Michelle Obama Watch

I love this blog, and its purpose, and that, yes, we WILL defend Michelle Obama. Period.

We must protect Michelle with our actions, prayers and thoughts. White feminists are different from black women feminists (oxymoronic) in that they are still white and are not used to taking the back-seat to the awesome power of black womanhood.

They want us to denounce and emasculate our men in the name of womanhood; and for black women that has never been our goal; our goal has always been to be treated and respected as equals and to have balance within the family. We have always loved and needed our men.

Admin,

how about all those folks, in the waning weeks of Hillary’s campaign, were on tv 24/7 talking about the sexism against Hillary. I know I didn’t imagine all those folks, and reading their columns in the newspaper. How about we begin with them?

Their silence is deafening.

I comfortable with the feminist label. However, I don’t identify myself as someone who is connected to the feminist movement because I know I’d have to check my race at the door.

I’m a black woman who is discriminated not only because of my gender but because of my race. This poses a unique challenge for me. So, not only do I hit the glass ceiling at work, I also get followed around when I’m in stores and harassed by the police significantly more than my white sisters. Oh, I still make significantly less than men and white women.

Feminist who don’t defend Michelle are only doing what we as a society have been indoctrinated to do. NOTHING! Black women are ‘throw aways’. We don’t matter. Black culture today underlines this message. Our music, movies, literature, echo this sentiment. Until we can change others, we’ve got to change community.

Well thanks for clarifying everyone.

@Ken, what exactly is a Vampire Feminist? OH GAWD!

Joi I don’t understand how you except the label, but forsake the movement. I guess that is my confusion. the word has to mean something or it means nothing at all.

Vicki,

You are on point, and tell the truth. Have to co-sign to everything you wrote.

Admin,
So what you are saying is that women in general should not expect one anothers support simply because we are women? Why not? As I see it that is the problem. We are so busy cutting each other down, White vs. Black, poor vs. rich, educated vs.uneducated, we don’t look at the bigger picture. The world is full of WOMEN who have been beaten, raped, abused, defeated, scorned, belittled and it’s pretty much across the board, the abuse, doesn’t make much difference what color your skin is.

Cmon folks. Michelle has some issues. She’s said some pretty inappropriate public things about Hillary and Bill: you can’t say “well they said nasty things too” (which is true) but let’s not name her princess of the year. She’s stepped in it more than once in other ways. And then, not everyone wants to worship at the altar of Barack. I will vote for Obama, but he isn’t the savior she keeps saying he is. He’s pretty sexist I think. I get tired of him sending his wife to talk to women. It’s obnoxious and irritating. Where is he? It’s really annoying to hear her talk about him, even as she has done most of the work rearing the children while he pursued his dreams; when he can’t put his socks in the hamper and didn’t even believe in marriage when they met. And his sermons to black folk about babies: I guess he and Michelle “waited” until they were married right? Don’t think so. He sounds pretty typically chauvenistic and male to me. And Michelle is one of countless women who look beyond the chauvenism of their husbands and sons, while decrying it from others. Michelle wanted marriage and children so much …. Ok. Her choice. Barack didn’t sacrifice much it seems. The goal of feminism should be to allow women to make choices; Michelle made hers and I respect that, but she is no role model to me for doing it. When I hear her decry the “guilt” working moms (as she calls them) face, I ask why her husband isn’t doing more to assuage that guilt. He is pursuing his life and she is falling into place even as she pretends to be oh so strong. In fact, women like her make it very difficult for women in the workplace because they make their men feel like they really don’t have a sexism problem. The only thing I celebrate her for socially is being a great parent – even if she’s had to do so much of it on her own. That’s a contribution and I hope her kids know who was really there when they are older. I don’t celebrate her for standing behiind her man. That’s in her best interest and has no content really. I put as much credence in what she says as I do in another political wife, Laura Bush. The black women who are running behind her and yelling that she’s their role model better wake up and smell the coffee. The Barack Obamas of the world will take advantage of sexism against you to make their careers fly. Happens every day of the week.

Bea, my own view here is that Mrs. Obama like all of us on this beautiful planet of ours is not perfect. Who among us does not have “issues”? I’ve no doubt that she has said some things in public that she might have rephrased on another day, as have any number of people in the public eye and many of those of us who are not….myself included among the latter!!

(As an aside, I am my own role model, and will deify and idolise no one. Never have and never shall, so I’m not looking at her or anyone else through any rose tinted specs. That’s just not going to happen.)

Mrs Obama has of her own free will made the choices she has made to support her husband in his endeavour and he freely recognises her worth and value to him; how much he is proud of, loves and appreciates her (how refreshing to see a husband in the public eye laud and applaud his wife so openly). If she chooses to stand beside/behind her busband in support of him I have no difficulties with that, whatsoever.

Mrs. Obama has achieved – and is achieving – in her own right and it’s interesting to see media this side of the Atlantic finally paying attention to her story and achievements as well as Barack’s. Yes, she’s the one holding it down on the home front as are any number of political wives and mothers many of whom I have no doubt are probably the intellectual equals if not superiors of their spouses. I recognise her for her achievements both within and outside of the home.

Hello there, Bea, I appreciate your thoughtful response; it’s good food for thought!

(I’m not sure why I’ve come up as Anonymous as I can clearly see where I’ve input my name. Anyway, no matter….)

Ah, it might be a good idea to leave perfectionism to the Angels; anyone expecting it of humans is bound to end up sorely disappointed! I do agree that not every criticism levelled at Mrs. Obama or any other black woman necessarily has anything to do with racism and/or sexism. It can just occur, simply because it does and it may well be constructive and useful even if the initial taste of it isn’t exactly sweet.

I garnered my initial views of Mr. Obama’s opinion of his wife from “Audacity”. For a man that has had charges of sexism levelled at him, it certainly raised my eyebrows that he would openly and proudly state that she was twice as intelligent as he was and that if she ran against him for public office “she would beat me without much difficulty”. That was my first introduction to Michelle, and I’ve been watching her ever since. For a supposedly sexist man he has proven to be consistently good at giving his wife her due…and rightly so! She deserves it; without her he simply would not be where he is, today. Of that I have not a shadow of doubt….and Barack knows that, too.

I do understand where you’re coming from, Bea, regarding the Ludacris crew. I’m glad that Barack put it out there that he didn’t appreciate Ludacris’s recent attempt to lift him up in song whilst denigrating others at the same time. It’s not helpful, it’s depressing and as unwarranted as it is unnecessary.

I too wish that we had more positivity towards and respect for women from men who seem to associate male success with doing women down. You know, I remember reading a while back a quote attributed to John Singleton in which he said that a lot of male negativity towards women wasn’t actually about women at all, but about men’s own low opinion of themselves and belief that women were in fact superior. The men’s negativity was their (feeble, I know..) attempt at salvaging some male pride. That surprised me, that little piece of insight, and it would be interesting to see whether you have any thoughts on how men might better support and uplift women (and vice versa, too, of course) without feeling that such behaviour reflects poorly on their masculinity.

Frankly, I’d be hard pressed to name any politician that I find “refreshing on women” or “non depressing” on gender….and a whole range of other issues to boot! However, being the “positive realist” that I am, and knowing that life is biased in favour of evolution, a part of me chooses to believe that as part of a turnaround in wider society over time we will see increased recognition of and respect for women and our many wonderful contributions to the world.

I’m delighted to read that you know of lots of black men who celebrate their wives and the women in their family, publicly. This will come as news to many! The advantage of having Barack do this is that he has a far bigger stage than most of those men will ever have! It will be noted, studied, remarked on and give many pause for thought to consider their own thinking about and treatment of the women in their lives be that personally, in a work setting or otherwise. This to me is a very, very good thing.

Kudos to you, too, for asking for more. I too believe that life has the best it can possibly bring lined up waiting for me, so there is no settling for second best here, either! However, for me there is no similarity between Mrs. Clinton and Mrs. Obama, not at all, with respect to their men. One clearly loves and is in love with his wife, and recognises her value in his life whilst the other ended up overshadowing his wife’s recent campaign efforts with behaviour and talk that was not uplifting of and supportive towards her. That was a shame and it didn’t have to be that way.

Sorry, but Mr. Obama did not describe and therefore did not insult anyone by calling them ” poor, gun toting, bible reading” folks who have the added misfortune of being “ignorant” to boot! There was therefore nothing for him to apologise for. Since there’s little that he or anyone else can do to police people’s thoughts and actions, the best thing to do is leave any “whitey haters” to their own devices!

One thought that has come to me is that those of us watching Barack and Michelle’s lives have been given – through the media – a small porthole through which we can view what we believe we know about their lives. Really, we can dissect to the nth degree the support that we think he may or may not have given his wife, the way that she has apparently “compromised” her life by choosing at this particular moment in time to stand behind/beside him, but really we know next to nothing. We are not, and never will be privy to the intricacies, and subtleties and nuanced details that have gone into forging a partnership that from what I can see works more than a little well and is a source of great happiness for them both and their impressionable young daughters.

Of course, Michelle’s sacrifice to Barack’s dream is tremendous. It is huge. I also believe that she has made the sacrifice because she is able to see that it has the potential to bear fruit that she, her daughters, her husband and the wider world might also taste.

Michelle will have her turn in the spotlight, again, and in her own right, of that there is no doubt from my side, and I cannot wait to see her “take off”, again.