The topic below was orignally posted in my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal.
Just prior to Election Day I did a post about my volunteer activism entitled, “Turning On the Janes and Phone Banking.” I described my experience talking to a struggling single mother from Cuyahoga County, Ohio I called “Jane.” Jane didn’t want to vote due to frustration and cynicism. During our conversation Jane told me,
“I’m not waiting online all day like last time. Screwed up my whole day and my vote for Kerry didn’t count anyway. It was stolen.”
For good measure Jane added that I was,
“Wasting my time with these calls. It’s fixed and the politicians never care about people like me.”
As I wrote at the time,
“Jane is a single woman raising two kids and a nurse. She’s living paycheck to paycheck and struggling to be a good mother. Her children are twelve and nine years of age. Jane’s job does not allow her to be home for her kids after school. She’s frustrated about not being able to attentively supervise their study habits and be more involved in their school. `I’d like to at least meet their teachers.’ Everything from groceries, clothing, utilities and the phone bill is a hassle. She has no time and money is very tight.”
Jane was also personally impacted by the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. One younger brother died in Afghanistan in 2003 and the other was killed in Iraq in 2004 when he was forced to endure another tour of duty. The one in Afghanistan signed up shortly after 9/11 even though he had a football scholarship. Her other brother enlisted in the National Guard prior to 9/11 and had no choice about going to Iraq. As Jane put it to me,
“My brother in Afghanistan might be alive but they don’t get enough support because of Iraq. My brother in Iraq was supposed to come home.”
We talked for forty minutes and I convinced her to vote after devoted listening and intense persuasion. It was an exhausting conversation and I was proud of myself for not giving up. I received an email from Jane today and she gave me permission to publish it as long as I continued referring to her as Jane.
“Robert,
I meant to keep in touch but I’m just too busy. I’m still going to mail that music demo like I promised. I haven’t forgotten about you. You’re so idealistic and you tried so hard to get me to vote. Well I did vote. But Robert, I have to ask? What are these people I voted for doing? Why is the Senate having a debate about having a debate about stuff that won’t make any difference? My neighbor’s son just died in Iraq. All the hurt about my brothers came rushing back when I heard. Who the hell is Joe Biden and that Warner guy? Why bother voting on something that won’t make Bush end the war? What are they doing? I don’t get it. I know you believe in this stuff but all these politicians talk like my first husband. Can’t trust any of them.”
I share Jane’s frustration after watching this week’s spectacle in the Senate. I know Democrats are feeling their oats these days but they better not lose voters like Jane.
sending your diary to Senator Bond and then I realized: He is happy the Janes are turned off. He doesn’t care about his constituency (or rather he doesn’t care about the voters). He only cares about what will keep him in office. If keeping his mouth shut about all the horrors in Iraq – physical and fiscal – keeps him in office then he is your rubber stamp boy toy. If pandering to some delusional cultish group keeps him in office then he is a born again just like dubya. There is no real substance left to Bond. He has sold his soul, if not to the devil, then to power.
They will not only lose the Janes, but create more of them.
A lot of idealistic people got involved in politics that past few years. That was a great thing, but the idealists learned a lot about the realities of the process and did not like what they saw. If these people don’t see some real action they will drop out or turn to third parties.
Wish you had encouraged Jane to get involved in grass roots organizing on issues instead. Its the grass roots movements that have induced real change in this country, not electoral politics. Give honor to her cynicism and doubts. There’s a real basis for them.
with that stuff some. But this is very busy person and it was damn hard just winning her trust and getting her to vote. But you’re right, that is something to be followed up on.
As ‘Jane’ is a single parent with 2 children and a full-time job who is struggling to survive, I can’t imagine where she would be able to find the extra time to give to that.
I’m a single bachelor with a full time job and I struggle to find the time for blogging/activism. I can’t imagine how she might but then again, those are the people you want involved if you can get them.
I read this a couple times before it really hit me how cogent it was. I often talk about the “guy at the 7/11.” That was a truth test we used to use. I was once in a position where I had to run election campaigns, and asking ourselves how we would justify what we were doing to “the guy at the 7/11” was really important. Whether it’s your Jane or my donut and coffee guy, the challenge is the same.
Do the Janes read the blogs? Well, truth be told, more and more do. We need to think about our language, our shorthand, our appeal. Lurkers can become advocates if we welcome them into our dialogue. But (not necessarily on this site) I’ve seen a lot of elitism: “We don’t need anyone else.”
Yes, we do!
is while our netroots movement is gaining strength the Janes and your donut guy at 7/11 don’t read blogs. They don’t have the time, or inclination to learn about them. And when we do reach them with our activism the politicians let them down as they have this week. That’s the real frustration. You blog and do all sorts of things and then nothing changes.
More and more are getting news on the Net. But (I can show you from research) the over-abundance of sources causes people to gravitate to sites and personalities that they already know, reconfirming their initial prejudices rather than causing any dissonance.
It takes some “missionary zeal” to get people to read outside their comfort zone. That means occasionally popping a link or (oh,my) printing some hard copy. “Did you know?”
It’s also important to make sure that our diaries are interesting and attractive, not always total rants! Ultimately, we aren’t here just to re-affirm one another’s instincts, but to change something for the better.
Good way of putting it:
Good words to live by. I sometimes get frustrated and wonder, “am I really making a difference?” But you never know who might be reading your point of view.
My daughter is one of the thirty-something Janes who loathes the Republicans and feels betrayed by the Democrats.
She grew up accompanying me on “Take Back the Night” marches, stuffed envelopes for universal healthcare AND childcare, funding for shelters, the ERA, comparable worth, etc. She remembers a time when women pressured men to take responsibility for rape by challenging their male friends and relatives when they treated women like objects and property. She remembers serious discussions about violent, unloving, demeaning pornography and its relationship to free speech. All of these concerns are now considered radical.
In fact, any issue that benefits primarily women is taboo among “centrist” Democrats.
The Janes will get on board when Democrats speak to them about the things that make women’s lives harder than men’s. We all suffer the erosion of our civil liberties, the plundering of the middle class and poor, the horrors of this imperialistic war, the enmity of our former friends and allies, the broken healthcare system, and corporate class warfare, but women have added burdens.
Universal healthcare is only half a loaf if any woman anywhere can’t walk into her local hospital and get an abortion as easily as a tonsillectomy.
Child support must be automatically deducted from the non-custodial parent’s paycheck and deposited into the caregiver’s account. We can do it with taxes, and if we REALLY cared about the welfare of children, we’d do it with child support.
Women will always carry a disproportionate load until every neighborhood has a government supported daycare center. The inequality which flows from this extra burden affects every aspect of women’s lives. It makes it harder to leave men who treat us badly. It makes it harder to say no to sex we don’t want. It makes it harder to quit that dead end job.
Some of us have become cynical enough to believe that the reason our issues are not addressed is that too many men, in their heart of hearts, are quite happy with our subordination. It is unfortunate that this appears to be as true of men on the left as men on the right. If Democrats want the Janes to hear them, they’ll have to risk alienating the Good Old Boys.
A bouquet of 4s to you!!!! Thank you.
Having read YOUR posts for a long time now, I value your bouquet all the more. Thank you.
as the diarist behind this thread, may I suggest this would make a fine diary itself? I hope you post it in diary form. It will definitely be recommended by me.