We have another in a growing list of laments that somehow the fact that Michelle Obama will not be working for someone else and will be free to fill her time with the activities of her choosing is somehow a great tragedy and a setback for women. This time its Rebecca Traister in The National Post in an article called “Not Such a Long Way Baby”
Americans may be ready for a black president, but not, apparently, for a career-minded First Lady averse to the traditional domesticity of her role…In all the worrying about how Sasha and Malia will adjust to having their lives turned upside down, in all the fretting about how Barack Obama will move his Chicagostyle shop to Washington, why is there so little curiosity about how Michelle will adjust to the loss of her own private, very successful, very high-profile and very independent identity? How will Michelle Obama feel as she becomes what she has long resisted — an extension of her husband? The National Post
Can somebody show me a survey of Americans to support this statement about Americans rejecting the idea of “career-minded” women? Didn’t Lynne Chaney keep her job for the past four years and write a couple of books as well? Weren’t there concerns during the campaign about the role Todd Palin played in Alaska government?
Now during the campaign, I was annoyed with the “Michelle Obama Needs a Makeover” meme that the New York Times pushed tirelessly. I didn’t see anything wrong with her that needed to be made over. All of that “First Mom” business got started to combat the “She’s too STRONG” meme. I reject them both. I reject the notion that MOMs are somehow weak and powerless. HA! You haven’t met my Mama.
Second, I reject the notion that accomplished women are inherently “STRONG” ( good or bad). I know plenty of accomplished, “driven” people who are miserable and crazy. I think both sides of this Mom vs Career argumant are equally annoying because they assume that each is mutually exclusive and one is inferior to the other. It assumes that Michelle’s brain will suddenly stop functioning and she will place all of her talents in a box and hide them away for four or eight years.
Where is it written that once you have a law degree that the only permissible role you have to play in the world is working for somebody else? Where is it written that if you choose a different role for yourself that you are somehow throwing away your professional achievements and accomplishments? Where is it written that the only “career” you can have is working long hours for somebody else? Where is it written that Michelle couldn’t continue her life’s work by crafting an East Wing operation that helps her focus on the same issues or passions she focussed on during her career at the University of Chicago.
Believe me, you don’t become any less accomplished when you choose another path. In fact, its really difficult to bury those accomplishments and talents. They tend to crop up, even when you try to suppress them. You just transfer them from one area to the next. Michelle Obama’s IQ isn’t going to suddenly drop because she is no longer working for the University of Chicago.
Posted by Gina
20 Comments, Comment or Ping
SweetT
Can you hear me over here snapping? Because I’m in total agreement with this post. This situation has totally driven home the point that it is impossible to please (wo)men. Nothing Michelle does will ever be good enough for some people. Can she just live, breath, EXIST without people measuring her every movement w/their personal barometers for what is acceptable or “progressive” behavior? I guess she’s going to pass Kat Williams’ “Hater Quota” by a few thousand by the end of this year…
Nov 13th, 2008
rikyrah
Sigh…
I’ll repeat myself….
Michelle Obama is going to be The First Lady.
The first Black First Lady.
You don’t think that’s going to be a job unto itself?
That THAT could take up all her time?
In addition to that..she has 2 small children that she’s got to fight and keep on ‘this side of normal’
And, guess what - I think she and the President-elect, have a REAL MARRIAGE, and while the rest of the world descends upon him, she’s got to help him have a pocket of sanity.
From where I sit - Michelle Obama will be busy from sunup to sundown for the next 4 years.
Nov 13th, 2008
Alsace
I love this post. It is an excellent example of the ways in which black feminism is often more subtle and nuanced than mainstream (white) feminism. Perhaps this is because black women were the first post-modernists. We’ve always had to have it all. When were we able to NOT work? You learn a lot after 350 years of “juggling.”
Your post echoed my thoughts. The position of First Lady is just another career for Michele Obama. She can now spotlight and advance issues on which she had only minimal impact before achieving her new status. She can be more independent and creative, more her own boss than she was before.
Nov 13th, 2008
admin
We’ve always had to have it all. When were we able to NOT work? You learn a lot after 350 years of “juggling.”
Ain’t that the truth. I guess there is a racial component. We never had an either/or option so one isn’t superior or inferior to the other.
Nov 13th, 2008
Msfirstlady
I celebrate this post because it confirms that what we accomplish in our lives is not be dictated to us but through us. Meaning, her accomplishments are just what they are, ACCOMPLISHMENTS. She is forever evolving. Forever padding her resume. Heck, she’ll be one of the best multi-taskers ever. Her intellect will keep her motivated, and her passion for her family will keep her sane.
I’m not worried at all about the notion of women losing ground when they “break” from their careers.
I’m pretty darn intelligent and able to do alot vocationally but my purpose and passion is for my family. As soon as my husband tells me that we can make it on one income, I’ll leave my job at the drop of a dime. Now that won’t cause my mind to deteriorate. It will actually give me more freedom to focus and make a difference on what really matters to me.
Nov 14th, 2008
SMH
Please explain to me how Michelle is going to lose her identity by doing what matters to her. She is an individual with a family - a loving, husband who respects and cherishes her as an equal and an individual and child who are well adjusted, loved and cared for and she is intelligent with a bright, lively mind and spirit. None of that is going to change even as her live changes.
Successful high-profile individuals know how to adapt and know when and where to make the necessary changes and are comfortable with shifting roles to do what matters to them. Shifting into Mom mode to care for the children and work with her partner does not mean she loses her identity. She is smart enough to know that it is not an either or proposition and that despite the way these insecure pundits like to think - why because she is her own person and secure enough within herself with who she is, what she wants, what matters to her. Like her husband she is guided by her own internal compass and instinctively does what in her assessment is best for her situation and circumstance taking in to account what matters most to her.
She has made it clear that what matters most to her is the well being of those she loves and that includes her own well being. She takes care of herself so she can take care of her loved ones.
These pundits need to get a life and stop projecting their own insecurities and fears onto those around them. Being an independent individual is not position dependent all that stuff is external. Independence is about self determination and self respecting choices. Being and individual is about living your individual truth based on what matters most to you. It means shifting and adapting as needed to manage and maintain the balance that works.
These insecure, selfish, self serving, whiny pundits, who are never satisfied, claim to want her to have choices and be respected. However they do not respect the choices she makes because they are not the choices they would make in that situation. Respect the woman - respect the choices she is making - whether you agree or disagree.
Nov 14th, 2008
DaisyDeadhead
Has Laura Bush been White House librarian for 8 years? And nobody expected her to be! Why this different standard for Michelle?
What Rikyrah and Alsace said; this is a “big job” all by itself, she gets her own chief of staff!
And maybe, like a certain other First Lady, she will run for office later in her life, also.
We certainly need her!
Nov 14th, 2008
KatJ
Michelle is doing what she feels is best for her daughters. This will be a time where her availability to them and her husband will be her priority. Living her life is her career. She has the authority to make executive decisions and choices which she feels is best for her. She is intelligent and focused enough to be successful in her role as mommy and wife and still have outside interest that may not be as demanding as a full-time job in someone else’s company. But as First Lady she will do a great service if she continues her work with the military wives and families support organizations. I also hope she is offered to give her input on some policy changes that affect military families as well as early childhood and middle-school education issues for all children. I believe she is being patient for her time to come without being too headstrong. Michelle represents such a vast majority of women and issues of the modern woman, lets embrace her and let her know we love and support her.
Nov 14th, 2008
Diana
Michelle Obama is just as qualified now as she was when President-elect Obama started running for office. The education and knowledge that Mrs. Obama has acquired can never be taken away from her. Why are we having this conversation. Did anyone question Laura Bush giving up her teaching career or Hillary Clinton when she gave up her law career to be first lady? And please not referring to Mrs. Obama as the first black first lady, she is a human being, a female, a wife and a mother. Why should it make any difference if she what ethnicity she is, she is now our new first lady, a very qualified, intelligent, humble, dignified first lady. Will everybody please just give her the honor and respect she deserves.
Nov 14th, 2008
Diana
Michelle Obama is just as qualified now as she was when President-elect Obama started running for office. The education and knowledge that Mrs. Obama has acquired can never be taken away from her. Why are we having this conversation. Did anyone question Laura Bush giving up her teaching career or Hillary Clinton when she gave up her law career to be first lady? And please not referring to Mrs. Obama as the first black first lady, she is a human being, a female, a wife and a mother. Why should it make any difference what ethnicity she is, she is now our new first lady, a very qualified, intelligent, humble, dignified first lady. Will everybody please just give her the honor and respect she deserves.
Nov 14th, 2008
MaryB NSB
It’s just a “temp job” for a few years. Let her enjoy it.
She’ll get some unusual experience, get to enjoy her daughters, help her husband and be an even more valuable employee because of it all.
I wish her all the best.
Nov 14th, 2008
Nitalia
Michelle’s greatest achievement is paving the road for her husband to be the most powerful man in America and maybe even the world. If she doesn’t do anything else, she has done enough and believe me she will benefit well from it! He gets to do all the work-she get’s to bask in the glory! How is that for being strong and independent!
Nov 14th, 2008
Odessa
I believe Michelle will do her job as wife, mother and then first lady and in that order. She has a loving husband who adores her, two beautiful babies that still need her and she will give her all to them and still come out on top. I know she will keep her mind occupied with the things that matter to her most and she is WOMAN, hear her roar. I am so proud of her and all of her accomplishments and people need to stop hating, that’s all this is.What a beautiful vision it will be to see a face of color in the white house. I say You go Girl and let’s all support her and President-elect Barack.
Nov 14th, 2008
Lynne
Rebecca Traister can kick rocks….take that bra-burning bullshit down to the lake, tie a boulder around it and LET IT GO!!
Nov 14th, 2008
Dana
I think Michelle’s first priority is making sure the media doesn’t drive her children crazy.
Nov 15th, 2008
Dee
Rikyrah and Alsace, I can add nothing more to your comments save a hearty “here, here!”
Nov 15th, 2008
Elizabeth
Mrs. Obama will be a wonderful First Lady. She has given birth to two children, and for women all over the world, we know if we choose to do it, our first priority is our children. She has an exemplary education and an established career which will not suffer. She will represent our country and women well. Someday it will be a Michelle in the White House, but that day has not come. In the meantime, Mrs. Obama will do an enormous of good for all of us just by being who she is. I think both Red and Blue States alike will like what this woman brings to us.
Nov 16th, 2008
Jean Ellingen
A woman who is smart and capable rises to any new challenge she faces as she moves along in her life.
Michelle Obama is the epitome of those qualities. Everything she has done so far in her professional life has prepared her well for the tasks and jobs she will take on as First Lady of the Unites States of America.
She will be remembered in history for being many things, a great mom, a wonderful wife, her professional accomplishments and being an incredible First Lady.
The fact that she isn’t being paid for this role in no way diminishes what she has already acheived.
As a woman, I look forward to having her in the White House and I can’t wait to see the global impact she will have.
What could be greater than that?
Nov 17th, 2008
Tariq Mahmood
I feel Michelle Obama will bring about as great a change as her president husband Barack would. Michelle before becoming the first (black) lady has lived a near perfect life as wife and mother. There is no reason she would be able to carry on a balanced existence.
Nov 19th, 2008
Moderate01
No, Rebecca Traister is right that there is something wrong with how the first lady is assumed to be the perfect housewife and feminine foil to the masculine president. However, nothing says that Obama must blindly conform to the stereotype. Hopefully, Michelle Obama will challenge these stereotypes while she is First Lady
Nov 23rd, 2008
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