#unpackit

She was always who she needed to be. Even when she felt lost and alone. Even on the days she knew she had not been her best.

Sitting with herself, she was whole. Being with those she loved, she was amplified.

You never know what you can do until you try. Never know who you can be until you focus on your inner truth.

No one is born being able to do anything but breathe and the rest we have to learn. The fastest runner in the world once only knew how to crawl and stumbled on their first steps.

She was born with a fire inside her A passion A warmth

She had been burned before Her fire grew

They had tried to freeze her out Her fire kept her safe

She had been here before. The chill. The darkness. The place in someone else’s shadow.

She had been there before. In the warmth. The light. The place in the spotlight.

She had learned to appreciate the time in the shade. Learned to let other people be the center. She had seen the darkness the shadow could bring out. The envy. The gossip. The pain.

She breathed it all in. Took her moment on the bench. Then remembered she did not need the spotlight. She had her own light within. Once she let go of all her armor, her light began to glow again. Illuminating all who chose to be near it. Only leaving darkness for those who turn their backs. Those who chose to look into their own darkness. Their own shadow.

We all have our light, if we choose to shine it.

The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was written in 1923, two years after the suffragist fight for voting rights was finally won by the passing of the 19th Amendment. It has since been ratified by 35states, just three states short of the threshold for putting it in theconstitution. The fact that we live under a constitution that fails to provide fundamental equality for all citizens no matter their presumed, implied, or affirmed sex is unjust. The injustice of it is directly related to laws that govern women’s bodies, that center on shaming and blaming victims of sexual violence, that simply do not allow for the same rules to apply to woman in the justice system as they do for men. For Patricia Arquette to use the Oscars as a platform to be a strong loud voice in support of the ERA is, in my opinion, a beautiful and brave choice. What is even more important though is what she actually said.  

I steered clear of the Oscars on Sunday but I was taken by the social media buzz about her words. In her acceptance speech, she stated, “To every woman who gave birth, to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else’s equal rights. It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all and equal rights for women in the United States of America,” hear, hear right? I was listless. I puzzled. I wondered if I was hearing her right. That taxpayers, birth mothers, and citizens of the United States have been fighting for “everybody else’s" equal rights and it’s time now for “them” to have the attention. Her language reminded me of speeches of white suffragists arguing that if the Negro has the right to vote then so should we. The same rhetoric of “we” in which White Suffragists who were abolitionists felt entitled to the support of people of color because they fought to end slavery.

Just in case I was completely taking her words out of context from the acceptance speech, when she was backstage with the press she shared, “It's time for all women in America and all men that love women, and all the gay people, and all the people of color, that we've all fought for, to fight for us now," which to unpack this by deduction of “us” and “we’ve” what she is leaving to fight for is white heterosexual woman. The yuckiest stomach churning acidic piece for my feminist belief system to chew on is that this, I am certain well-meaning belief on her part, hurts the woman’s movement. It hurts the movement because it denies the reality of Intersectionality, of Interlocking Oppression, of Racism. It reinforces a sense of entitlement among whites and furthers the misnomer that Feminism is an exclusive rather than inclusive movement. Not that I heard any affirmation of feminism in her comments. Which I argue to do so could marginalize her from the “us” she is so passionately fighting for.