me to the police station. Needless to say I didn’t sleep well that night.
Back in the US I’d grown up thinking critically about the way our country was governed. Reagan was the president for my late childhood/early teen years and I saw choices he made that were highly damaging (think the “trickle down” theory). There was a lot of apathy when he ran for a second term, as no one believed he could lose. As in a lot of recent elections, a huge number of people didn’t take the time to cast their votes. Sometimes this doesn’t seem like a big deal, when you think, “Oh, so and so is going to win this state anyway so it’s not really worth the effort.” But then you live in a place where people have no say in who leads them and you get police knocking on your door t ten o’clock at night and suddenly you start thinking, “You know, it’s actually pretty cool to have some say in who leads a country.”
It’s a pretty cool thing that we are awfully lucky to have. When you vote for a leader who is going to stay in office for a finite amount of time, the idea is that they have an obligation to listen to the people. Not that they always do, of course. I screamed in all the ways I could (demonstrations, petitions, emails to my Congress people, etc) that I thought the war in Iraq was unjustified and unjust. And even though there were a lot of us who screamed, we weren’t listened to. But that’s exactly the reason voting matters. Some candidates will hear the people’s concerns a little better and take the time to make decisions in a humane and rational way. That’s the kind of person you want in charge.
In an election you have a choice, and when presented with a choice, you always want to choose wisely. No leader is going to do everything your way (which is a reason to become president yourself really) but a good leader-one who makes his or her own wise choices and shares majority of your beliefs- that is a leader worth supporting. We don’t always have a candidate like that in a presidential election but this time around we’ve gotten lucky. We have the option of Barack Obama.
I respect and agree with so many of Obama’s views on things, from his stance on the war to his views on civil rights to his belief that religion in this country needs to be discussed in a more thoughtful and complex way. And he has some pretty cool ideas about the environment too. Do I agree with everything he believes? No. But I don’t agree with everything my husband believes either and I still married the guy. No one is perfect but in this election we have the option of a guy who is pretty close, at least in my opinion. And in this world that is a rare and wonderful thing.
When the police arrived to escort me to the police station the day after my house arrest, they were very gracious. They bought me a Coke while I sat around in the interrogation room’s very uncomfortable folding chairs and apologized for the condition of the bathroom (so gross there aren’t words) when I had to pee after a couple of hours. But that didn’t take away from the fact that I was being guarded, that I was scared and that I was vulnerable. There’d been a problem with my visa from the English institute and the word ‘deportation’ was being tossed around. I liked my life in China and I did not want to be deported. I certainly didn’t want to have to call my parents and tell them that their oldest child was being deported. But after a long day, another night of house arrest and another morning in the police station, my passport and visa were returned and I was free to carry on with the teaching, and the massages and everything else in my life. Which was great. For me.
But as I walked of the police station- a woman free to leave her home at any time- I found myself thinking about freedom and political voice and what it means to have even the smallest margin of say in how your country is run. I don’t like how people are deported from the US when they are seeking refuge, or when they’ve lived here for twenty years but are suddenly deemed a threat because the current government starts targeting people in a racist manner. But what’s so cool is that in this country I get to do something about that. In a lot of other places large crowds can’t gather to speak their minds, to protest, to try and make changes. Here in the US we can. In a lot of places the leader after four years is the same dictator who’s been there for the last ten years. Here, we get change and we get to vote for the candidate who we think can best impact our future.
This country is far from perfect. There are a lot of really pressing problems, economic and social, that need to be addressed. But we can be part of that change, give voice to it, cast votes to make it happen in the ways we believe it should happen. It’s a privilege and responsibility that we are very fortunate to have. So this election season I encourage you to use it! If you’re over eighteen go vote; if you’re not attend rallies, write letters, sign petitions, talk politics at lunch in the cafeteria. Get people fired up to make a difference, to make a change, to be part of something you believe in. Seize this moment to support the candidate who can shape this country to be a place for everyone.
It was the day that I was put under house arrest that I suddenly had an epiphany about our system of government. I’d been living in China for two years teaching English, and I’d just changed from teaching at a local university to teaching at an intensive English language institute. It was my second year living in China, I was conversational in the language, had made good friends, I knew where to get an incredible massage for only a dollar US and I loved my students. All was good until the night when armed police knocked on my door, politely confiscated my passport and visa and told me not to leave the house until they returned next day to escort me to the police station. Needless to say I didn’t sleep well that night.
Back in the US I’d grown up thinking critically about the way our country was governed. Reagan was the president for my late childhood/early teen years and I saw choices he made that were highly damaging (think the “trickle down” theory). There was a lot of apathy when he ran for a second term, as no one believed he could lose. As in a lot of recent elections, a huge number of people didn’t take the time to cast their votes. Sometimes this doesn’t seem like a big deal, when you think, “Oh, so and so is going to win this state anyway so it’s not really worth the effort.” But then you live in a place where people have no say in who leads them and you get police knocking on your door t ten o’clock at night and suddenly you start thinking, “You know, it’s actually pretty cool to have some say in who leads a country.”
It’s a pretty cool thing that we are awfully lucky to have. When you vote for a leader who is going to stay in office for a finite amount of time, the idea is that they have an obligation to listen to the people. Not that they always do, of course. I screamed in all the ways I could (demonstrations, petitions, emails to my Congress people, etc) that I thought the war in Iraq was unjustified and unjust. And even though there were a lot of us who screamed, we weren’t listened to. But that’s exactly the reason voting matters. Some candidates will hear the people’s concerns a little better and take the time to make decisions in a humane and rational way. That’s the kind of person you want in charge.
In an election you have a choice, and when presented with a choice, you always want to choose wisely. No leader is going to do everything your way (which is a reason to become president yourself really) but a good leader-one who makes his or her own wise choices and shares majority of your beliefs- that is a leader worth supporting. We don’t always have a candidate like that in a presidential election but this time around we’ve gotten lucky. We have the option of Barack Obama.
I respect and agree with so many of Obama’s views on things, from his stance on the war to his views on civil rights to his belief that religion in this country needs to be discussed in a more thoughtful and complex way. And he has some pretty cool ideas about the environment too. Do I agree with everything he believes? No. But I don’t agree with everything my husband believes either and I still married the guy. No one is perfect but in this election we have the option of a guy who is pretty close, at least in my opinion. And in this world that is a rare and wonderful thing.
When the police arrived to escort me to the police station the day after my house arrest, they were very gracious. They bought me a Coke while I sat around in the interrogation room’s very uncomfortable folding chairs and apologized for the condition of the bathroom (so gross there aren’t words) when I had to pee after a couple of hours. But that didn’t take away from the fact that I was being guarded, that I was scared and that I was vulnerable. There’d been a problem with my visa from the English institute and the word ‘deportation’ was being tossed around. I liked my life in China and I did not want to be deported. I certainly didn’t want to have to call my parents and tell them that their oldest child was being deported. But after a long day, another night of house arrest and another morning in the police station, my passport and visa were returned and I was free to carry on with the teaching, and the massages and everything else in my life. Which was great. For me.
But as I walked of the police station- a woman free to leave her home at any time- I found myself thinking about freedom and political voice and what it means to have even the smallest margin of say in how your country is run. I don’t like how people are deported from the US when they are seeking refuge, or when they’ve lived here for twenty years but are suddenly deemed a threat because the current government starts targeting people in a racist manner. But what’s so cool is that in this country I get to do something about that. In a lot of other places large crowds can’t gather to speak their minds, to protest, to try and make changes. Here in the US we can. In a lot of places the leader after four years is the same dictator who’s been there for the last ten years. Here, we get change and we get to vote for the candidate who we think can best impact our future.
This country is far from perfect. There are a lot of really pressing problems, economic and social, that need to be addressed. But we can be part of that change, give voice to it, cast votes to make it happen in the ways we believe it should happen. It’s a privilege and responsibility that we are very fortunate to have. So this election season I encourage you to use it! If you’re over eighteen go vote; if you’re not attend rallies, write letters, sign petitions, talk politics at lunch in the cafeteria. Get people fired up to make a difference, to make a change, to be part of something you believe in. Seize this moment to support the candidate who can shape this country to be a place for everyone.
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2 Comments
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Comment by Daphne Grab on November 1, 2008 at 7:39am - Thanks, Tamora! I remember how awful it was during those Reagan years (especially the Iran Contra horror) when people just had their heads in the sand about what a terrible leader he was. I think we are still feeling after shocks of some of the terrible choices he made too. But it is a great feeling to be banning together to be making change after the past 8 years, whose after effects I fear will also take some time to eradicate- but getting Obama into office will be a great step towards vital change!
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Comment by Tamora Pierce on October 30, 2008 at 7:02pm -
Thank you for posting this. I think I would have gone to jelly if I'd had my passport confiscated. Just reading your experience really sharpens my appreciation for being able to scream and yell, though I tried like hell in the Reagan years to foist from office the guys who didn't listen and it didn't work.
Now, though, it looks like a lot of us are finally banding together to do just that for the Bush years, and we can--we WILL. We don't have to thank them for restoring our civil rights, and leave them in office to screw up another eight years.
Thank you for shining a light on the difference.
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