The subtitle of this meeting was “Speaking Out About Our Lives: Sharing Stories, Seeking Support.” Speakers addressed serveral questions:
What is good about being a part of my group(s)?
Wynetta Devore spoke about being a mature, African-American professor. She spoke of ancestors who had once left Ghana in the holds of slave ships, commodities of the Middle Passage to be traded at the end of the voyage. She spoke of parents and aunts and uncles who were the children of sharecroppers and had been sent to rural schools for colored children, but who saw to it that their own children, Wynetta and her generation, went to college and earned undergraduate and graduate degrees, becoming teachers, social workers, lawyers, managers, and, in Wynetta’s case, a college professor. Her family represented what was good about being an African-American in a racist society that puts up all kinds of barriers. Excellence was expected from all her family members. Segregation did not stand in the way of their success. It was good to know that she was valued—she was told so by her father—and to participate in the joy of family traditions.
Ann Eppinger Port spoke about being a Jewish woman. She feels blessed that Jews have strong family and community ties. She likes the fact that the Jewish religion encourages critical thinking; this is rooted in the study of the Torah which, although seen as a divine message, contains secrets that can be discerned only through study and dialogue. Traditionally, scholars who studied the Torah were highly regarded and taken care of by others so they could devote their time to study. Education became more and more important as Jews experienced persecution and were driven from their homelands and into ghettoes. They could not take material possessions with them; the only thing they could take was the knowledge in their heads. Education continues to be important to Jews. Ann also values the Jewish emphasis on the whole person; Jews do not deny either their physical or their spiritual needs. Judaism is a humane religion, with an overriding concern for life and living people. Ann values Judaism’s belief that the individual communicates directly with God. As a Jew, she must take responsibility for her own actions; she cannot look to anyone else, past or present, to absolve her from her sins. She also appreciates Judaism’s respect for the rights of others to have their own religious beliefs. Jews believe that their religion is right for them, but they recognize that others choose to view and worship God differently. Ann feels comfortable studying other religions and their art; the more she learns, the more her knowledge helps ground her in her Jewish faith.
Kalpana Srinivas spoke about being a Hindu woman, a wife, and a mother. She was born into and brought up in a traditional Hindu home in India. Her father was a civil engineer, and her mother had an eighth-grade education. Because her father was transferred often and the family moved with him, the children were sent to boarding schools. Kalpana attended a convent school where she recited the Lord’s Prayer with her classmates. She prayed to “Our Father” and wanted to know why her mother was left out! So her parents sat her down and educated her about the Hindu religion.
Goddesses play an important part in Hinduism. Kalpana’s mother told her there is nothing she could not accomplish if she made up her mind to do so and did not let other people stop her. This, and the realization of the importance of female goddesses in the Hindu religion, provided a turning point in her life that made her realize she was in no way inferior to any man on this earth.
Bonnie Shoultz was raised as a white Protestant in a religion that never felt comfortable to her, even as a child in the Midwest. She became kind of a rebel and, because of that, has taken on identities that are not typical of people in her milieu. She spoke about three of them: (1) She has been practicing with the Zen Center since 1996 and is now a Buddhist nun; she went for 40 years with no faith tradition at all after she gave up Protestantism. (2) Both of Bonnie’s children, who are now 38 and 40 years old, have disabilities, and being a parent of a child with a disability becomes an identity. (3) In the mid 1980s, after having been married and divorced, Bonnie fell in love with a woman and self-identified as a lesbian for 15 years; then she fell in love with a man, which taught her that you cannot put yourself in boxes. That realization was very liberating.
Bonnie finds that one good thing about being a Buddhist is the wonderful sanga, or congregation, that practices together. Another is that Buddhism is a very experiential rather than a belief-oriented religion. She feels gratitude for Buddhism’s 2500-year history and for the people who kept the tradition alive all those years. She appreciates that there is an important place for women in the Buddhist tradition and that there is no discrimination against people who are not heterosexual. Being the parent of a child with a disability has made Bonnie deal with her own and others’ oppressive attitudes toward parents who have children with disabilities. It has taught her to empathize with people who suffer oppression, and it led her to a career that she loves. Moreover, in taking on an identity that is not heterosexual, she has learned how to deal with people’s narrow-minded behaviors.
Cheryl Spear is one of ten children of a stay-at-home mom who home-schooled her until she was in sixth grade. Then she and her brother integrated a white, Seventh-day Adventist boarding school in Tennessee. By the age of 14, she had really left home. Her mother told her how proud she was of the person that Cheryl had become. Cheryl became legally blind when she was in her 20s, so she took on the identity of having a disability.
Her present identity that she focused on for this presentation is that of an African-American woman with a disability. She likes that she does not see everything, that she can go from Point A to Point B without being distracted by the “in between.” It is important to Cheryl to be with other people with different disabilities as they deal with their needs. Being African-American, she knows how to put on one persona with one group and another persona with another group. She likes being able to move in the world and be a bit more herself.
Tricia Pethic is a history major at Lemoyne College and converted to Islam two and a half years ago. She told us that there are 7 million Muslims in the United States. Most are affluent, young, and well educated. The top four vocations are student, physician, engineer and homemaker. Overall, Tricia has been respected as a Muslim in America. A good thing about wearing hijab is that with people seeing you as a symbol of Islam, you try to practice what you preach!
What is difficult about being a member of my
group(s)?
What’s hard about being African-American, Wynetta said, is being invisible to colleagues, both men and women, and to service people in stores and restaurants. It is being disregarded by some African-American men and women with regard to your professional achievements. It is having a store clerk question your son’s need for a tennis racquet. It is having people at integrated events think that you are the maid. It is having people stare at groups of African-American and white people socializing with each other. It is when your son’s university classmates think that his mother could not possibly be a member of the faculty. It is the racist assumption that African-Americans can only sing, dance, and play ball, that in male sports they can throw but do not have the skills to manage. It is hearing Bill Cosby speak about urban African-American youth and family responsibility and knowing that there is too much truth in what he says because you know the women and the children.
Ann said that because Jews are taught to care for the earth, she finds it difficult to witness the exploitation of the earth and the denial of global warming by this country’s leaders. Because Jews believe in caring for the old, the young, and the infirm, it is painful to see policies by our country’s leaders that deny needed services to these populations. Judaism has taught Ann to give priority to the sanctity of people’s lives. When the choice is between an existing human being and the potential for life embodied in a mass of cells (as is the case with stem-cell research, which has the potential to cure human diseases and relieve human suffering, and with a woman’s right to choose whether or not to continue a pregnancy), Judaism’s concern is for the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual state of the living human being. Ann finds it sad that this humane philosophy is being portrayed by many of our current leaders as inherently evil.
Ann finds it upsetting when people malign Israel without looking at the good that the country has achieved. She does not appreciate being faulted for supporting this one tiny country where Jews have established a homeland. She quoted Ariel Sharon who spoke, after the rededication of the Yad Vashem Holocaust History Museum in Jerusalem, about the difference between living in one’s own country, where one is protected, and standing alone and utterly defenseless, as were the Holocaust victims who were confronted by “a beast in human form.”
Christmastime can be uncomfortable because of other people’s assumption that everyone celebrates Christmas. Sadly, there are still places in this country where Ann feels at risk to wear a Jewish religious symbol. Hatred and bigotry still exist, as reflected in the rise of neo-Nazi and other hate groups. There are still people claiming that the Jews killed Jesus, that 9/11 was a Jewish plot, that no Jews were killed in the bombing of the World Trade Center. How can she explain to her children, Ann asked, that no matter how much good they do for the world, there are people who will hate them merely because they are Jewish?
Kalpara told of how she worked in the American Embassy in Delhi, married, and immigrated to the United States. She had a daughter and was five months pregnant with her son when her husband was killed in an automobile accident. Her son was born with a handicap, and she had to decide whether to stay here or return to India. She knew that in India, she would encounter prejudice against widows and mothers of handicapped children, but she would have some family and other support there. She decided to stay in the US, however, after discovering that her parents would not allow her to live alone in India.
She said that the US has opened up its arms to her and provided support for her son. Her daughter is now in medical school. Her son is aging out of Fayetteville-Manlius High School, and the whole system is working with her to place him in a job and perhaps a program at Onondaga Community College.
Bonnie has found that although she sometimes has to explain her shaved head, it is not really that difficult to do so. What is difficult is people who speak or act out of their ignorance. Having a child with a disability was very painful at first, with people giving her strange looks and making comments. Particularly painful were comments by teachers. However, because of her children’s disabilities, Bonnie has met some wonderful people who are now friends. The most difficult problem regarding her sexual orientation, Bonnie said, is always having to think about whether or not to come out. She has to assess each situation to decide if it is safe to come out, and if it is not safe she has to decide whether or not to come out anyway. If it is a situation that she will be in frequently, Bonnie said, it is better to come out because people are going to make comments that they will feel badly about later when they learn of her identity. A particularly difficult time was when her daughter was a member of a very fundamentalist Christian religion. Her daughter had just had a child when Bonnie fell in love with a woman, and Bonnie feared that her daughter might keep Bonnie away from her grandchild. After about a year, Bonnie told her daughter about the relationship. Her daughter’s fundamentalist friends told Bonnie’s daughter that Bonnie would go to hell. Knowing Bonnie as she did, her daughter decided to leave the fundamentalist church, so telling her became a blessing. Telling everyone close to her has been a blessing, Bonnie said, although she has felt a lot of anxiety ahead of time.
Cheryl said that when she cannot get something she needs, it is difficult for her to know what she is being punished for. Is it because of her disability? Or because she’s a woman? Or because she is African-American? “Not knowing” makes it hard for her to work out ways to negotiate a situation. This has happened most often in universities where she has studied, including here in Syracuse. In her African-American studies classes, she is not sure if she is being dismissed because she is a woman or because she is disabled. African-American studies do not deal with disabilities, nor do disability groups talk about race or gender.
Tricia is looking forward to going to Egypt in the fall, perhaps because she will fit in as a Muslim and not be the exception to the rule. Before starting to wear the headscarf, Tricia would hear anti-Muslim remarks and jokes that she found painful. She has learned to gather strength to overcome such ignorance, and she takes heart from a saying of Muhammad: “Muslims are like the date palm. People throw stones at it, and it yields fruit.” There have been painful times with her family, although Tricia realizes that these have occurred because of their concern for her. She also finds it difficult to be regarded, at times, by non-Muslims as an “expert” on Islam and the whole Middle East!
What do you never want to hear again? What do you
want from your allies?
Wynetta wants her allies to trust her when she tells her story and to speak out against racism and sexism. She wants them to ask real questions and be aware that stereotyping and oppression exist. She wants them to be aware of the health hazards that African-Americans face, to read African-American authors, to be aware of scholars such as Cornel West and Henry Louis Gates, theologian James Forbes, and playwright Suzan-Lori Parks. She also wants us to know that in her home she serves neither soul food nor cheap wine!
Ann said it would be wonderful to not hear any more anti-Semitic comments; for example that Jews are parasites, or control Wall Street and the media, or killed Jesus, or are rich. None of these statements is true. And no more “you people” comments! She would like us to wish her a “happy holiday,” and she welcomes questions about her religion. She would like us to respect her support for Israel; her support does not mean she is in favor of everything that Israel does, just as she is not in favor of everything the US does. She would like to see more groups like WTB. She believes that our ultimate truths do not have to be the same.
Kalpana, likewise, does not want to hear the “you-people thing.” She does not want to hear ignorant comments, such as when the people at the Social Security office assumed she did not know English or when a guest of her sister commented that the Indian food looked like dog food. She does not want to hear people exclaim “What?” when they hear her name.
Bonnie wants people to say, in a respectful way, that they are really interested in hearing about Buddhism or disabilities or bisexuality.
Cheryl has concerns over language issues. Words that she never wants to hear again are minority, which to her implies subordination, and the color-terms dark and black, because the darkest cultures are always treated the worst. Also on her list are cripple and retarded.
Tricia too welcomes questions asked with respect.