Good morning,
Another week filled with interviews and dialogue. One thing someone said to me that I can’t stop thinking about is that you don’t have to become something you’re not to fight racism. It’s an inside job. You have to reveal what’s already inside of you.
It made me think about how impossible it is to evaluate American history without looking at religion and the role that it plays in the details of people’s lives. After all, much of what we think is inside of us comes from the stories we believe about why we are here at all.
It seems like fear and hate are to the individual what religion is to the system. I don’t think the individual or the system can be changed without looking carefully at both.
To that end, had a little bit of time on Sunday night to continue research on care work, and after watching an episode of Mrs. America, I found myself deep in the archives of of the Phyllis Schlafly Report. Here is the 1972 issue on why the Equal Rights Amendment is an attack on conservative American women’s privilege (i.e. the right not to work and enjoy social protections required of men who are providers). The basis of these rights, she argues, are the roles women have been given by God, not “the establishment” that liberals are trying to take down.
As I think I’ve mentioned before, I’ve been following communities of women who practice Christian homemaking in 2020 (moms who document all their care work on Instagram, women who have created online businesses to support homemaking, etc). Interestingly, so far I’ve noticed that the labeling around homemaking seems to be predominantly used by white women while South Asian and other moms of color who do the same thing, label themselves as bloggers and influencers (which brings up so many questions about what we are and aren’t willing to call care work). Considering the disparities between women’s rights to property and household assets between the global south and the global north, reading the Schlafly report makes a weirdly effective argument to convince people to hold onto their privilege.
One of Schlafly’s other arguments against the ERA is that if women are expected to work outside the home, they’ll end up with two jobs and not be able to do 100% at either one, which, nearly 50 years later, is an issue that has sparked many media projects, like The Double Shift podcast.
Anyway, it’s really difficult to understand America.
I recommend choosing a lens you’re not used to and going deep with it, not forgetting about the role religion plays in every evaluation we make of people’s behavior. If anyone has suggested resources on this, would love them.
Will leave it there for today.
Hope everyone keeps at whatever action they’ve chosen to take this week.
Jihii